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
How do we seewithout sight,and knowwithout knowing? By courageouslyreleasing our grasp,relinquishing our rightto understand. Listening insteadfor heartbeats,and songsof the deep, and how waterflows, orravens dancein the wind. Only then, whenwe’ve finally let go can we glimpsethe unknown.
The sun was setting, and we were in an open-topped jeep. Horribly lost in the Paphos Forest in Cyprus with no road signs or way markers, and before smartphones were invented. I was afraid. And my panic grew with each mile along narrow, unmarked roads, hairpin bends and precipitous edges. … We clearly found our … Read more
Most of us have grown up with roads and road signs. If we want to go somewhere, we get out the map (or digital equivalent), assess the best route, and follow the signs. Yet what do we do in uncharted territory? If we wait for the road to be built and the map to be … 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
We’ve been taught to fear the unknown – that it’s a scary place. Yet, in reality, we live here daily while wearing lenses that give us a false sense of control. And because of these ways of seeing, we assume we can live in a world of relative order, or at least minimal surprises at … Read more
Have you noticed? It’s those times when we think we absolutely need to know… That we don’t. Because the invitation is to step into the uncertain and create possibilities.
An invitation to largeness, to a space bigger than we can imagine or occupy. That stretches beyond the horizon of our sight. And extends into time beyond our present. A place of conversation with our vulnerability that releases the fragrance of possibility. Will we choose to befriend the unknown or keep the door tightly closed?
In a generously insightful piece over the weekend, the writer/poet Martin Wroe quoted Henri Nouwen: “We don’t think our way into a new kind of living. We live our way into a new kind of thinking.” And this is someone who knew the reality of stepping across the threshold into the awkward unknown. Henri had … Read more