It was a quiet Saturday morning in 2004, the kind of morning where the world feels slow enough to let you think - and slow enough to force you to feel.
My wife and I had finally found a pocket of time to talk. Really talk. All week we had been dancing around the tension in the air, both trying to stay strong for each other as newlyweds… and as soon-to-be parents. She rested her hand on her growing belly as we sat at the small kitchen table of our rented unit, the winter sunlight cutting across the room like a spotlight revealing the truth neither of us wanted to speak.
We were in trouble. Real trouble.
I had seen some low numbers in my life, but I had never seen our bank account balance sitting at $27. Twenty-seven dollars. The number burned into my mind like a neon sign flashing FAILURE. As a husband, a new father on the way, and the “provider,” it felt like a punch in the chest.
I remember quietly asking myself, How did I get here? And more importantly… how do I get us out?
Despite all my training - Life Coaching certification, NLP Practitioner, NLP Master Practitioner - I couldn’t think my way out of this one. I could help strangers create breakthroughs, but I couldn’t access one for myself. Pride kept me silent, fear kept me awake, and self-doubt kept me trapped.
That morning, something inside me broke… but something else awakened.
THE MOMENT EVERYTHING CHANGED
After our conversation, I walked into the bedroom and dropped to my knees beside the bed. I didn’t plan to pray - I just collapsed into it. And in that moment of helpless surrender, I felt a calm presence. A clarity. A direction.
I stood up, grabbed a shiny gold piece of cardboard - the kind you find in the craft aisle - and picked up a black permanent marker. I didn’t overthink it. I didn’t rehearse it. I just wrote.
I wrote an agreement with God.
A literal, physical contract.
A covenant.
I signed it.
And I meant it.
I stuck the agreement on the bathroom mirror where I’d be forced to see it every morning.
And something extraordinary happened.
THE MIRACLE
Within 24 hours - twenty-four hours -a cheque arrived in the mail. A cheque for $1,500.
From an insurance company I didn’t recognise.
I called them immediately, and after being passed around from one department to another, a confused woman on the phone said something I will never forget: “Sir… we have no record of that cheque. I guess it’s your lucky day.”
Lucky?
No.
Guided. I cashed the cheque. And as I walked out of the bank, a strange certainty washed over me: this was only the beginning.
THE FLOOD OF BLESSINGS
Over the next 3 months, opportunities started pouring in from directions I could never have predicted. People called me “out of the blue” saying the same thing: “I don’t know why… but I feel like you’re the person who can help me.”
Not one or two people.
Dozens.
Some had never met me. Some didn’t even know what I did. They just felt pulled.
My income skyrocketed.
My confidence resurfaced.
My faith surged.
I honoured the golden agreement. And the agreement honoured me. This wasn’t invisible magic. It wasn’t luck. It wasn’t coincidence. It was alignment - me working with God, instead of trying to work alone.
THE BIRTH OF INFINITY BELIEF
My good friend, Tony Frederick, watched my transformation and asked if I could teach him how to turn his own financial life around. I said yes. We sat together, step by step, and I walked him through the exact process I had used - the inner shifts, the outer actions, the spiritual alignment.
He applied everything.
And his life changed just as rapidly.
He looked at me one day and said,
“Rik, you have to write this down. The world needs to know this.” So I did.
I wrote a book originally titled Life Beyond Limits, later retitled by my publisher as A Richer Way To Think. People began flying in from around the world to learn what I had learned. They came not because I was special, but because I had tapped into a truth that belongs to everyone:
We are meant to be abundant.
We are meant to be guided.
We are never alone.
One chapter - The Power of Faith - became a turning point for thousands. It shares the same realization that saved my life: “Be within, and you will never be without.”
These words came to me one quiet morning, like a whisper from the Divine.
TWENTY-FOUR YEARS LATER
Today, 24 years have passed since that golden agreement was written. The cardboard has faded a little.
But the promise has not.
I still help people upgrade their inner world.
I still help them attract abundance.
I still teach them that the Divine is real, present, and willing - if we are. That golden agreement was the bridge that carried me from scarcity to service, from fear to faith, from limitation to a life beyond limits.
And I’ve learned this:
Your life changes the moment you align your belief with God’s vision for you.
It certainly changed mine.
By Rik Schnabel.