Leading Questions, Deep Thinking, True Answers
OVID has afforded us a unique momentary pause in which we owe it to ourselves to inquire into our own personal drivers and motivations. A process of self-inquiry can catalyse us finding our true life goals free from all the nagging narratives that had attached themselves to us.
Too often we write the story we want to hear
My suggestion is to fire up a program like Roam Research and input the following sets of questions. From there you can build out your self-inquiry practice. You will find that some questions are harder for you to answer than others. That’s OK, pull on a loose thread and get the process going.
You will also find that some questions resonate more deeply with you and you will want to repeatedly return to these. In Roam you can use block references (see the Note down below if you want more info on block references) to drag these questions into your Daily Notes or diary and delve into them on a regular basis, building up a rich tapestry of truth for yourself. You could also create a shortcut to the main Self Inquiry block/page/section and place this in your left tool bar so it is easily accessible. If you don’t use Roam you could do this with any other form of note taking or diarising tool, but Roam allows you to build up deep links between your inquiry points and that is where the magic lies.
These self-inquiry questions are drawn from my book Fierce Reinvention: A Guide to Harnessing Your Superpowers.
Who Are You?
• Who are you? What are your belief systems? What do you believe in? What values do you hold? What don’t you value?
• What do you believe to be true about the world?
• What vision do you have for your life?
• What kind of person do you want to be—when you grow up, tomorrow, at some point in the future?
• What do you bring consciously and unconsciously to your day?
• What feelings matter to you most during your day?
• How do you want others to remember you?
• What change do you want to see take place in the world and how do you want to play a part in bringing that to fruition?
• What do you want to stay the same—in the world, in your life?
What Do You Fear?
• What do you fear? How does that fear sit within you, where do you feel it in your body? What triggers that fear?
• What are your oldest, most deep-seated fears? Have you named them? If not give them a name, such as “the little girl,” “the San Francisco me.”
• What could you do to submit to your fear?
• What would you do differently if you conquered this fear? What would you ask for?
What Makes You Vulnerable?
• How do you feel? Where in your body do these feelings reside?
• How can you get comfortable with your vulnerability and other emotions? What makes you relax into them and leaves you feeling your stress wash away?
What Is Work?
• How do you define your work—passion, joy, job, begrudgingly? Are you engaged with your work?
• What is your relationship to work? In the past, right now? What work do you see yourself doing in the future? In a perfect world?
• What is success/failure to you?
• Do you bring anything from your parents into your work? How did they relate to work? What did they teach you about work?
• Do you show up in your entirety at work? What parts of you show up? How can you show up completely?
• How do things that you have denied about yourself, or feel uncomfortable about yourself, shape your company?
How Do You Achieve Flow?
• Under what circumstances do you work best?
• What is the algorithm that enables you to get into flow—exercise, food, sleep?
• What systems can you put in place to ensure you achieve flow more regularly?
How Do You Play
• What do you do to untether yourself?
• What gives you unfettered joy and has you excited beyond the norm?
• What gives you unbounded energy? How far away from work does this make you feel?
• What could you do to create moments of joy during your day?
What Are Your Soul Habits
• What are your current rituals for connecting to and centering yourself?
• What things do you do that fuel your energy, that nourish your deepest self?
• How do you create moments of pause during your day?
Note: Block References in Roam Research
_Everything is a block in Roam Research. This makes the block reference feature very powerful.
_The main purpose of block references is to avoid duplicate content in your database. The idea is that you only need to type something once and you can then use it in as many contexts as you like.
(Thanks to RoamStack for this explanation)