They Remember How You Made Them Feel.
One of my favorite moments during the Christmas season happens almost every year.
A shy little girl approaches carefully, sometimes half-hiding behind a parent, uncertain whether she wants to come closer or not.
And instead of immediately launching into jokes or questions, I often notice something small.
Her sparkly shoes.
The snowflakes on her sweater.
The way she carefully chose her dress for this moment.
So I smile and say:
“My goodness… did you wear that beautiful dress just for tonight?”
And then I ask the question that almost always changes everything:
“Would you twirl for me?”
Almost every time, the same thing happens.
The nervousness softens.
The shoulders relax.
And a tiny smile begins appearing before the twirl is even finished.
It is never really about the dress.
It is about being seen.
And moments like that have slowly changed the way I think about performance, connection, and what people actually remember years later.
Because there is a quiet pressure in modern performance work to constantly become “more.”
More entertaining.
More energetic.
More memorable.
More impressive.
More polished.
More viral.
And honestly, it is easy to understand why.
Social media rewards big reactions.
Fast moments.
Loud personalities.
Performances that immediately capture attention.
So many performers quietly come to believe that creating magic means constantly doing more.
Bigger jokes.
Bigger reactions.
Bigger personalities.
But over the years, I have started noticing something very different.
The moments people carry with them the longest are often not the performances at all.
They are the moments when someone feels truly seen.
Years from now, most children will not remember the exact joke you told.
They may not remember the trick.
The dance.
The performance itself.
But they will remember how they felt standing beside you.
Whether they felt safe.
Whether they felt welcomed.
Whether they felt rushed or truly noticed.
And that is where real Christmas Magic often lives.
The Pressure to Perform
Many holiday performers genuinely care deeply about families.
But somewhere along the way, many begin carrying an invisible pressure to constantly “deliver.”
To keep the line moving.
To stay entertaining.
To keep children laughing.
To create perfect moments every single time.
And sometimes that pressure quietly pulls performers out of the very thing that creates the deepest connection:
presence.
Because presence is slower.
Presence notices.
Presence listens.
Presence allows moments to breathe instead of rushing to fill every second.
And children often respond more deeply to feeling seen than feeling entertained.
Presence Feels Different
You can usually feel the difference immediately.
A performer focused only on performance often feels:
- rushed
- scripted
- loud
- constantly “on”
- focused on the next reaction
But presence feels different.
Presence kneels down to eye level.
Presence notices the nervous child holding tightly to their parent’s sleeve.
Presence notices the child who has suddenly become quiet.
Presence notices the carefully chosen Christmas sweater.
The missing front tooth.
The excitement.
The uncertainty.
Presence responds instead of simply performing.
And ironically, those quieter moments often become the most memorable ones of all.
The Most Powerful Moments Are Often Quiet
Some of the most meaningful moments are almost invisible to everyone else in the room.
A whispered conversation.
A soft reassurance.
A pause long enough for a shy child to feel safe enough to speak.
A performer slowing down enough to truly notice who is standing in front of them instead of moving immediately into the next scripted interaction.
These moments rarely go viral online.
But they often become core memories.
Because people remember how they felt in your presence long after they forget the details of the performance itself.
Presence Creates Emotional Safety
This matters for every child.
But especially for:
- shy children
- overwhelmed children
- neurodivergent children
- grieving children
- anxious children
And honestly…
for adults too.
Presence communicates:
“You are safe here.”
“You do not need to perform for me.”
“I see you.”
That kind of emotional safety creates a very different kind of magic than entertainment alone ever could.
Presence Cannot Be Faked
This is important.
Presence is not another technique.
It is not a script.
Not a gimmick.
Not a performance trick.
It is attention.
Real attention.
And children are remarkably good at sensing the difference between someone trying to impress them and someone genuinely with them.
That is part of why presence feels so powerful.
Because it is honest.
The Real Magic
The older I get, the more I believe the most magical performers are not always the loudest ones in the room.
Sometimes they are simply the people who know how to make others feel:
- welcomed
- safe
- valued
- noticed
- important
Long after the jokes are forgotten…
people remember how they felt beside you.
And perhaps that is the deeper invitation behind this work.
Not simply becoming better performers.
But becoming people whose presence leaves warmth behind long after the moment itself has passed.
That is one of the conversations we explore inside The Magic Keeper’s Workshop™ — an experience designed to help Santas, Mrs. Clauses, and holiday performers create deeper, more meaningful connection through the kind of magic people carry with them for years.
Because the real magic was never only in the performance.
It was always in how people felt in your presence.
