I’ve been working on a hypothesis of what goes into creating a miracle ever since I experienced something pretty miraculous a couple of years ago. It was February, and I was caught in a “Super Storm” that hit the east coast and caused my flight from New York to North Carolina to be cancelled.
Now I think I have a theory for how I managed—miraculously—to get home the next day while thousands of other travellers were stranded for several more days, and I’d like to share it with you.
Here’s where it begins: I left home on Monday, February 10th as a snowstorm was just approaching the southeast, and my connecting flight to New York City just barely made it out of Charlotte. New York itself was clear, fortunately, but the forecast was that this southeastern storm was going to follow me up the coast and become a major blizzard in the northeast by Wednesday night.
Knowing this, I tried to rebook my flight from Thursday to Wednesday, but Charlotte—the major flight hub for our part of the country—was shut down under 6 inches of snow.
So there was no getting out of New York City to Charlotte on Wednesday or Thursday. Still, I was hopeful that La Guardia could handle a blizzard—they do that all the time, right?—and that Charlotte would have time to dig itself out before I arrived on Friday. Bowing to the inevitable, I booked a room in an airport hotel to stay in on Thursday night.
I really didn’t want to stay any later than Thursday, and yet, after cancelling my Thursday flight, my airline wanted to rebook me for a flight on Sunday.
I considered calling friends in Manhattan and asking if I could stay with them, hang out, and perhaps even catch a Broadway show. I mean, New York is one of my favorite cities in the world, and I could make the best of it, right?
But I felt an immediate resistance to this plan: Yes, I LOVE New York, and I really wanted to see Wicked, but all I knew was that I had what I call a “heart sink” feeling about it.
I had been away from my family since Monday, and this was Thursday evening. I did not want to spend 3 more days away from them. My heart just wouldn’t take it.
So I told the airline reps not to book me on a flight on Sunday, because if I took them up on their offer, I would be out of the running for a standby seat leaving any earlier.
But when I called the airline at 5 am on Friday, the rep told me I wouldn’t receive any preferential treatment for having been bumped the day before, and that in fact only the people who got bumped the day of their flight are given preferential treatment.
And that’s when I decided to make a Plan B. My Plan B wasn’t to stay in New York City until a flight opened up. My Plan B was to rent a car and drive from Brooklyn to the mountains of North Carolina—a twelve-hour trip in good weather, but probably longer in the weather that we actually had.
Still, I thought of all the reasons a long car trip through the snow would be really lovely—and those reasons were: 1) I was reading The Fault in Our Stars by John Green. 2) I would treat myself to the audiobook version of The Fault in Our Stars and listen to it as I drove through five states and a major snowstorm. And that was all it took to convince me. Plan B is great! I thought. I really like this plan.
So I went to the airport on Friday with Plan A and Plan B. And I liked them both.
What I want to highlight is that there was no plan that I wasn’t happy about. Sure, I might prefer to get on a flight, but I knew that I could also be happy renting a car, provided I threw in just a little extra to sweeten the pot.
What’s more, I said to myself, Okay, I want to arrive to the airport by 8 o’clock but first I need to invest in some serious self-care. I said this because I knew I would never get the miracle I wanted if I wasn’t my absolute best self.
I knew I had to arrive well rested, well exercised, well showered and well fed in order to be my best self.
So I got up at 5 that morning, after 8 good hours of sleep. Then I worked out in the gym, practiced about 10 minutes of meditation, ate a good breakfast, showered, put on nice clothes and a little makeup and got the shuttle to the airport by 8 o’clock.
When I got in line at the ticket counter I was aware that I was the only one there who looked calm and collected. Everyone else in the line looked completely bedraggled and stressed out. Let’s hear it for sleep, exercise, nutrition, and showers!
And let’s hear it for meditation, too, because I think that’s why I could observe the scene that was playing out before me with as much detachment as I did. I watched as one waylaid traveler after another went up to the staff behind the counter and issued a series of threats and demands that eventually made the staff as stressed as the travelers!
And so when I got to the counter, I smiled at the airline representative. I said, “I’m going to be the best part of your day.” This made her laugh out loud. I’m sure she was thinking, “Okay, crazy lady!”
I continued, “I’m going to make your day because I am going to make it very easy for you to take care of me. I just want one thing—to be put on standby for the 10 am flight to Charlotte.”
At first she came back with all the objections I had heard before and why it would be better for me to take a ticketed seat for a flight in 3 days. But when I reassured her that I was committed to either getting a flight today or renting a car and driving home, she seemed happy enough to give me the standby ticket.
I tried not to think about what it meant to be number 21 on standby when it was an already overbooked flight. Instead, I focused all of my attention on feeling satisfied that I could was at least make my way through the long lines at security and get to the boarding area. Whatever happened next, at least I was that much closer to my goal!
When I got to the cluster of 4 gates at the end of the terminal, it was impossible not to flinch at the chaos: There were hundreds of people – many sprawled on the floor and apparently oblivious to anyone forced to walk around them. On the floor and in the chairs, everyone I saw seemed to be talking angrily on their cell phones, trying to pacify a crying baby, struggling to hold onto their sanity with the last ounce of strength left in them. Everyone was completely agitated. It was a mess.
And as I walked into this morass of humanity, the conversations I overheard almost hooked me. I was astonished and disheartened by the negativity that threatened to bury us like the approaching snowstorm. After a minute, though, I shook it off. I told myself not to listen. I found a seat and opened up my book, and once again got lost in the amazing world of John Green’s The Fault in Our Stars.
Every time I would come up from the book I would hear some negative talk and it would trigger my own negative thinking, but then I would just dive back in and find a reprieve from the negativity.
The hour passed very quickly and then the 10 o’clock flight was being boarded. Everyone surged toward the gate in anticipation. The representative on the intercom said that everyone would have to “gate check” any overhead baggage because the flight was so full—and I honestly wondered if gate check myself. Anything to get on that plane.
I took a deep breath.
Finally, after a lot of back and forth and manual counting on the plane (because some people had been given seat assignments for seats that were assigned to someone else), they announced that there were three seats available for standby passengers.
Knowing that I was #21 on the list, I didn’t feel optimistic, but I looking back I can say honestly that I didn’t feel discouraged, either. It felt more like I was enjoying the unfolding of the process, as if a voice inside me were saying “It will be interesting to see what happens in the next few minutes.”
The first name was called. And then the second. And then the third. Wait. That third name? That was MY NAME! Yes, me. #21. I got called third.
I don’t know why.
I do, however, have a theory, and here it is. I truly believe the only reason my name was called is because I stayed calm and centered the whole time. It’s like Marianne Williamson said, “You can have a grievance or you can have a miracle. You cannot have both.”
I didn’t have a grievance. Far from it. In fact, I did everything in my power to be grateful and gracious. So I got the miracle. I was back home with my family by 3 pm that day.
That raises the question: what makes up a miracle? When you’re confronted with a problem, you must create a clear vision of an outcome that leaves you feeling good (and you might even want to have a “feel good” backup), but no matter what, your focus is on feeling good.
Any negativity means that you are choosing conflict over peace, and your sacred self deserves better.
And that’s really the crux of it: Focus all of your energy on sacred self care – fill your well to overflowing – and only make decisions and take action when you’re feeling good.
Sound too simple? Yeah, I get that a lot.
I once counseled one of my clients to do this and she said, “Only take action when you’re feeling good? That sounds like the Lazy Man’s Path.”
What I want you to know is that this is not the Lazy Man’s Path.
It’s incredibly challenging to take care of yourself and choose better-feeling thoughts when you’re faced with an undesirable circumstance. It’s incredibly challenging to get into that place of feeling good, and it’s even more challenging to stay in that place of feeling good.
In fact, I’ve begun to think it’s the Lazy Man’s Path to make decisions and take actions when you’re feeling bad. And I know for sure that you’re not going to find any miracles along that path.
It’s not easy to honor your spirit with sacred self-care. It’s not easy to use your intuition as a compass for taking inspired action. It’s not easy to prioritize feeling good, no matter what.
But it’s so worth it. Because that’s when miracles happen.
