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I think that the basis of all knowledge is faith, so we always have more faith than we realize: we have faith in our teachers, in the articles we read, in the videos we watch, in the words of others. We have faith in science and math. We have faith that the sun will rise and that our lives will turn out okay.

But when it comes to spiritual faith, sometimes we all struggle to believe.

Faith is a choice. None of our knowledge is certain; some of it is just more widely accepted. And when we believe something that isn’t widely accepted, it can be harder to make that choice.

I have struggled at times in my life. How do we help those in the middle of a struggle? Here are some thoughts:

• Listen without lecturing. Sometimes people just want to be heard and validated. They don’t need advice; they just need to talk.
• Take the time to ask questions. You don’t have to avoid hard conversations. You can instead ask caring and kind questions to people. Sometime it’s really easy to hide what you are struggling with, but you don’t really want to. When someone shows concern, that can help open up opportunities for growth and connection.
• Be present, and be okay with discomfort. Sometimes you don’t know what to say and you don’t know what to do. But you don’t turn your back on people. You maintain friendships and you show up even if you feel a bit uncomfortable.
• Respect other people’s choices. People are going to make different choices And that’s good. Let people go through their own journeys, and try to be understanding and kind.
• Don’t condemn. While it may seem that someone has made a wrong choice, it might not be that way from a different perspective.
• Provide helpful resources. For people you are close to, who are searching for truth, it can be helpful to share the words or movies or sounds or images that have inspired you.
• Share personal experiences. Maybe those experiences aren’t necessarily inspirational or perfect or whatever, but giving a bit of our imperfect selves can help people through their own journey.
• Love more. Fill relationships with love, with genuine concern for another person and with respect for them. It is better to love than to be right.

And we shouldn’t treat people differently just because they are struggling with something that we don’t know how to deal with, whether that is a struggle with their faith or any other struggle in their life. Show up. Be present. You’re going to make mistakes and say the wrong things, but you can’t say and do the right thing if you aren’t there.

I recently sat and created a career plan. Then, a few days later, I deleted half of it.

I really want to keep my projects. But many of them are not essential, and they often distract me from the projects that are more essential.

I’m in sort of a weird place this year: I’m planning on applying to graduate school, but I currently don’t have a job. I have 10 hours a week where my youngest is in preschool; the other three kids are in school full-time.

I thought I might get a job, but it hasn’t felt right for me right now. So what do I do with my time?

Well, I am working on this book. And I’ve been working on it for a long time. And I am working on a home renovation. I’ve been working on that for a long time too.

But instead of continuing working on the ongoing projects that are more essential, I managed to come up with more and more projects that didn’t matter as much. (My ideas included creating a new website, taking online classes, and making videos.)

So I’m trying to delete the nonessential and focus instead on the projects and the parts of my life that I can’t give up: take care of my children, improve my marriage, serve others, learn new things, and work on my home and my book.

I read recently that someone had a life philosophy of saying yes to everything until they were completely swamped, then they could say no. What a horrible philosophy–that would lead to burnout, wasted time and energy, and missed opportunities. It’s hard not to cram my life full of everything; but it’s already full enough with just the essential.

It’s can be much better to focus a light and make it coherent (that’s what a laser does) than to shine light in all directions. I do need to focus my life, make it coherent, and stop wasting my time on pursuits that fracture my time and energy with that which has little worth.

My husband, Dillon, wrote that for me today. What does that question mean? Maybe it means that there are times where we just want not to exist, when life is really hard and pressing, and we want to fade our way out of being.

Maybe it’s about standing up and choosing to be a certain way, to change and move forward.

Or maybe it’s just an overused line that is easily remembered because the words are short and the rhythm is nice.

I love “How Firm a Foundation.”

It’s a song that takes a hard time and sorrow and lifts that up and brings happiness and joy and action.

I don’t know if I have an answer to this one.

There are some questions that seem much more important than other questions. And I think the most important questions change on the person and the time and the place.

Some questions change belief. Some questions change actions. Some questions don’t change anything.

There is a Wikipedia page dedicated to the common phrase that there are no stupid questions.

Asking questions can be a confession to our own ignorance. And we don’t’ want to admit we don’t know something.

But it’s okay if you don’t know something. It’s okay to ask a question even if everyone else around you knows the answer and you think that you should know it to.

But there are lots of things you don’t know. And it’s so much easier to just asks.

You know when you forget someone’s name even though you actually know them really well? Sometimes it’s okay to just apologize and ask.

Have you started a new task and someone explains it to you as if it’s the easiest thing in the world, and you have no idea what they are talking about? It’s okay to ask for clarification.

Do you ever struggle with things that everything else takes for granted? It’s okay to ask for help in your own journey.

When I was younger, I didn’t ask a lot of questions because I wanted to already know things more than I wanted to admit my own ignorance. But as I got older, I realized that asking questions was actually sign of intelligence, not of stupidity.

So ask away.

But in answer to my question, yes, there are many stupid questions. Questions asked in the pursuit of knowledge are not stupid; questions asked in the pursuit of humor and laziness can be stupid. And sometimes it’s just the wrong time and place to ask certain questions.

I recently watched this video:

One conclusion is that chairs do not exist, which comes about due to some jumping through arguments about metaphysics and language.

But here is my thought: the concept of chair is useful. We all know what it means and have an understanding of it. Because of that usefulness and common understanding, chairs exist.

We might not be able to come up with a solid definition of what a chair is. We might be completely unsure what is “real” and what are the qualifications for something to “exist.” Thinking about it too much might lead to some interesting paradoxes and questions.

Yet at the end of the day, the philosophizing ends and we go and and sit on our chairs and we know what a chair is.

So is the pursuit of questioning the existence of things actually useful for something? Or is it just for fun?