Why Now Might Be The Right Time To Explore the Bigger Life Questions You’ve Been Carrying

Many of us find ourselves circling the same questions over and over - and then one of life’s many distractions - exciting as they can be - pull us over to something new. And this can happen over and over again.

As a therapist, what I’ve seen over and over again is life’s “shoulds” clouding independent judgement, authentic insight, and the voice of the heart. I often meet with people who are confused about their life’s path and trajectory; wondering if it should look differently, if they’ve gone down the wrong path, or their doomed to feel lost forever because they feel stuck now. More times than not, it’s these points where they find themselves circling back to the same questions they had 5, 10, 20 years ago. They’re circling back to their authentic voice. But struggle - once again- to trust what it’s been saying all along.

I invite you to consider where you are in your life. What’s working? What’s no longer working that maybe worked great 4 years ago? Where does excitement live? Longing? What about joy? Like any adult in this fast-paced, high intensity culture we live in, some of these questions may be not-so-easy to answer on the spot. It might take a bit of contemplation, or an internal “inventory” check to really feel clear about where you may stand on those matters.

Our culture has normalized “finding the right time”, “waiting until all our ducks are completely in order” or “once things calm down” to pursue even the smallest sources of joy. While there are important nuances to this, I see the “right time” framing as a trap to just keep the best parts of ourselves trapped a little bit longer and muzzled by more and more and more thinking (which our left-brained culture loves by the way). We do more thinking now as humans than we’ve ever done before; discrediting the emotional part of our humanity more than ever.

If this reflection is reasonating with you, maybe you don’t need more time to think. Perhaps you’ve been over-thinking your whole life. Maybe something’s wrong - maybe something’s been off for a while. But knowing it and feeling it are two different things. Maybe what you really need is permission to feel. To feel what your big questions are. And what they’re made of.

Many of us arrive at the same questions over and over until we finally learn how to engage with them and pay attention. Every time we ‘just push through’ something that doesn’t feel right - a question is quietly being asked from a much deeper place within us. Everytime we say yes to something and theres a tiny 2% of us that wants to say no - a question from a deeper place is being asked of us. When this inner friction arises, we chalk it up to ‘anxiety’ or ‘stress’. But don’t ask what these feelings could be signalling, what deeper place they could be pointing to.

As a therapist who works heavily from an emotions-focused approach and works with defense mechanisms - inner friction, anxiety, overwhelm, or stress are often doorways to something deeper inside us that has always wanted to be known, but never knew how to be known. They often serve a deeper purpose.

Many of us have spent a lifetime sweeping our inner tension under the rug, chalking it up to “I’m just tired” or “I’m just being dramatic again”. But the way I see it is, there’s so much wisdom in our emotions; they cradle the big life questions we each so uniquely possess. Emotions are what make us human. They’re the tears that flow when we just watched a movie that moved us to our core, the shaking of our belly when something is undeniably hilarious, the heat that rises in our bodies when there’s been an injustice of some kind. The gasp at witnessing something in nature that is simply so beautiful, and so touching. Emotions are the nerve endings in being able to experience and feel life.

Our feelings are the bridge between who we were conditioned to be, and who we truly are. What the culture fed us and what we’re truly hungry for.

So why now? Why might now be the right time to explore the bigger questions you’ve always carried? Because if you know that something’s been off for a while, and chalking it up to “the same old anxiety” or “just being tired” rationalizations have been used over and over again - it’s likely time to engage with anxiety, overhwlem, depression, feeling lost in life differently.

And by differently I mean, truly differently. Not “just be more positive”, “I just need to be more greatful”, or “I just need to find better tools”. But forming a relationship to ourselves via our emotions in a way that maybe we’ve never experienced before. When our emotions are acknowledged without crticism or dismissal, and engaged with in the way we need, then we open the gates to personal transformation in how we relate to ourselves, others, and the world around us. We open the opportunity to finally feel less lonely, less exhausted, less scarce, less fearful of disappointing others. Which opens the door for more of something better - something more full of vitality to enter our inner worlds.

Perhaps something in life ended recently, or finally cracked. And the same tactics you usually employ to soothe yourself, to deal, and to feel better simply aren’t working - now is the only time available to approach yourself from a new angle. We can always, however, rebuild our defenses by staying busy, trying not to think about it, find the next person or thing to dive in to, and slowly, without even deciding to, we close the door to opportunity that this rupture once opened for us.

Now might be the time because for the first time you’ve lost the map.

The map that always brought you certainty, told you where to go, how to orient yourself, how to do life.

The map never asked you to question who you are, what you really want, what a life that actually belongs to you looks like.

This map was likely handed to you by family, your faith, your culture, the wider culture around us.

And now, for the first time, the map seems to be leading nowhere that you reasonate with. It’s scary being in unchartered territory. Disorienting.

Now you’re faced with the big life questions you’ve never had to consider before. It seems that the question is already here, in front of you. Once again. Maybe now louder than you’ve ever let them be.

But perhaps this time something is slightly different. Maybe now you’re considering your own big life questions a little more; pondering what they could be, or developing a curiosity about them.

Maybe now there’s nothing to stave off these questions like before. Maybe the life that once kept them manageable and at bay has shifted. And you’ve shifted in an unfamiliar, bewildering way.

Maybe you didn’t entirely choose this moment. But it’s here. It brought you to this reflection piece. And acknowledging it, letting it be here, might be the most honest place you’ve ever stood.