I created the Universe on my birthday (Part 0)

Friday the 9th. My birthday. A group of worshippers celebrated the holiday of a deity. It was the beginning and the end of a world. What had ended, and what had begun?

I frequently obtained perfect marks on those weekly math tests in grade 6. Except in grade 7, I got more attention for it. One guy rubbed my cheeks on Friday for good luck on the tests. On Monday, another guy always announced my grade. I kept answering all those questions and making comments in class that everyone thought I had the Divine Spark. “He knows everything.“ The essays I wrote at the time flowed like poetry. Gold was everywhere I touched, even in the higher realms.  I lived in the sunlit sphere among the leaves of the tree of life.

With gold, comes ritual. A methodical, disciplined approach to life flowed out of the gold and in turn revealed more gold hidden in rocks. The rituals are well preserved in my memory, however, there is not enough space here for it. Instead, a discussion of their contribution and effect on the later part of my life is well worth the effort. For the rituals, just pretend that they are a set of actions, if performed to perfection, brought the greatest of joy. Nevertheless, a less than perfect performance still brought much joy, since the fun was in everything I did. A set of mental repetitions accompanied some rituals to bring the mind to a highly focused state and to enhance performance.

There were some immediate results of a ritualized life: high scores on standardized tests, high score on standardized IQ test, an award for music performance. I outperformed my own expectations on nearly everything: the yearly TCAP, in the 85-95 percentile, IQ test for the gifted class,  99.5 percentile, test for knowledge master team. I was able to run faster than ever in the afternoons.

In light of the 7 years that followed, I must admit I was running. Fear behind me, joy before me. The man flying towards the sun cannot see his shadow. He is blinded by the light. He soars on his wings. What follows is that the wax on his wings melt, and he drops off into the sea.

Books read:

• A biography of Einstein
• Lord of the Rings
• Til We Have Faces
• Chinese Children’s Encyclopedia of Knowledge (A Hundred Thousand Why’s)
• A Collection of Children’s Short Stories
• Workbook of Mind Blowing Puzzles
• Book of Fun, Games, and Puzzles
• The Book of Three
• Charlie and the Chocloate Factory

Next episode: gold turns into ashes, then gets blown away by the wind