Trust in the Power of Questions

INTENSION: Curiosity

TOUCHSTONE:

Embrace Curiosity. Trust in the power of questions. While answers and certitude can bring rigidity and closure, questions and curiosity can offer discovery and possibility. Perhaps the greatest spiritual practice of all is to hold a beautiful question.

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Discovering a Spirit of Curiosity

Trusting in the power of questions is hard. I like KNOWING things! I want to know where I am supposed to go, what I am supposed to do, why I am here, and what this is all about. I want to KNOW! And yet, the answers to such questions rarely come…at least not easily. So why am I always seeking answers when so much of life’s journey is about living with the questions?

Humans are meaning making beings. We like to live within systems that define. We enjoy the comfort of systems that hold the answers for us. This is the appeal of fundamentalism. There is something very powerful about knowing what is “right” and what is “wrong,” because when you know that you can easily determine what side you are on. The problem is …life is seldom that easy.

I remember the summer I turned twenty and traveled outside of the United States for the first time. It was a very different world then…no internet, no personal computers, no iPhones. We got news the old-fashioned way, through the nightly news, the newspaper, and our immediate source, the radio. It was a world that was more contained, more controlled, and more defined by context than the world we currently live in. I believe there are both positive and negative things about such a world. (For more on that, see my article, "Living Life at Human Scale")

I was raised by parents who were taught and hence believed that everything American was the best. Therefore, I believed this as well. I also believed, as I was taught, that everyone, if they had the choice, would want to be an American. I remember every four years when the Olympics would be on TV, I would hear stories of athletes defecting or trying to defect to the United States. My parents would talk about all the restrictions in other countries and how people were risking everything to come to America. For me, this particular truth became a universal Truth. Without question, I believed that America was the greatest country in the world and that everyone, if given the choice, would want to be an American. I never imagined that anyone thought otherwise. Yes, naïve I know. Yet this was what I was raised to believe and the lens through which I viewed the world confirmed it.

That summer when I turned twenty, I traveled through Europe with a group of college students from the United States and Canada. My personal travel companion was my close friend and college roommate, Allyson. She was much more “worldly” than me. She had taken a gap year to live as an exchange student in South America the year between high school and college. That was before gap years were a thing. Allyson was the one who encouraged me to join her on the student tour through Europe for the summer. I had always wanted to travel, and this was my opportunity. During our freshman year of college, the plan to travel was formed. Both Allyson and I worked that summer, saving money for the trip. The next summer it was time for the tour.

Our European tour began in Spain. Our first stop was Madrid. Many of us on the tour had never been out of our home country. Our tour guide, Lucas, gave us instruction about the way things were in certain parts of Europe. He told us to watch our bags, especially in the big cities. He warned us about pickpockets. He talked about the poverty we may see on the streets. Lucas was adeptly aware of the fact that some of us may have been sheltered from such things. He wanted to prepare us as best he could.

Interestingly, the poverty I saw on the streets of Madrid, and other places like Paris, simply confirmed my beliefs. I thought, “America really is the greatest country in the world. I see now how things are so much better where I live. No wonder everyone wants to live in America.” (Context being key here. Other than encountering those experiencing homelessness in downtown Atlanta, I had no real encounter with poverty in my own country. It was a lot easier to believe “THE World” was “MY World” in those days.)

As the trip continued, I was amazed by everything…standing in the shadows of antiquity at the Parthenon, passing through the breath-taking beauty of the Swiss Alps, climbing the height of the Eiffel Tower, laughing and conversing with fellow students from around the world at youth hostels…even passing through Checkpoint Charlie and walking the streets of East Berlin in the days when the Berlin wall was still standing. Everywhere I went the world was opening me to new experiences and new ways of seeing. My smaller view of the world was growing larger each day. And then…I met Allyson’s friend in England.

Allyson’s hometown in West Virginia had hosted a strong student exchange program. As a result, Allyson had several friends in Europe. One night we met up with one of her European friends for dinner. The conversation that ensued shifted my understanding of things forever.

Allyson’s friend to my shock and dismay, was not a fan of America. In fact, she thought we were a joke of a country, electing an actor as our president. She questioned our welfare system, our health care, our views of industry and commerce. Actually, to say she wasn’t a fan of America was an understatement. She despised everything about America. I couldn’t believe it! This was someone from a first world country. This was someone who came from a country that I thought was our ally. How could she NOT love America?! What was happening? Was there another perspective that I had never even imagined?

I remember that moment because in many ways that was my awakening. That summer as a whole was my awakening. As odd as it may sound, maybe a better way of saying it is that it was the time of my “sprouting.” The ground of my upbringing had held me in a safe and secure environment that allowed me to germinate and grow. Then, when it was time, I was ready to “sprout” beyond that ground into a new world of discovery. It seems that before that point in life, my life revolved around a series of answers. I had been taught a way to live and had been provided the world within which to live it. The problem was that that world was not big enough for me anymore. Once I had been exposed to life outside of my context, there was so much more that I wanted to know and understand. I started to live life with more curiosity. I started to ask, “What are the other things I do not know about life? …the world? …people?” and more specifically, “What might my life be like if I were born in a different place? What would I think? What would I believe?”

I am grateful for my upbringing, but I am also grateful for the journey I have been on since. I am grateful for the experiences and learning that have expanded my world. My trip that summer and my encounter with Allyson’s friend opened me to something of great value. That summer sparked within me a spirit of curiosity.

What Can Be Gained by Holding a Question?

I believe that most of our conflicts, internal and with others, come from an inability to hold life with curiosity. As the Touchstone says, “While answers and certitude can bring rigidity and closure, questions and curiosity can offer discovery and possibility.” When I was a young person, I rarely thought to question what I had been taught, especially if those teachings came from my family. On a developmental level, that can be healthy. Young people need the stability of a firm foundation. Once the foundation is built, however, that foundation often serves as something to push against. This is the movement from childhood into the teen years. Albeit difficult, individuation and questioning are a healthy part of human development. Hence, curiosity offers us something that we need. Curiosity can broaden our view, deepen our awareness, and invite empathy and compassion. Curiosity is a key component in our journey to live more fully.

Holding a question allows time for discovery to unfold. When I hold a question, it is like planting a seed. I gently place the seed within the soil of my own being. I offer it time and space to grow. I water the seed by returning to it ever so gently, remembering that it is there. I do not stomp on the ground around the seed demanding that it grow. I do not reach into the ground and pull at the seed yelling, “I need you here, now!” I simply let the seed be, knowing that in its own time, after a period of gestation, what it has to give will emerge. The answer to a question, like a seed, will sprout and unfurl when it is ready and when you are ready to receive it. Such requires the spaciousness, warmth, and trust that a curious mind and heart allow.

What are Some Examples of a Beautiful Question?

“The ability to ask beautiful questions, often in very unbeautiful moments, is one of the great disciplines of a human life. And a beautiful question starts to shape your identity as much by asking it, as it does by having it answered. You just have to keep asking. And before you know it, you will find yourself actually shaping a different life, meeting different people, finding conversations that are leading you in those directions that you

wouldn’t even have seen before.”

― David Whyte

Some Possible Questions for Everyday Life:

What am I grateful for in this moment?
How is grace showing up for me?
How did I experience love today?
What does my heart have to say to me in this moment?
Where did I see God today?
What is my body telling me?
What might the opposite perspective have to teach me?
What is the way to approach this problem that I have not yet imagined?
What might things be like if I were to listen more?
What supports my ability to be present?
What offers me peace, comfort, and joy?
When should I do the unexpected?
What am I like when I approach life with curiosity?
How are relationships different when I allow people to be who they are?
What makes me come alive?

Some Additional Possibilities from David Whyte and Martha Beck:

Do I know how to have real conversation?*
What can I be wholehearted about?*
What am I harvesting from this year's season of life?*
Can I be quiet—even inside?*
Am I too inflexible in my relationship to time?*
How can I know what I’m actually saying?*
How can I drink from the deep well of things as they are?*
Can I live a courageous life?*
Why worry?+
What questions should I be asking myself?+
Where am I wrong?+
What do I love to practice?+
Are my thoughts hurting or healing?+
How do I want the world to be different because I lived in it?+

Lessons from Living with Curiosity

CURIOSITY has taught me:

Be patient, because answers seldom come to you on demand. If you long for an answer and demand it to come, rarely does that happen. There is a deeper part of you that is resistant to demand. The harder you try to figure something out, the less clarity you receive. In fact, it can be counterproductive to force an answer. Forced answers are often false answers grounded in the egoic self, driven by fear and external expectation.
The way you hold your truth can become the way you hold your heart. If you hold your truth with the unwavering certitude of a clinched fist, your heart may become tight and rigid. Yet, if you hold your truth with the humility of an open hand, your heart may mirror such through openness and generosity.

I have found that when I plant the seed of a question and then go along with my life, giving the question time and space, the answer will often begin to unfurl. I have always been amazed by how this happens. It seems that a deeper, wiser part of me (true self) can see the way forward in a way that the demanding, controlling part of me (ego self) cannot. It is only when I allow myself time and space to receive the question that I gain clarity, insight, and direction. This process of discovery can take hours, days, months, or even years.

When I plant the seed of a beautiful question, I do not hold that question with the expectation of AN ANSWER. Rather, I walk with the beautiful question as a companion and guide. It seems that this type of question is meant to form me. As I hold it, I begin to see differently, I begin to notice things that I have not noticed before, and I find that my heart and mind are opened in a new way.

My friend, whatever your journey, I want to encourage you to embrace curiosity. Curiosity holds the power to expand both your mind and your heart, offering a life of discovery and possibility.

With love and gratitude,