The difference between if or when something occurs is the difference between a possibility and a probability. It used to be that I would possibly exercise if I put on my training shoes whereas now it is probable that I’ll exercise when I put on my running shoes. The difference? Habituation.

In other words, our imagination can only expand its power by encountering new experiences. Those new experiences are the uncertain spaces I find myself in. As painful as uncertainty and lostness can be, facing them with genuine curiosity—”What if”—finds me in a whole new wilderness where being lost suddenly becomes “exploration.” Think about it. Explorers are never lost. Or they are always lost. Lostness is part of their being.

I am fully aware that I’ve been given exactly what I need to get exactly what I want if only I have the courage to be curious.

And perhaps that’s the better definition of restlessness that I can accept: spending energy in ways that do not satisfy. Even this meditation is restless energy stemming from my own frustrations with the current state of our country. I’m choosing to channel my energy into writing about restlessness itself. It’s as creative as Natasha Bedingfield writing a song about her inability to come up with lyrics for a new song, which is how her second most played song on Spotify came about. It’s called “These Words.”

Years ago, I heard a nu metal band launch into the pummeling set list with it, and the phrase stuck with me. The invitation part of it. They were–like preachers–inviting the faithful to join them in an action. Can I call the action a prayer? Not a license to destroy but rather an invitation to create without any intention for perfection, to create as honestly as possible, to see raw humanity in its primal power.

But how is this me treating my body with more dignity? I used to connect weight training to some level of prestige. As if I would be regarded superior if I were well-built, solid, strong. Little thought was given to the worth of the body as an actual vehicle for traveling life's road. I didn't consider how I might make my body the best vehicle possible for living.

I don't know its reactions. I am amazed at how it grew a handsome, thick branch just above the nub. A middle finger to human with the chainsaw. "You think you've taken from me. Here's me showing up anyway. I'll grow a stronger branch right above it."

Rae Evemond has invited me to see these "rabbit holes" in entirely new light. At best, the indulgence is creating a particular space for me to work; it's preparing me by sucking out the excess time to create the necessary pressure to spur me to more focused work. Like I don't know what to do with extra time, my subconscious has to construct a time block that suits my work ethic more fittingly.

A flood of memories tumbled out of the blue—a trip to North Carolina, then Ohio, Lollapalooza with my daughter, Hinterland with a friend named Andrea. The summer had unleashed sweat and dust and music into my life, scattered the anxiety into manageable portions, and rained down hope that life would not always be painful.

Reality: one of the bigs, Malachi, slipped while following the other two bigs and was carried out into the lake by the spillway’s rip current.

Courage simply says, “You have a choice to face it willingly or unwillingly.” The choice divides the courageous from the cowards. Brave is probably not appropriate here. Courage finds us in our heart gathering resources we never knew we had from storehouses we didn’t know existed to live in a freedom we could not have dreamed of. Courage leads us through the middle of our suffering to the Promised Land. A cloud by day; a pillar of fire by night.

Beauty enables the imagination to dream in mirrored cascades that contain the warmth of a mother’s embrace, the colors of a spring forest, the shrieks and laughter of children at play, the aroma of rosemary and jasmine, and the taste of a bubbling soup next to a fire in January.

The most invigorating—that word brings my father to mind—metaphor in my life right now is adventure. Not a hiking excursion that returns me to point A so that I can hop in my car and go home but a journey adventure with the destination unnamed. I see the warmth of the sun, sandy beaches, meals and conversations with other wayfarers, live music, and deep reflections in my journal. Is this a viable paradigm for experiencing the week?

In my 44 years, I’ve heard many people say, “I never thought life would turn out this way.” They find themselves in midlife confused, disoriented, and mapless. The landscape has shifted, and unfamiliarity abounds. Think of the Hunger Games where Seneca Crane is at the mainframe turning and disfiguring the arena to make things more interesting to some thrill-seeking, heartless audience. Life feels suddenly cruel, a spectacle of endurance and humiliation.

It's so easy to substitute familiarity for knowledge. I'd venture to guess that familiarity is key to our survival, that we have to make our environment familiar so that we can focus on what keeps us alive. Wonder demands that we take the time to look past the familiar to see the unfamiliar, past the image of the human who sits across from us every day at the breakfast table to see the intricacies of what makes them who they are. There are times to survive, but mystery offers the opportunity to transcend the language of survival.

Mystery does not assume that we know certainly. In fact, mystery demands that we value what we do not know more than what we do. There's no better synopsis of what mystery affords than—and here goes St. Paul again—1 Corinthians 13.12: "Right now, we are looking through a mirror at an enigma but eventually face to face." Mystery—especially within the context of faith—values "not knowing" as an invitation to deepen our understanding of a question that will never afford an answer. It emphasizes the value of the question in the absence of an answer.