milli-question/Ian Hughes
Was it really asking too much to want my partner to be as interested in me as I was (and am) in myself? The way I saw it and continue to see it although I am not in this relationship today is if she had been interested, she would have asked more questions. Here’s what happened.
Me: I feel taken care of because you’re paying for my dinner tonight.
She: I’ve had a lot of old girl friends pay for my dinners.
I felt slapped when she said that. There I sat with my heart on my sleeve, right after Valentine’s Day, and she didn’t recognize vulnerability when she heard it. But now almost a year later, I know what was wrong.
Truth is, neither of us was really there in that restaurant, which was Dosa on Fillmore across from the Sundance Kabuki.
Had either of us been truly present to each other, that exchange might have sounded more like this:
Me: I feel taken care of because you’re paying for my dinner tonight.
She: What does that feel like?
Me: I feel vulnerable yet safe. Thank you for giving me this dinner and this feeling.
She: Wow. I didn’t know that. I’ve had a lot of old girl friends pay for my dinners.
Me: And how did that make you feel?
Let’s assume for a minute that for her, there was some seed of sadness, loss or confusion still unexplored about those past experiences with all those old girl friends paying for dinner. So I ask her more questions.
She: I’ve had a lot of old girl friends pay for my dinners.
Me: Wow, did you feel really good about that, the way I feel now?
I’ve read books about relationships, love, and nonviolent communication, so I know questions aren’t the only way to show interest in someone you care about, but for me questions are big.
I have asked myself questions over the years, but they have changed considerably. Early questions were profound but unanswerable. Like Why was I born? Why isn’t my mother as interested in me as she is in herself? What is the meaning of life? What am I meant to do with mine? If I’m supposed to be Jewish, where’s the impulse? But maturity and eventually meditation shifted me, and I began to pose questions that I, and others, could answer.
How important are questions? Influential Enlightenment figure Voltaire said, “Judge others by their questions rather than by their answers.” And despite preferring not to judge at all, I once asked writer, Francine Prose when she spoke at the Jewish Community Center, a question I wouldn’t object to being judged by.
I asked her “What do you feel for the characters in your novels?” And she said she always found something in their humanity to value whether or not she approved of the actions she had them perform in her fictional worlds. Isn't that a good answer? I could ask myself the same question about people in the real world.
Questions have value when their potential answers invite surprise and point toward truths.
So far this year I have posed mostly practical questions: For example, there’s the question of my art phobia and if the least painful entrée into creativity would be a watercolor or a figure drawing class. How can I approach collage without hyperventilating?
How shall I upgrade my cooking now that I can’t afford to dine out as often? If I do take a cooking class, should it be beginning knife skills, sushi or intro to charcuterie?
Do I want to put videos and podcasts on my web page or rent a barn and do a one-woman show, which my oldest son suggests I call “The Angina Monologues?”
Though I tackle the practical, I wouldn’t mind knowing why I was born, if there is life after death and what’s my life’s purpose. Answers to those questions start to glimmer as I practice mindfulness meditation and stay present.
I think mindfulness will help me answer the question of how one attains what Dr. Howard Thurman* calls “a new and creative relatedness.” Actually, the answer he gives asks an even more profound question. He says, "Don't ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive and then go do that. Because what the world needs are people who have come alive."
People who have come alive are people who are awake to their interconnection with all living beings and who see and honor the dignity in all. No question about it. Namaste
*Dr. Howard Thurman was an African-American minister who, in 1944, established with a white minister, the first racially integrated, intercultural church in the United States in San Francisco.
Me: I feel taken care of because you’re paying for my dinner tonight.
She: I’ve had a lot of old girl friends pay for my dinners.
I felt slapped when she said that. There I sat with my heart on my sleeve, right after Valentine’s Day, and she didn’t recognize vulnerability when she heard it. But now almost a year later, I know what was wrong.
Truth is, neither of us was really there in that restaurant, which was Dosa on Fillmore across from the Sundance Kabuki.
Had either of us been truly present to each other, that exchange might have sounded more like this:
Me: I feel taken care of because you’re paying for my dinner tonight.
She: What does that feel like?
Me: I feel vulnerable yet safe. Thank you for giving me this dinner and this feeling.
She: Wow. I didn’t know that. I’ve had a lot of old girl friends pay for my dinners.
Me: And how did that make you feel?
Let’s assume for a minute that for her, there was some seed of sadness, loss or confusion still unexplored about those past experiences with all those old girl friends paying for dinner. So I ask her more questions.
She: I’ve had a lot of old girl friends pay for my dinners.
Me: Wow, did you feel really good about that, the way I feel now?
I’ve read books about relationships, love, and nonviolent communication, so I know questions aren’t the only way to show interest in someone you care about, but for me questions are big.
I have asked myself questions over the years, but they have changed considerably. Early questions were profound but unanswerable. Like Why was I born? Why isn’t my mother as interested in me as she is in herself? What is the meaning of life? What am I meant to do with mine? If I’m supposed to be Jewish, where’s the impulse? But maturity and eventually meditation shifted me, and I began to pose questions that I, and others, could answer.
How important are questions? Influential Enlightenment figure Voltaire said, “Judge others by their questions rather than by their answers.” And despite preferring not to judge at all, I once asked writer, Francine Prose when she spoke at the Jewish Community Center, a question I wouldn’t object to being judged by.
I asked her “What do you feel for the characters in your novels?” And she said she always found something in their humanity to value whether or not she approved of the actions she had them perform in her fictional worlds. Isn't that a good answer? I could ask myself the same question about people in the real world.
Questions have value when their potential answers invite surprise and point toward truths.
So far this year I have posed mostly practical questions: For example, there’s the question of my art phobia and if the least painful entrée into creativity would be a watercolor or a figure drawing class. How can I approach collage without hyperventilating?
How shall I upgrade my cooking now that I can’t afford to dine out as often? If I do take a cooking class, should it be beginning knife skills, sushi or intro to charcuterie?
Do I want to put videos and podcasts on my web page or rent a barn and do a one-woman show, which my oldest son suggests I call “The Angina Monologues?”
Though I tackle the practical, I wouldn’t mind knowing why I was born, if there is life after death and what’s my life’s purpose. Answers to those questions start to glimmer as I practice mindfulness meditation and stay present.
I think mindfulness will help me answer the question of how one attains what Dr. Howard Thurman* calls “a new and creative relatedness.” Actually, the answer he gives asks an even more profound question. He says, "Don't ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive and then go do that. Because what the world needs are people who have come alive."
People who have come alive are people who are awake to their interconnection with all living beings and who see and honor the dignity in all. No question about it. Namaste
*Dr. Howard Thurman was an African-American minister who, in 1944, established with a white minister, the first racially integrated, intercultural church in the United States in San Francisco.
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