Miracle-Prone

Our lives are a miracle. They’re unexpected. They’re improbable. They’re unlikely.

Our bodies and minds are a miracle. Over 3 billion years of evolution that fine-tuned us to be the most effective survivalists ever.

Earth and the universe are a miracle. At any moment we can turn our attention to something, anything at all, and witness the miraculous in the mere existence of whatever we’re perceiving.

Shapes, colors, language, relationships: miracles. There’s so much beauty to bring our awareness to, beauty within us and beauty around us.

Our feelings. Wow. It’s really a miracle to feel anything at all - the good, the bad, the challenging, and the appreciated.

I asked a client this morning if she were willing to experience a miracle in the area of life she brought up in our conversation. After thinking for a moment, she said yes.

(That’s how miracles always start: we open ourselves up and become willing to experience them.)

Near the end of the conversation, she said, “this has been an issue for 13 years of my life, and I never would’ve thought it could be resolved in a one-hour conversation like this. This is a miracle.”

Miracles are so much more about who they allow us to be than they are about what they allow us to do or to have.

A Zen master once told her students: “Enlightenment is a happy accident.”

One student came up to her after the lesson and asked: “If enlightenment is an accident, then why do we meditate so much, perform so many prostrations, and do so much work in the garden?”

The master replied: “To become accident-prone.”

Here’s a formula for experiencing miracles:

1. Be willing to experience a miracle. (This is a state of mind that we can access and foster at any time.)

2. Foster feelings, take actions, and put ourselves in conversations that will increase our likelihood of experiencing miracles. (In other words, become miracle-prone.)

Remember: miracles are so much more about who they allow us to be than they are about what they allow us to do or to have.

What's a miracle you're willing to experience? How can you make yourself more miracle-prone?

Thanks so much for reading. ❤️

Falling on Your Face

I was moved by my conversation with my advisee last week. He teared up a little, I teared up a little, and then we both left homeroom and walked into our 9th grade science class together. I was present to a clarity, insight, and power that felt like spiritual truth vibrating between us.

Once in the classroom, I looked around at the other 15 freshmen in the room, at least a handful of whom were also struggling with their grades this semester.

I asked if someone could remind us what happened in Marvel’s Dr. Strange: a rich, powerful, arrogant, and highly skilled doctor nearly dies due to his own mistake. He then hits rock bottom physically, emotionally, and spiritually. Then, with support of masters who traveled that path before, he claws his way to a transformation. Dr. Strange becomes a hero.

I asked another student to remind us what happened in Iron Man: a rich, powerful, and arrogant weapons maker gets kidnapped and he sees first-hand the damage of his selfish ignorance. He nearly dies, hits rock bottom, and works harder than he ever worked before to achieve a transformation. Iron man becomes a hero.

Finally, Spider-Man: a sweet kid gets super-powers, but in a moment of anger and frustration becomes in some way responsible for his father-figure’s death. He’s isolated, emotionally torn apart, and hits rock bottom, but awakens through a transformation into a hero who chooses to never back down from a fight for good. Spider-Man becomes a hero.

I imagine that you might might think you know where this blog post is going and that, despite my best efforts, you may think the hero’s journey doesn’t apply to you.

It does. You are the hero in your story.

You fall on your face sometimes. It feels like rock bottom sometimes. You struggle, you question, you stress, you fear, and you screw up. You’re challenged by things you don’t think you should be challenged by, and you struggle more than you think you should. You’ve got what look like internal and external foes, and the internal ones are the toughest.

All heroes do.

But the fall-on-your-face or rock-bottom part of the story isn’t where the hero’s journey ends. It ends in transformation that leads to success.

No one watches movies or reads books to hang out in the rock bottom part of the story. We follow those stories to see and experience the transformations. That’s the inspiring part, the part that allows us to feel bigger, stronger, and more significant than we typically allow ourselves to feel.

Rock bottom is the hero’s access to transformation. Rock bottom is the hero’s opportunity to make a choice and to take meaningful action. We viewers don’t care about rock bottom - we care about how the hero responds to rock bottom.

Falling on your face is your access to transformation. Falling on your face is your opportunity to make a choice to get back up again, stronger, wiser, and more clear than you've ever been before.

Your friends, family, and society don't care that you've fallen on your face. They care about how you respond to falling on your face. They care about you getting back up.

Is the hero willing to seek support? Is the hero willing to be courageous, unbounded, and unrestrained? Is the hero willing to let go of an attachment to failure and fear and step into who she’s really called to be?

And it’s more than one challenge. A hero’s transformation is ongoing. You surpass the current challenge, the current resistance, and another one shows up in a week. That’s the nature of this journey.

You are the hero of the story of your life. Your rock bottoms and those times when you fall on your face, however big or small they might be, can be challenging and painful - but we’re never as stuck as we think.

Though all heroes need support, guidance, and education sometimes, don’t ever think the transformation comes from anywhere but from within you. No matter how supportive, no guide, teacher, coach, priest, or guru can get you across the finish line of this next transformation - you are the source of your own transformation.

And yes, it’s usually a whole lot easier with support.

In case you don’t know: besides teaching high school science in my day job, I coach adults to access ongoing transformation in their lives. If you’re experiencing a challenge and would like to transform it, or perhaps you’re simply feeling ready to level-up your impact, effectiveness, and enjoyment, reach out and schedule a free call.

I promise you’ll be glad you did.

Thanks so much for reading. And thanks for being a hero worthy of the title. ❤️

When the Evidence Is Against Us

An advisee came into the room disheartened and resigned. This normally positive, outgoing, and friendly kid walked in with weight on his shoulders and sadness in his eyes.

This week was the end of our first semester, and this kid didn’t perform as well as he thinks he should’ve. He had made promises that the second quarter would be better than the first. It wasn’t.

He felt that he let his parents, teachers, me, and himself down. He shared about feeling like a failure and feeling alone. He loves being a part of this school community, but he wondered if he belonged here at all.

He also said he knows he can do better, but he just keeps falling on his face academically. And boy was he wrapped up in a lot of stories about falling on his face academically.

Our conversation continued, and it was the kind of conversation I’m sometimes thankful that students’ parents can’t overhear - the kind of conversation where I say that academic success is great, but that there’s something that matters more.

And I acknowledged him like crazy, and let him know that he’s the kind of student that teachers NEVER forget - and not because of his grades, but because of his attitude and spirit.

And I told him he didn’t have to stay at this school, he can go back wherever it is he thinks he should be. But he first has to understand that there’s not some kind of truth about that; in fact, he's actually the only one who thinks he doesn’t belong. In my world he is this school, and he makes it a better place for all of us.

Many of us adults have a sense that our stories about reality are not the same as reality, but we still so often cage ourselves within stories of our own making or stories we inherited. Our stories are what bring the heaviness and suffering to our lives.

This student didn’t do that. He walked into the room caged up, and he left free. He got in touch with something in our conversation - he got in touch with what he loves about himself, and he realized that that part of him matters so much more than his grades in Science and French.

Of course it does! The gold that we walk around with all day every day is what’s craving to be expressed.

We think the circumstances need to be perfect for us to live fully expressed.

We think the circumstances need to be just right for us to finally live the life we know that’s inside.

We think the people in our lives, the results we’re producing, and our feelings about ourselves are what’s keeping us from being expressed, fulfilled, in action, and in love with life.

None of that is true, and this 15-year-old got it. In our conversation this week, he shook off those limiting thoughts and feelings and stepped back into the integrity of who he is.

I’m going to support him in doing better academically, and that may or may not happen. But two things are crystal clear to me:

1. It’s going to be a heck of a lot easier supporting him when he isn’t weighed down and held back by the stories he was carrying.

2. It’ll matter a lot less whether his grades improve or not, because he’s already in touch with what will make him most successful in life - his own authentic, empowered, courageous, generous, and passionate expression of his innate wholeness and integrity as a human.

I invite you to step through your own stories about yourself, others, and your circumstances. I invite you to start expressing that life that’s already pulsing inside you and craving to be let loose into the universe.

It’s not our circumstances that hold us back - it’s our stories about our circumstances. Sometimes they’re scary stories, but fear doesn't have to stop us. In fact, it’s much safer out here than you think.

My advisee isn't going to wait until his grades improve before he starts living a fulfilled life. Maybe we can all learn something from him.

Thanks so much for reading. ❤️