Questions and Answers

The underlying question is what provides inspiration, encouragement, and action. The underlying answer provides none of these things; it only results in release, understanding and satisfaction. By giving importance to the answer and not the question, we never properly generate inspiration, encouragement, and action. Our questions are premature and mal-nurished, and thus the so-called answers we arrive at are sickly and short lived.

Some may think that answers result in inspiration, encouragement, etc., but really this is not the case. Either what they call an answer is actually a further and subtler refinement of the question, OR it is truly an answer- resulting in something other than inspiration,etc. Inspiration, etc. is movement, yet true answers do not result in movement. Questions bring movement and answers bring stillness. Put another way, answers are the release of tension that questions create. Arriving at the underlying answer, I feel, would be the release of all tension; the sublimation of all obstacles; Nibbana; Moksha. All so-called answers until that point are simply further progressions of the underlying question.

So thinking in this way, how does one live? One lives by continually asking the underlying question; continually being led deeper by its result. In this way, one does not need answers to live. Definately, answers will come, but they will cease to be the guiding force or principle in one's life.

The term underlying question has been used but not defined. Personally, I feel that the definition of this question is intimate and quite unique to each person; we must each find our question. One way for me to phrase my personal underlying question is 'Why Am I?' or 'What is this I?'

--As I see it.