Whispering Wyrd

Do you believe in miracles?

If you do, what qualifies as a miracle in your view? A lot of people think of miracles as something enormous, events so extraordinary they seem to defy all known laws of nature. That’s certainly one way to understand the word, and for a long time, that’s how I understood it too.

But now I believe that miracles can also be small. Or maybe they only seem small until we really notice them.

During acute withdrawal, making it through another 24 hours became a miracle for me. There were times I really didn’t know if I was going to make it. Life stopped being measured in years and narrowed down to days, sometimes hours, sometimes minutes. That experience changed my perspective in a way nothing else ever has.

Now, more healed but still healing, I see miracles everywhere.

A beautiful sunset feels like a miracle. The way the mountains heal me is a miracle. Stepping outside into the quiet night air, breathing deeply, seeing the moon and stars, that’s a miracle. Seeing my granddaughter smile is a miracle. Simply being here, alive, breathing, that is a miracle.

Please don’t think I’m using the word “miracle” lightly. I’m not. I mean it with all the weight and wonder that word is meant to carry. Thich Nhat Hanh once said, “The miracle is to walk on the green Earth,” and I believe that with my whole heart now.

My sobriety is a miracle. Every time someone finds their way out of addiction, it’s a miracle worth honoring. No one wakes up one day and decides they want to be an addict. No child dreams of growing up to struggle that way. The stories that lead people into addiction, and the things that happen while trapped there, are heartbreaking.

And when we finally get sober or clean, we don’t get to erase those stories. We carry them. But we carry them differently now. With tools. With support. With clarity. With the ability to face life as it is, without numbing ourselves away from it.

You don’t have to be in recovery to understand this. Anyone who has struggled, anyone who has been overwhelmed, anyone who has felt worn down by life knows how easy it is to miss the miracles happening all around us.

They’re there, in sunrises and sunsets, in mountains and oceans, in cool night air, in moments of laughter, in simply making it through a hard day.

There’s no need to wait for a world-shaking event that defies physics. The miracles are already here. They show up for us every day. All we have to do is slow down enough to notice them, and show up for them in return.

Amituofo
 ~Buck