Santa Claus doesn’t exist. There are very few seven year olds reading this so I think I’m safe saying that. There comes a time in every western kid’s life when they must come to terms with this fact.
Russian kids too. They know him as ‘Ded Moroz,’ literally ‘Grandfather Frost,’ a generous gift-giver who appears similar to Santa, although he sometimes wears blue, carries a staff and travels in a three-horse sleigh.
Father Christmas of English tradition, originally distinct from St Nicholas, is a personification of Christmas itself. He wore green with holly and ivy and later became red (although not because he was co-opted by a certain global brand). Eventually he merged with the Dutch ‘Sinterklaas’ (St Nicholas) when Dutch settlers brought him to the new world, hence known in the west as ‘Santa Claus.’
All of these owe their appearances to earlier pagan roots, namely Jólnir, ‘Master of Yule,’one of Odin’s many names, who would also reward the good, punish the wicked and descend through smoke holes to deliver gifts. As well as the Green Man, forest spirit and Joulupukki or Yule Goat, the Finnish, Capricornian giver of gifts.
While there isn’t a single literal ‘Santa Claus,’ what he represents and what inspires his many manifestations is most certainly real. Joy, seasonal magic and unconditional giving; initiative, abundance and the force of human-driven production during natural scarcity. Winter is when you discover whether your foresight and integrity during favourable times were adequate for carrying you and your loved ones through the dark. All of these figures are ways of getting at these deeper realities which humans have the capacity to know and integrate.
Enchantment takes many forms. Not only Santa Claus, but all archetypes take up appearances. Whether searching for the perfect leader, hero, lover, partner, mother, father, teacher, friend. No one can meet any of those roles archetypally. But indeed what makes them perfect in the end, just like the Master of Yule himself, is this very realisation. Perfection makes plenty of room for imperfection. Such is the spirit of Christmas.
But once you see through the story there’s no going back. You cannot re-believe in Santa Claus.
Disenchantment is the reason for much of people’s apparent slowing down and loss of energy as they get older—not from boredom or losing love or passion, but from breaking the spell of appearances and instead understanding and integrating what it is they need in order to meet their needs intrinsically.
The enthusiasm of young people, on the other hand, is often just a lack of discernment—for tasks, for people, for lovers, for purpose. Just as the less you know any particular energy the more likely you are to pursue mere semblances of it. Often the fervour with which we pursue something is proportionate to how much we don’t truly know or understand it, and the gratification in receiving it is the unfolding of its knowledge.
There are many roles available in life that appear very enchanting on the surface, but through experience show themselves to exist contingently not on what you do know and understand, but on what you don’t. In theory you should be able to go back to one of your former roles in life and perform it better than ever with your now greater experience, but you can’t. You would not only be worse at it but incapable. It does not matter how much money you were paid, or what other consequences you would face for not doing it. You might pretend he exists for the sake of your kids, but this is quite different from believing in him yourself. No reasonable adult can make a living that requires them to genuinely believe in Santa Claus and recruit others to the cause.
Yet this is what many roles in life appear to ask of us. Asking us to go against what we not only believe but on some level know to be true, and hoping to capitalise on the possibility that we either won’t notice or won’t listen. Just as many psychological models presume that your resistance points the way to knowledge. But fail to consider that often what appears as resistance is actually discernment, and that the real resistance may be towards trusting your own advice over others’.
Adult development and shadow work done properly is a perpetual process of becoming disenchanted with presentations and appearances, over and over again—facing up to the loss and tension that results, but eventually waking up to the real magic underneath. In many ways we’re still searching for Santa Claus. But in the end we find the self and genuine connection instead.
