Self-Care Toolkit: #6 The Importance of Curiosity
I worked as a product manager for many years and observed that most product managers have hefty amounts of curiosity. Granted this is curtailed with the cut and thrust of delivering product to customers but generally the curious nature is innate. This nature helps to understand what is beneath the surface, what’s lurking that needs to come out or be found because for a product manager the details are important. Something small can block the overall end-to-end flow whether it be technical, legal, or environmental etc. so being overly curious is always a good thing.
Some folks are just naturally curious and still have a child-like mind for asking questions and following the answers to deeper levels. But like anything we practice, curiosity too can be learned or at least we can make the muscle stronger so it becomes a bigger and more active part of our lives. I’ve found using this trait very useful in many situations and so was an easy decision to include as part of my self-care toolkit. Here are a few examples:
Curious on why we are angry
We can become angry with ourselves and others so easily and do it so often that we don’t realise it’s become a habit or indeed it’s become who we are. If we have a habit of being angry and hard on ourselves then research shows that most likely we will be quicker to anger and harder on others too. But being curious however when the red angry emotions descend, can help see what is really going on and enable us to have more compassion for ourselves and others. First step is to stop and ask curious questions:
What am I really angry for?
Why is this happening so often?
What is at the heart of it all?
What would it be like if I wasn’t this way?
When do I think this started to happen?
Who am I impacting, apart from myself?
These types of questions should flood our being with curious compassion giving us a moment to let the curiosity do its job and surface the answers or at least begin down a new path to manage the angry feelings. Perhaps you are too angry though to stop and attempt to ask these questions, this does happen and if so then you need a trigger, something to kick you into a calmer frame of mind. Such as a quick breathing exercise or counting up to 10 with the anger dissipating and fully gone by 10 or another method, like a mantra for example, like “let it go, onto the next shot”. Then try asking the questions to find you will hear more of the answers.
Curious about differing opinions
How often do you believe that your way is the best and someone else's point of view is not valid? How many times do you need consensus on an issue but there are blockers or capitulation, things just fall apart or dissolve helplessly? There never seems to be enough people willing to be curious and ask questions like:
Why would this person have such a view?
What is going on that they believe this is the right behaviour or approach?
What am I not seeing here based on their experience and ways of seeing things?
What questions can I ask to understand this more so we can get on the same page or at least understand why and where they’re coming from?”
As we know the people with the most curiosity and flexibility drive the outcomes of situations. A big reason for this is because these folks are patient, are open to not knowing and realising they are not always right even if they feel and believe it in their bones. But more importantly it’s because they are curious too. The curiosity impulse helps them ask the question versus bulldoze their views. The curiositeer knows they see the world through a lens that was created by their experiences, that it’s different to another’s lens so needs to be recalibrated as they grow and learn more. This can be difficult, so don’t be too hard on yourself as you practice.
Curious about stress and anxiety
You might wake up stressed in the morning or someone says something or you see something that triggers the anxiety to grow. It could be when you are doing something as mundane as having a shower. Before you let anxiousness flow over you and tumble into the stress loop again, it's time to get curious. Ask questions and notice:
What am I seeing right now? Speak it out, look at what you are doing and start to say what you see e.g., “the shampoo bottle has a nice red and green coloured tree design”.
I wonder how much water am I using right now?
If that spider doesn’t move it's going for a swim” etc.
Distract your mind from entering the stress loop with new information and new curious thoughts. You might only need a moment to fall into the stress loop or avoid it altogether so being curious is a bridge linking you to when you’re back moving again, concentrating on a task that requires attention and focus with natural defences to inside interference.
Curious to tame the advice monster
It's natural that we all like to give advice or lead people to where we think they should go. But most times that won’t help much or not as often as we think. If we stopped and deliberately were a bit more curious to dig deeper and ask another question, curious to listen to the answer, then ask another, find out what is really going on----------it would serve everyone better. It’s so important to build awareness, our emotional intelligence and ultimately accountability to take responsibility for our own lives and its performance. This will only happen if we can hold back the advice monster so the voice of others can be heard and they live who they are and not who we want them to be. Remember you could be on receiving end of a curious person’s questions and it could be exactly what you need right now to let out what is on your mind so try practicing paying it back.
Curious for innovation
Being innovative is really being curious as you link ideas together and find commonalities of the most divergent concepts and begin to uncover new approaches in a new way. To create something new and different you have to do something new and different and be very curious along the way. There are multiple tools and exercises you can use for brainstorming for example but at the core of them all is curiosity. We know that breakthroughs have been developed by standing on the shoulders of others’ great work while continuing to be curious until it’s time to pass the innovation flame to the next curious person. As for self-care, well to move to a new place mentally or physically requires some innovative curious thinking. That thinking is needed to uncover new ideas, to try new approaches you haven’t tried before and see if they work for you.
To conclude…
Most people naturally want to talk about themselves. if you can hold off when the compulsion to say “yeah, but I like to do it this way...” takes hold and just listen and then ask a deeper question on the topic, you will expand your understanding of the person, your knowledge of them and build a better and more lasting relationship. No one engages with a person very long that rattles on about their day but never listens or half-heartily so to others. Similarly, when someone has an idea at work, you don’t blurt over it with your idea too! it’s first important to be curious with theirs and build upon it. So why not practice being curious in an area of your life you do most every day, which is when you talk to other people. How can you slip into this curious mindset? An idea could be to create a daily reminder to ask more questions, to listen more in conversations or the next time you talk to a colleague try to find out something you don’t already know about them. There are plenty of approaches you could find, so be curious and see what works for you.
