He lived his life as if he were floating in the womb of the universe...

I asked Bryn, a friend of mine shortly before he died, what was different about life now that he’d been in recovery over 25 years? And he answered by telling me a story about the 3 women who’d won a competition run by the local supermarket to fill their trolleys with as many goods as they could in 5 minutes.

The whistle went, and two of the women rushed around as if they were possessed – stacking the biggest and most expensive goods into their trolleys: computers, TV sets, Radios, Cassettes, DVSs, mobile phones, sat nav’s, etc.

The third woman, meanwhile, ambled quietly from aisle to aisle selecting a quarter of tea here, two pounds of sugar there. She noticed that one of the other women, in her mad selfish scramble to get the biggest and the best into her trolley, had accidentally dropped a digital radio set on the floor, so she rushed over and picked it up and placed it in the other woman’s already packed trolley. The other woman didn’t even notice as the third woman returned to her own shopping and selected a packet of Shortbread biscuits, before heading off slowly for the cheese counter to select a nice cheddar for tea.

Soon the five minutes were up, and the women returned to the till to tot up their “takings”. Two of the women’s trolleys were stacked as high as they could get - reaching the ceiling. They then noticed the third woman had only about ten items in her trolley – and they started to make fun of her. We do that, don’t we, when we see someone whose behaving differently to us?

“What do you think you’re doing?” one of the two women asked her indignantly.

“What do you mean?” said the third woman.

“Well, don’t you understand the rules of the competition, woman?”

“What rules?” said the third woman.

“Well, we’re supposed to fill our trolleys with as many goods as possible, like we’ve done, you silly fool; look.” And she pointed to the mountain of goods stacked sky high on both their trolleys.
“But why should I do that?” said the third woman innocently.

“What do you mean ‘why should I do that?”

“Well, why should I?” She said again. You see, my father owns the supermarket.”

By then you see, Bryn lived his life as if he were floating in the womb of the universe and being taken care of always at every moment. He knew full well that all his needs would be met. And I knew that he knew (that’s what’s important) – just by looking at him.