Curiosity vs. Furiosity

Every morning before breakfast, I read a page-long list of reminders. It’s a To-Do list for retaining my sanity — a collection of sentences that I’ve found useful in my never-ending battle against gloominess, complacency, and my brain’s negative bias.

My list includes such reminders as…

—Remember that people had surgery before the invention of anesthesia. (In other words, there are lots of horrible things in the world now, but I shouldn’t have nostalgia for the past, because in many ways, the past was far more horrible).

—Don’t curse the darkness. Instead, light a candle. (This was one of my grandfather’s favorite sayings)

—Ponder sonder. (“Sonder” is the notion that everyone you pass on the street has as complex an inner life as you do. You may be the star of your own life, but you are the bit player (or less) in millions of others. This reminds me to try to be less self-absorbed).

—Ask yourself: What good can you do today? (This is the question that Ben Franklin asked himself every morning, and which I adopted during my Constitutional year)

—Your brain does not have your best interests at heart. (My brain was evolved to survive on the pre-historic savannah, not to make me happy or fulfilled or purpose-driven in the modern world, so I should be skeptical of my automatic thoughts).

—When reading the news, try to adopt the Veil of Ignorance (The Veil of Ignorance is an idea made famous by philosopher John Rawls. It says that when thinking about justice, you should imagine what would be fairest regardless of your own position in life)

There are a bunch of other reminders, including the classic Serenity Prayer, which I have made more secular by starting it with the words “Grant me…”

I think of this list as my Stuart Smalley Morning Routine — for those who remember Al Franken’s Saturday Night Live parody of daily affirmation culture. And like Stuart Smalley’s affirmations, perhaps my ritual is a bit absurd and worthy of parody. But to paraphrase Stuart, I find these morning reminders good enough, smart enough, and doggone it, I like them!

In future Substacks, I may dive deeper into a few of these mental tools. But I want to briefly write about one that has been doing a lot of heavy lifting recently.

And that is the reminder to myself to…

“Get curious, not furious.”

I first heard this phrase from a child psychologist in a webinar about parenting in stressful times. The stressful time in question was the pandemic, and I figured I could use all the help I could get.

The psychologist argued that when your kid acts up, it’s better to get curious than get furious. Ask your kid why they did what they did. Ask them what we can do in the future to prevent them from acting like that.

The psychologist said this approach is much more productive than yelling and screaming.

I liked his catchphrase, and not just because it rhymes. But I thought to myself, why restrict this approach to parenting? Why not try to deal with the many infuriating things in the world this way?

For instance, dealing with adults, especially those who disagree with me.

If i’m talking to someone who is on the opposite axis of a political issue, my default mode has always been to go into combat with facts as my weapons. Tell them they are wrong because of X,Y, and Z facts.

This approach rarely works. In fact, it’s often counterproductive. It polarizes both sides and frequenty ends up making us both angry.

Instead, I now try curiosity. Why does she believe what she believes? Why do I believe what I believe? What types of evidence would it take to change either of our minds? And if we continue to believe different things, where can we go from there? Is there any action that we can both agree would be productive?

Instead of a war, it’s a cooperative adventure to find the truth. It’s solution-oriented.

This approach has several advantages. First, it’s much more pleasant than yelling until veins pop out of my head. Second, I think it’s more likely to yield solutions, even if they are imperfect. We are more flexible thinkers when we are not furious, as some research has shown. And this curiosity approach is more likely to change people’s minds. (It’s related to a promising technique— called deep canvassing—which focuses on the participants asking the puzzling question: Why do we believe what we believe?)

I’m not saying totally get rid of anger. In real life, there’s plenty to be justifiably angry about. Righteous outrage can be a powerful motivating force. But when I can, I try to counterbalance my anger with curiosity. Maybe the more accurate catchphrase would be “Get less furious and more curious.” Or “Increase curiosity, decrease furiosity.”

By the way, my spellcheck says that ‘furiosity’ is not a word, but Webster’s Third New International Dictionary says it is. So I’m going with Webster’s.

Curious to hear your thoughts.

A.J.