Soon another girlfriend, Madeline, who had become my lifeline, mailed an escape check for $500 to the safe house, I was good to go. I bided my time until the morning on the Fourth of July, when he left the house to weasel money from a friend, to take us to the Marin County Fair. I quickly stuffed clothing, sleeping bags, and whatever else I could hastily gather into our SUV, now designated as my ERV, Emergency Rescue Vehicle. I urged my two young children into my Land Rover and drove for dear life to my sister’s home in San Diego, seeking emergency shelter on Independence Day 1999.

I knew that it was easy to set goals and create success when one is feeling successful already. But it seemed impossible to do when I was destitute and depressed. Intuitively, I sensed that if I could maintain my positive attitude, all would be well, but the years of living with an abusive man had eroded my inner reserves as well as my self-esteem.

My kids and I instinctively knew we needed a miracle to rescue us from our frightening predicament. Without a miracle, it would be impossible to make the changes we needed. I had no clue as to how I would restore my family to normalcy, but I knew it was imperative. I had become too weak, and I felt powerless. By creating a circle of three, I decided, we would generate positive waves of energy that might help mobilize my resources.

Lesson 3: What is a Miracle?

You need a miracle. Perhaps this would be the perfect time for something miraculous to happen. Like a white bearded, handsome God shining light down on you saying “Hello down there. I remember you. Here’s an olive branch with your lifeline. Have this blank check and a gift certificate to Starbucks. Enjoy.” Wouldn’t that be nice? A juicy ripe miracle every time we needed one. So what exactly is a miracle? Each of you has a different idea of what a miracle is. Before this point, you might have believed that miracles are only random acts of God. For some, a miracle is an unexplainable act that no human could possibly accomplish alone. Or maybe you simply define a miracle as, “something that can never happen to me.”

If your definition falls into one of these categories, or something similar, I am challenging you to set aside everything you’ve been told and consider that there’s something more to miracles that you’ve yet to learn.

The word miracle has been applied to:

Saints, healings and bleeding statues

Synchronistic events

Avoiding a near fatal crash

Intuition

Sudden insights

The discovery of light

A new baby

Falling in love and staying in love

Hope

A helping hand

Magic

Winning the lottery

Getting an education

Being surrounded by loving families

Food when you are starving

So you see, a miracle is not necessarily an unpredictable act of God. There are so many types of miracles that if you opened your eyes, you could see miracles twenty four hours in a day. In truth, you already have the miracle gene within you, thus you are a Miracle Maker whether you know it or not.