The Most Excellent Questions

I wish I could remember where I first heard of The Excellent Questions, but it was back in the days of index cards and post-it notes as daily reminders of affirmations.   I had already learned that posting affirmations all over the place didn’t work.  After 3 days the conscious mind just accepts those notes as “wallpaper” and stops noticing or thinking about them. They’re easy to skip.  

And here’s why: 
The conscious mind can only hold 7 (+2  or  – 2 at any given moment) pieces of data. These are commonly referred to as “chunks” in the NLP community.  You only get to HOLD 7 chunks of information in conscious awareness at any time.  If you’re as ADD as I am, you only get 3.  Maybe 4 if you’re fully caffeinated.  

So posting a message on your bathroom mirror doesn’t do a lot of good when you’re noticing that the air is cold in there after you step out of the shower, and you are trying to unscrew the goopy cap on the toothpaste, and cursing your partner for never rinsing the cap off, and the mirror is foggy, and you wonder what time it is now, and the dog is barking downstairs, and you’re wishing you had your coffee now, and the sink needs a thorough scrubbing, and the toilet paper holder is EMPTY again.  What’s the use of having a toilet paper holder if it doesn’t hold toilet paper?And that’s 9 things you are actively noticing.  Your conscious mind tossed the “affirmation” on your foggy mirror aside as unimportant in the scheme of things.  It’s seen that note every day for 3 days and it will still be there in 5 minutes, so you just mentally toss it into the “Later” file.   “I’ll do that as soon as I…”  

While people tried to use The Excellent Questions as a “post this on an index card where you’ll see it every day” exercise, it largely failed to produce any notable change.   BUT – my smartphone calendar breathed new life into this old game.  

Now I’m going to tell you The Excellent Questions, and how to make them part of your daily routine, and what they will DO for you.  

The questions are “What’s new?” and “What’s good?” and that’s all.  

The plan is that you put these into your smartphone calendar at 3 intervals; say, 9:00 AM, 2:00 PM, and 7:00 PM.  If you’re ambitious, add in a bedtime reminder.  
Set it to repeat every day.  

That’s it.  

Of course, it’s only the beginning.  But it’s a VERY effective pattern interrupt, and it WILL cause your conscious problem-solving mind to stop and notice what is RIGHT in your world.  The conscious mind does not focus on what’s RIGHT.  It focuses on what is IMPORTANT.  Problems are important.  They have to be solved. 

In the example above, the conscious mind is focusing exclusively on problems and how to solve them: 

I feel cold (need to fix that)
Cap isn’t coming off (need to fix that)
My husband is uncooperative (need to fix that)
I can’t see in the mirror (need to fix that)
I might be late (need to KNOW and maybe fix that)
Is there a threat downstairs? (need to know and fix that)
Need for comforting hot morning beverage (need to fix that)
The sink is icky (need to fix that) 
The toilet paper holder is empty (need to fix that)

In this version of reality, my day is only 15 minutes old and already I am consumed by problems.  Yes, they are low-level problems.  But I’ve gone 100% negative in that I’m surrounded by problems I need to fix and I am NOT noticing the birds singing outside my bathroom window, or the sunlight glinting off my red glitter floor, or how good my soap and shampoo smell, or how soft my towel is, or how much I love my dog, and never mind how many exciting new opportunities and insights might open up for me today. And what’s happening in my body?  I’m dumping cortisol into my bloodstream, lowering my metabolism and immune response, tensing my muscles, and preparing for MORE problems to be solved.  And I will find them, guaranteed. My conscious mind is a problem-solving somebody.  It is really GOOD at finding and solving problems.  I spend half of my day finding and solving problems that I don’t actually HAVE.  Yet.  My conscious mind is forever re-minding me that I don’t have that problem YET.  But I *could* have it. And it’s only thanks to my ever-loving, problem-solving, left-brained, conscious mind that I’m still alive, and dodging phantom bullets.  Whew.  I get exhausted just thinking about it.  

I can only hold 5-9 chunks of information, and I’m fixated on protecting myself from problems, most of which don’t even exist.  

Then my 9:00 AM alert chimes at 8:30 and I have to consciously refocus my attention on turning it off.  It says “What’s new?  What’s good?”

And I remember to THINK about what makes me happy.  

I LOVE that my silly dog is warning me of some critter in the yard.  I LOVE looking out the window and seeing him run around protecting me from the birds.  I LOVE that my towel is soft and warm.  I LOVE that the coffee will be ready for me when I let my goofy guardian back inside.  I LOVE that he’ll be chowing down on his breakfast hard enough to rattle the china.  I LOVE that my first client of the morning always throws me a curve ball that I’m not prepared to catch.  I LOVE that he keeps me on my toes.  I LOVE that Spring is almost here for keeps.  I LOVE that my sweater is so soft and warm, and feels so good against my skin.  I LOVE that I made the decision to invest in that expensive cashmere sweater that I didn’t think I should buy.  

Do you see how I unconsciously managed to sneak in a really powerful affirmation of my right to own and enjoy a luxury item?  I still struggle with that.  I grew up really poor, and I have some POWERFUL beliefs around that.  This game makes it possible to upend even a powerful, lifelong belief that “I am not supposed to have expensive things” or “There’s not enough money” without having to argue with an unreasoning belief.  I will lose that argument every time. Simply being HAPPY that I’m enjoying that item undoes the belief that I shouldn’t have that item.  Here I am, proving that my moment of self-indulgence did not destroy the fabric of the universe and cause me untold sorrow.  

Seriously, over time (and a really SHORT time) a simple 60-second exercise like this can change your entire life.  Plug it into your smartphone calendar, 3x a day.  What’s new? What’s good?  Set it to repeat every day.  Think of something NEW and something GOOD right now.  

If you ever had trouble scheduling a 20-minute meditation into your day, (don’t feel bad about that because MOST people resist a daily meditation like it was going to unleash a horde of demons) here’s your solution.  If you do this one small thing – What’s good?  What’s new? – every day, I PROMISE you that in a few short weeks that soothing 20-minute break will be something you look forward to.  Why? Because you’ll be much more accustomed to LETTING GO of all the critical, problem-oriented, conscious thoughts and noticing things that actually make you feel good.  

This is also called “chunking”; i.e., breaking a large, unmanageable task (daily 20 minute meditation) down into small, manageable pieces (60 second exercises).  If you do the SMALL thing, the LARGE thing becomes easy.  
Trust me.  I’m the Queen of Chaos.  I know from I-don’t-have-time-for-that and it-can’t-be-done.  This works.  

I know now that I have exactly the same amount of time that every successful and unsuccessful person has.  I have NOW.  That is the only time I will ever have.  I don’t have the past.  That’s gone.  I don’t have the future.  It hasn’t come yet.  I have now.  My smartphone reminds me 3x a day to be in the NOW and to dump a few chunks of negative thinking and open up to being happy, now.  

Of course, this only the beginning.  This is where we START, not where we finish.  But it’s a really GOOD start to training your brain to notice what’s WORKING.