November/December 2002
Feature Articles
Holistic Health Q & A
by Dr. Carol Anne Bates
The role of the liver in Oriental Medicine.
The connection between the liver and depression. How acupuncture can help.
What is... the Organic Movement?
by Robert Roman
Final part of a three-part article
detailing the author's personal experiences and the growth of the organic
movement.
UnCommon Sense!
by David Findlay
Iraq?
Articles on the theme "Miracles"
A State of Consciousness
by Rev. Susan R. Griffin
The real "reality" in which
miracles are part of everyday experience.
A Personal Course in Miracles
by Lisa Raphael
Miracles and the Big Picture. Co-creating
with the Creation.
Are Miracles Miraculous?
by Charles Larsen
A psychotherapist's attempt to define
the word "miracle."
An Everyday Experience
by Rev. LeRoy Zemke
The realm of miracles and how to get
there.
A Miracle?
by Dave Hunt
The "miraculous" effect of
changes in perception.
What Happened?
by Dr. Audrey Craft Davis
A first-hand account of two miraculous
events.
The Miracle of Life
by AnneMarie Dyer
Letting go of a personal perspective
and opening one's eyes to the miraculous possibilities of life.
Sharing the Miracle
by Rev. Pat Cross
Some personal miracles and some reflections
on the nature of miracles.
A Personal Course in Miracles
by Lisa Raphael
A miracle, according to the dictionary, is an unexplainable event that we attribute to the supernatural. According to Albert Einstein, "Either everything is a miracle, or nothing is a miracle." Is the awesome balance and intricacy of the patterns and forms of life throughout the universes random or a miracle the manifestation of a supernatural intelligence?
How we answer this has everything to do with the way we live our lives.
An otherwise meaningless piece of paper was the difference between life and death for my family and me in 1938. For years, I thought it was random, a matter of luck that we escaped from Hitler's Vienna. Then one day it occurred to me that maybe there was a reason my dad studied for a degree he never got to use. Australia was the only country taking in ANY refugees at that critical time he had already been picked up and held by the Nazis and then only with evidence that they could help develop the land. The otherwise meaningless piece of paper that saved my life was my dad's degree in agriculture.
Throughout the decades during which I believed that what happens in life is simply "the luck of the draw," I was something of a control freak. I lived in defiance of anything that stood in the way of my accomplishing my goals. Outwardly, I was successful in achieving what I set out to do: working my way around Europe, changing citizenship, establishing a career, marrying and bringing my family back together. But inwardly, there was something missing. Life was struggle. Everything was a challenge, something to overcome, to conquer, and to survive. The belief that I alone was in charge of directing my life left me feeling empty inside.
When I began to recognize patterns in the sequence of events in my life that did not correspond with my carefully formulated goals and plans, everything changed. Perhaps there was a reason, a purpose after all. As these previously unrecognized patterns revealed themselves, I began to pay more attention to my intuition, dreams, physical symptoms, as well as the meaningful coincidences in my life. (According to Jean Houston, a coincidence is a miracle in which God prefers to remain anonymous.)
As I paid attention to these signs and signals and took them into account in my decision-making, life became less of a struggle, and less lonely. It was like walking hand in hand with an unseen Presence, One that operates outside of our conscious awareness.
Since September 11th, 2001, there have been countless stories of individual lives that were saved by apparent miracles. But what about those who did not escape the disaster of September 11th or the ethnic cleansing in Bosnia, or the Holocaust? If Einstein is right, and either everything is a miracle or nothing is miracle, then injury, suffering, death must also be part of a larger plan or picture.
It is so much more difficult to accept miracles when our loved ones are killed or injured in national or natural disasters than when they are mysteriously saved. Once we embrace the concept of supernatural influence, however, we must accept as miracles the manifestations that are contrary to our expectations, wishes and prayers as miracles, not just the outcomes that seem to be an answer to our prayers and intentions.
As we become more and more conscious of the hidden factors influencing our actions, the picture becomes increasingly complex. Each feeling, impulse, thought or action may have thousands of causes and consequences, and how we choose to explain or perceive events has a lot to do with our perspective. Circumstances that may seem inexplicable on a personal level can become understandable when we take other people's points of view into account. Rejection became less of a source of hurt and blame when I understood the fear behind the behavior of those who rejected me. Events that did not make sense physically, like fast-growing cataracts at age fifty five, made sense when I looked at them as a psycho-spiritual lesson: the need to see the world through new eyes. Nevertheless there were instances where it did not matter how many factors I took into account; the jigsaw puzzle simply would not come together.
The Big Picture is simply too vast, too complex for even extended human capacities to comprehend. We must simply trust that the unseen power in charge of the grand design has our collective best interests at heart.
It may be a leap of faith to believe in miracles, but it does not render us powerless. On the contrary, it opens an opportunity to work in co-operation with the unseen power, to co-create the miracles of our lives. In New Thought circles this is known as manifesting.
Manifesting involves making plans, setting specific goals and intentions, and then letting go of the outcome.
The unseen hand can play some funny tricks with regard to outcome. I envisioned living in a waterfront condo on North Shore Drive, Chicago, when I married my husband. But he moved us onto a sailboat in Florida, and rented a house for the rest of our years together. Twenty years later, I live in a waterfront condo on North Shore Drive, St. Petersburg not North Shore Drive Chicago, but the manifestation of my vision nevertheless. The supernatural also played a role in the decision to close my counseling practice. The voice of Spirit had been calling me more and more insistently into personal process, writing and channeling, but I was afraid of giving up my source of income. Fear drove me to put a lot of energy into promoting my practice, but previously successful strategies to stimulate referrals did not work. For four long months the telephone did not ring. Finally, I set a date for closing my practice. Within twenty-four hours the phone was literally ringing off the hook. I would put down the receiver from one referral, and there was the next one on the line. Within two days, I had all the clients I needed to carry the practice until the closing date.
It is not easy to live as if everything is a miracle. To co-create with the Creation is an enormous responsibility. But it certainly is not dull! Recent explorations have brought me into contact not only with guides, angels and masters in other dimensions, but alien life forms from other parts of the galaxy, not all of whom have our best interests in mind. Discerning these different "voices," monitoring the seen and the unseen requires constant vigilance and awareness. Yet confusing as it gets, I would not give it up for all the certainty, all the seeming security in the world.
Lisa Raphael is a Florida licensed mental health counselor, transformational holistic healer, seminar leader and author. (727) 822-0489. lisaraphael@worldnet.att.net
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