Change Your Questions, Change Your Life

I'd like to introduce you to a dear friend of mine. At age 95, Lillian Brown is one of the liveliest, most inspiring women I know. We met 25 years ago, when I lived in Washington, D.C., and since then she's been my teacher, mentor and friend. More than anything, she's a shining model of a woman who is continually expanding her potential.

Lillian is the author of three books and she's currently working on two more. For years, she was a professor at three prestigious universities, as well as a media consultant, providing makeup and media advice to nine U.S. presidents. The memoir she's currently working on is about those experiences, as well as the amazing impact that television has had on politics.

Despite these accomplishments, if you were lucky enough to meet Lillian, what you would notice most would be her energy (she does tai chi daily), her delight in living, her kindness, and her unabashed curiosity and affection for people. Lillian probably doesn't think much about the notion of "potential"; she just lives it fully everyday.

While writing this month's blog, I wondered what Lillian would tell us about unleashing our potential, overcoming limitations and hardships, and living healthy, happy and fulfilling lives. I thought it would be great to share her with you, so I called to find out what advice she would offer.

What she described was different than I expected. She doesn't think about herself and her own potential as much as the goal before her. Her most compelling goals have almost always "been for the betterment of others," especially her own family of three daughters. She told me that she actually lies in bed each morning and asks herself, "What can I do with the gift of this day to do what I have to get done?" She was quite emphatic when she told me, "Marilee, tell [people] not to ask questions like 'Why did that happen to me?' because that will just stop them in their tracks."

In last month's blog, I talked about the huge impact it makes when we ask Learner questions instead of Judger ones. I'm sure I learned some of this from Lillian! Her question about the gift of the day is a beautiful Learner question. The 'woe is me' one is pure Judger.

Learner questions lift us up and propel us positively toward the future, while Judger questions sap energy and self-confidence and put up all kinds of roadblocks. Of course, we all ask both kinds; the point is to ask more Learner ones and fewer Judger ones. (You can refer back to the Choice Map, at left, which illustrates how this works. You can also download it at www.InquiryInstitute.com.)

Lillian also said, "Don't hesitate, just keep going." Her point was that we usually don't know what potential we have until we call upon it, often because we have to. When she was asked to help out with makeup for guests on Face the Nation, for instance, "I didn't know a thing about makeup, my dear, not a thing," she recalled. Fast-forward and we find her helping President Kennedy get ready for his Inauguration Day -- at his request because she was "simply the best."

In Change Your Questions, Change Your Life, I wrote that the key to a happy, healthy, fulfilled life is to "accept Judger and practice Learner." I do this every day and one of the best ways I do it is to keep Lillian, and other wonderful women and men, in mind. So when I find myself in Judger mode, and discouraged or down on myself, I might ask: "How would Lillian look at this?" or "What gift would she find in this situation?"

Who are the models who inspire you to keep expanding your potential? Who are the individuals whose vibrant being and fierce determination light up your life? What is it about them that makes such a difference for you? What stories about them could you share with us? I'd love to hear some -- and so would other readers of Experience Life who read this blog.

Did you know that the questions you ask have a great deal of influence on your happiness, success and quality of life? It's true.

We all ask questions constantly, and the nature of those inquiries -- from inherently negative questions like "Whose fault is it?" and "How could I have been so stupid?" to more positive questions like "What's possible?" and "What do I appreciate about myself (and the other person) in this moment?" -- can have an enormous impact on the outcomes in our careers, relationships, health and every other aspect of our personal well-being.

I've made a career out of asking questions, and in this blog I'm going to share with you the best tools I know for improving the questions you ask yourself and others on a daily basis.

But first, let me tell you a little bit about myself and my connection with Experience Life magazine . . .

My relationship with Experience Life began in late 2004 when they wrote an article about a book I had just written, Change Your Questions, Change Your Life: 7 Powerful Tools for Life and Work (hence the name of this blog). They did a great job and I also had some delightful conversations with editor in chief Pilar Gerasimo. We even ended up doing a radio show together. There was a lot of great chemistry, and we knew we'd do something together when the time was right. Fast forward and here we are today!

A little about my background. I live in New Jersey, right near the Delaware River, with my husband (he's an amazing artist), two dogs and two turtles. In 1998, after being a psychotherapist for 25 years, I wrote a psychology textbook, The Art of the Question: A Guide to Short-Term Question-Centered Therapy. During that part of my career I worked with individuals, couples and families, and also gave workshops on positive ways that people can be more in charge of their attitudes and behavior to support their health and well-being. Those experiences taught me many things, including how the questions people ask themselves help or hinder their ability to change and enjoy satisfaction and success in their lives.

Then I decided it was time to make this work (I call it Question Thinking, or QT) more available, so I expanded into coaching and even into working with organizations. I also realized that I needed something other than a textbook for the QT methods to be easily accessible. That's why I wrote Change Your Questions, Change Your Life -- so people could learn simple, practical methods for asking better questions that would help them get what they want in their own lives.

I am continually gratified by the response to that book, which became a word-of-mouth bestseller and was translated into 12 languages. I get emails and calls from people all over the world with stories about how they were able to change their attitudes and behavior after reading the book -- like the reader who was finally able to have an effective conversation with a boss and others who've improved their relationships and even their self-confidence. You can read some of those stories in the introduction to the second edition of the book, which just came out this summer, or at my Web site, www.InquiryInstitute.com.

People are particularly enthusiastic about the Choice Map, which is a graphic in the book that illustrates the two main paths that are available to us at any moment: the Learner Path and the Judger Path. It also describes the kinds of questions we typically ask on each path.

The Choice Map (shown at left; click the image to see it full size) shows people how to change their questions so they can be more in charge of their moods, how they think and feel, and more able in general to get the results they want. It shows how we can continually choose to operate on the Learner path, even though we all take the Judger one from time to time -- and sometimes end up in the Judger Pit. Cindy Joseph, another guest blogger for Experience Life, gave an inspiring example of Learner thinking when she described her vibrant positive attitude about "power aging."

Now it's "confession time" for me. Today while writing this blog, I realized that I've been a bit Judger on myself for not getting to the gym for a few months. So I asked myself some questions to help me switch from Judger to Learner and then called a friend for support. Here are some of the questions I asked myself: Am I being Judger with myself? Am I willing to switch to Learner? Am I really serious about starting to exercise again? Do I need support to get back on track? Who could do this best? When will I call her?

I often use this method of asking Switching questions and it's made an enormous difference in my life. Many readers and workshop participants say that asking Switching questions is a practical "how-to" that's been missing for them, that it's easy to remember and use, and that it's made a wonderful difference in their lives.

In this blog I'll be writing about how to apply Switching questions and the Choice Map to situations and questions you care about. I'll also share stories about ways that others have used this material so you can learn from them, too.

The invitation to write a blog for Experience Life is a very exciting opportunity for me: I've never had such an immediate and direct way to connect with readers -- to find out who you are, what you care about, and what you want that I may be able to help you with. I'm also looking forward to learning from you, so if you have any suggestions for this blog or any questions you'd like me to comment on, please ask!

You're also welcome to visit my Web site, www.InquiryInstitute.com, where you can get free downloads of the Choice Map, as well as the introduction to the second edition of Change Your Questions, Change Your Life.

See you next month!