Craving Answers: Permission to Rot in your own Choices

Some finally reach the Guru at the top of the mountain.
Drained, almost dying, only to hear, “Sorry, Guru Services are closed due to heavy snowfall.
Or, merch is now available in all T-shirt sizes. Buy some. The Guru now only does online queries.”
The guru-metaphor has become overused, and stale, but sadly, remains relevant.
Outside of cartoons form the 80s and 90s the current gurus reside in LinkedIn profiles, TikTok videos, and corporate wellness seminars.

The search for answers has always driven our species to great depths and heights.
Now, more than ever, the business of providing answers has become a cult of sorts, and a massive, booming business.
But often, seekers, those who crave authentic answers, are left disappointed.
Not only because many of the answers are shitty, generic, Instagram-ready motivational drivel, but also because some have begun to understand a more daunting truth: in many cases, there simply are no answers.

To answer someone asking about the arrival of the next train is neat, tidy, and mostly doable. With experience, you start remembering the timetables, and barring some unforeseen disaster down the tracks, you can answer with comfortable certainty.
But now someone asks, “Why can’t I leave the abusive boyfriend?”
That question demands a much more nuanced, complex answer, along with the realization that there might not be one, at least not within the desired time frame posed by the seeker.
The situation becomes even more complex when you start digging.
Then you find another brutal truth: most people aren’t actually searching for answers. They’re searching for relief. Relief from uncertainty. Relief from the weight of ambiguity. Relief from the aching, gnawing sensation of not knowing.
And answers are seductive because they promise clarity.
“When does the next train arrive?” is neat. Contained. You can fold it up and put it in your pocket. The world, for a moment, makes sense.
But questions like “Why am I so sad?” or “Why is this happening to me?” don’t live in the same clean room.
Those questions are swamp creatures. They slither. They shift. They mirror you. And when people come looking for “the answer,” they often forget that there may not be one, at least not one that arrives cleanly, on time, and printed in black ink.
That’s why the pivot, “Why am I asking why?” is a scalpel.
It cuts into the meat of the matter. It forces a reckoning with intention.
Are you trying to understand or to escape?
Do you want to solve or to stay?
Do you want to heal or to hold on to the thing that’s eating you?
This is where orientation comes in. Answers can be delayed, distorted, or absent.
But orientation gives you a direction, a foothold. It’s less about knowing and more about standing.

I chatted with the girl who asked for advice a week ago. She knew she had to dump the asshole.
There’s a very definitive library of information that screams to her: this guy is bad news.
So she asks, “What should I do?” But she already has the answer. She’s not digging deep into why she’s asking. She wants justification for how she can stay with him, not how she can leave. She wants to know how she can stay with him, weasel through his weaseling, and survive despite his being an asshole. For her, it’s more about finding someone who can tell her how to achieve what she wants, not what she needs.
This is one of the most common, quiet manipulations people perform on themselves. It’s not ignorance. It’s evasion wrapped in a question.
She already knows the answer. She’s sitting on it like a stone. But knowledge alone isn’t what people crave. She’s looking for permission to do the thing that makes her feel safe in the short term, even if it destroys her in the long run.
When someone says, “What should I do?” and the answer is already painfully obvious, they’re not seeking truth. They’re seeking a way to keep lying to themselves without feeling like a fool.
They want someone else to build a narrative around their decision so they don’t have to take responsibility for it.
That’s the brutal difference between wanting answers and wanting orientation.

An answer says, “Leave him.”
Orientation says, “You’re asking because you want to stay, and staying comes with a price. Are you willing to pay it?”

She doesn’t want to leave the asshole. She wants a manual on how to keep her dignity intact while staying with an asshole.
She wants someone to say, “You can survive this and still be okay.” But the truth is uglier. Staying with someone who erodes you isn’t survival. It’s slow self-betrayal dressed up as endurance.
People often aren’t confused. They’re conflicted. And conflict masquerades as confusion so they don’t have to admit what they already know.
Years ago, I met a glowing hippie who’d attended her second Zen retreat, branded and fully customized for customer satisfaction.
“Answers?” she said. “No, of course not. Nobody travels there for answers. They find a space where they can stand and breathe again, before deciding on the next step.”