In this episode of Waking Up With Melissa Ruiz, I talk about how I learned to ask highly skilled questions, or what I like to call “thought-provoking questions”, throughout my career as a TV producer. In four steps, you’ll learn all about the connective tissue—the vulnerability and the authenticity—that it takes to forge lasting relationships and create the life of your dreams!

A BREAKDOWN OF THIS EPISODE

[05:07] Tap into your emotions
[08:44] Ask yourself “why” instead of “how”
[10:57] Get straight to the heart
[15:27] Deepen your relationship with yourself
[21:34] What it really means to be in a community

Tap into your emotions

Our emotions don’t exist so we can bully or shame ourselves. Rather, our emotions are our traffic lights: Excitement tells me one thing while nervousness says another.

Don’t take your emotions personally. Take a step back and ask, “What is this emotion I’m feeling pulling me towards?” That alone will help you ask higher-quality questions.

When interacting with another human being, this practice of sitting with your emotions and looking at them objectively can make for infinitely more productive conversations.

Instead of proclaiming that you’re overwhelmed, you can now follow up on how you’re feeling by giving the person you’re speaking to more context behind why you’re feeling a certain way.

Most people would be happy to hold space for you as you walk them through what’s going through your heart and mind. By tapping into your emotions, you can ask them to either just be there and listen to you, or to offer possible solutions to your issue.

Either way, it’s better than running into the dead-end of letting your emotions overwhelm you (and the person you’re sitting across from)!

Ask yourself “why” instead of “how”

Most people, when talking about their goals and dreams, say upfront that they want more money, a thriving business, or a better relationship without really knowing why they’re so pulled toward it.

Ask yourself why you want the thing you want. Why do you desire happiness? Why do you want to be wealthy?

Once you have that deep-rooted motivation crystal clear in your mind, then you can ask a trusted friend or mentor to help out with the how.

Simple questions lead to simple answers. Bigger questions lead to bigger answers.

Get straight to the heart

If you’ve got something you’ve been meaning to get off your chest, speak directly.

I’ve had a ton of clients who gave me these 20-30 minute long speeches when they only had a single question in mind. The deeper they spiraled into their sob story, the deeper they dug themselves into a hole.

It’s so much harder to function if you’ve built up stress, and anxiety, and are overthinking. It leads to the possession of the mind, heart, and spirit that takes some time to recover from.

A good question to ask, if somebody (or yourself) is rambling about an issue that seems to stem from a single source, is simply: “What is your highest intention?” or even “What do you want to see out of this situation?”

It doesn’t have to be complicated. It just has to be straightforward.

Deepen your relationship with yourself

Our greatest relationship is the one we have with ourselves. If we want to ask more highly-skilled questions, we need to get to know ourselves in a deeper way.

Most of us take what we do for granted, and we end up going through the motions in our day-to-day lives. If we slow down and start asking why we do what we do, we can learn to see past the surface and become more intentional about our daily choices.

Naturally, as we become more curious about and intentional with our decisions in life, we become better at helping others do the same.

What it really means to be in a community

Stronger relationships all around can be built if more people know how to ask thought-provoking questions. Once we learn not to limit ourselves to emotion over heart, or to how over why, we can deepen the connections we forge with our fellow human beings.

We need to ask questions that come less from a place of ego and more from a desire to hold space for the other person.

And let’s not aim to ask highly-skilled questions just to get something from others, but because we want to truly lead, add value, be of service to our community, activate our heart chakra and, in turn, allow others to feel our warmth and our love!

If you enjoyed this episode and experienced a shift or got more clarity, I would love for you to screenshot this episode, share it on Instagram, and tag @iammelissaruiz – let’s start a conversation!

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