What is the difference between 97% and 100%? That gap of “the final 3%” can have a critical impact. A project 97% finished is not. Total focus with 3% distraction is not. Totality, or 100%, is the dramatic shift of the final three percent.
Note about the image: One of my favorite spots in Mystery Acres, a place to experience totality of the forest experience. For a picture of me in eclipse glasses go to The Big Screen.
My Mysterious Mind
April 8, 2024 was a special day for much of North America; a band of total solar eclipse marched across the continent in a different, and wider, trajectory than August 21, 2017. The next total solar eclipse will be August 12, 2026 but will require a trip to Greenland, Iceland, Spain, or Russia. For North America, there will be a total eclipse March 30, 2033 but only people in Alaska will enjoy the celestial spectacle. After that, the next total solar eclipse in North America will be August 22, 2044, twenty years from now.
Aside from those in the path of totality, many more people have, or will, witness partial eclipses. In 2017, my husband and I drove a bit more than two hours to view a bit more than two minutes of totality at my older brother’s home. My parents joined us for a memorable afternoon on the deck, the last cancer-free memory with my mother, who died in 2018 from a return of cancer. On April 8, 2024, my husband and I were at our oldest daughter’s home in Indiana. We sat in her backyard and enjoyed over four minutes of totality, our newest grandson, only one-month old, slept in the shade behind us.
This year, as in 2017, our home was in about a 97% eclipse, allowing me to compare notes with many friends and students who witnessed a near-total eclipse. For both 2017 and 2024, I had witnessed 97% of an eclipse, moments before the moon completely blocked the sun’s rays. The difference in the experience of 97% and 100% is dramatic. The temperature drops, planets become visible, and it is safe to look directly towards the sun without eye protection. The corona of the sun is visible around the edges of the moon; this year reddish areas of intense solar activity could be seen without a telescope. My daughter, prepared to be unimpressed like the middle-school children in her classes, was awe-struck. The majestic beauty is hard to describe and impossible to capture in pictures or video. You just have to experience it to understand.
Which got me thinking about the difference between 97% and 100% in other aspects of life. There’s a huge difference between an almost-finished college degree and a completed one. A cake that has only baked part of its required time is undone in the middle. An “Incomplete” grade in a class earns no college credit, and will convert to an “F” if neglected too long.
I started a redecorating project a couple of years ago that involved the living room, dining room, stairway, kitchen, and two hallways, all connected. Everything is finished except the kitchen walls, which need wallpaper stripped and new paint applied. This final step will bring the entire transformation together. Except the thirty-year old wallpaper is still on the walls of the kitchen. The project is 97% complete, but that final 3% will make a big difference.
When will I get around to finishing that project? Getting “a round to it” is such a common problem that, years ago, my grandfather received a round wooden disc as part of a promotion. Stamped on the disc was “TUIT” with instructions to use this “round TUIT” as a way to complete an important task. I started thinking about that strange wooden disc as I was pondering the unfinished business in my life. What was keeping me from getting around to it? What unfinished business do you have? What is keeping us from reaching totality?
Message from Mystery Acres
Most of my world is about getting things done; Mystery Acres is different. If I made a “to do” list of projects for our place in the forest, it would be really long and discouraging. Just the things we plan to do to our little cabin are extensive. Add to that list the annual tasks of upkeep, and the joy of Mystery Acres is quickly replaced with the burden of unfinished business.
Mystery Acres isn’t about the totality of completed tasks; Mystery Acres is about the totality of being present. Like other recreational activities and hobbies, the totality is achieved by complete focus, by becoming “lost” in the experience. People go to sporting events, movies, or live performances, to totally escape from the rest of their lives for a few hours. If 3% of their focus is on a problem from the “outside world,” the 97% focus won’t have the same healing affect as 100% would.
For projects, the difference between 97% and 100% means the cognitive burden of unfinished business is still carried. For hobbies, the 3% gap is the distance between a partial escape and a total one. In both, the benefit of cognitive release is achieved only by reaching 100%. That 97%, though it would be an A in any of the classes I teach, is far short of the benefits of 100%.
The message of Mystery Acres is a voice calling for complete immersion into whatever brings you restoration and a call to completion of unfinished business. A focus of only 97% is far away from the benefit of total focus. A 97% completed task is a mental and emotional drain until it reaches total completion. Totality is more than a few percent points better than 97%; that final 3% is huge.
Ancient Mystery’s Voice
“Finish the race.” (see Acts 20:24)
In a speech recorded by Luke in the book of Acts, the apostle Paul said his only aim was to “finish the race” and complete the task he received from his Lord Jesus Christ. The word often translated as “race” is more closely translated as “course” because the verse is not referring to a competition with other runners, but, rather, a set of assignments for an individual. Many translations also add the phrase “with joy” as to the attitude with which Paul intends to complete his mission, the task of telling people good news about how much God loves them.
The consistent emphasis in all of the translations is finishing. Alternate words of “completing” or “accomplishing” all indicate a 100%, not a 97%, or “almost” attainment. For Paul, he only had one item on his “to do” list and his total focus of life was finishing that assignment. He was a totality kind of guy.
Jesus was also a person with a singular purpose. He didn’t get to the cross, reach 97% dead, and back away from finishing. He is even quoted as having said, during his final moments, “it is finished.” He didn’t offer his saving words to 97% of His listeners, but to all of them; some chose not to believe what He was saying. He offered salvation to all who believed, not grading on the curve, but providing a totality of life-change. The totality of focus Jesus demonstrated is offered as a model of focused existence and complete surrender of self-serving purpose.
Paul’s singularity of focus, as captured in these two-thousand-year-old words, is worth contemplating. I wonder if my “to do” list were reduced to only one task what that singular purpose would be. If your life were reduced to a totality of one task, with daily objectives supporting its accomplishment, what would your focus be? What does totality of purpose look like to each of us?
Living in Mystery
To live in the mystery of totality is to apply the benefit of the final three percent. The totality principle can be lived in at least three ways. Unfinished business, distracted living, and fragmented purpose are signs of the incomplete gap of less-than-totality living.
First, living in the mystery of totality means finishing things. Make a list of your unfinished business. At the top of mine is that makeover and the kitchen walls awaiting me. Instead of thinking you will get “around to it” someday, decide what day that will be. I just this moment wrote “kitchen walls” on my calendar for Memorial Weekend. I’d like to get that makeover finished before the distractions of summer settle into my world. It will be great to get that project off my mind. What cognitive space can you clear by committing to the final 3% needed for totality?
Second, totality of focus during recreational time brings deeper restoration than distracted focus. What hobby or place can you get 100% away from the rest of your world? How can you achieve that final 3% focus in those spaces or activities? Consider how your cell phone or smart watch might be preventing the release of total escape. Distracted recreation is like a partial eclipse, it’s far less able to create a miraculous experience.
Lastly, what is your purpose in life? Do you live with a singularity of purpose, or a fragmented scattering of activity? This is perhaps the hardest of the three paths to totality because it leaves no 3% in any direction. Try to summarize your life’s goal into what would fit on a grave marker. Honestly, this is hard for me, but I am going to think about it. The closest I can come at this point is a three-fold purpose: To live, to love, and to learn. Each of these has a rich and complex meaning for me.
The message of totality challenges each of us to push through the final gap between 97% and 100%. Totality living has a focus of purpose, times of complete restoration, and a very short list of unfinished business.
Connecting With Mystery
Dear Lord of All Mystery, thank You for the wonder of a solar eclipse. It amazes me that the moon is the perfect size and distance to block all but the sun’s corona. You cleared the sky of clouds so millions could marvel at this rare and spectacular display. Help me to live with greater focus and less fragmentation, becoming a beautiful display for others. Thank You for helping me and never holding back even the tiniest percentage of what I need. Amen.
Notes from Dr. Mac
If you want to do your own investigation of any of the scriptures I use, I suggest you go to Bible Gateway. This free online version of the Bible offers a search of words or phrases in various translations. For this week’s meditation I suggest you look up Acts 20:24 and click on “Other translations.” I find this deepens my contemplation of a single verse by considering its different wording.
You can find previous posts and podcasts in my ARCHIVE and organized compilations in the My “Books” section.
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