What do ancient amphibian gods from outer space have to do with your ability to get answers? Everything. “Help me find a career!” is a common plea, made more and more urgent the longer it is repeated. When you’re stuck on challenging questions—like “what should I go to school for?” or “which career is right for me?”—the best approach is sometimes to plunge into the scary and quirky depths and view things from a more outlandish perspective.
I recently read about the Dogon tribe in northwestern Africa. The Dogon worship the Nommo, ancestral spirits and teachers from the stars that have both human- and fish-like characteristics. They are known as “Masters of the Water.”
This got me thinking, which is always dangerous. What if humans are actually the descendants of these amphibian gods? What if we are all really mermaids and mermen, if only in spirit?
These are crazy ideas, I know. So I pray to the Nommo that you’ll indulge me as we delve into my bizarre new theory about how to approach finding answers to life’s pressing questions.
Getting by on the surface
Imagine yourself on a sailboat, carried by the wind and the waves in the middle of a vast ocean. You’re not alone. Other boats surround you, sometimes knocking into yours. And you might even have a few people onboard.
Your resources are limited. Out on this sea, you’re just trying to survive, trying to avoid pain and suffering. Your main concern is security. So you’re doing your best to protect yourself (and, perhaps, those you love) from emotional, spiritual, and physical dangers. You hang on desperately to anything you deem as “yours.”
You’ve spotted small islands here and there that could have stuff you might need or want, but the other boats are trying to beat you to them. Out here, competition seems to be more prevalent than cooperation. You can’t even be sure what is on each island, so choosing a direction seems impossible.
You feel out of control. It doesn’t help that nobody ever gave you proper sailing lessons. You are merely reacting as best you can to the many different forces that compel or coerce you.
The winds of past memories are pushing your sails. Passengers, in disagreement with one another, are hounding you to change course. Turbulence caused by the other boats keeps you on edge. Government buoys and coast guard cutters misdirect you or warn you to stay away from islands that look promising. Your compass keeps pointing to your own magnetic preconceptions. And, of course, random storms and greedy pirates make retaining your possessions even tougher.
You are being ruled by the circumstances that you’ve learned to depend on. But life on the surface—conflict and struggle and evasion and escape—is all you know, so you’re terrified of sinking or falling overboard and drowning.
Breathing underwater
Now imagine that you’ve had enough with “life” on the surface. You decide to take some drastic initiative to see what lies below. You make the plunge.
Whereas you were previously at the mercy of the surface chaos, you now have freedom to move without constraint or coercion. Diving far below the surface, you initially experience calm. A hurricane could be raging above and you wouldn’t know it.
The problem? It’s dark, which also means it’s damn scary. You’ve never felt more alone.
You begin to panic, realizing that you don’t have a clue about how to exist in these depths. You’ve been holding your breath, but you’re starting to lose consciousness. You are also too far below the surface now to come up for air.
In desperation, you open your mouth and fill your lungs with water. You’ve never felt pain like this. Your body tingles with razor blades. Death feels certain.
Then, sudden relief. You’re breathing, but not in any way that you understand. You’re also moving through the water with more speed and agility. You’ve got fins!
Still, it’s dark. You need a way to navigate. You can no longer rely on external stimuli to guide you. Whatever you use, it’s got to come from within, and it’s got to be based in the here and now.
As you get acquainted with your new body, you can’t help but curse like the sailor you used to be. But the strange circumstances inspire you, creating a powerful urge to blurt out difficult questions that you’d hardly considered before. After doing so a few times, you discover something amazing; you possess an extra sense, a whole new way of perceiving your world, free from influence and bias.
Just as dolphins use echolocation (reflected sound) to navigate and find objects, the questions you are asking bounce back at you, revealing the outlines of answers you’ve always struggled to find. You learn to ask and listen, with patience, a still mind, and an open heart.
Then, you start to wonder about the bigger implications of your newfound superpower.
Exploration versus exploitation
As an amphibian, you can, of course, return to the surface. It still has plenty to offer. And your new power works just as well up there, albeit it requires extra concentration due to all the noise and hubbub.
Just be careful. You might discover the perfect island destination—the perfect goal—living your life only as a means to get there and conquer it. Like every other island, though, it has limited resources to sustain you. You can only survive there for so long.
The danger is that you might over-exploit your goals. Viewing attainment as an end is the surest path to stagnation and decay. You must not overstay your welcome. To do so is to risk losing your new ability.
Your amphibian power is a gift designed for exploration, not exploitation. The world is abundant with possibilities when you recognize that there is far more to life than what you see on the surface.
40 deep questions
If you hope to find meaningful answers that align with who you really are, then you’ll have to start with deep questions. The surface ones, although perfectly necessary and seemingly large, are really just details. Here are a few examples of surface questions:
Where should I go to school?
What should I major in?
Where should I live?
Which career is right for me?
When should I start?
The problem with surface questions is that nobody really knows you well enough to give you good answers, and you may not know yourself well enough either.
Without going deep, your answers will usually be influenced—whether or not you are aware of it—by misconceptions, social conditioning, your past, and your immediate circumstances. Following such answers too often results in the substitution of one set of struggles for another that is different but not necessarily better.
Plunging into the deep waters is designed to make you fully aware of your insufficiencies and dependencies. So it takes real courage to do so. It won’t be pleasant at first, but the benefit of better understanding yourself and the world around you is well worth it.
After tackling the deep questions, you’ll be in better position to address the ones on the surface. Below are 40 examples to get you started. Choose only a few to answer in the beginning, until you get the hang of it. Be brave. And be honest.
Let me repeat that: be honest. You don’t want to be putting any more false perceptions into action. What you can learn will only be as good as your willingness to tell the truth. (Nobody else has to know your answers.)
1. Who (or what) am I desperate to hang on to?
2. Does my possessiveness make me feel worried or fulfilled?
3. Who (or what) do I want to escape from?
4. Who (or what) am I always evading?
5. What am I trying to prove? To whom? Why?
6. What am I keeping secret?
7. Am I a bullied deckhand or the captain of my own ship?
8. Am I living for myself or for other people and outside influences?
9. What would I have left if everyone I cared about suddenly passed away?
10. Who am I competing against? Is it really necessary?
11. Do I spend more time distracting myself from my feelings than listening to what they are trying to tell me?
12. What am I accumulating in order to bury my feelings? (“Love?” “Knowledge?” “Friendship?” “Stuff?”) Am I a hoarder?
13. What am I protecting?
14. Which do I value more: freedom or security?
15. Am I living my life as a means to attain an end of someone else’s choosing?
16. What am I hiding from?
17. What am I afraid to lose?
18. Do I believe that my ideas are inferior?
19. Who is judging me? Are their opinions more valuable than my own?
20. What do I always talk about but never do?
21. Am I willing to settle for a life imagined by someone else?
22. What do I do differently or better than other people but am afraid to show?
23. Am I blinded by my memories? Do I see a false reality?
24. Am I afraid to make room for new memories?
25. What is more important to me: happiness or prestige?
26. Is it necessary for me to have the perfect plan in place before doing what I know is right?
27. Am I just reacting to life as it happens to me, or am I the one in charge?
28. What am I most grateful for? Do I celebrate it, or do I spend my time worrying that I’ll lose it?
29. Am I willing to make my own decisions even if it means I might fail?
30. Do I spend too much time doing things I don’t like? Why?
31. Is there a difference between surviving and living?
32. Am I afraid to challenge my assumptions or the things that others “know” to be true?
33. Do I spend more time dreaming about doing the things I like to do than actually doing them?
34. When was the last time I really listened to my own feelings?
35. Who is capable of understanding me better than me?
36. Am I afraid to lose something that I don’t even have yet?
37. Do I make my own decisions or have I empowered others to make them for me? Why?
38. Am I in the habit of substituting one set of conflicts for another? Why?
39. How many of my thoughts come from other people or as a result of my past experiences?
40. How many truly original thoughts do I have in a day?
Remember: be honest
Do you have the guts to become a master of the water?
