The Questions you Ask Determine the Answers you Get

Recently my teacher for Swedish massage read a poem in class that presented a distinction between learning that comes ‘from without’ and learning that comes ‘from within’. The learning from without was described as purposeful for climbing ladders and making marks on tablets and climbing above others. Wisdom and memory represented the learning that comes from within.

What was interesting to me was the large reaction I had to this reading. Though I’m very fond of wisdom and do believe we know much of what we need to know, I am equally astonished by the thrill of anatomy and physiology and kinesiology: learning from outside the most basic structures of our cells and what parts are powerhouses and what parts are sluggish blobs and how what we feed ourselves determines whether we blob or function as little engines. It seems the very heart of wisdom to me to feed my brain frenzy and drink in as much information and science as I possibly can.
I found the distinction between ways of knowing unhelpful and all of me wanted to say

STOP

let me twirl with my questions and invite my fancy for detail and specificity

The pictures you see are of our snowshoe hike 10 days ago a little north of Flagstaff. I remembered my first snowshoeing trek with Carlton in Wyoming one Easter weekend and it was such a happy association for me. The snow was so pure, even days after its falling. The sky so blue and the pines so green. Our world is colored so vividly. It is easier to see this with such big sky.

I have come to know my classroom and classmates much better to a point. Group life is a lot like massage therapy. It is not unnverving to stay ‘skin deep’. It is an appropriate starting point. Getting into the ‘belly’ of muscles and reaching deeper requires a lot more relationship. Always tracking and checking in — looking for signals and asking for information: is this pressure okay? could it be more? could I go deeper? I think in pastoral relationships sometimes I forgot to check so carefully — or to bother to learn how to navigate the shallow points into depth.

Also, massage therapists have some similar personality to clergy: want to help someone, want to touch someone, in my case: want to invite a larger narrative and inspire healing. There is also a lot of pain in the room. We get the occasional spurt of life horror erupting into the room. Prison ministry and my chaplaincy work at a mental hospital visit me in these moments. Suffering abounds as does the resilience of the human spirit.

One thing different about massage therapists and clergy is an allergy to ‘religion’ some of my peers report feeling. I hear apologies for referencing ‘God’ when reading poetry. I am going to read the Mad Farmer Liberation Front Manifesto one day by Wendell Berry as my offering.

I wonder often how we got to the place where the narrative of grace and welcome and wholeness turned into a source of such pain, devastation, and heartbreak. As we learn the muscles that have natural twist I think about narrative and how things get twisted. At the place of the twist is always tension and tension is always at those points. One does not ‘untwist’ to relieve the pressure. One takes a different approach.

As we talked about evidence for various scientific theories I remembered a phrase from studying texts: the questions you ask determine the answers you get. It is more important to learn the right questions than it is to find the right answers to the questions presented.

After snowshoeing, Allen and I headed for Sedona for a day of hiking. We splurged on a wide angle lens. I practiced taking pictures of big sky to try and show you want it means to be able to see sky on all sides of you at one time. There is no boundary on the peripheral perspective in the high desert. Standing still you spin in circles looking up at sky.

These are the days of wisdom and memory out hiking and thinking about the next step and being in the middle and oh, so small all the time.

In the classroom, I find more pleasure at discovery and revelation.

Our anatomy instructor presented the origins of the universe. He gave us “the narrative that comes from this thing we call science” and the accuracy of his presentation brought giggles to my throat. People looked at me curiously, but nobody asked me why I found it so funny.

As he proceeded to explain the billions of years before human life and how water showed up on the planet from comets and the fundamental elements of life arriving in part also from these comets I began to see the links he was making and the predications upon which all our assumptions are made in this thing we call science.

For the first time I had a glimmer into what must feel at stake for the Creationists. How it all began really does determine implications for where it all is and in relation to who/what. With the notion that this narrative of science is somehow more devoid of holiness and mystery than Church narrative I find no allegiance.

I find the narratives to be like the double helix of DNA: different ropes creating a ladder on which that which defines us in particular and unifying ways are hung into rungs.

Science is one big huge playground. I wish I had been taught in this way before. My memories of science have to do with memorizing periodic tables and rote repetition. This class is all about application and relevance.

I used to think I would enjoy the sunset more if it maintained its mystery (which required my ignorance). Now I find that I want to understand it all in order to see the mystery.

Today we practiced finding the deepest muscle in the human body: the psoas muscle. It lies on the front side of the spinal column behind everything else in our bellies. The humility required to reach below someone’s liver and through the intestines to find that most buried muscle surprised me. To offer my belly to someone I’ve known for 12 days for their rooting and searching was humbling as well.

But at the moment when my young partner found the psoas muscle inside me, she grinned really broad and her eyes twinkled and she said loud enough for the whole class to hear, “I found it!” And that was pretty great.

Saturday morning I took Allen and his high school buddy Mark to the edge of the Grand Canyon. As they checked in the ranger cautioned about 3 miles of ice to navigate down Bright Angel trail and the two winter storms heading their way. They are having a very large adventure! They re routed their trip a bit to come out a day sooner. I laughed at myself watching movies on Sunday to alleviate my lonesomeness and distract me from worrying. The movie I chose? A Mighty Heart which detailed for 2 hours the desperate search for the missing journalist Daniel Pearl. Probably not the best choice for me to watch. But I got through it and am grateful that their initial campsite had cell service.

One story I heard from them was on the initial first hour of their hike. They encountered

a hiker in trouble and talked to the rescue folks at length. Said hiker had a problem with his calf and was reportedly unable to complete the hike. Word came back that there was no rescue available that night and the hiker would have to sleep there overnight until morning.

“What? Can’t you send a mule or something?”

No, sir. We’ll have someone get to you in the morning.

“Well, I”m not going to spend the night HERE!”

And out he hiked.

As I write this, I’m waiting for LOST to start and I imagine Allen in the belly of that Canyon, eating cliff bars and trail food (the it’s amazing, you just add hot water and seal it up and shake it, and then you have lasagna kind of trail food) and drinking hot chocolate while being completely enveloped in majesty and beauty — and one very light weight down sleeping bag!

Thanks for reading along. I am choosing to write the way my mind confounds things together, spiraling at places and leaving threads hanging. This is what massage school in Arizona is like for me. Class and play interact and sift together. Thanks for your company and interest…. or, as my kinesiology teacher, Joe, says at the close of every class: Thanks for playing. See you soon.

Comments

kelly says

February 13, 2010 at 6:09 pm

Had to look up and read Mad Farmer Liberation Front Manifesto… you should definitely read it as your offering.
Thanks again for sharing your journey….

Lauren Bradley says

April 19, 2010 at 3:52 pm

I LOVE reading about all your adventures, both inside and outside the classroom. Can't wait to pay YOU for a massage!!!

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