Wonders out of you

                                                                                    Phys 52.1 / 07.10.07

 
          People don’t make geniuses out of a nobody. How does it happen then?

They go above themselves.

Albert (yes I call him in first name basis now) was astonishingly normal. Unlike how most people perceived him to be. (Or at least, now). He had those troublesome moments of temporary paranoia over making it with life or just down right failing at it. He wasn’t particularly special, no fanlisting of any sort, was not exceptionally favored by his teachers. More surprisingly, he had moments of notable detestation from one of his high school teachers. He had friends, though - friends whom he laughed with, and gossiped with. I don’t know ‘bout you. But he seems like the ordinary Joe to me.

That was Albert Einstein simply being unmasked from the miracles of 1905 and the wonders that pivoted from it through the future. Statistically speaking, he’d be naturally a median. Average, so to speak. Struggling. And nearly failing, even.

But what happened? It’s almost as if the gods gave him a crumb (yes, just one) of their celestial food and it drew phenomenon after phenomenon for him from that single crumb. In Einstein’s language the crumb became a quantum and everything was colored and breathed through a four-dimensional space-time. If Newton discovered the universe, Einstein unlocked it. And I didn’t mean the universe per se, I meant the laws that came with it, and how any man could possibly bring forth those laws in a most logical mathematical brogue. I can only think of a word. Miraculous.

Einstein didn’t receive a crumb from the gods, though. I’m pretty much sure things didn’t happen that way. During Einstein’s time, Mount Olympus was not particularly sitting cheekily at its pedestal any more. Science became the tenet of reality and it had Mathematics for a foundation. So when Einstein hit the jackpot one perfect morning, it was purty much a repercussion of brilliant thinking within the bounds of numbers, imagination and logic. So how, pray tell?

He obviously went above himself.

He had failures and tons of unproductive days to deal with. Money problems. To add spice to the situation, he didn’t have the pleasure of time to even visit the library because by the time work was over, so were the doors of the library. That didn’t stop him, though. And this is where he cuts off from all the medians of the world. He went forward and didn’t stop. He kept on until he bumped on the next best thing which practically flipped the entire world of science on where and how it’s supposed to be viewed, understood and chopped.

Yes, Einstein had the genes to match the works of his brilliant brain. But if he had a sappy attitude and gave up easily, who knows where modern science would pick stuff up. I’m a fan of Physics (favorite subject), because next to Math, it makes the most sense of them all. So to me, they are the things that I believe in a hundred percent, almost. 

I don’t believe too much in predestination, though. In this life, we write our own stories and live our own lives. Life happens because we choose it to happen. And yes, there will always be accidents beyond us. Histories that seemingly peg us to be predisposed of something that’s greater than our own will. Seemingly. Just seemingly. Why? Because I’ve known stories of people who were seemingly predestined to be nothing, and yet they drew wonders and miracles out of themselves. And that didn’t happen by luck. That happened because they worked hard for it to happen.

What happened to Einstein could happen to anybody. Well, of course the theory of relativity and all the original brilliance of Einstein would have to be out of the choices. The miracle that happened to Einstein could happen to anyone, though. People just have to work hard for things to happen and go above themselves until they bump unto their next best thing.

Until I bump into my next best thing, I shall work hard to go above myself and try my best to draw wonders out of my ordinary. The road should be difficult, but nothing’s wrong with trying and on keeping the feet on the run. Einstein did it. We should, too.

So what do you think about making wonders out of yourself? It’s a tough challenge. But the prize is promising.

As the Nike logo says, “Leave your old self behind.”