A Simple Way to Have a Good Life: Be Curious
Curiosity killed the cat, but satisfaction brought it back.
Summary
· The Power of Friendly Curiosity
· Examples of Friendly Curiosity in Action
· How to Cultivate Friendly Curiosity
· Gratitude for Graves
· Nick Cave’s Newsletter is Better than Mine
· Travel
· A Short Reminder You Will Die
Quotes
I think, at a child's birth, if a mother could ask a fairy godmother to endow it with the most useful gift, that gift should be curiosity.
Eleanor Roosevelt
Curiosity is the essence of human existence. 'Who are we? Where are we? Where do we come from? Where are we going?'... I don't know. I don't have any answers to those questions. I don't know what's over there around the corner. But I want to find out.
Gene Cernan
Replace judgment with curiosity.Lynn Nottage
I’m Glad You’re Here
Welcome to the Simple Ways to Have a Good Life newsletter, your monthly guide to cultivating the life you want without spending money on gurus, gimmicks, or influencers. Two decades of helping people change their lives has taught me that the best things are simple and don't require spending a dime. I use this space to share those things.
A Simple Way to Have a Good Life
I decided to change the format a bit so we could jump right into the heart of the newsletter each month. Let's get started.
This month's simple way to have a good life is to be curious. We're going to talk about having curiosity toward ourselves, toward others, and about the world in general over this month, but today we're going to start with the number one concept I've discussed with people over the past few years: friendly curiosity.
I'll be 45 tomorrow, and I saved my favorite topic this year for my birthday month. I talk with people about friendly curiosity three or four times every week. I include it in every class that I teach. I've written about it, done podcast episodes about it, talked about it in interviews, and written blog posts about it. It might be the most essential skill we can cultivate, especially in what seems to be an increasingly scary world.
Curiosity can be defined as a strong desire to know or learn something. We all have things we are curious about. I'm curious about everything (At least, I haven't found something that I don't want to know more about yet, apart from the things that are unhealthy for us to know too much about. The internet has taught me some hard lessons in that respect).
I don't want to talk about just being curious, though; I want to talk about cultivating a friendly curiosity toward yourself and everything around you. Friendly curiosity is wanting to know or learn about everything, but without any sort of obsessive or interrogating stance. There's a sense of amusement in it, and it can help soften our approach to wanting to know things.
In the last two weeks, two clients asked me about having difficult conversations with their employees. Both people are intentional, compassionate leaders who want to create a healthy culture for the people who work for them and were having to address behavior with an employee detracting from that culture.
I've spent the last 12 or 13 years dealing with constructive conflict in one way or another. Sometimes, it was a conflict between spouses, friends, roommates, professors, and students, or, as mentioned above, bosses and employees.
Sometimes a person's conflict with themselves brought them to my door. They knew they should stop drinking but weren't doing it. They wanted to cultivate better habits, but they kept failing. They had a voice in their head that belittled and degraded them, and they didn't know how to get rid of it.
Conversations about this conflict often led me into conflict with the client sitting across from me. The things that are most helpful to us are rarely the things we want to hear, and it is easy to become hostile or defensive when we aren't being told what we want to be told. I understand this, and it's not an issue for me when it arises.
In all these situations, the concept of friendly curiosity it's been my primary attitude and tactic. I've practiced it for so long now that it's my natural response to all but the most difficult situations. Let's look at some examples.
An Example. Or Ten.
Here's a theme that will come up a lot this month: what we "know" is often the problem. When we think we know something, we preclude other possibilities and thus limit our options for response. Knowing is necessary and expected for many life situations, but it can be deadly in the wrong situation. Let's consider a few.
A teenager is using drugs.
A man is cheating on his wife.
A young 20-something got fired from their third job for oversleeping.
A man in his 40s is only marginally successful because he drinks too much every night.
A young woman is rude to nearly everyone she meets.
A young child seems completely immune from all forms of correction or punishment.
Someone cuts you off in traffic.
The person in front of you at the store is holding up a long line because they keep talking to the cashier.
You know you should go to bed earlier, but you stay up a lot later than you should binge shows on Netflix.
You are chronically late and cannot seem to correct it even though it has caused you endless trouble.
I'm not going to look at every single one of them specifically, but these are all situations where friendly curiosity can be helpful, especially in dispelling judgment and condemnation toward others and ourselves.
In these scenarios, we all have some inherent bias or perspective that jumps to mind based on our culture, upbringing, and how we think the world works (or should work). This is normal; we all have them. The problem is that these things also limit our options and perspectives, lowering the chances of us being useful. Being judgmental also tends to make us less happy in general.
As I wrote those down, different elements of friendly curiosity popped into my mind. Here are a few:
What is leading this young person to seek intoxication? To escape from reality? Is it peer pressure? Are they watching and listening to things that make it seem cool? Do they just like being high?
What is this man lacking that he is seeking in relationships that might destroy his marriage? What is worth the risk of losing his family? Does he understand this risk? Does he care? What are his priorities in life?
What's going on with this kid that they can't get up in the morning? Do they have bad habits in the evening? Are they drinking? Have they talked to a doctor recently or had blood work done to ensure they are healthy?
I wonder what she and the cashier are talking about. Does the cashier feel awkward holding the line up like this? The woman seems lonely; I wonder if this is an important interaction for her.
Friendly curiosity toward ourselves is also important. When I'm doing something that I know is not healthy - eating poorly, not exercising, or staying up later than I should (for me, this usually because I’m reading), I try to be curious about what's driving the behavior rather than judging or condemning myself for it. This can be applied to everything we are doing that is not working out how we would like it to.
A Practice
Cultivating friendly curiosity is something we have to do with purpose and intention until it becomes a habit. Whenever you catch yourself in a negative or unpleasant situation, see if you can allow yourself to explore the situation as if you don't know what is happening.
Here are some questions I often encourage people to ask:
What is this?
What is this really?
What would I think of this if I didn't have ideas about it?
What makes me think I know what this is?
What makes me trust my feelings about this?
What would this be like without my thoughts about it?
What would this be like without my opinion of it?
What might I think about this if I was an alien encountering it for the first time?
What might I think about this if I lost all my memories?
I get it, some of these will seem silly or strange at first, but when you see how they open new options in situations that usually cause you trouble, you will use them more and more. Getting underneath our preconceived ideas about what is happening creates an invaluable sense of space.
Journal Prompts
Looking back, can I find times when what I "knew" about a person or situation was wrong?
What might I be wrong about now?
How much of my suffering might be created by what I think I know?
How often do I make assumptions about the thoughts and motives of the people closest to me?
How often do I judge myself rather than trying to figure out what's going on?
How can I cultivate a friendly curiosity about everything instead of judgment about it?
Toxic Positivity
The 10 days after my thyroid went haywire in September last year were the hardest of my life. It was worse than addiction, worse than jail, and worse than any of the hard times brought on by my choices when I was young.
It felt like those hard times had all been compressed into an experience of acute terror and hopelessness. I've spent two decades helping people through difficult situations, but everything I've learned in that time - all the work on emotions, all the work on my thoughts, all the practices and years of meditation - were useless. The physiological panic was overwhelming.
It took me 10 days to reach out to my doctor because I assumed I was just having the worst anxiety I'd ever had, and then it took another 6 to 8 weeks for the medication to become therapeutic. Since then, I've gotten hyperthyroid a few times, and each time is a reminder of how difficult that time was.
My day-to-day hasn't been easy since then. My weight goes up and down for no good reason, I shake all the time, and my heart rate goes through the roof for the smallest things. I can't remember if I mentioned it, but it turns out my testosterone is also too high now, and that's posed some strange mental and emotional challenges on its own. I get to see the endocrinologist toward the end of August, and I'm excited about that.
All that being said, I wouldn't trade any of it.
I tell people that God seems to come through and clean house on me like clockwork every 10 years. My thyroid was the most difficult so far, but it brought me to a new place of trust and acceptance that I wouldn't have found otherwise.
I'm a stubborn, foolish man; I often have to have my fingers broken before I'll put something down. I try to get better at listening each year. My thyroid forced me into a place of helplessness and hopelessness that broke my will in multiple ways. I am so grateful for that.
That's not to say I won't accept a solution if the endocrinologist has one. Bearing our suffering well and learning what we can from it is important, but suffering for the sake of suffering is ridiculous. I've known people who have gone out of their way to suffer more than they need to, and I've always felt it was insulting to people who are trapped in lives of suffering that they cannot escape from.
Overall:
I'm grateful for the place of trust and dependence this brought me.
I'm grateful that it broke my pride in thinking I had done the work and could handle anything.
I'm grateful for the relationship of dependence it fostered with God.
I'm grateful that my doctor knew what was going on and was able to help me.
It hasn't been cheap, but I'm grateful we have had the money to see the doctor when I've needed to throughout this.
It's taken 10 months, but I'm grateful for what I've learned while waiting to see the endocrinologist.
I'm grateful to be here as a human being. It's a privilege to experience this life that I've been gifted.
Media of the Month
As you know from reading this, I have a newsletter that goes out several times each month. I've done this for years and put a lot of time and energy into it. I am serious about every post and work hard to make sure they are the best they can be.
This is not the best newsletter I know of, though. It's not even my favorite, and it never will be so long as Nick Cave's Red Hand Files exists. The Red Hand Files is a work of art. The level of insight, compassion, and wisdom that Nick Cave offers people is not something I aspire to because I don't want to set myself up for failure.
Nick Cave is a musician with a very loyal and dedicated fan base. I don’t really like or listen to his music because I have basic tastes, and it’s too complicated for me. I’m sure it’s good, but good music is probably wasted on me; I just want synthesizers and an upbeat vibe. Good food is also wasted on me. I will put hot sauce and jalapenos on it no matter how much it costs.
I keep a file in my email where I save all Nick Cave's newsletters, and I go back and re-read quite a few of them. You can check it out here, but don't start judging me by a Nick Cave measuring stick.
Housekeeping
Alright, I moved this to the end because I thought it might make the newsletter more accessible for the people who are more interested in skimming things or just want the simple way to have a good life.
As you can tell by now, August is about being curious. Today we talked about friendly curiosity; later this month, we will talk about cultivating curiosity toward ourselves, others, and the world. I realized that looking at things in terms of ourselves, other people, in the world might be a useful framework going forward since it covers pretty much everything in our lives.
I wanted to ask if it has become harder to reply to my posts since I started writing on Substack. I was honest about moving to Substack to lessen the engagement, but I did not expect it to drop by 95%. I would appreciate it if you would let me know if you can reply through this post or if you have to go and email me (james@jamesscotthenson.com).
I also wanted to ask about the notes part of Substack. I posted something on there, but I'm not sure if I did it right - let me know if you saw that; it may be something I will utilize more going forward.
What's Going On
I went back and forth to New Mexico a few times in July. We spend the 4th up there, and I always enjoy reconnecting with people I haven't seen in a long time. All my closest friends growing up lived in other states, so I only get to catch up with them every few years or so. It was cool.
With my 45th birthday coming up, I remembered Project 44, something I started last year to shift how I spent my time and energy through reading, exercise, and things like that. It got derailed by my thyroid, but I did manage to hang on to a lot of the best parts of it.
I had a goal to read an hour a day, but I realized that I was already doing that. Looking back at the last year, I was able to count 53 books that I read, but those were all on my Kindle, so there are a few I missed because I read them as a hard copy and gave them away or borrowed them from someone else. I'm also following a plan to read through the Bible in a year, and I'm using a cultural background study Bible so it clocks in at around 30 to 45 minutes a day by itself. Suffice it to say I've realized that I am super privileged and get to spend a lot of time reading.
The exercise part of the Project 44 plan was difficult because my doctor told me I needed to lay off for an extended time - when my thyroid was acting up, exercising was miserable, and my heart was giving me trouble. I am back on that, though, and I have been enjoying it.
I see the endocrinologist on the 21st, and I am excited and curious to see what they say. It's all an adventure.
Memento Mori
I wrote a special post for my birthday. Those of you who know me won't be surprised to hear that it's all about death, so I will just remind you that you'll die someday and leave it at that. We'll get all sorts of death-focused tomorrow.
Until Next Time
I love and appreciate you all, and I would like to hear from you and know more about your lives. Until I figure out how to do that through Substack, you can email me at james@jamesscotthenson.com
Take care,
James
I continue to both find your writing most helpful and to find it enjoyable. And I'm glad you've gone to Substack. Here's to a meaningful celebration tomorrow, and many years of curiosity ahead.
Happy early birthday. :).