Believing is Seeing: Dawn of a New Day

I begin every morning with a meditation after I open the shades and let the light of a new day enter my room.

Yesterday's sunrise was spectacular and inspired a poem:


Dawn of a New Day from the soon to be released Hope: A Collection of Essays and Poems From the Pandemic of 2020:

Dawn of a new day
radiant morning light
a kiss to awaken

Daybreak whisks away yesterday’s cobwebs of worry
greeting new day with a heart full of gratitude
possibilities await on the horizon

How will you paint the Masterpiece of today
each moment an opportunity to reveal and revel

Bask in the Love of the Divine
Rejoice in the dawn of a new day!

I reflected on the wonder and awe of creation in the world and in my corner of the Universe.

By all appearances and predictions from the medical community, I 'should' have been sitting in a wheelchair right now with all kinds of adaptive equipment to support a neuromuscular system deemed headed on a rapid decline. It was called Post Polio Syndrome and was the result of the late effects of having contracted paralytic polio at the age of 5. While paralytic polio is a devastating virus that impacts the spinal cord, brain and connections between nerves and muscles, it can be healed (as can any disease) given the right environment. Unfortunately, the environment I lived in growing up was rife with violence and anything but conducive to healing and recovery.

At the age of 53 I had an incredible opportunity to heal my life with the crisis of that diagnosis.

I got still, asked for Divine Guidance and harnessed the power of my imagination through writing poetry. I saw and felt a future very different from the one that the Western Medical model predicted for me. I healed my past with poems of gratitude and forgiveness.
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In my meditations, I visualized the Divine as my Master Electrician rewiring my body. I worked my body in new ways under the guidance of a physical therapist who believed in the body's innate capacity to heal and then with a personal trainer who subscribed to Henry Ford's mantra of whether you think you can or you think you can't, you're right.

Despite all appearances, I believed in my mind's eye that I could and would run the 2009 Boston Marathon:


Before February of 2008, I had never run a day in my life!

In December of 2014, my left knee blew out. I briefly returned to Western Medicine to see what needed to be healed. As expected, the prognosis was grim but I refused to be grim.

After an epic fail with a physical therapist, the Universe led me to an amazing chiropractor. He gave me a new strength training program, chiropractic treatments, KT tape and new mind/body healing resources to get me back on the roads and continue my forward momentum in my healing journey.

I went on to run Half Marathons in Bermuda in 2016, 2017 and 2018!

Every dawn is a new day; an opportunity to see ourselves and the world the way we want things to be. It is so easy to get pulled in the undertow of catastrophic news and the rancor in the political landscape. I start my day with imagining what headlines I would like to read and transform raging fires, devastating hurricanes and the raging fear of a pandemic into a world where Mother Nature is in balance, where people focus on their health and well being and where inevitable storms that are a part of life are no longer catastrophic in nature.

I know that together we can create a new world order; that these recent months of navigating our way through turbulent times will lead us to a better place.

You may wonder how can she hold onto hope and optimism when, by all appearances, everything is falling apart...My answer to that question is that believing is seeing!

To learn more about my inspiring journey and explore healing resources, be sure to visit my website at www.marymcmanus.com

My books are available on Amazon

From my heart to yours
to your health and well being
Mary