“There are years that ask questions and years that answer.”
-Zora Neale Hurston

It seems I’ve been asking questions most of my life. Partially this is a personality trait. I am curious. I have always wanted to KNOW. Why are we here? What can I do with this life? Who am I? What is the way to freedom?

Many questions have come from desperation. I’ve felt a lot of pain, separation, and darkness in my life. Why? Why do I need to feel this? What is the point? To what end is this bringing me? What reason could there possibly be for me to feel this crippled under this much heaviness, suffering, and grief. Why does it feel like the sadness will crush my bones? Why on earth does this world need me to feel so shattered? At many different times in my life I have asked these and many, many other painful questions. Sometimes I have spat them out through coughing tears, sometimes in whispers barely audible because I did not have the breath to spare, and sometimes in angry screams towards a seemingly indifferent black sky.

For a very, very long time it seemed like maybe there would only be questions. Perhaps I’m meant to hurl boulders into an endless canyon until my last breath. And perhaps the only call back will be the echo they make as they fall to the bottom. Maybe there will be only questions. I settled into that. I let it clean me out.

There is a hallowing out that happens when you ask the big questions. There is a leaping, a wandering out into darkness. There is a nakedness and wildness about it. When you really, I mean REALLY let the questions consume you, there is a divine emptying that happens.

“I don’t know.”

It feels bare. It feels naked. It feels like strange freedom. Like falling down a canyon with no bottom. It feels like an invitation for grace.

This is a very sacred place. It’s the void. It’s birthplace. It is beginning of all. Before we can create anything, we MUST return to the void.

I prayed for years that the Universe do SOMETHING with me. I still pray this way. I’ve learned to be somewhat indifferent about what exactly that is. Yes, let it be healthy, joyful, and a little wild. Let me love it with all my heart. But the WHAT of it exactly, I don’t care. Dear Universe, make use of me. Let me live and serve.

I have made this prayer almost every day, in one way or another, for years now. I have prayed in words, in mumbles, in tears, in dances, in laughter. I have prayed in swims and climbs and sweats and in loving. And for the first time, for real, I can tell you with absolute certainty – the Universe listens.

I led my first retreat this past weekend. There were many, many things that went into the creation of it. I’ve been working towards this for longer than I can consciously remember. But I believe these prayers were a big piece. My years and years of bones-to-the-earth, empty-me-out prayers are finding their echo. There is a return vibration.

I never could have imagined things going smoother. My years of emptying-out training paid off. They had to. There was no other way to hold that much space, to teach that much, to organize everything I had to. Something bigger than me HAD to come through. I don’t believe I could have held that space if I had not learned how to empty myself.

I have never felt the presence of so much grace in all my life. The time leading up to the retreat, during, and after. There were so many things big and small that aligned perfectly – from the finding of the venue, to the delivery of wood, to the meals, to each and every heart that was there. The teaching flowed from a place deep within the earth and far above my head. It wasn’t me, but it wasn’t not me.

In the middle of it all, I realized that what I had been asking for was here. I was of use. The small parts of me had been pushed aside, to allow the Universe to move through. I was madly in love with the work that I was doing. I was inspired, creative, in the flow. These things I have prayed for for longer than I can remember were here.

There was nothing about this that felt transcendent or other-worldly or anything other than here and now. It did not feel particularly special or different. I can only say that it felt right. It felt the way a spider hangs on her web. She is neither proud or ashamed. She isn’t in awe of what she has created or envious of the web of another. She simply sits on her web with glistening eyes and waits for dinner. It’s the right place for her to be. There is no other place for her than on her web. That is the closest thing I can explain.

Since returning from this retreat, I cannot shake this sense. I now feel the millions of prayers I’ve made over the years now washing over my body. It is not some force out there answering, but my own voice, energy, love coming back. There is nothing to do but cry and blink and be wide eyed hugging everyone. It is a fullness I have never experienced. A fullness of heart and purpose and of being in my right place. Of doing my right work. And there is nothing fantastic about it. I mean yes, it is f*ing spectacular. But no more so than a spider. Hanging on her web. In her right place, waiting for dinner.

I want to share this for you. Who ever you are who needs to hear this. Keep asking questions. Follow them over the forest floor. Get lost. Keep going. Loosen. Drop down until your bones hum like the earth. Be emptied. Keep asking. Follow the questions to their end. Ask through tears and laughter. Ask through love making and climbing. Ask through gritted teeth and gentle whispers. Ask the questions. And keep asking. They will lead you home. One question, asked honestly enough, humbly enough, will echo back. Prayers – screamed loud enough, long enough, will always echo back. Your canyon walls may be wide, but they are not endless. Your love comes back to you. Yes, I can attest to this. Your love will always, ALWAYS come back to you.