[Asking Good Questions]

Everyone has a story to tell. And everyone wants to share that story. Because only in sharing it and being known can you experience true connection. As humans what gives us purpose and value is experiencing connection. We want it. We need it. We desperately yearn for it and without it we become a mummified version of ourselves, stale, apathetic, and buried deep in the mess of our minds.

My point is this, we all want to be known. I think that is why we are always trying to figure out what to say to people or how to impress people. In the midst of this however, we have a lot of people talking and very few people listening. And even fewer people asking Good questions that get to the heart of who someone really is and what they are passionate about.

We are so focused on being known that we think 'why would I waste time getting to know someone else?'. The funny thing about this is that it is so backwards. People don't care what you know until they know that you care. And once they see that you do care, they really want to know you!

Asking good questions is an art. And a lost art at that.

What asking good questions shows is that you are curious, you are fascinated, and you value the person you are having a conversation with. By asking questions that dig deeper into who someone really is you are essentially saying "You are worth my time and you are worth my fascination".

Whether you think Jesus is awesome or not one thing he was incredible at was asking good questions that got to peoples hearts. And in doing that he was saying to that person "I am about you and you have a story that I want to hear because you deserve to be known". He found the one thing that he shared in common with the person across from him and connected over that. There's a story about a woman at a well who it would be totally culturally taboo to talk to or to even stand next to and they literally had nothing in common. She was a different ethnicity, she had a different religion, she was a different class, and she was a woman, which in those days was not something you did in public. So he connected with her over the one thing they had in common. Water. Because everyone drinks water right? Ha! What if we focused more on what we had in common with people than the one think we don't have in common? There would be a lot less arguments and a lot more people feeling loved and known.

So,

Ask good questions. Be fascinated with every person you meet. And focus on that one thing you have in common when you find yourself preparing an argument for why that person across from you is "wrong".

May your love be strong,

Joey

(The picture is of my friends Kyler, Peter and Tyler in Yosemite this past summer. We had an incredible time together touring and asking good questions during the time we spent together in the car. We each ended up growing so much from hearing each others perspectives and having true depth in our conversations)