Living the Questions

I seem to be in a new phase of this journey with cancer. Before, even when chemo was rough, after three or four days I bounced back quickly to "normal," and thought, "I can live like this." But now, the sickness and exhaustion last far longer, and lots of questions flood my mind. So I appreciate this wisdom from the poet Rainer Maria Rilke:

"I beg you . . . 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." And this from Virginia Satir: "Most people prefer the certainty of misery to the misery of uncertainty." I don't mean that I'm uncertain about everything--only about some questions that don't seem to have answers just now.

After a very quiet and restful long weekend, I'm feeling quite ready for today.

I'm now reading in the prophets at the end of the Old Testament--those bold spokesmen who predicted the terrible destruction of the nations that had defied God. Tucked inside all that terror is this gem: "The Lord is good. When trouble comes, he is a strong refuge. And he knows everyone who trusts in him" (Nahum 1:7). He really does like to be trusted! And we really do need to trust him!

Blessings,
Carol