• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Heart - Head - Hands logo

  • About
    • Beth Godbee
    • Commitments
    • Offerings
    • Publications
  • Blog
    • Contemplative Practices
    • Emotional Literacies
    • Everyday Feminism
    • Higher Education
    • Interviews
    • Racial Justice
    • Recipes
    • Why Vegan?
  • Coaching
  • Register
  • Subscribe
  • Contact
  • Navigation Menu: Social Icons

    • Facebook
    • Instagram
    • LinkedIn
    • Twitter

Expect Miracles

Filed Under: Contemplative Practices, Everyday Feminism By Beth Godbee December 21, 2017 Leave a Comment

Of the many lessons I’m still learning, an important one is to trust life as it unfolds. I struggle with trust because I struggle with letting go of perfectionism and perceived control. Despite these struggles, whenever I soften attachments to my preferred timing and open instead to possibilities, miracles occur. And the more I open to miracles, the more I find HOPE, which is so greatly needed on the long haul toward justice.

Recently, I’ve had an important reminder to expect miracles (or at least miraculous timing) in everyday life:

A few weeks ago, I lost a mala that Marty Tribble custom-made for me after several Reiki sessions of discussing my desire/need for greater grounding, spiritual connectedness, and trust in divine protection. Marty created this garnet bracelet and shipped it in a box with stenciled arrows, at the same time that I’d had an arrow drawn onto my hand during a summer retreat (pictured here).

2017-07-03 21.17.56

I took the arrows to be a sign of the mala’s significance for decision-making and directional guidance.

The mala must have been helping me trust, because when I lost it, I trusted that it was where it needed to be and would reemerge at the right time. I was somehow sure that the mala wasn’t lost to me, but just buried from my view or consciousness.

This loss happened about a month ago, before I started 40 days of yoga nidra—a meditative practice that I’ve been doing at bedtime. I often fall asleep during the guided practice, and I’ve been having especially vivid, symbolic dreams. These powerful dreams, I believe, have been a continuation of yogic sleep in actual sleep.

Through this process, I’ve become more aware of how much self-work and self-healing happen through dreams and sleep. I’ve also become aware of the mala’s hiding place.

Just before leaving town for a full month’s travel, I changed my bed sheets and moved my mattress away from the headboard. That night, when practicing yoga asana on the floor, I saw the mala under the bed. It had likely been tucked within the bed frame, near my head for the past weeks of yoga nidra. Despite my perception of having “lost” the mala, it was exactly where it needed to be: physically in my bed, supporting yoga nidra practice, and present for self-work during sleep.

The timing of its re-emergence has felt divinely orchestrated, too. Since I’m now traveling for a month, my home bed is no longer my practice space. By making its presence known, the mala is able to travel with me. I’m again wearing it as a bracelet during days and keeping it near my bed at nights.

I share this story of the lost-and-found mala because it’s the sort of everyday miracle that gives me hope at this time. It’s a reminder, especially in this week of the winter solstice and many religious celebrations, of the importance of trusting divine timing, especially when choosing to tread another path.

I share this story, too, because it’s opened for me a series of new questions:

  • What needs to change in my approach to everyday living if I am to act as though miracles are already present and possible?
  • What does it mean for miracles to be present at this time of great injustice? Might the recognition of miracles help with recognition of other often-dismissed phenomena like microaggressions, systemic racism, and epistemic injustice?
  • How do we undermine or block ourselves from noticing miracles and other magic that can give us life, even in the toughest times?
  • How might the expectation of miracles (or at least miraculous timing) aid in building resilience, commitments to justice, and long-term staying power?

I am excited to see what emerges as I learn to expect miracles. I hope you, too, will look for the miraculous in everyday life.

—
This post is written by Beth Godbee for Heart-Head-Hands.com. For more posts like this one, you might try “Everyday Divination,” “Attending to Anger,” or “Sieving Life: Keeping What Nourishes and Releasing the Rest.” Please also consider following the blog via email. Thanks!

Share this:

  • Print
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn
  • Pinterest
  • Pocket

Tagged with: #52essays2017, commitments, countering perfectionism, divination, epistemic injustice, healing, hope, learning, meditation, racial justice, yoga

Support the Work

subscribe to posts:

Previous Post: « A Few of My Favorite Things
Next Post: 7 Lessons from My First Year Blogging »

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

About This Site

Embodied knowledge matters. So do commitments. And especially acting on commitments as part of everyday life, BIG and small. This website—a mix of blog posts and research writing, courses and offerings—shares ongoing efforts toward everyday living (feeling, thinking, and doing) for justice.

Subscribe via Patreon

This button from Patreon says “Become a Patron” in white font against a bright orange background.

Subscribe to Newsletter

courses, webinars, and writing groups

This e-course announcement shows a yellow sunflower and blue sky. It includes a textbox with the following information: “E-COURSE AVAILABLE NOW! Career Discernment for Academics: Aligning Career with Commitments. Self-paced study, exercises, coaching, and more ...”

This ad reads: “Time to write! Writing Retreats. Learn more @ Heart-Head-Hands.com.” A white coffee mug and table appear in the foreground, with golden chairs and walls in the background.

This image shows writing tools (phone, keyboard, journal, pencil, and pen) along with the event information: “Online Writing Groups. Tuesday and Friday mornings 10am EST | 9am CST | 8am MST | 7am PST. Come Write Together: Heart-Head-Hands.com.”

This image shows a scene of wrapped packages, a pine cone, and evergreen branches. A white text box shares the circular logo for Heart-Head-Hands: Everyday Living for Justice, and another text box reads: “gift cards available.”

Categories

  • Contemplative Practices (60)
  • Emotional Literacies (82)
  • Everyday Feminism (102)
  • Higher Education (50)
  • Interviews (9)
  • Racial Justice (61)
  • Recipes (22)
  • Why Vegan? (12)

Footer

bethgodbee

Today's newsletter "Welcome spring, poetry prompts Today's newsletter "Welcome spring, poetry prompts, and reading recommendations" begins with the following wishes: 

"Welcome spring!

It's time to reawaken.
To stretch with longer days.
To regenerate after the stagnation of winter.
To plant seeds and intentions and to tend to those we're planting.
To experience renewal with wonder, play, curiosity, and laughter.
To revive our senses and grow with the growing light.
To bloom. To blossom. To become.
To compost. To create. To cultivate."

Read more here: https://mailchi.mp/6de7a1751064/mar-2023

#spring #springrefresh #springreflections #springwishes
Thanks @inspirationalsoulqueen for all that goes i Thanks @inspirationalsoulqueen for all that goes into this deep work of recognition, of holding space, of strengthening community. 🧡

#Repost @inspirationalsoulqueen with @use.repost
・・・
Register now! 2023 Hiphop Literacies Conference & Concert honoring LGBTQ+ contributions to hiphop and social equity. March 30-31, free, virtual and in-person. The conference that puts educators, scholars, artists, youth and the community in dialogue. Concert features 🔥headlining artist @SaucySantana. go.osu.edu/hhlc #BlackQueerandTransFeminismsAndLivesMatter. #OSUHiphop #HiphopIs50
Welcome spring! IMAGES: -- First two photos show Welcome spring! 

IMAGES:
-- First two photos show cherry blossoms here in DC.
-- Third photo shows the wider scene of me standing in a construction zone. My arms are reaching up and snapping photos with my phone. I'm wearing layers of jackets, black pants, and a black hat. ~ This tree is flourishing in the midst of it all! <3

#cherryblossoms #spring
New blog post today: "Reflective Poetry Prompts fr New blog post today: "Reflective Poetry Prompts from Writing Retreats: A Contemplative Writing Practice" 
 
This post shares a few reflective poetry prompts (along with my poetic answers) from recent one-day writing retreats: https://heart-head-hands.com/reflective-poetry-prompts/ --> link in bio.
 
May these prompts support reflection about the writing process, our identities as writers, and gratitude for all that writing teaches. <3
 
[This image shares information about writing retreats—where these poetry prompts have emerged—in 12 colorful blocks framed by leaves and flowers. The text reads: Writing retreats. One-day retreats: 6 dates open. 10am-4:30pm ET. Join via Zoom. Guided meditations. Lots of writing time. Optional 1:1 coaching. Reflective prompts. Group check-ins. Writing community. Available for groups, too. Sliding-scale fees. Facilitator Beth Godbee, Ph.D. Heart-Head-Hands.com.”]

#writing #writers #writingcommunity #writingretreat #writinggroup #writingretreats #coaching #writingcoach #writingprompts #journaling #journalprompts #poetry #poetryprompts #reflectivepractice #reflection #reflectivewriting #contemplativewriting #contemplation #contemplativepractice #writersofinstagram #writinginspiration
The next writing retreat is this Monday, March 6th The next writing retreat is this Monday, March 6th. There’s still time to join: https://heart-head-hands.com/product/writing-retreats/ 

Link in bio.
 
Thanks to Rachel Bloom-Pojar for this description of the retreat experience. :-) — @rachel_bp5 
 
[IMAGE: On the left side (against a beige background), the image reads: “Testimonial: ‘As with any space Beth helps create, these retreats center our humanity and ground us to recognize a variety of activities (i.e., reading, journaling, going for a walk) as important contributors to our writing goals and care for ourselves as writers.’ —Rachel Bloom-Pojar, retreat participant.” On the right side (against a gray background), the image reads: “Writing Retreats / Next = March 6th 10am-4:30pm ET / Heart-Head-Hands.com” and shows a workspace with a computer in the foreground and light streaming into a room filled with cushions and plants.]

#writing #writinginspiration #writingcommunity #writer #writersofinstagram #WritingResources #WritingSupport #WritingLife #WritingCenterLife #WritingTime #TimeToWrite #writinggoals #writersblock #writingmotivation #writerscommunity #writers #WritingCoach #WritingRetreat #OnlineRetreat
Load More... Follow on Instagram

About Beth Godbee

I'm an educator and former writing studies professor who believes our fully embodied selves matter in the world. We can’t just think our way out of the incredible injustices, dehumanization, violence, and wrongdoing that characterize everyday life. We must feel and act, too. [Pronouns: she/her.] Read more ...

This image shows books alongside the words: courses, coaching, consulting. learning + unlearning.

Copyright © 2023