Setting Your Heart on Fire:

Seven Invitations to Liberate Your Life

The Second Invitation

“To know is to be ignorant. Not to know is the beginning of wisdom.”

””J. Krishnamurti

“Love is the answer” —it’s a song, a bumper sticker, and a clichÃ©. But in a way the message is misleading. It would be more accurate to proclaim that love is the question.

An answer is closed. It means that the investigation has been finished, that all discoveries have been made. When you’ve found the answer, you look no further.

Questioning, like love, spurs you to grow and expand. Rather than just believing what you’ve been taught or told, you come to prize the capacity to think on your own. What’s true becomes highly personal, continually in flux, and subject to frequent review. In questioning with such conviction you bring a constant vibrancy to your sense of self, to all aspects of life, and to every single moment.

For most of us, putting this into practice is more difficult than it sounds. From childhood we’re trained not to question but to conclude. We spend years developing a concrete identity, and then construct a life to reinforce it. We choose partners, friends and communities who share our beliefs. We avoid or even judge those who don’t.

On the societal level, we affiliate ourselves by class, race and ethnicity. Celebrating our uniqueness can create confidence and strength, but it can also breed superiority and distrust of outsiders. When we set ourselves apart or others do it for us, stereotypes result. To thrive, stereotypes rely on the absence of firsthand knowledge. When we don’t question such unfounded opinions and our own role in perpetuating them, discrimination can quickly follow.

On the spiritual level, where love is meant to flourish, religious institutions can act out just like people. At one point or another, almost all have committed massacres in the name of God. They’ve frequently turned on themselves as well, erupting in factional disputes for money, power and ideological supremacy. All of this continues today, with no tradition entirely immune. Such clashes are customarily fueled by a fierce resistance to questioning.

As individuals, we’re often forced to choose between loyalty and inquiry. When we hold back our questions in the name of devotion, transgressions frequently result. And just as frequently, if we do question religious authority, we soon find ourselves outside the fold.

Self-righteousness can also tempt those of us who follow a non-institutional path. Even in the most alternative spiritual groups, disputes often arise over the slightest differences. And, perhaps just as often, members bond together to malign everything mainstream.

The Second Invitation, therefore, asks you to conduct a candid search for all your unexamined or divisive beliefs. To do so means revisiting everything you know. It requires you to shatter your frame of reference, and to step through it into virgin territory.

To begin, let’s look at how your frame of reference formed in the first place. The initial element was heredity, which determined such basic characteristics as your body type and personality. This happened, of course, without any of your involvement or control. Next came your early environment, upbringing and education, also all out of your control. By the time you graduated from grade school, your core values and beliefs were well developed, and very little of it happened by choice. Free will played a part, certainly, but no greater than the role of chance.

Whether you’re a Democrat or Republican, devout or atheist, sports fan or opera buff—these preferences have been shaped largely by circumstance. And even when you evolve later in life, or make sudden transformations, such seemingly autonomous changes rely on traits instilled long ago.

None of this is a problem—unless you forget it. Forgetting your circumstantial nature allows you to assume that your worldview is entirely self-developed, that it’s entirely right or complete, when in actuality it can only be one single fragment of a vast, interrelated whole.

Does this mean that living in accord with love requires you to abandon your beliefs, opinions and tastes? Of course not. But it encourages you to keep exploring, reconsidering, embracing whatever you discover and any shifts in perspective that may result.

Imagine that there’s a wolf, bounding through the woods. It’s strong, sleek, magnificent. To the naturalist this wolf is precious, one of God’s hallowed creatures. To a hunter, this same wolf is a target, the source of sport and possibly dinner. To a scientist, the wolf is an object for dispassionate study. And to the nearby sheep rancher, whose herd has been slowly decimated, the wolf spells financial collapse.

The wolf, it’s obvious, is both all those things and none of them. The naturalist, hunter, scientist and rancher each have a clear point of view. When they find themselves in disagreement, they can either take sides and vilify one another, or can seek mutual understanding and common ground. They can choose to open or close, to question or answer.

While opening yourself to love makes you a more loving person, it doesn’t preclude the possibility of disputes. It doesn’t mean that simple solutions are always possible, or that there’s always a happily ever after. But in accepting the Second Invitation, you minimize any unnecessary harm that your own viewpoint may cause.

To do so, you must perform a courageous uprooting of any snap judgments, inherited stances, and absolute allegiances. Without abandoning your own interests, you’re called upon to inquire first and decide later, much later. Actually, the most loving approach is not to take sides in any dispute until you can first understand and restate the opposing position with complete accuracy.

This is a tall order, especially when passions flare, yet love asks for nothing less. In fact, it compels you to go even further. Fully accepting the Second Invitation means not just asking questions, but instead becoming one. Only when your entire life is founded upon exploration, only when you’re as comfortable in mystery as you are certainty, only when you can open to new and differing points of view with the ease and constancy of breathing—only then will you have met love’s challenge.

Illuminating the Second Invitation

“Often that which is true will appear false, and that which is certain, doubtful” There is scarcely a single truth of which we can have complete knowledge.”

””St. John of the Cross

Who Am I?

Questioning your everyday identity can lead to a richer sense of self.

Who are you? Or, more precisely, what makes you who you are? Is it your body and mind? Is it the work you do? The roles you play in family and society? How you feel and act? Your personality? Your soul? All of that or something else entirely?

These are the kinds of questions that often confound us as adolescents. Then, when we’re older and busier, they fall by the wayside. But the moment we stop asking them, something vital inside us begins to die.

Many of us reawaken this type of questioning at a more sophisticated level when life doesn’t meet our expectations. It may happen in church, during recovery, through meditation, or other forms of spiritual exploration. If we’re lucky, however, no single satisfactory answer will come. It’s not much more enlightened to define oneself as an addict than a skateboarder, or as a child of God than a Mets fan. Any such definition is confining, incomplete, and exactly what gets in love’s way.

The truth, as seen through the eyes of love, is that every single one of us is a unique and particular expression of the infinite. You’d be astounded, dumbstruck, to grasp the whole of what you are. The key to discovering this vastness is to question your own identity with diligence. This practice is similar, and builds upon, the attention required for opening to emotions.

To get the process started, take another look at the first paragraph above and search for as complete an answer as possible to the question “Who are you?” Begin by writing the phrase “I am” and then complete it with whatever pops into your mind. Do this over and over, perhaps a dozen or even twenty times. For example: I am a (gender). I am a (nationality). I am a (religion/atheist/agnostic). As you continue, make sure to include your various roles and responsibilities. I am an executive. I am a soccer coach. I am a parent. Before wrapping up, add some descriptions of your personality. I am funny. I am smart. I am impatient. I am romantic.

Now that your list is done, read your answers out loud. After each one, take a long pause. Notice the feelings and thoughts that arise with this particular identification. Let’s say you’ve just pronounced, “I am a parent.” At first you might feel a wave of love toward your family. Then you might feel some of the stress and overwhelm that parenting often brings. You might start to get angry at the lack of affordable childcare in your area, or wonder how you’re ever going to save enough for the college fund.

By performing this exercise, you can quickly see how much energy and investment your sense of identity consumes. This is natural, unavoidable, but it’s not the whole story. Now read the list out loud again, only this time insert the word “not” into each sentence (I am not an executive. I am not a soccer coach. I am not funny, etc.). Imagine, just for a moment, that all these renunciations are true. This gives you a chance to peel off layer after layer of everyday identity, and to see what, if anything, remains.

For some people, imagining themselves shorn of all roles and characteristics is frightening. For others it’s a taste of freedom. How does it feel to you? Can you experience the part of you that exists beyond every item on your list?

If so, you’ve touched the region of your consciousness where love lives. It’s through this formlessness that all things are connected, that we’re all one. If you haven’t yet been able to access it, try the final piece of the exercise. On a new sheet of paper, in large letters, write only the words “I Am.” Repeat the words out loud, boldly, and let their evocation of pure being resonate within you.

If you’re like most of us, such resonance is all too fleeting. Your sense of self feels threatened in the wings, and quickly resumes center stage. Its power to do so has developed over your whole lifetime. The goal of questioning is not to vanquish it, but to bring more of you into the limelight. The more you arrive, the brighter you shine.

Is That A Fact?

Your beliefs about yourself may be outdated or inaccurate.

Are you tall or short? Thin or fat? Smart or slow? Attractive or plain? More important, how do you know? By comparison? Because you’ve heard it all your life? Would the answers change if you lived in a different family? A different culture? A different era?

Think of a personal quality that you’ve never really questioned. Maybe you’ve always been outgoing, gentle or willful. Try to locate the earliest memories in which this quality played a part, and in which you began to incorporate it into your self-image. Did something happen at home, in the classroom, or on the playground? Chart the course of that quality from those first formative moments through the years that followed, noting any special occurrences that seemed to accentuate it. Did you get positive feedback for this quality in high school or college? Did it help you in your first few jobs?

Next, do the same for a quality that you’ve always lacked. Perhaps you’ve never been very quick-witted, graceful or mechanically inclined. See if you can remember the first time you felt this quality’s absence, and then any key experiences that intensified it.

As both of these searches make clear, self-perceptions arise out of the context and events of our upbringing. Over time, they become deeply ingrained. Often, when circumstances change, perceptions remain stubbornly fixed. Many slender adults, for example, still feel like the overweight children they used to be. Many rich people can never quite feel secure after their impoverished beginnings, and many overachievers continually compensate for being devalued early on.

Sometimes, the opposite occurs. If people struggle to replace one personal attribute with another, their whole identity may hinge upon this transformation. A previously fat person may become obsessed with thinness, a previously poor person with wealth, and a previously unappreciated person with continual acclaim. This type of over-identification with one particular trait can seriously skew a person’s self-perception.

What about you? Are there parts of your own self-perception that have outlived their validity? Are there parts of you that go unseen or get distorted by your need to view yourself in one particular way?

It’s not hard to grasp that many of the traits we take for granted about ourselves aren’t actually givens but instead beliefs. What’s challenging, on the other hand, is eluding the unwanted impact of our beliefs. The most common approaches to doing so involve replacing harmful beliefs with constructive ones. This might involve self-esteem building activities or affirmations. If you saw yourself as a timid person and wanted to be more powerful, for instance, you might be instructed to begin each morning with the phrase, “I am strong, clear, and assertive in all my endeavors.”

Almost anyone who’s tried such approaches can attest to their great difficulty. As resistant as they are to change, beliefs are also highly sensitive to outside feedback. On occasion, even when we’re riding high, just the slightest critical comment can give renewed strength to a negative belief we’ve supposedly overcome. Likewise, beliefs are also subject to our own shifts in mood. One bad day, for instance, can sometimes void months of increased self-worth.

The reason for pointing all this out is that the Second Invitation takes a completely different tack. It does not suggest that you try to like yourself one bit more or favor certain types of beliefs over others. Rather, it encourages you to recognize the tendency for all beliefs to be unreliable, and to question them with equal fervor.

Any belief, if held too tightly, can limit your ability to open. It can have the same effect as an emotional shutdown, cutting you off from yourself and the present moment. That’s why investigating your beliefs about yourself is so important. It helps you to set those beliefs aside periodically, to see past them when necessary, to glimpse possibilities you might otherwise never encounter. Often, such an expansion of your perspective creates a thrilling surge of love. More than just self-esteem, this love is bigger than any single self. It connects you to that place in your heart where all beings dwell, and where there’s unity beyond belief.

Shades of Grey

When it comes to judging your own character, no trait is all good or bad.

One way to break through the limits of self-perception is by investigating the value judgments that accompany it. Value judgments are beliefs that pertain specifically to worth. They’re about right and wrong, good and bad. With that in mind, let’s expand the list of key personal qualities you made earlier, such as I am funny, I am smart, and I am impatient. Include a wider variety of qualities this time, everything from I am aggressive, if applicable, to I am a gossip to I am good with my hands. When the list includes at least ten qualities, spend a moment with each to see whether you view it as mostly positive or negative.

Wherever you’ve assessed an item as positive, give a careful explanation why. For each quality, try to determine how and when your evaluation of it developed. Notice whether each belief is strong or a little shaky.

If you listed I am supportive, for example, you might point out that offering help to others makes for great friendships and is usually returned in kind. Maybe you remember an early incident at summer camp when an especially supportive bunkmate made a great impression on you. Yet perhaps you’ve been highly critical of others lately, and are wondering whether your helpfulness has waned.

Next, explore whether that same aspect of yourself could be seen as negative. Are there times when it’s too much? When it gets in the way? Are there others who might think so even if you don’t? What, in their own history and character, might lend them to take that view?

Keeping with our example, you might find on occasion that your support of others feels smothering to those it’s intended to benefit. You might also conclude that it can be a smokescreen to keep you from focusing on your own needs. In addition, you might notice that certain friends respond harshly even to your most non-smothering aid because they don’t really feel deserving. In their case, due to their beliefs, offers of support only stir up shame.

Now let’s continue. Wherever you’ve assessed an item as negative, go through the same analysis. What led to this evaluation? Does it ever waver? Are there situations in which this same part of you might be an asset? Or where it might even become essential? Would any people who know you agree? Would something in their own make-up influence the answer?

Whether negative or positive, as this exercise helps demonstrate, all value judgments about yourself are truly relative. Negative value judgments, obviously, have a great capacity to shut you down. But positive value judgments can also be limiting. As long as you perceive yourself through a good/bad or right/wrong lens, you can’t possibly view the whole picture. Even if you judge yourself as all good, for example, absolutely brimming with wisdom and kindness, what happens at those inevitable times when you aren’t?

Whenever a personal value judgment arises, it’s tempting to judge yourself for that as well. Instead, however, you can gently question. Is this the complete story? Am I leaving something out? When you ask these kinds of questions with consistency, your value judgments soon begin to diminish. You see yourself much more clearly. Rather than straining toward ideals, you find yourself easing toward love.

Vantage Points

A worldview is the outgrowth of circumstance.

How you see the world around you is every bit as subjective as the way you view yourself. Perhaps even more so, since you likely spend far less time examining it. Your gut reactions—to other people, situations and world events—are based upon a host of circumstances uniquely your own. From these gut reactions flow the opinions and values that make up your vantage point.

Why do you love a certain song and revile another? Why does a popular co-worker “rub you the wrong way?” What’s behind your views on taxes, drugs, immigration? If you don’t care about those issues, what leads you to disregard them?

To ask these questions, as you may have gathered by now, is more about gaining awareness than seeking definitive answers. It’s another way to jar you loose from your habitual take on things, and from the conviction that any particular position exists independent of those espousing it.

Pick a topic you feel strongly about. Articulate your opinion on it with full force. Now ask yourself—would I be likely to have the same opinion if I were an oil baron in Texas? A waitress in Detroit? A beggar in Bombay? What if I were locked away in prison? Terminally ill? Or the victim of a violent crime?

If shifting situations in this manner might change your opinion, what does that tell you? Can a point of view that’s determined largely by fate ever be absolutely correct?

Many rational minded people, when confronted with the subjectivity of belief, point to science as a way out. They rely upon the scientific method to separate unreliable personal perspectives from verifiable “proof.” Yet the best scientists understand how each generation’s theories are shaped by the prevailing culture, and how those theories evolve constantly over time. The worst mistake a scientist can make, no matter the discipline, is to consider any theory beyond review.

Many devout people, when invited to question everything, sense a challenge to the moral authority set forth by their God. The idea that there’s no best way to see things, that there’s no fixed right and wrong, can seem to throw the whole world into disarray. Like it or not, however, such disarray is a part of life. The dozens of conflicting groups within every organized religion provide a potent example. Since no divine text is without multiple interpretations, all of us are left, in the end, to make our own judgment calls.

Contrary to first impressions, then, the Second Invitation gels with both science and spirit. It unites the two approaches by casting aside all filters that limit our perceptive capacity. Its call to constant questioning is what keeps us alive, awake, able to nurture both our understanding and awe.

Stretching

It takes practice to acquire a fluid perspective.

When our muscles are stiff, or display a limited range of motion, naturally we stretch them. A similar stretching is required to keep our viewpoints limber. Purposely stretching our viewpoints is what renders the Second Invitation practical, relevant, instead of just lofty words.

The following stretches are designed to be challenging, informative, and even fun. Do as many as you like, in any order and over whatever period of time feels right. Most important, take each stretch just to the point of healthy tension. Pushing too hard could cause you to recoil, and to question less instead of more.

Persona Complete this sentence a number of times—I’m not the kind of person who” ” Make your declarations specific, such as “hangs out in bars,” “goes camping,” or “likes to be the center of attention.” Then, as a brief experiment, do these very things. Monitor closely what it feels like. Think of it as research into different types of people and behavior. See if anything shifts within you.

Connection Choose someone in your work or social sphere with whom you find it hard to connect. Ask that person to lunch. Search out what you have in common, as well as what you don’t. Try, when you’ve gone your separate ways, to see the world through your lunch mate’s eyes.

Controversy Pick a current issue—abortion, the death penalty, or something equally contentious. Make sure it’s a subject about which you have a clear, strong view. Now, seek out someone with the opposing view and ask for a detailed explanation. Notice every time this explanation causes you to shut down emotionally. No matter what, keep listening. Avoid all interruptions and keep from silently planning your rebuttal. Then, repeat back the argument you’ve heard and check to see if you’ve done it justice.

Home Front Perform this stretch with your partner, close friend or family member. Focus on the most consistently problematic issue between the two of you—money, sex, judgment, jealously, etc. Ask very directly what the other person feels in relation to this issue, and especially in regard to your own behavior. As in the last stretch, just listen, absorb, and make no effort to defend yourself. Next, repeat back what you’ve heard and make sure your understanding is accurate.

Field Trip Visit a part of town that you usually don’t, that’s mainly populated by a race or class other than your own. Spend at least a few hours there, making sure to interact with a variety of residents—men, women, youth, the elderly. Whenever you’re about to approach someone, observe all your feelings and thoughts. Afterwards, notice if the interaction has either confirmed or challenged any preexisting beliefs.

Worship Trip Attend the weekly service of a faith other than your own. If anyone approaches you, say you’re there to learn. If possible, have someone explain the subtleties of the service to you. Participate as much as you feel comfortable. Observe all your reactions without critiquing or censoring them. When the service ends, see if it has shifted anything in the way you view your own type of worship.

Adversaries Find someone from an opposing political party. Ask for an unedited account of the things that make your own party the most loathsome. Listen carefully, noting all your triggers and shutdowns. Later, on your own, see if you can find any truth behind the generalizations.

Influence List the people who’ve had the most influence on you—parents, teachers, friends, authors, and so on. Then take them out of the picture, one at a time, and imagine the ways in which you might have developed differently.

Subscription For one year, subscribe to a magazine that supports something you detest. Read it cover to cover. If you don’t want to support the cause with the cost of a subscription, use the library. Keep your reading exploratory, investigative, with a special emphasis toward finding any possible common ground.

Inventory List ten of your strongest opinions about people and places, as well as about social, cultural and political issues. Then make a candid assessment of how educated you really are on each topic. Are there any topics, in truth, about which you know very little? Would you be willing to admit it if there were, even just to yourself?

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Portrait: The Shock of Discovery

Margaret had always been shy and reserved. For the most part she considered that a virtue, an outgrowth of her commitment to humility. When beginning the “Persona” stretch from the previous illumination, she completed the sentence, “I’m not the kind of person who” ” with the phrase, “hogs the spotlight and wears her heart on her sleeve.”

Deciding to make the stretch a big one, Margaret auditioned for the chorus in the annual Christmas musical at a local community theater. Much to her dismay, she was offered a small speaking part instead. She took it, with some reservation, since rehearsals for the main cast required a lot of emotional sharing and exploration. Each time the cast got together, in fact, the director started things off with a round of personal check-ins. Margaret couldn’t get by with just a few words, either, because if she tried to retreat into her shell the other cast members would pepper her with questions.

At first, participating at the theater filled Margaret with nothing but dread. It seemed like she spoke more in the first week, and to virtual strangers, than she had to her family over the past few months. Whether onstage or off, whether reciting lines or sharing something personal, “hogging the spotlight” would make Margaret feel dizzy, embarrassed and even shameful. She thought of quitting after almost every rehearsal, but that felt even worse than sticking it out.

Then, as opening night neared, Margaret noticed a big change. The personal check-ins no longer bothered her as much. She shared without any of her usual sweaty palms or heart palpitations, and actually began to look forward to it.

But the biggest change came in her listening. She noticed that she was increasingly eager to hear what the other cast members had to relate. She’d hang on their every word, nod with understanding and offer special words of encouragement later.

The show debuted, and Margaret got through the run without making any gaffes. There was nothing particularly striking about her performance, except that she was the one doing it. Her husband and kids joked that she must have been possessed by an alien, and secretly it felt good to surprise them.

When her extended family got together for the holidays, Margaret enjoyed it more than ever before. She spoke a little more, too. A couple times someone teased her about it, but mostly people didn’t even notice. What Margaret noticed was how she listened differently, at least here and there, just like she had at rehearsals.

Driving to work the next morning it hit her—her shyness had always been tinged with resentment. She’d harbored a secret judgment about people who “wore their heart on their sleeve” —a judgment based on anything but humility. As a result, she had listened to talkative people grudgingly, even bitterly. Stepping outside the comfort of her usual persona had caused her to see herself in a new and unflattering light.

When the shock of discovery wore off, as well as the guilt that accompanied it, Margaret was grateful for the whole experience. She had no desire to perform again, even though the theater asked. What she did desire was greater connection with the people who mattered most to her. To create that, she realized, would require more genuine sharing and listening. Since then she’s done a lot better in this regard, but still sees a long road ahead.
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Why Do I Want What I Want?

No one is immune from media manipulation.

The opposite of stretching your viewpoint is tightening it. Such tightening can happen without your involvement, knowledge or approval. This is often the effect, unfortunately, of mainstream media and advertising. No matter how savvy you are about its impact, no matter how mightily you strive to resist, media messages can penetrate your mind like the most contagious virus.

Such a topic may seem out of place in a spiritual book, and in one about love most of all. Yet it’s impossible to question everything and at the same time ignore what continually bombards us. The source of that bombardment is quite narrow, since only a few corporations now own most of the media. With the incredible development of technology, these corporations and their partners can literally, and efficiently, program some of your deepest longings.

Recognizing the role of media and advertising in contemporary life is not the same as complaining about the evils of TV or Madison Avenue. It’s not about right or wrong, good or bad, or about shoving the genie back into the bottle. Instead, becoming aware of the degree to which you’re programmed is what allows you to call it into question.

The advertising industry has become eerily expert at determining exactly what makes you tick, and what makes you buy. This is true even if you think you’re immune to its methods. There’s no escape—from the billboards, the product placement, the catalogs, and the market segmentation that grows ever more refined.

What do you crave most—safety? Money? Acceptance? Freedom? Whatever your answer, that’s where you’re most vulnerable. Craving is a kind of emotional trigger. It can shut down anything that gets in its way, especially your dedication to questioning, and override it with manufactured desire.

If such manufactured desire led to any kind of lasting satisfaction, it would be possible to make a case for it. But instead, the opposite is true. The goal of the system is to create a consciousness of lack, of endless need, which in turn stimulates further consumption. Reality, once luminous and full of mystery, becomes ever more flat and commodified. No toy, no rush of adrenalin, no fleeting sense of power can hold a candle to a liberated life. What they can do is deprive you of the time and focus necessary to create that life.

Embracing the Second Invitation requires you to pay special attention to where and how you’re most susceptible to manipulation. Here’s a way to get started. As soon as the time is right, set down this book awhile. Watch TV for an hour or read a glossy magazine. Pay close attention to the ads and see if any get you to crave. If they do, just sit quietly for a moment. Open to your craving without judgment, but also without making plans to satisfy it. Notice what happens when you give it such free reign. Does it only continue to swell, or does it eventually crest and recede?

If none of the ads get you to crave, focus on your greatest area of vulnerability. See if you can design an imaginary ad that would succeed where the actual ones failed. Placing yourself in the role of advertiser, even just briefly, can teach you a lot about your susceptibility. Often, it can even help you seriously reduce it.

Whenever you find yourself in the throes of craving, take a big step back from the sensation and ask yourself—why do I want what I want? When the answer to this question reveals an implanted yearning, it’s an opportunity to unclench, to let go, to remember that no matter how much you’re surrounded by messages to the contrary, love is never bought and sold.

A Deep Breath

Thriving amid uncertainty requires calm and patience.

Questioning everything kicks up a lot of dust. Things we assumed were true are suddenly doubtful. Beliefs we’ve clung to for security no longer provide any. It’s possible, and even likely, to feel a little lost. If this happens to you, it’s time to take a deep breath and relax. Accept the Second Invitation at your own pace. There’s no need to pressure yourself. In fact, doing so will only cause you to shut down.

The importance of calm and patience is something to keep in mind throughout all the Invitations. Most challenges are akin to a big boulder that you must push up a mountain by sheer force of will. Getting through school, succeeding in a profession, raising a family—all these goals require consistent effort, even when you have little left to give. Opening to love, on the other hand, is the opposite. While it, too, is often a major challenge, you can’t meet that challenge with exertion. You meet it, strangely enough, by relaxing.

Remember the metaphor of the rain, and how fully letting in each moment is like reveling in a downpour? Recall the exercise in your bath or shower, in which you dissolved into the heat as a model for creating emotional space? Whether in relation to feelings or to life itself, the process of opening is pleasant during easy times, but daunting during difficult ones. The same is true of opening to love. Love never goes away. It’s available even, and especially when you’re upset, frustrated or confused. But when you grasp at it, or strain for it, the resulting constriction only keeps love at bay.

The task, whenever you crave love the most, is to unclench. On the surface, the idea of trying to let go can seem contradictory. It can also seem like defeat, like giving up on your quest altogether. In practice, however, it’s exactly what frees love up, and frees you up to tap into love’s flow. If you haven’t experienced this already, your first taste of it will create a powerful “aha.” Afterward, each successive opening will arrive with greater ease, and will often be longer lasting.

Questioning, when done in a relaxed manner, can be a great aid in prolonging this openness. But what does the relaxed form of questioning entail? It entails not just living with uncertainty but embracing it. It entails feeling entirely at home in the state of not knowing, and cultivating that state with regularity.

Here’s a simple way to get started. Over the next few days, whenever someone seeks your opinion, pause for a good, long moment before responding. Instead of saying the first thing that comes to mind, allow other possible answers to arise. If you’re worried about how that might appear, go ahead and explain what you’re doing. If it’s you who can’t take the silence, locate the discomfort it elicits in your body and focus on opening to that.

Eventually, befriending uncertainty leads to a new type of balance. This balance allows you to continue making difficult choices and taking decisive action, but without the false sense of assurance you may be used to. Though balancing decisiveness and doubt can seem a little awkward at the outset, this is where the first two Invitations work together. When you’re able to feel everything, as well as question everything, it creates genuine flexibility. You can remain balanced and relaxed, flowing freely with life and love, even when events are at their most turbulent. The best course of action, in this state, frequently becomes obvious and effortless.

Imagine, like Margaret in the previous Portrait, that you found a flaw in one of your supposed strengths. Let’s say, through questioning, you came to realize that your greatest acts of generosity often came with an unstated demand for payback. This realization might cause you to shut down, distrust your own motives, and refrain from extending yourself at all.

Feeling everything, in this case, might involve opening to waves of guilt, confusion and insecurity. You might also encounter anger at yourself, and at a history of actions that you now deem hypocritical. For a time, you might even judge yourself as essentially stingy. Yet, after all that passed, you’d be able to see yourself as neither altogether generous nor stingy. You’d just be you, capable of a wide-range of responses that sometimes contradict each other. Without needing to shoehorn yourself into an overly restrictive identity, you’d have all the room necessary to take both a figurative and literal deep breath. This, in turn, would help bring a relaxed, spacious and loving perspective to what was previously such a loaded issue.

The next time you felt generosity stirring, it would be a wonderful opportunity to inquire. Can I give freely in this case, or do I need anything in return? Rather than trying to hash this out analytically, your openness would allow you to connect to your body, without stress or interference, and determine which approach actually felt the most authentic. Perhaps it would feel right to give without any conditions. Or perhaps, for the first time, you’d feel compelled to make some conditions clear before giving.

So far, we’ve been discussing how to prevent the Second Invitation from leaving you a little lost. But it can also take a different toll, leading you to question hypercritically or compulsively. You may begin to use the process of inquiry as a defense, a shield, hiding behind it to keep from fully taking part in the world. You’ll know if this is occurring when there’s a cynical edge to the way you question.

Such cynicism might arise, for example, if questioning a trusted leader revealed unacceptable behavior. This might cause you not just to question similar leaders in the future, but also to become overly suspicious. You might make blanket statements such as “It doesn’t matter who’s in charge—they’re all alike.”

Blanket statements are a possible indication that you’ve been triggered. It’s therefore important, when you catch yourself making them, to postpone further inquiry. More questions at this point would only set you at odds, with one part of you shutting yourself down, and another trying to pry yourself open.

The remedy for this predicament is the same as the last—embracing the First Invitation along with the Second, so as to pause, expand and relax. In the wake of your commitment to feel everything, any lingering shutdowns would ease. You’d uncover whatever emotions have been provoked. In this case, you might feel hurt, abandoned, and betrayed by the fallen figure.

Unfurling yourself as widely as possible, and letting all these feelings sweep through the resulting space, would restore you fully to the present moment. You’d be truly open, not just to the backlogged feelings but also to love as well. Your cynicism, without anything left to fuel it, would then naturally begin to melt. In its absence your questioning would deepen. You’d be able to evaluate all leaders on their individual merits, with an agile and unfettered mind.

Accepting the Second Invitation

To the best of my current and evolving ability, I resolve to:
Expand my self-definition
Regard beliefs about myself with doubt
Avoid one-sided judgments of my character
Recognize the circumstantial nature of my opinions
Stretch my perspective
Counter the effects of media manipulation
Relax into my new uncertainty