If you’re looking for ways to change your life or survive tough times, there’s a lot of insight from others out there (we’ve published on this topic plenty ourselves!), but have you considered the insight you might gain from yourself?
This isn’t some hidden, esoteric wisdom - it’s simply the fact that there is a lot to be gained from a systematic method of thinking critically about your own thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. That’s what we have for you today!
Asking the right questions can help you challenge your beliefs and gain clarity and personal understanding.
We ran a series of five scientific studies and discovered a set of practical yet rarely-asked questions that people reported were valuable for them to answer.
People are often surprised by how valuable answering these open-ended questions about themselves can be. For instance, our readers have said things like:
"[I learned] that there is an ideal life very close to what I have now, but I need to make it happen”
and…
"[I learned] that you absolutely must engage in self-reflection. You must think about what you can do to improve your life rather than just allowing things to fall into place.”
Want to try it yourself? Here are 8 of the 32 questions people found most valuable. To get the most value out of these questions, you should take time to carefully give thoughtful responses.
1️⃣ What in life gets you excited?
2️⃣ What would you say is the greatest accomplishment of your life so far?
3️⃣ What was the most significant turning point in your life, and how did that experience change you?
4️⃣ What's one of the best days you've had in your entire life?
5️⃣ In your opinion, what is the purpose or meaning of life?
6️⃣ What has kept you hopeful in life's most challenging moments?
7️⃣ Imagine receiving a message from a version of yourself five years later. What warnings would these give you, and what advice would they offer about how best to achieve your goals?
8️⃣ What valuable things have you learned, or what practical takeaways have you gotten from answering these questions?
If you have some extra time today, you can also try the full version of this exercise, which contains 32 questions. You can answer alone or in a group (with a partner, friends, students, family, etc), save your responses and send them to your email, send your answers to a friend (and get their responses when they answer), and even order a beautiful physical deck of Life-Changing Questions cards!
We hope these questions bring clarity and help you change your life positively. Now, we leave you with a quick piece of advice from the famous wit of Voltaire:
“Judge a man by his questions rather than by his answers.”
Voltaire