Better Questions Lead to Better Lives

(Transcript edited for clarity.)

Hi, I'm Wes.

Hi, welcome to Better Questions Lead to Better Lives, or simply Ask Better Questions. I'm Wes. Thanks for being with me today.

I've found throughout my business and personal life that when I was trying to figure something out and I started to struggle figuring it out, or I was having trouble getting to the right answer or a good answer, if I'd step back and look at the questions I was asking, often the problem was that I was asking the wrong questions or I was asking the questions in the wrong way.

I'm going to have to give you a warning up front here that this took me a long time to figure out.

Asking questions is good, but it took me a lot of years to train myself to stop banging my head against the wall when I'd get stuck and take a step back.

The way I was raised, and the way I saw people around me growing up, was that you didn't take a step back. You kept hammering. You kept trying. You kept working harder and harder and harder, and eventually you'd break through.

Sometimes that is what happens. But sometimes, if you can stop and take a step back and look at the questions you're asking, or possibly get an outside view, it can help you get the breakthrough you're looking for.

So, a couple points to start with here.

The quality of your answers depends on the quality of your questions.

If you're trying to figure something out, or you're trying to get the answer to something and you're struggling and you can't seem to break through, maybe you need to ask a better question.

Next, most people spend years - and I did this too, which is why I know this is true - asking questions that don't actually solve their problems.

I spent years saying, "How do I stay motivated?" I always heard about motivation. I read books about motivation. I read about motivation. I watched motivational videos and listened to motivational speakers about how to stay motivated.

But that wasn't the answer I really needed to find.

I was asking the wrong question.

Everything changed when I started asking questions that led to better solutions - not more motivation, better solutions.

Let me give you a couple examples.

I have two daughters, and of course they're considerably younger than me. If you've reached my age or older, you've probably had some of the same experiences I've had.

I look at things in one way, but often people considerably younger than me look at them in a completely different way.

I've had this with both of my daughters at different times over the years.

I'll be working on something, usually a business problem, trying to figure something out, or a marketing problem. I'll do the research. I'm a researcher. I read. I research. I'll keep working on this and keep working on it, and I just can't seem to get it.

Then I'll go to one of my daughters and lay out what I'm doing to them. I don't keep track, but I'm guessing at least seven or eight out of every ten times, whichever one I talk to will instantly ask me a question.

It's a question that I never even thought to ask or think about, and often that question is exactly what I need to unlock where I'm stuck.

Have you ever heard the story about the horse with the blinders? They put blinders on a horse so the horse doesn't get distracted, right? The horse sees what's right in front of it.

So often I get stuck in that laser focus. I get so focused on what's directly in front of me - usually solving a problem - that I put blinders on myself. I stop seeing some of the things I need to see.

I've also done this in business settings when I was working either for myself or for others over the years. We'd be working on a problem and couldn't seem to get the big breakthrough, or maybe things were okay but we knew they could be better and we couldn't figure it out.

Sometimes you need a different perspective.

I've got several people who are colleagues or peers who do some of the same things I do. Every once in a while when I get stuck, I'll talk to one of them and say, "Hey, this is what I've got going on. What's your thought on this?"

Here's the big secret when you're doing this.

Every time - and I had to learn this when I was younger - when I go to my daughters and ask them for their view or opinion on these things, or I talk to one of my peers about something we're stuck on, you can't get offended.

You've got to train yourself to understand that they're not attacking you or even questioning you. They're helping you.

You have to put your ego away when you approach things like this because that's the only way you can learn.

Plus, you don't want anyone you're asking for help in these areas to stop being honest with you.

You need to seek honesty because sometimes my biggest breakthroughs have been when I was completely missing something.

It had nothing to do with my ego. If I wanted to fix it, I needed somebody to show me what was wrong or what I was missing.

One more thing about this before I move on to my other key points.

Sometimes one of my daughters - and the nice thing about them is that some of the things I do target different age groups.

Usually, I can communicate very well with people my age and older. We talk the same types of language. We understand the overall world in basically the same way because of the way we were raised.

Younger generations often think of things completely differently than I do.

I've found, not 100 percent but mostly, that people my age and older think in pretty much the same group or basket of ways, where a lot of times people in their 20s or 30s think in their own baskets of ways.

I'm not judging whether they're right or wrong. They're just different.

Sometimes I have a hard time relating to that age group, and that's where my daughters are very valuable.

If I'm doing something - a marketing message that goes to 20- or 30-year-olds - I need to be very careful that I'm sending the right message because they won't hear the message the same way as someone my age or older hears it.

So the important thing here is that sometimes I'll go to my daughters with something and they'll ask questions, but sometimes they'll say, "This is what I would do," and occasionally it's dead wrong.

Neither of my daughters is in the business that I'm in. They're smart and they know a lot, but they don't always have the business experience that I do.

Occasionally, they'll tell me something that just won't work, and I know it as soon as I hear it. It's the wrong answer.

Very, very important point here: Do not ever instantly say what's on your mind.

I learned this the hard way.

You don't instantly tell whoever is helping you that it simply won't work. You need to have a little more tact.

You might explain why it won't work and why you know it, but you don't want to hurt the feelings of someone who's trying to help you.

I've learned. I'm better than I used to be. I still slip up every once in a while.

But if you're going out looking for help, this help can be very valuable.

Remember what I said. Sometimes when I talk to my daughters or one of my peers for help, it's that fast. They'll ask the question that I haven't asked, and they'll unlock everything.

Extremely valuable. Extremely valuable in time, valuable in money, valuable in business, and often valuable in life.

So it's very important that you either find or develop people in your life who can do these same things for you and help you ask the right questions.

You need to think ahead when you're doing this about how you're going to handle it.

Anyway, the moral of that story is don't be mean.

Don't run them off. Thank them even if they're wrong. Thank them and go on because the next time they might give you something that completely unlocks exactly what you've been fighting with.

If you're as stubborn as I am sometimes, we're not talking about something I've struggled with for an hour.

Sometimes it's something I've struggled with for six or eight hours, and occasionally it's something I've struggled with for a week trying to solve on my own before I woke up and said, "Why don't you ask somebody else, and maybe you can find a better question?"

So, closing.

Sometimes the breakthrough isn't finding a better answer. It's finding a better question.

Put another way, changing the question often changes the solution.

So that's it. Ask better questions. Better questions lead to better lives.

I'm Wes. If you enjoy the types of messages here on Your Life Systems, hit the subscribe button. I'll see you soon.

·        Notice a problem you've been pushing against without making progress.

·        Write down the question you've been trying to answer.

·        Ask whether that question assumes something that may not be true.

·        Get one outside perspective from someone who sees the situation differently.

·        Listen without defending your current approach.

·        Use the new perspective to ask a better question before searching for another answer.

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