"Why?" is one of the trickiest questions to ask someone.
Even trickier to ask ourselves.
The quest for an answer can lead us down a rabbit hole until we get trapped in our own stories.
Yesterday, I went for a walk with my friend Luca (even if he lives hundreds of km away, but that’s another story). It was a sunny and crisp winter morning here in the Italian countryside.
I wanted to get away from everything, so I took an unmarked path among the vineyards. I found myself walking along a small canal that I haven't seen before. I've lived here for decades, and I still find places that are new to me.
A swan floated placidly on the water in the morning mist.
Luca and I were talking about tough questions, the ones that children ask. The ones we ask in front of pain, felt or witnessed, like that tricky "why" question.
It was there, before the swan, that I realised that maybe true wisdom is learning to stay with the questions without being worried by the answers.
I've been on this journey of learning to stay with the questions for a while.
In the past, I wrote about the difference between sensing and making sense and the struggle of finding meaning.