ASKING QUESTIONS AND SEEKING ANSWERS
TO LIVE LONGER
If
you wish to live longer or to a ripe old age, you must ask yourself many
questions about life; after all, living is about asking questions and seeking
answers to the questions asked. Livingfor life in this contemporary world may never be easy because it requires
wisdom, which is essentially finding answers to the questions asked about life
and living, and then applying those answers to everyday living in the material
world.
Have
you ever wondered: there has to be much more to life than this—the kind of
life that you are living right now?
If
you have, then maybe you should, first and foremost, ask yourself questions
about why you want to live longer. Your reasons could be some of the following:
You desire to live a better life
than the one that you are currently living.
You want to see your children or
grandchildren grow up and mature into adults.
You have your life passions, some of
which are already accomplished, while others are being pursued but remaining
unfulfilled.
You are experiencing some core
values, which are not just your life goals but rather your beliefs in humanity
that have to be lived in order to fully experience the meaning of existence as
well as the innate happiness in humanity.
You still like to enjoy some of the
mundane pleasures of life and living that have satisfied your five senses.
You love to maintain good
relationships and true friendships with those who are close and dear to you.
You may be fighting some life
challenges or health issues—just like Alex
Trebek, the 77-year-old TV celebrity famous for hosting NBC's “Jeopardy”,
who openly declared in 2019 that he had to live longer in order to fight his
pancreatic cancer because of his still-standing three-year contract with
NBC.
Asking
the question “Why you want to live longer?” may initiate many other why
questions specifically related to you, to others close to you, and to the world
around you. Living is all about asking the many why and how questions in your
everyday life and living.
In
the Bible, Jesus said: “Ask, and it
shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find . . .” (Matthew 7:7) In real life, we must always ask ourselves many
thought-provoking questions at all times. Asking questions is
self-introspection, which is a process of self-intuition and self-reflection,
without which there is no self-awareness and therefore no personal growth and
development. A static life is never a life well lived and worth living.
Therefore, asking questions is self-empowering wisdom—a tool necessary for
living longer.
The
truth is that the kind of questions you ask determines the kind of life you are
going to live. Your questions often trigger a set of mental answers, which may
lead to actions or inactions, based on the choices you make from the answers
you have obtained. Remember, your life is always the sum of all the choices you
have made in the process. No matter what, life is a journey of self-discovery,
a continuous process of asking questions and seeking self-enlightening answers
from them. It should be noted that the answer to every question you ask may
change over time, because life is forever changing, and changes are often
transformative. The more questions you ask, the clearer your mind will become,
and the more ready you will be to receive the answers.
Although
asking questions is a self-learning process, do not seek absolute answers from the questions asked; more importantly, do not
seek answers that might not be given to you. The most important thing in
questions-and-answers is to experience everything, not just to pursue the
knowledge. As a matter of fact, knowledge can help, but it can also hinder.
When you only follow what you know, and forget what you feel, you can easily be
led down the wrong path. Extensive knowledge and logical reasoning may not
necessarily compound true wisdom.
The
bottom line: live every question you are going to ask yourself, and live in its
presence. Be patient toward all those questions that you cannot find answers
immediately. True enlightenment may dawn on you one day when you find yourself
asking no more questions because you already have all the answers; that is the
ultimate awakening.
Enjoy
the process of self-reflecting all the questions you are going to ask yourself;
without this self-reflection, you may exist for other people, and not for
yourself. Now is the time to start asking questions, and putting yourself on
the right path to intuiting the TAO of living longer.
Stephen Lau
Copyright©
by Stephen Lau
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