Magic in your miracle

Magic is happening. Even here, even in this.

It may not feel like an incredibly magical Christmas with everything that has gone on in the world and perhaps in your life this year. Thankfully, miracles and magic and wonder don't depend on everything going right and turning out the way you want them to, to be here now with you. The nature of a miracle is that it's something beyond, something more, something that adds an element of what wasn't there before. So why, dear one, would you believe that your lack or your pain or your mess or your indifference or your what little care and energy and excitement you have would cancel the wonder and magic out?

They are already happening all around you and in you. It's happening whether you're on board or not, whether you can see it or not, whether you're aware or not.

Jesus grew within Mary for nine-to-ten months, as most babies do inside their mother's wombs. The miracle was present, becoming, growing, working its way into the world. You couldn't see it for the first few months, but around month four, Mary's belly started to swell, and her clothes needed to be loosened, and the shape of the miracle became manifest. Jesus was there, even though he was yet to be born. And all that time, as Mary's skin stretched, and her legs ached, and she lived with reflux and pregnancy insomnia, as she worried about all the things she didn't know and questioned everything she believed, and wondered if she even saw the Angel or if she was just having a trauma response to a terrible situation...

The miracle was there; the miracle was working its magic into her, and into the world.

The Christmas story comes down to this:

A virgin teenaged girl, who stood to lose everything, who belonged to a people group who had continuously been violently conquered, who lived in arguably the most volatile political environment, under the control and constriction of a foreign military superpower - she birthed a miracle from her body, with her body, with her blood and breath and tears and joy, that changed the shape of the world.

So tell me again how 2020, and everything that is going on in your life is an obstacle for magic?

Because friend, if I'm reading the story right, and perhaps I am, it seems to me that miracles and wonder and magic are even more present and possible and likely in times such as these.

Rumi said:

"Never lose hope, my heart. Miracles dwell in the invisible."

Just like Mary's, your invisible miracle will become tangible soon enough, all on its own. It's on its organic and holy journey to change your life.

Maybe you need to re-write what you think a miracle is... most often we want the miracle to come and save us from having to show up and do all kinds of work.

Maybe for you it's the work of forgiveness, or hope, or self-love, or creating boundaries; or finally coming to terms with a relationship; or taking a step of faith, or speaking up, or marching out, or finding compassion, or working at resting.

Whatever it is that you think a big instantaneous miracle will save you from, remember Mary. Think of her nine-month-long pregnancy. Think of her in labour. Think of her as she breastfed Jesus, as she chased him around the house, as she cried over how hard parenting is, as she worried about his health and happiness, as she talked long into the night with her son, as she watched him leave home in search for his own life, as he became a Rabbi, gathered disciples, travelled the country, was executed as a traitor and an enemy of the state, and rose again from the dead, only to disappear into the sky...

Jesus was one long miracle strung together by a million little ones along the way.

I dare say, if you open your eyes to the possibility of it, your life is, too.

Mindful Prompt: Never lose hope, my heart. The miracle is here. Even though it may seem like this year has been anything but miraculous, the ground is fertile, and in times such as this, wonder and magic are even more present and possible.

Continued in the series "Magic Happens Here", this week with a subscription in the App.

Written by Liz Milani.
Instagram: @thepracticeco