Refocused Living

One of the most important personal development skill to learn is how to ask specific, great questions. While this can be a difficult skill at first, with a little bit of practice it’s something that can come naturally and easily.

Asking specific questions is a lot like goal setting in a miniature way. When you set a goal that’s sharp and focused, you’re able to see past the finish line. The steps you need to take to cross that line become clear. If your goal is “I want to set better goals,” you’ll never get there. At best, you’ll be able to take a few random stabs in the dark and you may achieve some limited results that result in a few clearer goals. However, if you rewrote that goal as “I’m reading one new goal setting book and finding and applying five tips and tricks that I can immediately apply to my goal setting,” it’s clear to see what results you want to see after the goal is completed. It even lends itself to implying how you’re going to achieve the goal.

Because everybody loves music, I’m going to give you a musical example to illustrate this topic further. Don’t worry if you don’t have a musical bone in your body or you can’t play the piano – you’ll still understand and appreciate the message coming across.

Bad: “How come I can’t play this passage?”

I shouldn’t even need to give an explanation for why this is a bad question. This question is the farthest question from being clear. You get a few brownie points for being in the general ballpark (piano playing) and at least asking a question about something you’re having trouble with (can’t play something). If you asked this question to any piano teacher worth their weight in Mozart sheet music, they’ll immediately ask you to clarify.

Better: “Why do my fingers start to get tangled when I get to these measures, even though I’ve practiced this passage for hours on end?”

Okay, this is a little bit better. Now we know what the problem is (finger dexterity at a specific area in the music) and a piano teacher can start giving you methods to fix your problem. But you’re still not telling us your issue in a specific, focused way. While this question is leaps and bounds ahead of the former question, there are still some clarity issues that need to be resolved.

Best: “When I get to measures 34 to 36, I become finger tied as I’m not quite sure which fingers to use to achieve the most smooth playing in this passage while still sounding quiet and mysterious.”

The above question is like a piano teacher’s version of heaven. Now it’s clear what your main problem is (not sure of which fingers to use to play certain notes) and where the problem is located at (measures 34 to 36), and you’re also telling me what characteristics you want the final solution to have (must be able to also sound smooth, quiet, and mysterious).

The more crystal clear your questions are, the better results you’re going to have in the long run. Asking a vague question will almost always result in a vague answer. It’s like somebody asking you to identify a tall, thin object in thick fog. What you’re looking at could be a tree, a telephone pole, or even a lighthouse, but because you’re vision is cloudy, you’ll never quite know for sure. Remove the fog from your mind by being more precise. You want to be able to ask your questions to yourself or other people and be able to get an answer back that’s going to totally work for you, beyond a shadow of a doubt.

At the end of the day, the best questions always lead themselves to solutions, as you probably have guessed. A well crafted question leads itself to a beautifully sculpted answer. When you can see the answer to your question emerging in front of you, you no longer feel stuck; when you no longer feel stuck because you now know exactly what to do, you’re more likely to take immediate action. Action leads to a motivational increase – feeling motivated always feels good, which then leads you to asking better questions.

Lame questions are… well, lame! Don’t ask lame questions, and if you need any help… just ask around.

When it came to writing, I used to have major issues with expanding my notes into a readable work other people could enjoy. Like many people, I’d come up with brilliant ideas away from the computer, so I’d have to jot down everything that came to me in order to use it later. I’m great at sketching out ideas and thoughts, so that was never a problem. However, when I’d get home, trouble would arise. I’d look at my notes before I’d begin to type… and the divinely inspired, sketched out idea I had just three hours ago no longer felt like a gift from God himself.

Where’d all that inspiration go? It was like it seeped through the page I was note taking on. You know… “poof!” All gone!

Then I realized something that blessed my writing life. Whenever I’d be sketching out my ideas, I’d always pretend to be speaking to an audience. When I’d take notes on time management, in reality I’d be “lecturing” about time management to an imaginary crowd. This wasn’t too weird to me; I love extemporaneous speaking and spur of the moment improvising. Speaking seemed to be a natural way to organize my thoughts. The problem always began when I got to the computer. Now that I was no longer “speaking” to a crowd, I’d have to type out what I thought I said. The structure that seemed so spontaneous and witty at the time now felt contrived and forced. What to do?

Eventually, I came upon the answer. And it was ridiculously simple – do as much speaking about the topic immediately before writing as possible.

No, I don’t record myself speaking and try to transcribe my mumbles. (I’d be here all day!) I simply verbalize my next few paragraphs as if I’m addressing a question from a crowd of people, and then I sit at my computer and type out my thoughts.

When you’re explaining a topic to somebody else, you’re forced to automatically arrange your thoughts in a somewhat logical way (unless you’re randomly verbalizing your thoughts.) If you’re explaining an exact process to somebody, where D is the end goal, you’re going to have to talk about A, B, and C first, in that order. You could try to work backwards, from D to C to B to A, or in a different order, but that could cause some confusion. You want your explanations to be as coherent as possible.

When I try to write without speaking through my thoughts first, I tend to not be entirely clear on which direction I want to take my writing in. When you’re writing up a blog post or typing in a word processor, it’s very easy to write a sentence or two and then stop because you’re thinking of the perfect way to structure your next sentence. Or perhaps you stopped because you want to decide where to take your thoughts from there. Unfortunately, because of the thousands of ways you could do each of those things, analysis paralysis becomes a full blown issue – especially for me, and for those of you out there who feels like each word you write has to be the absolute perfect word for that sentence.

Also, when I’m pretending I’m talking to somebody who’s genuinely interested in what I have to say, it feels like my words are a bridge to a true connection. The writing becomes clearer and more interesting because I feel as if I’m writing to you – the reader – personally. I’m writing for a human being, somebody who’s going to be reading this post and applying the wisdom in it to achieve fantastic results. These kinds of feelings are very hard to achieve when I write using an outline or my expansive note collection. An outline might work well when writing a research paper. It’s not so useful when writing for an individual person.

It’s also worth mentioning that sometimes you’ll get an amazing idea away from the computer, but still want explore and elaborate on. In these cases, take as many notes as you want, but once you get home lecture about the notes you took. Use your notes to guide you, but only as a outline. Then write down your spoken thoughts accordingly.

If you’re having trouble editing your written works, try speaking what you’ve written out loud. If it sounds odd when you hear it, chances are your readers are going to find it bizarre as well. (As a side note, edits should make your piece sound like a conversation between you and the reader. If any part of your work sounds mechanical and clunky, try rewriting it as if you were chatting with your best friend.)

Who would have ever known that your five year old self’s imaginary friend was going to come back one day to help you out?