Living in the Question with Inspiration

When I was in my first year of college at Pasadena City College, which had a reputation for professors who enjoyed teaching and were not distracted with PhD research, I had a fantastic professor who used the Socratic method of teaching. He would ask questions in a way that would allow students to open up to different possibilities of answers or ideas, or insights related to the topic. It was a very powerful and effective way of learning. In a way, it has been with me for all of my life. Only in recent years did I decide to give a name to it - living in the question.  

For me, living in the question is a type of perspective that I have with most information that I read, or hear, or watch. It is different than questioning everything. It is more like being open to possibilities of different interpretations, perspectives, and depth that may not easily be seen.   

These days, sometimes there is a tendency to want to have it all figured out and "live in the answer". Yet, living in the question leaves things open-ended and has the effect of creating more freedom in thinking, in my opinion. 

Today this is more important as we are bombarded with news and views, scammers and spammers, intense emotional exchanges in social media, the pandemic, and the election coming up in November. 

When I searched Google for the phrase "living in the question" there is reference to Rainer Maria Rilke, the mystical poet, who wrote this in his book "Letters to a Young Poet. 

" I want to beg you, as much as I can, dear sir, to be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves like locked rooms and like books that are written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer."

Perhaps we can also appreciate this letter as written to us in these times. Maybe we need to be patient towards all that is "unsolved in our hearts" and to love living in the question. Maybe there are some truths or answers out there that we cannot handle, as we would "not be able to live (with) them." 

By "living the questions now" or living in the mystery, then gradually, or suddenly, when the timing is right, answers or insights will be revealed. Hidden truths may come to light, and we will still live in the question even then, with more peace of mind, inspiration, and wisdom than we had before.

Could living in the question be like a liquid elixir of life?
read on >