100 Essential Questions for Tapping into Your Inner Wisdom

The Hard Questions for an Authentic Life
by Susan Piver

A thought-provoking guide to approaching life;s questions and transitions with presence of mind and integrity from the New York Times bestselling author of The Hard Questions: 100 Essential Questions to Ask Before You Say "I Do."

The Hard Questions: 100 Essential Questions to Ask Before You Say "I Do." took a revolutionary approach to prenuptial counseling in a provocative questions-and-answer format that encouraged readers to uncover their own unique truths. Taking this breakthrough approach to an even broader audience, The Hard Questions for an Authentic Life challenges readers to independently explore their deepest beliefs about relationships, friendships, family, work, money, creativity, and spirituality. The responses they uncover become the building blocks for a revitalized life that is lived with a sense of ease and confidence. Most important, The Hard Questions for an Authentic Life gives readers the renewed emotional strength necessary for coping with life;s many inevitable transitions. The Hard Questions for an Authentic Life marks the start of an important revolution in self-help publishing, one that at last enables us to find the answers and the experts within ourselves.

The search for authenticity is among our deepest and most natural inclinations. Anyone can live an authentic life. Living authentically doesn't require you to secure your dream job, get in perfect shape, or find true love. Certainly those are wonderful, but there is no guarantee that reaching any of these goals will provide the sense of confidence, joy, and ease that comes with authenticity. Haven't you known people who seem to "have it all," yet are not content? Hasn't each of us had the experience of finally securing something - the job, the boyfriend, the home, the perfect weight - that we've always longed for, thinking that this, at last, will mark the beginning of "real" life? I know I have. I also know that every time I find something I've been searching for...nothing happens. Invariably, after the first rush of happiness, I find myself wanting something more, again, imagining that my "real" life is just around the next corner.

While living an authentic life might include meaningful work, great relationships, health and beauty, and a great house, none of these has the power to unmask your true self, or settle you in the center of the life you are meant to live.

What does it mean to live authentically? Living authentically is what you're doing when you find congruence between your inner world - your feelings, values, gifts, needs, spirituality, and passions - and your outer world - your job, relationships, home, and community. When you live your authentic life, these things support and synergize each other. It doesn't mean that you have no worries, conflicts, or fears; you may even have more as you choose to live authentically. There is one key difference, though: they no longer have the power to unseat you. When you have discovered what you can offer to others, when you feel that you are on your unique path, when you have an ongoing, honest, reliable connection to your inner wisdom, then you have found your unique spot in this world with all its craziness, sorrow, and joy. This discovery gives tremendous ease. You finally have a way of relating to work, lovers, friends, and spiritual practices with openheartedness and intelligence. Problems, no matter how intense, are workable.

When I was a small child, I used to lie in bed and wonder where my real life was and when it would begin. I would sniff the suburban air, tune into the sound of the occasional car in the distance, look at the lovely, manicured lawns out the window, and try to locate anything at all that felt, sounded, or smelled right to me. Nothing did. For whatever reason, my early life, peaceful and secure as it was, didn't feel comfortable. I had the distinct sense that I didn't fit in - at home, at play, at school. I wasn't academically talented or good at making friends. The things I was interested in didn't appeal to anyone else. What I was good at - writing, reading, wondering about why people acted the way they did - didn't elicit much response. I felt isolated.

I always felt that my "real" life lay elsewhere. Even then, I knew (or hoped) that somewhere there were people who explored the worlds around and within them, engaged in passionate relationships, lived purposeful lives, and even connected with God. I believed that these were the qualities that made life worth living and that my life, once I located it, would connect me to them. I would find the joy of true love. I would discover my unique gifts. I would engage in work that allowed me to offer those gifts with courage and dignity. I would know God, the Goddess, Jesus, and the Buddha. I would come to a deep understanding of what it meant to be human and, specifically, what it meant to be Susan Piver. This understanding would naturally lead me to my true place in this life.

But where was it?

Interactions with family members did not yield many clues. School was the antithesis of it. Occasional friendships gave a taste of meaningful connection. I found the best clues in music, books, and movies. These gave valuable but often confusing pictures of what "it" might look and feel like. But when I turned off the radio, closed the book, or left the theater, I came back to a diminished world.

I knew I didn't want to live a compromised life, one in which the inner life and outer life were mismatched, where my values, talents, and thoughts were uncalled for in my work, relationships, and community. Throughout my life - and I know I'm not alone in this - I have been accompanied by a powerful wish to live fully, to throw myself on the fire of my own life - once I knew what it was. Tell me what I should do with my life and I will give everything to it. This thought has driven me from job to job, from town to town, from relationship to relationship. It seemed clear that the only way to figure out what to do with my life was to figure out who I was. Early in my life I made a commitment to do just this. I used to prowl around bookstores, praying for a book that could walk me through the steps needed to calculate the answer.

I believe that this longing to find one's place is among the most primary of human urges. Once basic needs are satisfied, our minds naturally turn to questions of meaning. "Who am I?" "Why am I here?" "What are my special gifts?" These questions are so basic, so gut level, yet they are profoundly difficult to answer. Why would you trust anyone else to answer them for you? Who better to answer these questions than the only person who has ever lived your life from the inside out, who knows the subtleties of your heart's pains and pleasures? Who better than the only person who will ever be able to accurately tally every last moment of your life, underscore the column, and total the result? The inventory of your existence - thoughts, emotions, insights, sensations - is available to only you. Yet, often, the last place we look when trying to answer life's hard questions is within.

For a long time, I believed that I could live an authentic life by making up a blueprint for action that encompassed my goals and objectives. I spent many hours visualizing, planning, and writing out elaborate plans. But strange things kept happening. My goals kept changing. My personality and values continually evolved. I would reach a desired outcome only to find it was different than I had anticipated. I would fail to achieve my purpose, and something cool would happen anyway. What I thought would bring me pleasure often did not. What I imagined would be painful was not as bad - or was worse - than anticipated. Things kept intruding on my plans: Relationships came and went. Skills that I had counted on became unreliable as external circumstances altered. Unknown talents surfaced to meet new challenges. Opportunities materialized and fell away. True love felt one way, then another. My big questions about life were never answered; I just started caring about new questions. I realized that my authentic life couldn't be achieved by imagining the perfect scenario and then trying to create it. It simply never worked out that way.

After working through failed plans, unplanned successes, new interests, deepening values, and shifting relationships - I realized something important about living authentically: I couldn't count on my thoughts and ideas about what would make me happy to make me happy. So I stopped planning. I stopped imagining a career path. I stopped trying to figure out what city I would be happiest living in. I stopped thinking I had a "type" when it came to intimate relationships. I stopped envisioning the house I would live in. All this ever did was create confusion in my life. It was only by cultivating the ability to be present to what was actually occurring, to how I was feeling, to the feelings of those around me, to my relationships today, my job today, my body today that I ever achieved a measure of clarity and direction. Something really interesting began occurring when I adopted this stance: I had more accurate insights about myself, my relationships, and the events of my life. I made better decisions about where and with whom to invest my time, energy, abilities, and feelings. My intuition got stronger and stronger. My ability to listen to myself kept deepening. At some point, after giving up on figuring out what my life's purpose was...I noticed that I was living it instead. I was choosing relationships that nurtured my inner life. I was working on projects I valued with people I treasured. The gifts that I had to give were required to execute my responsibilities. My creativity was blossoming. I was living an authentic life. At last.

Copyright © 2005 Susan Piver

About the Author

Susan Piver is the author of The Hard Questions: 100 Essential Questions to Ask Before You Say "I Do." She was also a writer, producer, and marketing specialist for the entertainment industry for more than a decade before launching Padma Media, which creates special book packages for bestselling authors.