Earlier this week I cried after watching this clip of Marianne Williamson. I want to do what she’s doing, which is traveling around the world and inspiring people, but it’s clear to me that now is not the time for me to do something like that. My health will not allow me to travel all over creation and speak to large crowds. Because I’m not inspirationally speaking now, and I can’t foresee when I will, in my mind it means it won’t happen.
I’ve realized that I plan my life two months in advance. I buy plane tickets approximately two months before the trip, I make holiday plans two months before – two months is about as far into the future as I can see. If something is set to take place more than two months in advance, like a wedding, my attendance is a possibility, not a reality.
Last night I rewatched one of my favorite movies, Amelie, and was struck by a memory. I saw Amelie in the theater when it came out in 2001. I remember at the time yearning to visit Paris, where the movie takes place. I wanted to travel abroad so badly but didn’t know if I would ever get the chance. In 2005, I studied abroad in London and visited one of my dearest friends in, you guessed it, Paris.
Rewatching Amelie, I felt a surge of awe and wonder because some of the places in the movie, I, too, stepped foot on. I reminded myself, “I’ve been there.” It’s amazing to reflect back and realize a dream I had came true. The frustration comes in when I think a dream is impossible or it’s not happening fast enough.
My spiritual teacher says that “whatever happens in this universe of ours is nothing but an expression of Cosmic desire or Cosmic will … when a human desire and His desire coincide, then only does the human desire become fruitful, otherwise it is a sure failure.”
Sometimes when I see that quote I want to scream because I want what I want now, like a petulant 2 year old. But when I really think about it, I know when I align my desire and God’s desire, that’s when things work out the best. In the case of visiting Paris, it happened when I was already abroad and could take the Eurostar over. It happened when I could stay with my friend, who is nearly fluent in French. It happened when someone else could play tour guide. It happened when my friend “coincidentally” needed extra emotional support. As my recovery mentor says, “Nothing happens in God’s world by mistake.”
All of this is to say one day I could do a version of what Marianne Williamson does. My higher power knows better than me when things should happen. My higher power has a broader, longer perspective – beyond two months. Realizing a dream is not so much about visualizing, praying, practicing affirmations, etc., to make it come true faster, but rather preparing the soil and understanding that a flower blooms when it’s ready. Realizing a dream is about understanding it happens when my desire and God’s desire sync up and there’s nothing I can do to rush that process.
I dream of a world where we realize dreams do come true, just not in the way or the time we think they will. A world where we understand our desires bear fruit only when they coincide with the divine’s. A world where we realize some things are out of our hands, but that doesn’t mean they’ll never happen.
Another world is not only possible, it’s probable.
This article originally appeared on www.anotherworldisprobable.com