Why your curiosity isn’t serving you (yet)

Learn to use your superpower for good

“The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing.” — Albert Einstein

You can never ask too many questions right?

Well, it depends.

If you find yourself struggling to attract like-minded people, having difficulty making meaningful connections, or missing out on friendships, chances are your curiosity isn’t serving you.

The cause: your curiosity isn’t serving others.

The dark side of your curiosity

As with everything in life, curiosity has its downsides.

For über-curious people like you and me, this is old news. As you know, for us inquisitives, it’s all too easy to slip into a ‘fit’ of passion and unintentionally dominate the discussion. 

Without realizing it, we’re hogging precious minutes that could have been spent reciprocating and supporting our fellow conversationalist. But we can’t help it. We’re just too excited about this topic.

When question-asking turns into questioning, we steamroll people.

It transforms our natural curiosity, from our biggest strength into our biggest weakness.

Leaving it up to our conversation partners to zone out, roll their eyes, walk away from the conversation or even worse, avoid us forever from now on.

The solution is closer than you think and it doesn’t involve suppressing or containing your curiosity.

You just need to learn to aim it.

Spidey

Your curiosity is a superpower.

But only if it’s wielded like one.

When Peter Parker has just been bitten by the radioactive spider, he struggles with the sudden onset of his newfound powers. Breaking things, sticking to objects uncontrollably, and inadvertently causing chaos wherever he goes as he learns to harness his abilities.

A pivotal moment in Spider-Man's story is the death of his uncle Ben, which he could have prevented had he used his powers responsibly.

This emotional blow teaches him the crucial lesson that ‘with great power comes great responsibility’, ultimately benefiting his character and marking the start of his reluctant superhero ‘career’.

It is the same with your superpower.

It’s your responsibility to learn how to use it for good.

Instead of asking someone’s ears off and badgering them with your ‘passionate curiosity’, put your focus on them. Aim your curiosity and get passionately interested in the person across from you.

Learn to ask questions that are interesting and helpful for them.

Or don’t, but I promise you, you’ll never become their go-to ‘friendly neighborhood spider-man’.

Become a people magnet

Even though I’ve always wanted a vibrant social life, for a long time, I didn’t have one.

I badly wanted to discuss my ideas with people but because I was a steamroller, most of them learned to bail before I opened my mouth.

By channeling my curiosity for good, it became a breeze to make connections.

Now, people come to me to have conversations.

When I meet them for the first time, they send me a message afterwards to say it was ‘such a delight’ or ‘can we jump on another call’.

What I wouldn't have done for this level of connection back in my steamroller days.

To be able to:

• Connect with people easily and effortlessly

• Find like-minded people

• Set up long-term relationships

• Find friends

• Collaborate on projects

• Get invited to events and asked for roles etc.

To become someone who is sought-after. Someone people can’t wait to talk to. Going through life finding people and making connections with ease.

It’s what I’ve always wanted.

And aiming my curiosity got me there.

4 steps to get there

Luckily, we have conversations all day, so there’s lots of opportunity to practice. At work, with family, or even at the grocery store, anything goes.

Here are 4 steps to prevent you from becoming a steamroller and start wielding your superpower.

1. Decide you're going to try

Before going into your next conversation, prep yourself: instead of following your default curiosity, decide to be aware of your questions.

2. Change your question to be supportive

During the conversation, when a question pops into your mind, ask yourself first: ‘How is this question helpful for them?’

Example:

If someone tells you they’ve just started a new yoga practice, your impulse might be to ask: ‘What style of yoga are you doing? Who's your instructor? How many times a week are you practicing?’ 

Instead you could ask: ‘What made you decide to go for yoga?’, ‘What does yoga give you?’, or ‘Why is exercise important to you?’

3. Listen to the answer (i.e. shut up)

After having asked a supportive question, give them some time to actually answer it. It would be even better if you could listen to the answer while you wait.

4. Pat yourself on the back and get out your calendar

Well done, you’ve made it through the first three steps. Sit back and wait for them to ask you when to meet next. Fair warning, if you start applying this strategy, you will run out of time.

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Your curiosity is a superpower, when you aim it. Ask questions all you want, just make sure they serve others.

They’ll serve you right back.