Curiosity helps you clarify problems, ideas, and situations, and
encourages you to explore different options.
Questioning takes you to deeper levels of knowing. When you develop
curiosity, you improve the quality of your life by asking better questions and
being receptive to new ideas. You learn more because you desire to know
more.
Your brain rewards you for exploring fresh ideas. When you experience
novelty, your brain produces more dopamine—a chemical that lifts your mood
and increases your sense of wellbeing.
What stops you from being curious? There are some common curiosity
barriers—fear of the unknown, entrenched beliefs, insecurity, apathy, and
avoidance. Once you start to break through the barriers, you can quickly return
to a state of child-like wonder. Every time you confront a barrier and find a
way to remove it or go around it, you improve your problem-solving skills and
strengthen your curiosity muscles.
So, rather than dreading the barriers, try to anticipate and deal
with them. People who are curious are open to thousands of potentialities—and
thus increase their power to find the best solutions.
When you put aside past judgments, you come up with innovative ideas.
Thinking like a child opens doorways. Children believe that most everything is
possible. Until someone convinces them otherwise, or until they become jaded through
failures or disappointments, the world is a wide-open place filled with delightful
possibilities.
To reconnect with that open sense of possibility is one of the most
powerful benefits of heightening your curiosity.
Seven Suggestions
Here are sevens suggestions:
- Think like a child. Children are like reporters, constantly asking who, what, when, where, and particularly why. They also have few preconceived notions, so
they are open to taking in new information without being constrained by biases
and judgments.
- Look beyond the obvious. The obvious can mask information that may be vital to learning the truth of a situation. When you think “obviously,”
make a note of your assumption. Then search until you find at least three pieces
of information or sources that conflict with the “obvious.”
- Fire your inner critic. Remember that someone had every great idea in history. Why not you? Stop being so critical of yourself. Give your ideas time to develop.
Respect your intuition. Let ideas percolate for a time before applying a critical
eye.
- Vary your daily routine. Take different routes to work, or school, or the
market. Use your curiosity to see how many ways you can get there from here.
- Identify the most impossible solutions. When faced with a challenge, try to identify the most absurd solutions possible. This can be fun and may unmask a
solution.
- Work like a detective. Detectives follow all potential leads, often gathering lots of relevant information that turns out to be useless. Seek the one thread
that leads you to a solution.
- Try new things. Take a class. Try a new mini-hobby. Taste a food that is new to you. See a movie or read a book on an unfamiliar topic.
The more you put yourself in learning and questioning mode, the more
you develop curiosity as a habit. PE
