The power of right Questions

Seema and Dimple are best friends. They stay in the same society. Their kids are in the same school and in the same standard and they have been playing together since the very beginning. I was their neighbour and I observed the way they brought out conversations with their kids. There was a huge difference in the quality of the questions that were asked to the kids.

When the kids went to their preschool for the first time, they were very excited. The mothers eagerly waited for them to come back from school and know their experience. Seema asked her daughter if she liked the school. She was only expecting a yes or a no as answer. Whereas Dimple asked her daughter what she liked in the school. Here she would get an answer which is far better and detailed than a simple yes or no. She would understand the state of the child better.

When kids were back from school, Seema generally asked whether they finished their tiffin’s or what was there for homework etc. Dimple would ask a different question like "What did you enjoy in school today?" or “What did you learn today?" etc. There was an incident that I remember. One day both the kids returned home crying. Both the daughters were overwhelmed. They exclaimed their pain to their mothers, “You don't love me?". When Seema heard this, she began to give explanations of how much she loved her daughter. She reminded her of how she bought clothes and toys for her, how she took her out every weekend and fulfil all her wishes and her daughter still said she didn't love her. Dimple asked a simple question "What do you want me to do so that you know I love you?” "Please hug me as soon as you come back from office." The emotional drama simply came to an end.

Now, it was the day when the first semester results were declared. Both the girls could not score well. Seema asked her daughter, "Why did you scoreless in the exams?" whereas Dimple asked her, “What needs to be done to score good marks in exams?" In the final semester examination results, Seema's daughter still could not score well but Dimple's daughter scored surprisingly well and topped her class.

Reflection by Dr Anjana?

Reflect in life and am sure you will surely agree that asking the right questions can help individuals think and reflect on the right aspects. Our brain is like a supercomputer. It will always give you an answer. If you keep asking yourself why this keeps happening to you. The answer you will receive is that you are an idiot. But if you ask yourself what you could do to overcome this situation, you will get a positive empowering answer. If you ask negative questions outcome is most likely to be negative but when you ask a good positive question you will get a positive result.

Asking empowering questions enhances ones emotional intelligence too. Remember knowledge is having the right answer Intelligence is in asking the right question.

You can never get the right answer by asking a wrong question. Am sure you will agree that life is filled with unanswered questions but it’s the courage to seek those answers that continue to give meaning to life Answers come when questions that are being asked need to be answered. Let’s go ahead in life and answer all questions and question all the answers.