On Ordinary Miracles

To a lot of people, miracles mean something completely unnatural, like setting aside the laws of nature to allow someone to fall out of a three-story window and hit the ground unharmed. Or maybe being able to stave off the inevitable consequences of some unfortunate act we may have initiated. As far as I am concerned, sometimes getting out of bed in the morning is a miracle. Oy! (Bones don’t always want to cooperate much!) Seriously, though, miracles do not have to be big, earth-shattering deals; they can be and often are the most effortless flows in the world. In fact I think that the definition of a miracle can be reduced to five, simple words: The truth revealed without obstruction.

The deep, abiding connection

There is a spiritual portent to this that does not involve a god that rearranges the laws of the universe to satisfy our needs. I am not talking about a god that stops a lava flow in mid descent because we choose to live at the foot of an active volcano. As I have often written, I am a believer, and I revere the deep, abiding connection that is always present among all of life, however we may postulate this. I believe as the ancients said that I live, move and have my being in something greater than myself. Some days…no lights, bells and whistles…some days…a bird song or two outside the window…or maybe a bit more.

Flashy whiz bangs

Does it deflate the whole idea of miracles to deem them so simple? Oh, sometimes they come as flashy whiz bangs, as something that occurs that is big and magnificent like a wonderful, unexpected healing. But I also think that healings of any kind would always be possible if we could clear up our infernal capacities to misunderstand everything! This, friends, would truly be a miracle! No kidding, it would be because we finally share the awareness of our connections with the great love and wisdom of That Within Which we all live and move. There are no pragmatic proofs of the miracle maker, only those that come as light through minds and hearts. No books, no gurus can give us what we can only know and experience for ourselves, and every wonder will not line up according to reason. Once we are open to this and don’t disparage what we can’t always explain, we are ready for ordinary miracles…things that fall into place just as they should…our being exactly where we need to be…large and small gifts coming to us…bringing gifts we never knew we had.

Follow our footsteps

Ordinary miracles would follow our footsteps every day if we would let them, and in fact they often do. When we get out of the way of our own truths, they come forth as the most natural things in the world. How can we not know this? Probably because we don’t always know how to look. What if we woke up one morning with a dawning clarity about something we had been wrestling with for God knows how long? If that isn’t a sweet miracle, I don’t know what is!