Living the Questions

Welcome to Tuesday’s with Chel.

Each week Chel Micheline of Gingerblue will offer her perspectives on our Bliss Habits. Please enjoy the wisdom and clarity she offers.

“…have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don’t search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer.” – Rainer Maria Rilke

I have read this quote a zillion times over the last twenty years, and until very recently, I had no idea what on earth Rilke’s advice to “live the questions” meant.

I think I’m starting to get it, though.

I truly believe what Rilke was advising was to love *whatever* questions you have rolling around inside you; to love all those uncertainties, and doubts, and even turmoil that might be weighing you down.

I believe Rilke was advising that we even love the really gritty stuff we don’t want to acknowledge because it’s so painful or weird or far-fetched. To love that little idea that is so scary that even the thought of dipping into it with your pinkie toe might set your life into complete chaos.

Maybe ”love” is too grand a word. It is for me. But I think there’s something to be said about HONORING the existence of uncertainty inside us.

I’m not talking about the thoughts of “ohmygoodness so many terrible things can happen to us on our drive today and I couldn’t handle it if something did” but more along the lines of “I’m not completely sure I’m happy with that choice I made yesterday” or “I wish I had gone back to school” or “maybe I’m supposed to be a teacher”. These thoughts are usually followed with a “…but, it’s too late” or “…whatever, why rock the boat?” or “…there’s no way it could happen”.

We all experience this feeling- it’s a leftover from our prehistoric ancestors.

Personally, I find the idea of just LETTING the uncertainty exist rather than trying to stomp it out really kind of scary. It’s sort of like an ember that might turn into a forest fire- give that spark a little air, and a little space, and it might explode into a Big Bad Thing and engulf our entire world in flames.

In my personal experience, the minute something a little conflicted or uncomfortable comes up inside me, I can feel myself react very strongly, desperate to chase the discomfort away. Get that spark OUT.

But maybe banishing and censoring the uncertainties we have inside us isn’t such a great idea. Maybe we’re stunting our own growth by doing this constant “damage control” inside of us, by being so vigilant about what we allow to take space. The one thing about “damage control” is that it rarely chases the uncertainties away for more than a few minutes. It’s just a constant, raging effort that takes a lot of emotional energy. And maybe it’s not worth that energy.

What would happen if we gave each of those uncertain thoughts, the “what if-?”s some space and time? What if we opened a dialogue with them, even in a small way? What if we just acknowledged their existence?

We don’t need to follow these questions, or take action on them, or search for the answers. Just allow them to pop up to the surface and see what happens.

Ideas are just that- ideas. Ultimately, we control our responses to those ideas. Maybe we need to spend less time squelching the uncomfortable ideas, the ones that feel a little threatening and chaotic, because they always seem to work themselves back up inside us again. Maybe we should just let them be for a while and just “live the questions now”, as Rilke sagely suggests.

I know this is something I could use practice in. How about you?