Living the Questions: A Story in 5 Parts
This narrative is best told in 5 acts. (Fans of NPR’s “This American Life” will enjoy this.)
Act 1
When I was 5 years old, my dad started his own business. He was a hazardous waste consultant. I still don’t really understand his work, but I’m pretty sure that it’s fair to say that he helped people figure out what to do with their garbage so that it didn’t do harm to the planet.
I still remember him using an overhead projector to enlarge his company logo onto a large white board so that he could trace it and paint it. (For you young folks, that’s how we made signs in olden times.) He threw the beam of light from the projector down the hallway in our house, and traced that logo right outside my bedroom door. When I say that I grew up with this logo, it’s literally so true that you could say that I tripped over it.
Act 2
Throughout high school, college, and my young adult years, I was mentored by a priest who became, at different times throughout my life, my counselor, my confidant, my confessor, my boss, and most importantly, my friend. Those of us who were mentored by him (there are many of us… and some of you are reading this…) came to know and expect that whenever we poured out our hearts with our latest coming-of-age challenges, we’d eventually be met with this quotation from the German poet, Ranier Maria Rilke:
““I want to beg you, as much as I can, 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.””
This mentor always reminded us to “love the questions.” So much so, that eventually, he didn’t even need to say it anymore. Usually after we’d unloaded our frustration about whatever life challenge we were facing, we’d look at the expression on his face and say with annoyance, “Yeah, yeah, yeah, love the questions. I know.”
The incredible part is that it’s true. At some point, I got old enough to look back and find perspective. And I found that I could remember the major burning questions that I’d had in my teens (“Who am I? What am I good at? Where do I belong?”) and see that I did, in fact, live my way into the answers. I saw that the issues that seemed unsolvable in my 20s (“What’s my role? What’s my contribution?”) eventually resolved themselves with time and patience. Mind you, the questions were always replaced with NEW questions, but I could see that it was true – if I loved the question and lived the question well enough, I “gradually, without noticing it, lived along some distant day into the answer.”
Act 3
My dad died in 2018, after a long battle with Alzheimer’s. As I struggled to frame some thoughts to share in his funeral program, his old company logo came back to me. It took on new meaning to me as I thought about my dad’s life and legacy, his love for his family, his dedication to making the world (and people) better, and his devotion to his faith. As I wrote then, “The question mark was never scary to Dad. There was no problem too large for him to tackle…. There was also no problem too small for him to care about.” I shared some examples of the myriad of ways that my dad lived the questions of life and work. I also shared about the power of his exclamation mark: “Now that his journey here on earth is complete, we know that he has lived his way into the fullest answer there is – the glory of the Father’s kingdom.”
Act 4
While I admired my dad’s work ethic, problem-solving abilities, and perseverance, I always said that I never wanted to be an entrepreneur. I’m not sure I knew what it would take, but whatever “it” was, I was pretty sure that I didn’t have “it.” Then I lost my job in 2020. As I pondered options and professional paths, the idea of starting my own coaching business came to mind. But I always stopped myself short, reminding myself that I’d always said that I never wanted to be an entrepreneur. Thankfully, a wise coach heard me say that and remarked, “You know you’re allowed to change your mind, right?” That comment unlocked my fixed mindset and gave me the internal permission I needed to begin to climb the unknown and unseen staircase of starting my own business.
I immersed myself in a coach training program, and I found myself thinking often of the Rilke quotation about loving the questions. As I practiced coaching, I felt honored and humbled by the opportunity to hear people’s questions and to accompany them as they learned to accept, love, and live those questions. I also experienced the joy as a coach of celebrating with people as they lived into their own answers. I was starting to feel like life was coming full circle, and I was finding the “why” of my business.
Then, as I began working on the “business” side of the business, Dad’s old logo came to mind. How perfectly that image of the gradually transforming question mark fit with my new work as a coach!
Act 5
In celebrating the one-year anniversary of this business, I am delighted to unveil a new brand pattern. With the assistance of a wonderful graphic designer, we’ve created this additional visual element for the Teal Horizon Coaching brand that perfectly complements our mark.
It’s a nod to my dad – perhaps I’m more like him than I’d realized! In different ways, we both help(ed) people figure out what to do with their garbage to create a better future. It’s a nod to my mentor who first taught me to love the questions, and who always walked with me through the murkiness of those questions. But it’s in a style that’s fresh, and uniquely mine.
And while this has been a long story about my life, what’s most important is what I hope this image brings to you. I hope it reminds you that
There’s always hope for an exclamation point (eventually), even in the hardest of questions, and
I’m always here, ready and waiting to accompany you through whatever questions life brings. We’ll live our way into the answers together!