One a day...

Yesterday as my appointment ended with my herbal/qigong/meditation practitioner, she stated that 2025 is a Nine year.

My eyes lit up.

"What do you mean?" I asked.

She answered, "When the digits are added up, they equal nine. Nine is the completion of a cycle bringing in a new cycle the following year."

"Wow. I just wrote a blog piece about the number nine," I responded.

We both discussed our love and fascination with the number nine.

I then opened my journal and showed her my recent reduction calculations of the first day and last day of each month through the years 2023 and 2024. 

I'd handwritten them in columns; it was easy to see the patterns from month to month and year to year.

When each month or day reduces to 9, the pattern begins again at 1.

This all started for me on June 24th.

I wrote the date at the top of my journal entry: 06/24/24. 

The number 24 equals 6 when reduced by adding the two digits: 2 + 4 = 6.

6/24/24 became 666, which caught my attention and made me laugh.

Thereafter, I started adding the digits every time I dated a journal entry.

And a pattern emerged. 

A few months later, I learned that I was calculating using the Pythagorean theory of reduction. 

(I write more about the process here: Mighty Fine Number Nine...)

~*~

I typically don't make New Year's resolutions. 

However, I do typically think in terms of a theme for the year. 

Sometimes I'll remember the theme through the year; sometimes not so much, until something happens that brings the theme back to consciousness.

A few days ago, I thought, "I want to be ordinary." 

I chuckled, "That'd be a good goal and theme for the year -- to be ordinary." 

But there is a twist...

My "ordinary" is in the context of all the ordinary miracles that surround us every day...

From sunrise to sunrise and all that happens in between...

Life itself is an ordinary miracle...

As far as scientists can supposedly calculate, one human body contains 36 trillion cells...

That's pretty miraculous...

~*~

Currently, as I endeavor to grow/transform/alchemize my morning-wake-up-to-another-day-of-struggle dread into wake-up-to-another-day-of-mystery gratitude, I've set an intention to note and be aware of at least one spontaneity or serendipity each 24-hour period and to write it in my journal at the end of each day.

So, for yesterday, the unsolicited (and thus spontaneous) subject of 2025 being a Nine year was added to my serendipity list, and it prompted me to look up that subject today.

I landed on a website about Numerology.

From what I read: "The foundation of Numerology is the single digits 1-9..."

The practice uses the reduction method with which I have become so intrigued.

I did not know that; maybe I'm a closet Numerologist. 

I know little about Astrology and even less about Numerology.

Do I believe either influences our lives? 

I'm open to the idea, but I can't say I believe it as an absolute truth, can I?

~*~

Another major serendipity this week happened Sunday evening...

Two bucks in the back yard battled for their territory...

They fought and one ran away...

Then he ran back and fought again until he submitted, again running away...

Another wild-kingdom moment in our backyard...

The serendipity?

A real-life, real-time example of an observation from a film I watched last week, Things Hidden: The Life and Legacy of René Girard. 

In the film, Girard shares one difference between humans and animals.

Animals (typically?) do not fight to the death with their opponent (within their own species, I assume).

One animal always gives up before death, granting dominance to his competition.

Humans, on the other hand, will kill their own species to conquer a given territory or to win a desired outcome.

~*~

So, Carol, be aware of... 

The "spontaneities," the "serendipities"...

The "ordinaries," the "miracles"...

One a day...

I guess it is a goal and a theme...

But would I call it a "resolution?"... 

~*~

Sarah McLachlan with Ordinary Miracle...

~*~

In looking up the etymology of resolution, I discover another serendipity: "a process of reducing things into simpler forms."  

Brings to mind the reduction of numbers. Ha. 

Source: The Etymology of “Resolution":

"To loosen, release, explain"...

"A breaking into parts"...

"Resolution’s earliest 14th century definition drew from its direct Latin source resolutionem (perhaps via the Old French resolution), which meant 'a process of reducing things into simpler forms,' drawing from the notion of resolvere as a word for 'loosen' or 'untie.'"

"The phrase "New Year's resolution" was first used in 1780 (or perhaps earlier)..."

~*~