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Ask & Find  ·  14 questions

What you want

The honest version, not the sensible one

Most people can tell you what they are supposed to want. Fewer can tell you what they actually want, because they stopped asking a long time ago.

Nothing here has to be realistic. You are just finding out what is in there.

01

If money were handled, what would you do on Monday morning at nine? Not forever. Just Monday.

Forever is too big to answer. One Monday is honest.
02

What did you want at twelve that you later talked yourself out of?

Some childhood wants were just childish. Some were right, and we gave them up to be sensible.
03

What would you do this year if nobody would ever find out?

Take away the audience and see what is left. That is the want, not the performance.
04

What are you a little embarrassed to admit you want?

The embarrassing wants are often the real ones. Saying it here, once, takes some of the charge out.
05

Which parts of your week would you keep exactly as they are?

Finding what you want is partly noticing what you already have and would fight to keep.
06

What do you want more of? Three things, as specific as you can make them.

More time is not an answer. More Sunday mornings with nowhere to be is.
07

What do you want less of?

This one is easier than it looks, and often the fastest route to a better week.
08

Whose life gives you a small pang when you see it? What exactly is the pang about?

Envy is just information with bad manners. It points at something you want.
09

Walk through a perfectly ordinary good day, from waking up.

Not a holiday. A Tuesday you would be happy to repeat for years.
10

What have you wanted for a long time and never said out loud?

Writing it down is the first time it exists outside your head. That is already something.
11

What are you waiting for, and who is supposed to hand it to you?

Sometimes the answer is a real person. Often it is nobody, and the waiting is just a habit.
12

What would you try if you were sure it would be fine to be bad at it?

Most of the things we want are behind a door marked beginner.
13

What do you want to be true about your life in five years that is not true now?

Five years is close enough to picture and far enough to change almost anything.
14

What would you do with a free afternoon, no phone, no plans?

The answer is usually smaller and better than people expect.