When we are young we learn numbers. The first are likely 1-50 and then the day of our birth and our corresponding age. The next would be perhaps a phone number or address. Our home base.
As we get older, so many numbers to remember. Passwords, other addresses, phone numbers, averages, weight, measurements, salaries, bills, blood test results, months pregnant, ages of children, then maybe sizes of tumors, prognosis - years predicted to live..... days left....many more numbers. These numbers hold corresponding relevance and importance depending on who we are, how we were raised to regard them and how much they impact us.
Everyone has a favourite number. It bears significance somehow. We attach significance to numbers because it quantifies things, it comforts us, it allows us to gauge where we're at. Maybe it brings us closer to a goal, maybe a number just represents a vision.
For some people, numbers are of no comfort. For those with cancer, numbers are scary. Percentages, averages, prognosis....days to live. When did numbers become so important?
What makes a number so unique? Is it that it's an absolute in and of itself? Or is it that since we've been young it's been something that we used to anchor ourselves? Is it something that is absolute? Mathematics, is the strongest of all the philosophies, well...not so much a philosophy any more more of a science now but it started out as a question....what is ONE?
Numbers, as we age, mean less.....if we're sick even less. They're abstract concepts....predictions....something you may ask for to feel more control but really no one has the number for you.
NO one can tell you how many days you have left to live. We want numbers. The older we get, the more unreliable they are. There's no calculation, no magic number, no age. The number is ONE.
We have ONE day. This one. We have ONE chance to improve or stay the same or get worse. Today. ONE.
We can spend this day worried about how many are left, or we can spend it aware it's the ONE we have.
We can remember all those numbers, we can somehow convince ourselves they are equal but nothing is equal to ONE.
ONE chance to make a first impression.
ONE chance to make someone smile.
ONE chance to enjoy a sunset.
ONE chance to wake up.
ONE chance to appreciate that we are alive today.
Sooner or later that ONE will be zero...or infinity, depending on what you believe but today that number is ONE.
ONE home.
ONE family.
ONE self.
ONE home. In ourselves.
I decided to write this because my address growing up was 124, the entry number of this blog. Today it is 1.
1 me.
Just today...never to be repeated. They don't add up. It's just 1 and then another 1.
We can live to 100 and never have just 1 day where we are truly alive or we can live to be 44 and live each day like it's the ONE.
I'm still waiting on my results. Instead of counting hours and days......I'm counting this 1.
I'm not waiting around for numbers. I'm taking it by ONES.
We are trained to think ahead, to project, to quantify and to evaluate.
What we aren't trained to do is focus on the ONE.
What are we doing now? What are we focused on now? What matters now?
It's only ONE.
The mind can hold only ONE thought at a time. Make it a positive one.
That ONE becomes your home address, regardless of where you are from, grew up or are going.
Focus on the ONE.
It's the only number that matters.
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