Has life ever handed you set backs or conundrums? Has it surprised you with health issues? natural calamities? relationship dynamics? job loss? cultural or political shifts? In one of his most compelling teachings, Alan Seale suggests that your answers to three questions may help you find your way.
When something extraordinary rocks our world, it usually exceeds our ability to explain or justify. A line from Bob Dylan’s song Ballad of a Thin Man comes to mind: “…something is happening here but you don’t know what it is do you, Mr. Jones?”
The first question is: What wants to happen here? Alan encourages us to turn from fear to curiosity. Since our usual explanations are inadequate, what are some possibilities that we haven’t considered? The Chinese word for “crisis” combines the characters for “danger” and “opportunity.” It takes courage to believe there is opportunity on the other side of our vulnerability. However, unless we venture, we will never know.
Who is that asking me to be? Responding to new possibilities may force us either to reclaim basic values we have neglected or to embrace capacities that we have failed to acknowledge. Who are the parts of self that the crisis is calling into the center of our personal mandala?
What is that asking me to do? What are steps I can take to acknowledge that I am not in Kansas anymore? I may not be able to rewind a circumstance, but I do have the power to move toward the openings that new possibilities present. The actions need not be large. They need only be sustained.
For a more detailed exploration of the questions Alan poses, read his blog for this week.
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