Better Questions

As many parents of school-aged can children probably relate to, I was only lost the land of good with my nine-years-old daughter, when she started elementary school I was so excited for her for us. She was embarking on this new journey and every day with that excitement in my eyes I pick her up and I say so, how was your day today and without fail she shrug her shoulders and say good and then I'd say okay. What was good about it I don't know it was just good. Naturally I wanted to know more, I was curious about what was happening in her little life, how was she liking her teacher and getting along with her friends and what was here favorite subject and looking back on it now I don't know I thought I was going to get all of that by simply asking how was your day. but ultimately I was in search of an opportinity to connect with her, an invitation of sort of join her on this journey of big girl school as we called it that she was embarking on.

but I want to do that in a way that didn't feel like a daily interrogation so I sat with ti for a while and then one day it all just kind of changed. we are driving home and I say, tell me what is the best part of your day today, she said oh, my best part, I said yeah your best part like what make you smile the hardest today. She stops and she thinks about it and says oh, I know. the best part of my day was getting to play handball after school with my friends. really, I said, I didn't know you knew how to play handball. she said yeah it's a fun game you throw this ball and you do like this. now she's giving me instructions from the backset on how to play handball not knowing that her own mama played handball tetherball and dodgeball when I was a kid. and I share that with her and she's so suprised, she can't believe it, and we have a short but reveting conversation on after school activity. and that kind of became a new thing between us and it's something that we still do to this day and I ask her what was the best part of your day today. It has ranged from eating cinnamon rolls in the cafeteria to practicing to going to the computer lab which she loves to do more than anything and just like that invitation I had been longing for her life.

I finally received all by asking a better question and it's that interaction that I consider to be a path to connection, real connection with real human beings through real conversation as a communication expert certified life coach my life's is built around this idea. that the quality of your life is directly influenced by your ability to communicate with confidence and with clarity part being a good communicator requires that you are in active listener,  part of listening requires that you ask questions, but I want us to go deeper I want us to ask good questions the juicy kind, that can help us to go deeper faster with the people in our lives.

In the 15th edition of their textbook looking out looking in authors Adler and Proctor state that questioning helps us to do more just gather information like data and facts and details, It can also help us learn what people thinking, how they're feeling and in some cases what they want and that I consider to be the secret source to developing relationships that add value to our lives and fulfill us. To be clear, I define a better question simply as one that demonstrates genuine curiosity but without being too intrusive and when we can strike that balance that's when we can shatter the perceptions that we have of other people and that in some cased people might have a bais.

Take my former student Khalid, for example,  I was an adjunct professor in communication studies for about eight years and over the course of that time I realized that a good number of my students had never had a black teacher before in their life ever let along a black female professor in college, so it wasn't lost on me that by me showing up in all of my glory. on the first class would impact how some of them perceived me and in some case how they experienced me as was the case with Khalid a youg black male. this night in class we are brainstorming persuasive speech topic ideas and it's his turn to share with me what he's going to his speech on.  So he comes to my desk and pops down in the chair and I said so tell me what are you thinking about your topic for your persuasive speech and he says I think I'm gonna do my own recycling. Okay um, tell me more about that why recycling and he says because everybody shoud be recycle and I said uh, yeah,  you are right about that, but tell me more is this something that you're really insterested in is, are you really passionate about recycling and he says uh, I mean not really I guess so clearly he wasn't sure what he wanted to give his speech on, so we take a moment, and I noticed that he's wearing a marnoon color hoodie with the letters TDE printed on it in white and I recognized that to be the logo of TOP DOG entertainment, the record label that puller surprise winning rapper Kendrick Lamar assigned to  and this sparks an idea in me and so I ask him, do you think that you could write a speech that argues the TDE is the most important label to West Coast Rap since death row. and he looks at me and says I'm sorry what. I began to repeat the question and he said nah I heard you, but how you know that, how do you know the TDE is, and I said well first of all it's on Youtube and second I was (listen)  to hip-hop I love rap, love Kindric you know, don't kill my vibe, he couldn't believe it. his whole accountants changes and smiles wide and he says see miss amber that's why I like you becuase you like you young as the same time. I never had a professor like you before, and I just smile and said thanks I think, but at that moment a perception was shattered and a connection was made, we weren't just teacher and student, we were two hip-hop fans and we taled about everything from snoop to tupac to Kendrick, I never forget the look on Khalid's face as he was walking back his desk brimming with new ideas on how he could possibly construct that argument, becuase it was the face of someone who had just felt seen and that's the benefit that comes from asking better questions, I could have left it at recycling, but taking it a step further, we were able to engage in a more thoughtfull way,.

some of you might hear this and say okay girl, this just sounds like small talk which I already don't like doing, now you want me do more of it by asking people questions, I don't think so, and that's not exactly what I'm saying asking better questions isn't about meaningless chatter, it's actually quite the opposite, it's about communicating with intention with the people around us, we see this play out in our romatic relationships, for example,