CHOOSING TO STAND Where am I standingWhat am I standing onWho am I standing with Here Where is the love I am standing onWhat is the truth I am standing withWho are the people I am part of Today On the first anniversary of the invasion of Ukraine. ~ Inspired by listening to a poetic … Read more
Over the summer, I worked with the idea of beautiful questions. As I developed one of my own, eventually it distilled as ‘I am water, where shall I flow?’ But what kind of question is that? Yes, it can feel rather esoteric, yet it has become a powerful metaphor for me – a kind of … Read more
Questions can be uncomfortable. They sit at the intersection of the known and the unknown and make us feel vulnerable. Yet if we can exchange the confidence of certainty for the curiosity of possibility, then perhaps we have a future. Not just a gilded past. Or as Rainer Maria Rilke once wrote to a young … Read more
Recently I joined a webinar with Michael Bungay Stanier (MBS to his friends) on the one question that unlocks everything. What was it? “If I say YES to this, what must I say NO to?” MBS has an extraordinary skill in capturing crucial ideas so simply that you can’t ignore them. This phrase has deeply … Read more
For those of a particular vintage or disposition, the answer is 42. So what is the question? It’s important to ask as I suspect it will differ for each of us. And we can’t rely on an algorithm because only we can face that question for ourselves. Time – what is your question? ~ The … Read more
UNDERNEATH IT ALL Digging down, beneathall the questions,we find ourselves;and realise thattoday is sufficientand we are enough.
When we ask significant questions, we implicitly recognise that there might be a different way of seeing. And an alternative view of what we think we see implies the possibility of change. OK, so far. But what about fractals? Maybe the big questions we might grapple with are patterns that replicate elsewhere and at a … Read more
Who asks questions? Most often, it’s the little ones. And the big little ones who haven’t bowed to the pressure to grow up and conform. Yet if we don’t ask questions, we don’t believe that we or the world could be different. And that takes imagination. ~ This week’s On Being Podcast with adrienne maree … Read more
Yesterday I gave myself to sit with my question. It didn’t last long because physical sitting was too static. So I walked. Down the lane to retrieve our emptied recycling sack after the village collection time. Then up the valley to wander in the woods and by the brook. Movement certainly helped – Solvitur ambulando … Read more
Have you noticed? Often our significant questions invite us to sit with them for a while. Yet we’re in such a hurry. We’ve become conditioned to believe that questions need clear answers. Now. But how would we know we’re looking at it the wrong way round, upside down, or back to front? Indeed what if … Read more