Member-only story
Is it the End of the Road?
Do you know that scene in a movie when the hero suddenly finds themselves at a dead end or impasse? The road they were following has abruptly ended and there doesn’t appear to be a way out. They were so sure they were on the right path. What happened?
Recently, I’ve been feeling that I’ve approached a dead end. It surprises me because I’ve been so sure I was on the right road. And now I’m in this spot and I’m not so sure. Nothing seems to make sense. I look around and I see and hear thousands of voices calling and gesturing: “Come this way” and “No, go that way” and “Over here, this is the true way”. Everyone wants you to follow them. Everyone has the “secret’ to the Way!
But I was so sure I knew my way.
I hoped that like the hero in the movie, there was some hidden trigger, something that would reveal a secret passage. Did I really come all this way for nothing? I look around. I listen, I read, I practice but nothing reveals itself as the key to unlocking the way forward. I’m stuck.
Until today.
Today, I came by chance upon a poem by one of my favourite poets — Wendell Berry.
“It may be that when we no longer know what to do
we have come to our real work,
and that when we no longer know which way to go
we have come to our real journey.
The mind that is not baffled…
