Ten Ways to Change Your Behavior Immediately #5: Use Curiosity

The most natural thing in the world is to get stuck in our usual patterns.  We do the same thing day in and day out and it becomes a habit, it feels incredibly easy or maybe even right to take the same action.  Each time we follow the path of least resistance we create a slightly deeper mental groove, which makes the next iteration even more difficult to escape.

It is time to break the pattern.  Take a deep breath and change your context.  Now, I want you to look at your situation with fresh eyes.  Forget for a moment everything you think you know – pretend you are an alien who has just been dropped into your body here on Earth.  Be curious about yourself, your reactions, what you are trying to accomplish and why.  You need to find out more information about the situation, so start listing a bunch of questions that you would need to answer to be able to make the best decision.  Write as many questions as you can before you start trying to answer any of them.  The purpose is to explore as much as possible before proposing any of your usual solutions!

Genuine curiosity is an incredibly powerful state because it is so open to new possibilities.  By asking all of these questions and wanting to know the answer, you have engaged your subconscious mind in gathering information.  Now that you have done this, imagine the outcome that you want in as much detail as possible, including any pictures, sounds, words or sensations you want to be experiencing.  You will begin to notice that ideas are spontaneously coming to mind, that there are in fact a number of ways to achieve that particular goal.  Don’t reject any of them, no matter how absurd, and let your subconscious keep working.  One of these original ideas could be the brilliant alternative you’ve been looking for!  When one of them feels right, you will experience a natural surge of motivation to begin working on that solution.  Well done!