I was vying for a position as an Executive Assistant when I noticed someone had posted a Mitch Albom quote about miracles in my Facebook feed. 

“Miracles happen quietly every day – in an operating room, on a stormy sea, in the sudden appearance of a roadside stranger. They are rarely tallied. No one keeps score…”

I spent my whole life trying to find miracles and it often backfired. I asked my boyfriend at the time, why I never seemed to have any luck scoring good jobs. I prepared myself to fend off gushing remarks to make me feel better. 

Instead, he turned to me, and said in a serious tone, “You will be nothing but a librarian. You’re of average intelligence.”

I was in shock. Was this how the world saw me?

The worst thing was, I couldn’t even get a job as a librarian, let alone anything else.

I continued surfing the web, searching for jobs and turning to a forum for the unemployed. Even most of the other people posting there were a success who had just fallen on hard times, eventually finding new careers they never conjured, or getting better jobs.

Compared to the wages of my friends’, and their accompanying job status, I had achieved nothing. I had studied to be a journalist but the writing world eluded me and I ended up in low skilled jobs. I knew what they all thought.

A rich friend said to me once, “life has been so unfair to you, you’re always struggling, it must be so hard to live on your wage.”

Yet…. for all her riches, her world seemed perennially dissatisfying. An immaculate kitchen always needed renovating, expensive crockery got smashed nonchalantly in the chaos of life. Her husband would get home late from a well-paid corporate job and hardly speak a word.

 “Are you still trying to be a writer?” he would ask her.

To apply for the Executive Assistant position, I had to complete a pschometric assessment. For hours, I completed question after question; visual logic puzzle after visual logic puzzle, until… a message popped up on the screen:

“You have an IQ of 124. Only 3% of the population get 125 and above.”

I took the test again to be sure – the same thing again. Suddenly it dawned on me. Maybe miracles did occur, but tragedy and ordinariness disguise them.

Was this why I was unemployed? Was the universe trying to tell me I was intelligent but humbling me so I didn’t take life for granted?

I didn’t get the Executive Assistant job.  I didn’t get a lot of jobs.  But I figured if I was always on the outside, maybe I was meant to be there. I decided to go it alone and become a massage therapist.

Gaining a diploma in massage therapy was a nightmare, what with a student accusing me of injuring them; protracted study requirements while working; administration problems and blunders. But having to fight for my opportunities made me fight harder. Two years that turned into three and half years later, I was finally qualified.

Having an eye for saving, I run a mobile massage business. I don’t have overheads for a clinic nor do I pay public liability insurance. Suffering has given me resilience to deal with income peaks and troughs; even clinical ethics – as I don’t take my privileged autonomy for granted.

Missing out on many jobs has made me a business owner – something I didn’t think I could be. I have half my friends’ income yet enjoy every moment of my job. As I fly down country roads, sailing past technicolor yellow canola fields, I feel lucky after all.

Following my new career path, I also found new friends who seem to enjoy and value my company a lot more.

About the Author:  Kerry Millan – Kerry’s poems and articles have been published in Australia and overseas. Working as a massage therapist, cooking, and all things creative, helps with the ebbs and flows of writing