A Better Question

I was a philosophical young man, by which I mean I would from time to time find myself asking, “What is the meaning of life?” I really did find myself asking that. I’d ask it after all other questions had been exhausted, after what I perceived as unnecessary and capricious suffering had gone unanswered. I did not really ask the question expecting an answer, which is good because one never came. I sometimes took this silence as an indication there was no meaning at all, but mostly it left me quietly confused. The confusion reminded me of how I’d feel when I was writing a story that wouldn’t finish. Sometimes I’d think about that story: “Well, maybe it just can’t be finished.” I didn’t ask this often because I ultimately had faith that all stories could be finished if you looked at them from the right angle. That was the trick. If what you were doing wasn’t working you had to turn the story, ask a different question about it, and by and by you’d unlock it and away you’d go.

That was always the best. I was never happier than when that story had been unlocked. I didn’t know how it was going to end but I knew I was on the path, and all I had to do was ask, “What next?” and an answer would soon come. I did have to learn what it felt like to be on the path rather than just near it. That took some time, but all that was required to learn that difference was honesty, which I could usually manage in the privacy of my workroom.

After about twenty-five years of this practice I noticed that I wasn’t asking what the meaning of life was anymore, though I did still suffer. Now when I suffered I’d ask, “Where’s the path?” This was a better question. In fact, it’s really the only question. Everyone’s answer is going to be different to that question, just as every writer will tell a different story. To hear the answer is to find yourself again and again, find yourself not in a place but in a direction, moving forward with the flow of life.

If you like the ideas and perspectives expressed here, feel free to contact me about individual and group coaching.