So here's a quandary for you. We go through life being many things. Relative, friend, Christian (or whatever you subscribe to), worker, student, traveler, artist, thinker, athlete, collector of greeting cards...The list goes on. But at some point just about everyone sits down and asks the one question that brings the whole vehicle of life to a screeching halt:

"Does any of it mean anything?"

I struggled a lot with this one in the past. Sometimes I still do. It's not one of those things you can necessarily prove outright. When I was younger I would work so hard at just about everything I did, to varying degrees of success. Usually I felt like I was going nowhere, and I wasn't happy, by any stretch of the imagination. So I'd sit alone somewhere, lost inside the giant cavernous realm that is my mind. I'd sit there and the words would play over and over again: "What's the point? Why do I bother? Does anyone even care?" Sometimes they were heartfelt questions pouring out; sometimes they were the bitter rages of someone who's reached the end of his fragile rope. Either way the answer was always the same: there was no answer there because there was no one I could see. No one but myself.

My inner self is rather impressive to behold. He's always calm. Always knows what's going on. Maybe not necessarily in control of what's going on around him but always in control of himself. He sees what I believe to be real and he sees how it really is. He allows me my time to rant and when I'm done he's still there, patiently waiting for me to stand up and try again until I get it right. He's got a very confident half-smile. I have no secrets from him. I couldn't if I tried. He knows me too well. His eyes look past every deception I inflict on myself. He knows only truth. It's all he has use for. I admire him. I aim to be him. More often than not it seems like I fail.

It wasn't until I recently that I realized that every time I see him he's always on fire. A burning figure in a halo of light. Something about it scares me. An endless expanse of fire and light that threatens to consume whatever it touches. My inner self has invited me into this space, often sounding like it's no big deal. But it is a big deal to me. I fear that if I do go in the fire will burn me away, reducing me to so much ash. "It will," says my self image, "but only the parts you don't need."

In a sense it means giving something up, something that I had previously held on to with all my heart. It was my everything. It was all I knew. It was my life. And I didn't want to give it up. It may not have been perfect but I was sure it was mine. It belonged to me, flaws and all. I told my burning image this. Yet still he waits, waiting for me to take the plunge. To burn. To rise anew. I'm not God. Neither is the specter of me in my mind, but he speaks as if he knows Him and that I have nothing to worry about.

Why then do I hesitate? If it means giving something up it's because I'm not entirely sure what it I'll be giving up. There are some things that I'd be glad to be rid of but there are others that I don't ever want to lose. Places, people, ideas, some of these things I treasure more than I do myself. If I enter the flames only to emerge later will I still be able to keep them? Were they even mine to begin with?

You can muse over these things as much as you want. I'd like to leave you with something else. A question for you to give some thought. It comes in a pair. People have long been described as needing one another. When you look into your heart, who do you honestly believe that you need? And when you go even deeper, who do you honestly believe needs you?