Day eighty-two, BOOM

With not quite the force of a ton of bricks, the hit was similar.

Having spent countless waking hours doing and the remaining hours thinking about the doing, the bricks fell with authority, funneling 60 years into six seconds.

I used to call them the Big Three. That was back int he day when I actually fooled myself into thinking I had it all rendered down to a few bullet points. Can you imagine the audacity? How do you condense the indefiniteness of the universe into less than a handful of conceptual moving parts? The chapter could be titled, A sophomore looks at life.

Anyway I did it. I listed the four points that seemed at the time to fit the requirement. I was teaching an alternative education class and needed an outline on the elements necessary to stay rooted on the path. A twelve steps in Cliff Notes. Just the facts Ma'am. Memorize these and you'll never ask for another road map. They were/are:

1) Think positive thoughts.
2) Be here and now.
3) Help others.
4) Be happy.

A rudimentary list of the basics. In my class I took each one and discussed in detail. It all made sense, kept the attention of the class and challenged me to use colorful anecdotes and graphic examples. I also got to hone my public speaking chops.

Under the Be Happy heading (No.4) I created a sub-category containing the above mentioned Big Three.

1) Mind
2) Body
3) Spirit.

With enough attention to the three, number four could be obtained, went my reasoning.

And up to yesterday, I held that premise as one of my highest truths. Profound in its simplicity, no?

But my health over the last year has headed south faster than swallows to Capistrano. The mysterious and as yet diagnosed malady has also caused memory loss, dizziness and what they call brain fog. There goes one AND two.

Leaving solely number three.

And guess what happened? I found out, perhaps the hard way, that with enough love, empathy, compassion, gratitude and passion for life, that the sound mind and body I once revered, are nothing compared to the power of spirit. No contest.

It was an amazing moment. Enlightening. An epiphany. Right passage. I sat paralyzed by the spontaneity and power with which those bricks hit.

BOOM