Monday, March 17, 2008

Ever-elusive


It is interesting to note that a teacher's worst nightmare can take the form of a diligent, hardworking, well-behaved, nice little frum kid. Such nightmares are often overlooked and forgotten due to the increased attention given to their counterparts, the rebellious, chutzpadik, perpetually careless, or hyperactive sort of nightmares. But the subtle ones do exist too, and I know firsthand how much they irk their teachers in ways that worry them just about as much as one of their out of control terrors.

I was one of those so-called subtle terrors. And boy, was I proud of it.

Oh, how I loved to sit in class, drink up what the teachers would say, manipulate all of the information in my head, and come up with the many questions I usually had on any given lesson. I would raise my hand, wait my turn, and then ask away. They were usually pretty good questions, too. Of course I enjoyed wasting class time (and my classmates frequently prodded me to use my inquisitive guise to sublty propel many a teacher off topic. Ahh...what bliss! And they barely ever realized!!) but it was a very very rare occasion that I would ask a question that I was not really curious about. After a while, my teachers would hesitate to call on me when I would raise my hand in class, because so often their lessons would be brought to a standstill while they answered me. And sometimes I even asked things that brought their lessons to a standstill because after certain questions, face value teachings are rendered quite meaningless... My questions were not meant to spite, and never to undermine the teacher. I was a nice girl and a good student...just so intensely curious.

Intensely curious. That described me in a nutshell. I wanted to know everything, sense everything, experience everything, touch, see, taste, hear, feel, delve into, understand everything in and about my world. So I asked, challenged, questioned, and dissected until I was satisfied. Lessons taught merely on face value with no internal depth bored me to pieces. I needed layers or proof or inside sources or contextual cross-references or meaning or depth or emotional appeal. Come on! Give me real stuff! Teach me! Challenge me! I don't want to memorize or spit back. Teach me to think. To better understand this world. To become a better inhabitant of this world...

Not much has changed since then. Besides for the fact that now, to my chagrin, I don't learn chumash anymore with Mrs. Shoham. Because that, my friends, was an unforgettable year in learning. Real learning. I don't think I'll ever forget what I learned in that class...

Machshivos Hashem amku...we can never really understand His ways...im yidativ, hayusiv...mi yachol la'amod b'sodo.....lo livado niskanu alilos......never step on anyone's toes while you're doing good things...sometimes mudpuddles are there for you to fall into...yiras shomayim...ela ha'emes shehasneh mav'ir aish hatzaros...

She taught us about life and how to live it. I remember her distinctly saying, "Girls, things are going to be hard in life. But you have to hear that! Know it! Always know that things are going to be hard...but that knowledge will give you strength and support when it is hard..."

She encouraged questions. She loved questions. She breathed questions, lived questions, was passionate about questions...and I was thrilled to have the merit of learning under her instruction for 10+ glorious months of my life...

And then I graduated.

And brought the passion we shared along with me, I guess.


As ever, I still harbor an intense pleasure when faced with a straightforward statement or lesson. I read it, turn it over, backwards, upside down, and identify a few of its inherent questions. Of course, nowadays I have slightly more tact than I did back when I was in high school, so it's rare that I actively rip apart someone's most recent utterance, but the questions are still there, and my thirst has not been quenched.

Which is a good thing. And I'm still proud.


But it's hard when life presents you with the hard stuff Mrs. Shoham lovingly warned me about...and then there are no answers to my thirtsy questions...


I was taught never to ask "why?" Why? Because machshivos Hashem amku...If we'd understand Him, we'd be Him...Everything has a reason and sometimes we cannot understand it or are meant not to. And I accept that. But the feeling of unanswered questions--so like a gaping chasm in an otherwise comfortable heart--can be breath-catchingly overwhelming, especially when these are questions that stem from the sincere and almost painful desire to live my life in the best way I can and try to understand what exactly it is that He wants from me...


It's almost as if this cherished part of myself comes back to haunt me as my own worst nightmare....

In a way, how can I be expected not to ask questions when I was built this way and have been asking questions since I looked at the sky the first time and wondered...? Of course I can ask, but what's the point in asking if the answers are not and cannot be dispensed to me?

But ahhhhh....there it is. The answers are not the point. It's the questions that are the point. Somehow, in some confusing way, the questions themselves must be the catalysts for growth and richer living that I was looking for in their ever-elusive answers.


This is hard to swallow. That is, given that it's even a correct assumption. But I must come to terms, because I think this chasm is destined to remain unfilled until Teiku--Tishbi yitaretz kushios v'ebayos.

Oh, what a day that'll be.....

For all of us...

10 comments:

pobody's nerfect. said...

"i beg you... to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. don't search for the answers, which could not be given you now, because you would not be able to live them. and the point is, to live everything. live the questions now. perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer..."
- rainer maria rilke (20th century german poet. this quote is on a card hanging on my wall. the one between the window and the shelves.)

Anonymous said...

I don't nec. agree with the pickle jar. One does have to know his/her self and not tackle too many questions at once. Corner and the pickle jar- These questions do not have to be tackled alone. When I find things to be overwhelming, confusing, overbearing or dizzying, I call an older and smarter person who lives a life Bederech Hatorah(like a Rav, Rebbetzin, teacher...) There is a reason why Hashem did not put you on an isolated island, but, instead on a world populated with many different types of people. And it is definately not a sign of weakness to reach out and ask for help.... and once you do, you will find that it's easier to breathe because know there is someone who has seen more of life who is helping out. It is hard to do, but it's worth it-to tackle the problem/question, and not to live with it your whole life waiting for the day when "someday far in the future"...when you will.."live your way into the answer..."... bec. leaving too many things "unresolved in your heart" might never allow you to leave your corner or to dive into the pickle jar with everyone else.

pobody's nerfect. said...

but sometimes you ask and nobody has any answers...

Scraps said...

There is something to be learned from every difficult situation we go through in life. Sometimes it is apparent in the moment, but far more often, we need the distance and perspective of time to be able to grasp an understanding of why we had to go through that hardship.

And then...there are the situations that we simply cannot understand. Time and experience shed no light on them. And as we turn them over and over in our minds, unbidden the question bubbles up...why? And we may even question what is the purpose of our being put into such situations where we seem to be almost forced to ask questions that have no answers. What can we learn? I think, however, that that is precisely the purpose--we are put into such situations to learn how to live with the questions. Yes, they trouble us. Yes, they are difficult to live with. But if you can learn to live the questions and still come out with your emunah undiminished or even strengthened, you have learned a great lesson in life.

I think it is better to have a questioning mind than an apathetic one. The questioner may be more troubled, but is ignorance truly bliss? As a sem teacher once told us in the name of the Kotzker Rebbe, "I prefer wisdom even if it is painful."

corner point said...

Po--
Great quote. And yeah, I know that one. Thanks.

Anon--
Do I know you IRL? You sound familiar...
And good points. Shkoyach.

Scraps--
You're right.
Sigh.
...
Contented sigh, almost
:)

G said...

I have a Rebbi who from time to time reminds his students not to worry so much about finding answers. That a good question is worth far more than a good answer. Answers will come, or they wont; either way it is the questions that teach you about whatever it is you are studying.

"the questions themselves must be the catalysts for growth and richer living that I was looking for in their ever-elusive answers."

That's just it. "Growth and richer living", what better answer to many, if not all, of life's questions.

corner point said...

G--
Interesting....
It's just...chaval...that such good questions need to hang there somewhere suspended between being understood and being purposeful in their confusion.....

G said...

I guess that depends on the question and the topic.

Some answers take time to develop some to understand and some, truth be told, are not available at the present time. Yet I don't think, even in the last case, that it relegates the question to the status of "chaval".

Questions can be an end in and of themselves.

---As far as never asking "why?"...I was always told growing up (and sometimes now and again) that one can always ask Why. It's just important to know whether you are asking "why not" or "why yeah".

corner point said...

When I said chaval, I meant that sometimes the question builds up so much and becomes so important and real to you that when you come to realize that the answer is not available to you, you feel as if you've been hiking on this amazing, intense trail and suddenly come face to face with this incredible void and the path simply...stops.

In which case, I suppose, you should stop and enjoy the view...learn what you can from that void...
But in my opinion, after such a high, it's still a bit of a letdown...

Questions can be an end in and of themselves.
How so?

It's just important to know whether you are asking "why not" or "why yeah".
Please explain. What's the difference?

corner point said...

And unfortunately, I was taught not to ask why.

A few teachers promoted "why" kind of questions, while most others saw it as sacrilege. Despite the strong influence of the former, the feeling I got growing up was that asking "why" was the manifestation of a chisaron in bitachon and emunah--That some things need simply to be "taken"...
I know that's an erroneous belief, but that's the impression I got.

But there are categories of "whys" too...
One of the most powerful lessons I ever learned was from the family of a young mother who passed away. In short, the question never crossed her mind despite all the levels of gehinnom she passed through. There are places and times for "why", and sometimes not asking so even when you can shows something big about you...