Asking for Stories, Part 1

One of the most amazing methods I have discovered for bringing powerful, transformative stories into my life is to simply ask for them. Some of my story-requests were accidental--more like rhetorical questions--and I didn't actually expect the responses I received. As time has gone on, though, I have become more bold in asking for stories and, while such requests don't always produce meaningful results, I can attest to the fact that sometimes the most profound, extraordinary things happen when you ask for the stories you need.

Once when my daughters were little, I was browsing in a bookstore and leafed through an astrology book that described the characteristics of children born under each sign of the zodiac. The description for my younger daughter Katerina's sign (Pisces) was so accurate to my experience, it made me grin ear to ear. The book said something like, "Your Pisces child is the type of child you can place in her playpen and tell her she is watching a circus, and by the time you return from putting in the next load of laundry, she will be able to tell you all about it." That fit my imaginative little one to a T.

"Katie" (as I called her then), I might say, "Tell me about life on your planet," and, without any hesitation whatsoever, she would launch into a rambling description of a different world. "Katie!" I might call from my room at bedtime: "There is a monster under my bed!" From the darkness of her room, she would giggle, ask what kind of monster it was, and give specific instructions and as to how the crisis should be handled. So perhaps I should not have been at all surprised that she would have an answer to the most profound question of all, but I was.

When Kina (as she prefers to be called now) was four years old, my sister and I--with Kina in tow--were driving from the midwest to the east coast for a family reunion. My sister and I were at places in our lives where we were looking at where we had been and where we were going. We were determined that, in addition to the festivities and bonding of the family reunion, this trip would give us insights. To that end, we were bringing personal growth tools (our journals, self-help books, tapes and cd's with lectures and meditations on them, etc.), intending to carve out some reflective time for ourselves. It was from this position of "seeking" that I asked my happy-go-lucky little four year old THE question. Her response was short, yet it spoke volumes.

We had stopped at a Burger King at around ten or eleven o' clock at night. My daughter and I were already seated across from each other in a booth, and my sister was still at the counter waiting for her food. "So, Katie," I asked, half-joking and half-serious, "What's the meaning of life?" My four year old reached across the table top and pressed a chubby finger to my lips. "Shhhhhhhhhhh," she said. "You have to be quiet so you can hear the song..." Then she paused, took a bite of her cheeseburger, and added, "And if you drop your song, pick it up!" I was stunned, stopped in my tracks by what I had just heard. My sister, arriving at the booth, took one look at me, and asked, "What?"

I have gone back to Kina's four year old wisdom-story again and again, returning to her words many times as, in the busiest seasons of my life, I have struggled to hear "the song" underneath the chaos and disorder.

I have gone back to her words when I have found myself longingly searching for my song, knowing I had dropped it somewhere along the way.

I have passed her words on to other seekers, hoping that they, too, benefit from them.

As with many of the most powerful stories I know, Kina's spontaneous response resonated deeply for me when I first encountered it, and it continues to resonate deeply for me now. My understanding of her message has evolved and expanded as I have grown and changed. I have gained volumes of insight from this one tiny story moment... and to think: all I had to do to receive such profound wisdom was ask!