I’m always looking for the right solution to my problems.
It’s solutions we’re all chasing after. The silver bullet. The wave of the magic wand.
People are always looking for what will solve their problems. Most of the time, right away.
How then do you get to solutions?
How then do you solve problem after problem, and get to continuous improvement in your life?
Avoid Negative Questions
When I closed down my businesses, I kept asking myself questions.
In hindsight, questions that I shouldn’t be asking.
That I shouldn’t have entertained.
“How could you fail?”
“How could you be so stupid?”
“You failed two businesses. You must be such a failure?”
And as sure as I asked those questions of myself, I was also able to come up with answers.
Answers that supported those questions, and what would make them true.
I told myself that I was stupid, lazy, idiotic, with no strategy, and not enough resources. That maybe I wasn’t born with the skill and savvy. I worked so hard, and yet I failed. I must be a failure!
I answered my negative questions, and although I didn’t like my answers, they supported the questions I asked, and propped them up to be true.
Questions enable us to find answers, even if what the question wants to prove isn’t true, is damaging, and will sabotage our future success.
Use questions to your advantage.
Use Empowering Questions
Instead of negative, disempowering questions, use questions that would get you thinking of solutions, your positive traits, abilities, and what would make you bounce back from setbacks.
“What’s so good about this problem?”
“How can you bounce back from these failures?”
“What can you do to turn this around?”
And now, instead of your mind looking for answers to support negative questions, your mind will now begin looking for answers to support the underlying purpose and meaning behind the questions.
Questions act like a spotlight, for us to focus our attention and awareness on.
Instead of focusing on negative, focus on the positive, and allow the questions you use to empower yourself, and maybe even others.
Focus on the positive
Apart from using questions to empower you, you can also use them to focus on the positive, and to create resourcefulness.
Ask question not focused on just the reasons for failure, but rather, focused on turning the situation around, and finding solutions.
And also, uncovering what strengths and skills you have, can use, or develop, to be able to create a solution, and get to your desired outcome.
“What strengths and skills I have that I can use?”
“What resources can I tap?”
“Who can I speak to?”
“Who do I have to get to know?”
When I started asking these questions, I could feel the difference! Even in the initial answers that I was getting, that I was thinking about.
It felt like I was more empowered, and was open to more possibilities. That suddenly, I had more creative power and freedom to wield.
Use your questions to focus on the positive, and to focus on getting better.
Frame the situation
All the world, and our experiences, is given meaning, by us.
It’s up to us, how we take the situation, whether we will let it beat us down, or build us up.
When I closed my businesses, I took the situation not only as a failure of my businesses, but my failure as a person as well. I framed the situation such that my failing defined my worth as a human being.
Needless to say, I had a difficult time coming to grips with that one, and it took some time for me to recover.
I realized that I had to frame the situation in such a way, that it would build me up. I began asking questions like : “What did I learn?”, “What would I do differently that would lead to success?”, and “How did that experience make me into a better person?”
Which it invariably did.
But I wouldn’t have had found the answers I was looking for, if I wasn’t asking the right questions.
Frame the situation, and your questions of the situation, to get the result you want.
Use questions to improve your life.
Because life is also a series of questions and answers.
“What kind of life do I want?”
“What kind of impact do I want to make?”
“Do I want happiness? What does that look like?”
Ask better questions.
Get better answers.
Improve your life.
What questions do you keep asking yourself? Please share in the comments below!
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