Highlight(yellow) - Location 7
This is the pathless path. Where the journey leads is to the deepest truth in you.—Ram Dass
Highlight(yellow) - Page 4 · Location 88
This was the end result of an obsessive focus on getting ahead in my twenties. It’s a state familiar to many. Study hard, get good grades, get a good job. Then put your head down and keep going, indefinitely. This is what I call the “default path.”
Highlight(yellow) - Page 5 · Location 104
I left with the intention to become a freelance consultant, but soon enough, that story started to show its cracks as well. It didn’t take me long to realize I had been on a path that wasn’t mine and to find a new way forward, I would need to step into the unknown.
Highlight(yellow) - Page 5 · Location 107
the idea of a “pathless path,” something I found in David Whyte’s book The Three Marriages. To Whyte, a pathless path is a paradox: “we cannot even see it is there, and we do not recognize it.” 1 To me, the pathless path was a mantra to reassure myself I would be okay.
Highlight(yellow) - Page 5 · Location 111
Whyte says that when we first encounter the idea of a pathless path, “we are not meant to understand what it means.”
Highlight(yellow) - Page 5 · Location 112
The pathless path is an alternative to the default path. It is an embrace of uncertainty and discomfort. It’s a call to adventure in a world that tells us to conform. For me, it’s also a gentle reminder to laugh when things feel out of control and trusting that an uncertain future is not a problem to be solved. Ultimately, it’s a new story for thinking about finding a path in life.
Highlight(yellow) - Page 6 · Location 118