We live in the world our questions create.
~David Cooperrider
Something I read made me think about questions, what they are, why asking them is important, which ones to ask. What surfaced for me is this. The questions we ask engage the mind, shape our thoughts, inspire feelings, create energy, support our choices, and lead us to action.
Questions are powerful tools for living. Questions invite us into the moment, allow us to explore with our hearts and minds, and open us to experience life.
Questions guide our attention, shape our experience, and create our reality.
The important thing is not to stop questioning.
~Albert Einstein
Questions are wonderful tools for self-reflection. Questions can lead to important insights. We discover our truth when we explore questions that open our minds and our hearts. We find what’s important, what we want to create in the world.
Questions are rich for building relationships. When we ask someone a question – from a place of curiosity, and truly listen for their response – we can open a genuine dialogue, make a connection. A question can be like the energy that pulls two magnets together.
Questions can build community and shape collective energy. When we lean into what we don’t know and step into possibility, we begin to change the world.
The power to question is the basis of all human progress.
~Indra Gandhi
The questions to ask are not found in guidebooks. No, the question that serves a moment arises naturally when we create space for it, when we invite it, allow it, and open to it. Questions emerge from listening to what our hearts need and tuning into what is happening right now. From here, our minds can shape powerful questions.
What questions do you ask? Do you even know? What questions do those around you ask? How do these questions make you feel? What do you experience in their asking? What questions do you ask others? What gets created when you explore the answers together?
Here’s a practice I’m trying as a way to better tune into questions arising in me:
- Make space for stillness and inner silence, slow down.
- Notice self-talk that flows within the quiet.
- What is being said?
- Open to what arises, without judging. Simply let the ideas move through.
- Take a deep breath – long inhale and slow exhale.
- Is there a desire, a curiosity, a wonder?
- Name it, shape it, invite it to lead toward possibility.
