Questions

For the past few years, I’ve loosely followed the “Bullet Journal” method of note-taking. Usually in a Leuchtturm1917 Hardcover A5 notebook with dotted pages (the best!). Whenever I finish one notebook and start another, among other things, I like to write down some key questions and mental models at the front of the new notebook, so that I can easily refer back to them whenever I need to. Here’s what I’ve written at the start of my current notebook. ...

Source: Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals by Oliver Burkeman Where in your life or your work are you currently pursuing comfort, when what’s called for is a little discomfort? Are you holding yourself to, and judging yourself by, standards of productivity or performance that are impossible to meet? In what ways have you yet to accept the fact that you are who you are, not the person you think you ought to be? In which areas of life are you still holding back until you feel like you know what you’re doing? How would you spend your days differently if you didn’t care so much about seeing your actions reach fruition? Want more self-elicitation questions like these? Check out “Questions Worth Asking.” ...

These are questions that are always worth asking yourself. For a list of questions I’m currently asking and investigating, see my /questions page. Five-Minute Journal Questions Morning I am grateful for… What would make today great? Daily affirmations: I am… Evening What are 3 amazing things that happened today? How could I have made today even better? Morning Questions (5 minutes) What’s one thing I’m grateful for? What’s one thing I’m excited about? What’s one virtue I want to exhibit? What’s one thing I’m avoiding? What’s the one thing I need to do? Evening Questions (5 minutes) What were my biggest wins of the day? Did I have any major realizations? What’s on the agenda for tomorrow? Bottleneck Breaker What’s the biggest bottleneck to achieving my next goal? Why aren’t I working on it today? 80/20 Analysis Where am I feeling satisfied? Where am I feeling dissatisfied? For each of the above, what are the 20% of places, habits, people, beliefs, etc. that are responsible for 80% of the positive and negative results? Compounding Projection If I repeated every action from today for one year, where would I end up? Is this the place I want to be? Course Correction Questions What do I need to spend more time doing? What do I need to spend less time doing? What do I need to schedule? What do I need to do? What do I need to be more mindful of? What unresolved issues am I overlooking? What opportunities are in front of me? What obstacles are in my way? Am I going in the right direction with my commitments? What do I need to add? What do I need to delete? What do I need to expand? What do I need to shrink? What have I done well recently? Source: The Productivity Project Forty-Nine Questions to Improve Your Results, by Josh Kaufman Do I use my body optimally? What is the quality of my current diet? Do I get enough sleep? Am I managing my energy well each day? How do I manage daily stress? Do I have good posture and poise? What can I do to improve my ability to observe the world around me? Do I know what I want? What achievements would make me really excited? What “states of being” do I want to experience each day? Are my priorities and values clearly defined? Am I capable of making decisions quickly and confidently? Do I consistently focus my attention on what I want vs. what I don’t want? What am I afraid of? Have I created an honest and complete list of the fears I’m holding on to? Have I confronted each fear to imagine how I would handle it if it came to pass? Am I capable of recognizing and correcting self-limitation? Am I appropriately pushing my own limits? Is my mind clear and focused? Do I systematically externalize (write or record) what I think about? Am I making it easy to capture my thoughts quickly, as I have them? What has my attention right now? Am I regularly asking myself appropriate guiding questions? Do I spend most of my time focusing on a single task, or constantly flipping between multiple tasks? Do I spend enough time actively reflecting on my goals, projects, and progress? Am I confident, relaxed, and productive? Have I found a planning method that works for me? Am I “just organized enough”? Do I have an up-to-date list of my projects and active tasks? Do I review all of my commitments on a regular basis? Do I take regular, genuine breaks from my work? Am I consciously creating positive habits? Am I working to shed non-productive habits? Am I comfortable with telling other people “no”? How do I perform best? What do I particularly enjoy? What am I particularly good at doing? What environment do I find most conducive to doing good work? How do I tend to learn most effectively? How do I prefer to work with and communicate with others? What is currently holding me back? What do I really need to be happy and fulfilled? How am I currently defining “success”? Is there another way of defining “success” that I may find more fulfilling? How often do I compare myself to my perceptions of other people? Am I currently living below my means? If I could only own 100 things, what would they be? Am I capable of separating necessity and luxury? What do I feel grateful for in my life and work? Testing the “Impossible”: 17 Questions That Changed My Life, by Tim Ferriss What if I did the opposite for 48 hours? What do I spend a silly amount of money on? How might I scratch my own itch? What would I do/have/be if I had $10 million? What’s my real TMI (Target Monthly Income)? What are the worst things that could happen? Could I get back here? If I could only work 2 hours per week on my business, what would I do? What if I let them make decisions up to $100? $500? $1,000? What’s the least crowded channel? What if I couldn’t pitch my product directly? What if I created my own real-world MBA? Do I need to make it back the way I lost it? What if I could only subtract to solve problems? What might I put in place to allow me to go off the grid for 4 to 8 weeks, with no phone or email? Am I hunting antelope or field mice? Could it be that everything is fine and complete as is? What would this look like if it were easy? How can I throw money at this problem? How can I “waste” money to improve the quality of my life? No hurry, no pause. Useful questions for reframing (Derek Sivers, Useful Not True) When something goes wrong What’s great about this? How can I use this to my advantage? Does this change the goal, or the path, or nothing? How can I reduce the downsides? When changing direction When I was at my happiest, what was I doing? What have I strongly wanted for the longest time? What’s the opposite of what I usually do? Which of my old beliefs are not serving me? Forget me. What would be most helpful for others? When stuck What is my one top priority now? How can I begin without waiting for anything? What advice would I love to hear from an all-knowing sage? What am I doing that’s actually a distraction? Instead of avoiding mistakes, how can I make more to learn faster? Who can help? To make peace with what’s out of your control What happens if I ignore it and do nothing? Should I learn a lesson from this, or just move on? How can I blame no one, and see this as nobody’s fault? How can I be OK no matter what happens?

Say what you will about Tim Ferriss, I’ve always really enjoyed the questions that he asks himself and others. I also really enjoy LEARNING as much as I can from other people. And so, with that in mind, I’d like to “open source” my search for mentors and invite you, dear reader, to answer at least one of the questions below. Please comment your answers below this post (that way others can benefit from your knowledge as well!). Or, if you’d like, send them to me via email (use my contact form here). Then, go ask these questions to others! Cheers! ...

While reading Beth Felker Jones’ Practicing Christian Doctrine: An Introduction to Thinking and Living Theologically, I came across the following list of extremely helpful questions to ask while reading theology (on page 29). What are the key Christian teachings being articulated? What is the author’s driving concern or main theme? What counts for the author as authoritative (Scripture, tradition, reason, experience…)? Is the author’s theological method implicit or explicit? How does the author deal with the witness of Scripture? a. Implicitly? Explicitly? b. Does the witness of the Old Testament matter? The New? c. What biblical themes are privileged? d. What interpretive principles are at work? How do these claims relate to other doctrines? How does context (including gender, race, class, culture, and time) shape the theological voice? Is the theologian conscious of this? How does your context shape your evaluation of the piece? Practice reading charitably. What is the best possible interpretation of how the piece reflects an attempt to be faithful to Jesus Christ? How do these theological claims relate to the life of faith? Doe you bring other questions from your experience? If this theological proposal were taken seriously, how would it shape Christian practice? Would it affect our participation in spiritual disciplines? Our understanding of faithful living? Our practice of evangelism? Our life as the church? Add this to my 1 simple trick to read faster, 4 questions to ask while reading a book, and 3 questions to ask while reading the Bible. ...

I’ll keep this short, sweet, and to the point: I’m looking for problems that I can help solve, so I need you to rant at me in the comments. That’s right, I basically want you to complain to me in the comments section of this post. What’s causing you frustration, angst, or stress these days? What questions are you struggling to find the answers to? What obstacles are in the way of you achieving your goals? Here’s MY problem/frustration: I don’t know what problems are causing YOU the most friction! ...

The Problem: Studying the Bible can Quickly Feel Overwhelming Right? Even with helpful books out there like How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth (that’s an affiliate link, by the way, meaning that I get a small commission at no cost to you if you end up buying the book), there are still so many potential questions to ask of any biblical text when we study it. How are we supposed to keep questions of authorship, genre, meaning, application, etc. etc. straight when we study the Bible? ...