A New Title

I changed the title of my blog today from "Living in the Now" to "Living in the Question".  Not that anyone cares (except me!), but it seemed more descriptive of how I was actually blogging.  I'm not consistent enough with blogging to talk about living in the now... ha!  It seems that most of why I write is to wrestle with questions, paradoxes and tensions and, indeed, my life always seems to be full of them, so I have plenty of material.  I like the quote by Rainer Maria Rilke in the header and am challenged to love the questions and live the questions.  After all, if my life is full of questions and I wait to really live until they've all been answered, I'll never live.

Our culture is so "answer" oriented that holding the tension of an unanswered question is practically intolerable.  We want life wrapped up; nailed down...  But, if we're honest, it's in that messy tension of "not quite, almost, unsure" that most of us live.   Questions destabilize us and we worry that a question might knock out the foundations of things we already knew or were comfortable with.  Living with a question is disconcerting at best. 

I like what Sue Monk Kidd says:

There's an art to living your questions.  You peel them.  You listen to them.  You let them spawn new questions.  You hold the unknowing inside.  You linger with it instead of rushing into half-baked answers.... those who "loiter" in the question long enough will "live into" the answer.  "Seek and ye shall find," said Jesus (Matt. 7:7).  I sometimes read that as, "Seek long enough and ye shall find."  You see, it's the patient act of dwelling in the darkness of a question that eventually unravels the answer.  

May I be patient in the question... may I loiter long enough to live into the answer... may I get comfortable with discomfort...

It's not supposed to be like this...

I've had a few days lately where I've thought, "It's not supposed to be like this." Sometimes sadness accompanies that thought, sometimes anger... When the thought is relative to an event or situation that is particularly personal, I can easily be drawn into a downward spiral of self-pity and depression. Here is a familiar scenario... A wonderful event is in the making and much anticipated, like a vacation or a party or a celebration dinner. Just hours (or minutes... but sometimes a day or two) before the event, a massive fight ensues between those who are supposed to be enjoying each other or celebrating a special event. Tempers flare, angry words are spoken or stony silence reigns. Perhaps a long past hurt is flippantly revisited and all the old feelings of despair come tumbling in. Everyone knows the issue must be resolved before anyone can truly enjoy the event, but there is not time enough to heal the wounds inflicted. So, the event goes on, but the sadness or anger is suffocating and the unspoken words hanging in mid-air are, "It's not supposed to be like this."

Although I've wrestled with those words on many different levels, today I'm pondering them with respect to something rather more insignificant... The San Francisco Half Marathon! I have trained well and carefully for the Half that is happening this coming weekend but my right shin hurts and I suspect a stress fracture, which means I won't run the race! Ay! It's not supposed to happen like this...

In comparison to other situations, this is minor, I know! But, it has raised the question... How does one live in the "now" and not spiral into self-pity or depression while embracing the pain of a situation that is "not supposed to be like this?" Perhaps pondering this question in the context of an "insignificant" event will shed some light on how to answer the question when faced with a serious, life-changing situation.

While there are volumes dedicated to this very topic (not the least of which is the Bible) and I have friends and family who have wrestled with this question on deep levels who have given me some insight, writing is a discipline that allows me to "verbally process" while forcing me to be specific and clear in my thinking. Writing seems to be a tool that walks me through questions to a place of hope. So, I will continue, but not today... out of time...