The Most Influential Question
Although life is not built in a single moment, rather in a series of moments - some very defining, and others a little less so - there are a few key moments, people, conversations, and events that imprint upon us like none other.
A few years ago, a friend of mine introduced me to a friend of hers who was new to the city. One of the evening when we were hanging out - this friend asked me a very simple yet a very defining question:
"How do you deal with disappointments?"
As innocent and simple as it sounds, I was stumped and could not come up with a coherent answer.
I was a late-20s guy with absolutely no idea how I had dealt with disappointments in the last few years. Now that I think about it - the answer to this question back then was - "I am on auto-pilot mode and have stopped looking around to see how life had been changing because of my own actions and inactions".
I had been drowning myself in useless social gatherings, parties, mindless hobbies that added no value to my life, and some genuinely useful travel. But none of that was done to actively manage my disappointments. I guess that I was not even aware of where my disappointments were at. Had somebody asked me that question five years before this event happened, I had a far better thought clarity and self-awareness.
I could not answer that question, and I was not articulate in that moment. That one question jolted me into reality. That confused and potentially disappointed look on my acquaintance's face after listening to me stumble was a reality check that I was not expecting that day.
It still took me a few more years of active soul searching to even grasp and accept the harsh realities of my life and situations, and be able to answer this for myself. To this day, it remains one of the most influential questions of my life. There are a few other such questions that were more private in nature, but this one simple question smacked me back into reality.
What is the most influential question that somebody has ever asked you?
