Miracles . . .

‍Last week, while scrolling through my inbox, an article entitled, “The Ordinary Miracle of Existing” stopped me short.

Written by Alan Lightman, a physicist and humanities professor at MIT, and published in The Atlantic, it was the subhead in particular that caught my attention:

“Being alive at all is the most extraordinary stroke of good luck any of us will ever experience.”

I frequently marvel at the continuum that takes each of us from fertilization, through fetal development, childbirth, human development, and of course, aging.

To think that every single living being began as one cell that multiplied and multiplied and multiplied is, at least to me, downright miraculous.

As parents, many of us frequently remark as our kids enter adulthood “It’s a miracle they survived childhood,” between the mistakes we inadvertently made and the trouble they got into along the way.

But we rarely take that same perspective into consideration as WE continue to age—particularly as we enter older adulthood.

We seldom look back with gratitude at how far we’ve come—and at how much we’ve experienced and learned and endured along the way.

Like, for instance, our aforementioned children’s childhoods. Or the mundanities of our daily routines. Or the challenges we faced at work outside the home, inside the home, and/or both.

Not long ago, a women in her thirties incredulously asked me how people manage to work all day and then come home and make dinner for their families. It seemed to her to be expecting too much.

“What if you want to go the gym?” she asked. “Or see a movie?” “Or you have more work to do after you get home?”

“We just did it,” I answered.

Was it hard? Yes. Would we maybe have preferred to do other things with our time after already putting in a full day of work? Absolutely.

But we learned a few shortcuts and developed a routine and (mostly) managed to get through it. Strategies which helped us develop skills like planning, prioritizing, coping, multi-tasking—and which built our stamina, strength, and ability to focus.

Why is it that we look at youth as a joyful miracle but older age as nothing more than a dreaded eventuality—IF we’re lucky?

The fact is older age is pretty miraculous, too.

“A privilege denied to many,” it’s been said.

“A time for us to become the people we were always meant to be,” declared David Bowie.

And perhaps the most miraculous aspect of older age is that it’s nothing like what most people expect it to be.

Much like childhood, older age is also a time of discovery. Of trying and learning new things. Of acquiring new skills and knowledge. Of overcoming challenges, yes. But also of appreciating the simple things in life.

Like spending time with friends and family. Participating in activities we didn’t have time for years ago. Volunteering. Taking a class. Reading a book. Hitting the gym. Going to the movies—or even taking a nap—in the middle of the day.

The choice is ours. IF we embrace it.

And the truth is we OWE it to OURSELVES to celebrate the MIRACLES that WE are:

The reminders of history. The creators of legacy. The sharers of wisdom. The keepers of memory.

You can find a copy of the article here:

I hope you are as inspired by it as I am. I’d love to know what you think—please share your thoughts in the comments section below.

In the meantime, as Albert Einstein once said,

“There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.”