“So tell me,” I asked, “why did you call?”

The phone call had come out of nowhere, “So and so [someone I’d never heard of] gave me your card.” So this stranger and I met in a local coffee shop and talked for almost two hours about his dreams and history and a little about Spirit Moxie. “What intrigued me was the word ‘moxie’,” he said.

Ah. Yes. There is that word. While there are official definitions of “moxie” such as, “vigor; verve; pep” or “courage and aggressiveness; nerve” or even, simply, “skill, know-how,” they all seem a little bland. The word includes a sense of puckishness and daring, at least in my mind. It’s a word to keep you going on average days and dancing on extraordinary ones.

This particular conversation happened two days after a fall that had me headed to the doctor that afternoon. Words weren’t forming properly for me, and I thought someone who knew what they were doing should probably look at the wound over my eye where I’d slapped a bandage to stop the bleeding. But I’m sure my coffee companion talked about “moxie” and his own search to find calling and grace.

My diagnosis was “a mild concussion.” The instructions were to do “nothing.” “Soft music. Stay away from the computer.” Having learned in the past couple of years that sometimes an illness is our bodies trying to get our attention (just stay with me on this one) and because I had no explanation for falling ( I didn’t trip and didn’t pass out, but just suddenly saw that my head was headed towards the sidewalk), I explain the fall by saying my body wanted my attention.

So if this is true, what am I learning? First has been the lure of the word “moxie.” What does this mean about who I can be? Who you can be? Who we are as we live in the moment? In fact, it might mean to do even less than being present, a state I’ve been touting as what we really need to learn to change the world and our personal world, i.e., to just “be.” (For some reason, for me, there is a sense of expectation in the present, which is why I’ll be talking about miracles in a moment.) It’s amazing what happens with just being, doing nothing. For example, while doing nothing, I’ve connected deeply with people who affirm a future I’m barely naming (that’s too active).

“Sure you can stay with us in Seattle for a week or so while you figure out if this is where you should live.”

“Did you send that resume yet? I’ll be your goad.”

“That won’t work. Wrong context. You need to come at a discount to this conference. I have someone you need to meet who can help reframe that.”

It is moxie that creates the possibilities around us, And helps us see them. Oh, and say yes to them. So what is right there for you to see? And when you see it, is there a moxie kinda “yes” waiting?

Yeah, yeah. What about the miracles you say? Nothing about a concussion and lying low fits that. Well, the day I woke up with instructions to do nothing all day the sky was just, simply grey. It was a perfect fit that didn’t demand anything of me. Yes, you say. Another coincidence. Well, the nagging past/future conversation that has been bothering me is when people either discount miracles or assume they are so obvious that they don’t delight in them. (“Delight” is a moxie trait. Really.) My most recent complicated example of feeling discounted was being with people who, if you’d asked them, believed in miracles. I love shrimp, and finding new styles of shrimp-and-grits cooking has become kind of a quest. But on my most recent trip, it wasn’t happening. The last night of the conference I went off by myself and sat at a deserted bar for a salad (since there were no shrimp on the menu and I wasn’t super hungry) and a local bourbon. The manager asked if it was OK if he joined me and brought his plate of the staff kitchen dinner a couple of seats away. Shrimp and grits. “Oh,” he said as I shared my love. “I’ll go see if there’s some left–think there might be some grits.” And a perfect bowl of grits–and shrimp to go with it–appeared in front of me. All at no charge. Miracles. What are the chances? Telling my friends about this experience (“I created shrimp and grits!”), I got an “of course” response. Where was the delight? The joy? Such events are never matter of fact for me, but I felt the miracle was discounted by those I told about it. [Just for the record, that picture is of the best shrimp-and-grits I’ve had, not the miracle ones!]

Other miracles. My friend Linda is a librarian at my local library. I can actually find her at work only when either I really need to confirm a social arrangement or need her particular brand of expertise. She works full time, and I almost never see her unless her presence will make a difference.

Or stopping by a pub in a strange city and learning from my fabulous bartender that they had a great brunch on Sunday, but, no, he wasn’t going to be working that day. Except, of course, he was there when I showed up. I almost apologized to him for “making” [a colleague had called in sick] him work and hoped he wanted extra hours.

There have been times I longed for social connections and they just were there. Or got the check in the mail. Or the call. Or multiple things that involve time working in strange ways, which is another conversation. There are such things as buses that arrive just as I get to a stop or are delayed and the delay makes everything work perfectly for me.

I’m finishing writing this on an airplane. Those of you who know me know I love airports and airplanes and am happiest en route. But yesterday, I visited my doctor who assured me my head wound would take six months to a year or two to heal completely and that he could feel the swelling above my eye that had me concerned. He assured me I’m fine and it was just a question of time. But cabin pressure on the airplane has it hurting a lot. Where’s the miracle there? However the moxie in me is thrilled that I’m traveling again and writing was easy and one of the people who loves making me feel cared for, whom I haven’t seen in months, was working at the Sky Club this morning. And it seemed a miracle at the time that all I got was a head wound, nothing broken, no stitches. Coincidences? Miracles? I think for this trip I’ll let it evolve and have me a moxie-filled adventure studded with miracles.

Come along. How does your moxie show up? Where are your miracles? This really is how we change the world.

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All photos by Spirit Moxie:
Selfie at the doctor’s office after the fall
Shrimp and grits at the Claremont Hotel, Berkeley, CA
The bartender who wasn’t supposed to be working! Stone Mad Pub, Cleveland, OH