The Power of Questions | Steve Aguirre | TEDxBergenCommunityCollege

thank you questions are powerful they create connection they drive destiny and they inspire action but the problem is we as humans our natural instinct is to say something not ask something so today I want to explore how questions have started to die in society why we need to bring them back in six ways that we can introduce them into our lives so let's start with some data in 2013 there was a study out of Britain that found that the average four year old asks 390 questions a day 392 things pop through my head first kids are jerks and second those poor mothers oh my goodness save their souls so 390 questions that's a lot and if you do the math that's a question every two and a half minutes with that kids awake so the question here is what happens to us now it's not realistic for you to ask 390 questions because if you did I don't know you'd have no friends right so what is realistic let's think back to when we were kids and we had the courage to ask anyone anything what happened well as we grew older fear and insecurity kicked in we started worrying about what other people thought our brain started wandering well what if I asked a question in class and looked stupid what if I say something at a company meeting and look foolish what if I ask a question it's something that I should know that's really difficult when did fear and insecurity replace curiosity bruce lee has a great quote he says quote a wise man can learn more from a foolish question than a fool can from a wise answer so we need to ask more questions but besides fear what else has killed questions in society well social media what does social media do it conditions us it shapes us it influences us what happens we trade statement after statement after statement we try to one-up each other well I traveled here I did this I studied here I have this house I'm dating this person oh my gosh it's hard to keep up and we don't ask questions questions are scary it's vulnerable on social media which is a shame because that's a great way to connect with people but it may not be the platform for questions may not be and that's okay but maybe that platform is influencing how we interact in our day-to-day lives I was having a conversation in person which sounded like a social media conversation a little while back a friend came up to me just came back from Paris and said Steve I just went to Paris it was amazing what my family I loved it what did I think well my brain goes well I just went to Paris I have to share my thoughts let's talk about me me me I went to Paris too I love the cafes I love the people watching well me and my family we got to eat at a restaurant on top of the Eiffel Tower it was amazing well you know never gonna get what I got to go to the catacombs and see spots that people have never seen before was this competition of statements back and forth monologues there was no curiosity and I thought did I lose a chance for connection was me having these type of conversations impacting my personal relationships what if I would ask the question well what was your favorite part about going to Paris what did your family love most it would have invited them and granted them a chance to speak to me share more showed I was interested I could have built that relationship so 0.1 questions create connection now I personally am honored to be here at Bergen Community College because I am a product of the community college system in California so California laid back with my mind on my money my money on my mind that is a Snoop Dogg reference for those who love the west coast and the thing is the dream in California is to go to UC Berkeley that is the school the public school out of community cause it is the dream and so my first date Community College I go right up best stress outfit I get an appointment for the career counselor I see how do I get into UC Berkeley what do I got to do and the career counselor responded in a zombie mono like tone with ru F if you're wondering what are you f is it stands for resting unfriendly face it has a street name called RBF but I'm on the stage I can't see the B okay so let's keep that between us so but his answer was you can try kid but nobody gets into those good luck and his answer wasn't what mattered it was the desire behind my question I wanted to know how can I go to great schools how could I achieve more do more accomplish more and I'm proud to say that I did get into UC Berkeley and graduating I eventually got into Wharton where I did my MBA and the question that drives me today is how can I make personal and professional growth fun real engaging life-changing for people and I started to realize a lot of successful people in life will tend to do things themselves where they ask questions so for example Elon Musk creator of Tesla what question does he want to answer how can we use less fossil fuels in the world we've got Oprah she wants to know how can I help people be their best selves in their lives we've got Steve Jobs who was wondering how can we get a computer in everybody's hand in the world so what are the questions that you really really want to answer what are the questions that will fulfill you drive you consume you what's the question that's gonna unlock your destiny so point number two questions drive destiny now three when I was at Berkeley I had a classmate above me called Ghent and and called her name was Jennifer and Jennifer as she was graduating - Jennifer what's your plan after school basic question she said Steve I'm gonna move and live and work in Spain I said what you can do that that's possible that blew my mind because for me I grew up in inner-city Los Angeles we're just getting out of Los Angeles was a big deal and I know that there's internet stars who travel and there's successful people who do all these accomplishments but me personally I can't always connect with what they achieve it seems so big and large and hard to achieve but what was great about Jennifer she was a peer like me so being able to see that she moved there made it possible for me and I'm proud to share I did get to live overseas for four years so thinking about that is totally powerful and I love meeting people all the time because I love to ask them about their lives what they're doing and when they tell me what they're doing I've realized that can be now be possible for me so number three open the door to possibility and for it's not just about asking questions it's about getting people to ask us questions and that could be hard when I first graduate from college I worked in finance and I was presenting to clients and prepped my little heart out get really ready and then at the end I'd say two words any questions crickets nobody'd say anything like what am i doing and I thought about it two things one any questions is a statement and two it's common autopilot language cliche everyone in the corporate world says any questions it's kind of like when somebody comes up to you to say how you doing your ear tunes out it's like we all say that so we shut down so I needed to change it from any questions to what questions do you have what can I explore further and that's opened up the floodgates why is that because it Peart their ears up that sounds different that got my attention and secondly it was granting them an invitation by asking a question so number four questions grant an invitation now five it can also help you in your personal life so me I have a fiance when she comes home from work she needed to be happy she can be sad she can be frustrated problems and challenges that she deal with and when she has problems or challenges me I want to be Superman I want to solve those problems for her I'm like honey this is what you should do and the thing is I channel my inner Vanilla Ice I'm like babe if you got a problem yo I'll solve it okay the problem is she doesn't want the answer okay she does not like vanilla ice she's more of a Spice Girls person right she's like tell me what you want what you really really want you might be thinking where am I going with this well I thought about this and I have to get from her to tell me what she wants so the question I asked her is instead of solving a problem with a statement I said what would you prefer would you prefer me to listen right now or would you prefer to hear my perspective and that question changed the game for us so number five it builds bridges and six it's really important it's about you as an individual and using questions on yourself if you're like me your brain runs it's like a hamster in a wheel oh my gosh to do this my friends doing this I got to keep up I got a work hard I got stressed just the brain keeps running a statement after statement after statement and positive statements are better than negative statements but the best thing our brains can do is be curious and ask questions so for example if I'm prepping for a speech I could be statements I'm great I can do this really positive but on the other side I could ask questions how can I prep how can I reduce my nurse who can I speak to that could help me and I want to start answering questions and questions are more effective which is proven by social science in 2010 they had a to group solve anagrams so scramble letters to see how many they could get group a was all about statements so they had to write down or think of statements I can solve anagrams I am smart I'm intelligent Group B ask questions they'd either write them down or think them what's the best way to solve these anagrams how can i how can I improve my strategy here so what were the results Group B the one that asked questions solve 50% more anagrams 50% then being Dan pink writes about this and why is that the case because the brain hates an unanswered question we can't handle it if I asked you what's the color of your couch at home it hijacks your brain you start thinking about that so questions put us in a proactive state we tend to do better so use questions but the thing too is we have to think about the types of questions that we ask we can't use whiny questions why me what's wrong why did this happen it's not as effective Albert Einstein had a great quote he said quote if I had an hour to solve a problem in my life depended on it I would spend the first 55 minutes thinking about the right question to ask because I could then answer that question in less than five minutes so we have to really not just ask more question but ask the right questions and number six questions inspire us to act inspire action so we ask more questions we asked write questions and the final ingredient is how we ask the question and kids hold that secret you know why that mom let's that kid come back in the house after three hundred ninety questions well one cuz it's adorable right so cute it's super adorable but the other reason that kid is genuinely curious when they ask you know mommy where any thoughts come from they actually want to know and so we have more patience for that so I encourage you to ask with a spirit of curiosity instead of a spirit of animosity a spirit of curiosity instead of a spirit of animosity because if we think about if I'm in an argument with somebody and I say yeah well what would make what would change your mind huh what could it do it's probably not gonna work versus I say what could I say that would change your mind about that candidate okay and you're sincerely curious or yourself again why me what's wrong versus how can I learn from this experience what can I do better so in closing I went to a Leadership Conference where Billy Beane was speaking he's the guy from Moneyball the real guy and I said Billy I coach leaders for a living what advice should I give him and he said Steve I learned this from a general in the military who said when times are good be tough demanding and firm on your people when times are harsh be patient kind and empathetic but what happens in the real world the exact opposite so made me think about questions when we need questions the most or they're stressed worried in an argument tough day after work what happens we go to statements social media what we're comfortable with so would it be amazing if we could rewire our brains so we're our first instinct was to ask a question with a childlike spirit of curiosity so I want to challenge each and every one of you to unleash that inner child and go out there and ask more questions because questions are powerful any questions thank you very much guys [Applause]

Channel: TEDx Talks

Views: 86,193

Keywords: TEDxTalks, English, Life, Purpose

Id: 5K842cXNlEI

Length: 12min 57sec (777 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 19 2018