James E. Ryan Quotes

Too often we decide very early whether we agree or disagree with someone or with an idea, without making an effort to truly understand the person or the point. Our public conversations, and especially conversations on social media, often seem like exercises in picking sides and choosing teams. We hear or read something, make a quick call, then dismiss those with whom we disagree as ignorant or evil.

This single question is the key that can unlock a wealth of stories and solve a host of mysteries, large and small. This is the question that launches discoveries and leads to remarkable insights.

Not having answers, much less a vision, made me nervous at first, to the point of despair and occasional panic. After a while, however, I grew tired of pretending I knew the answers, so I started to ask questions, even in response to questions. As in: “That’s a good question. What do you think?

When faced with difficult conversations or emotionally charged situations, it is always a challenge to pause to ask if you have all of the facts you need to draw fair conclusions. It is easy — too easy — simply to react, often passionately and often based on assumptions rather than facts. Reminding yourself to ask “Wait, what?” is a way to guard against jumping too quickly to conclusions.

Wait, what?” is first on my list of essential questions because it is an effective way of asking for clarification, and clarification is the first step toward truly understanding something — whether it is an idea, an opinion, a belief, or a business proposal. (It’s probably not a good idea to ask this question in response to a marriage proposal. Just saying.)

Asking good questions is hard because it requires you to see past the easy answers and to focus instead on the difficult, the tricky, the mysterious, the awkward, and sometimes the painful. But

Because you were my first friend here. You listened to me.

Everyone has a unique story. […]

Learning these stories will inevitably enrich your life. It might even lengthen it. Curiosity, it turns out, is conducive to health and happiness, as scores of social scientists have documented. Curious people, not surprisingly, are likely to learn more and to retain more of what they learn. Curious people are likely to be more attractive to others, as people are attracted to those who seem interested in them. Curiosity also leads to empathy, an emotion that seems in short supply today. Curious people are likely to be healthier, and to experience less anxiety in particular, because they see new situations as an opportunity to learn rather than an opportunity to realize that they don’t know enough. Curious people are also, according to some studies, likely to live longer, presumably because they are more engaged with the world around them.

And there is no greater gift to bestow on children than the gift of curiosity. Effective leaders, even great ones, accept that they don’t have all the answers. But they know how to ask the right questions — questions that force others and themselves to move past old and tired answers, questions that open up possibilities that, before the question, went unseen.

In sum, the question “I wonder why?” is essential because it is at the heart of curiosity, and asking this question is the way to remain interested in the world around you, including your place in it.

Couldn’t we at least talk it through, and talk about what it would mean for our family?

More than any of his colleagues, Justice Stevens tended to break open the case by asking lawyers the question at the center of their case, one they had to answer successfully in order to prevail.

The important thing,” he observed, “is to not stop questioning. Never lose a holy curiosity.” Curiosity begins with asking “I wonder why?

Asking good questions is hard because it requires you to see past the easy answers and to focus instead on the difficult, the tricky, the mysterious, the awkward, and sometimes the painful.

Albert Einstein, in a classic humble brag, once remarked: “I have no special talents. I am only passionately curious.” The first half of that statement was surely false, while the second half was undoubtedly true.