Topaz Adizes on Why Asking Better Questions Is the Key to Love EP 518

27:31You can watch it and go, oh my, I'm not the only one who's experiencing this. And not only am I the only one, look at how they all deal with it differently. So it's a wonderful tool of reflection. It's a wonderful tool of shared humanity. Oh my, look at these people. They're sharing their experience. I'm going through the same thing. I see myself in them. They're doing this similarly or different. How can I do it differently? So that's a wonderful tool for the now. Long term. Long term, I want my grandkids to look at this and go, what was it like in the year of the great pandemic? What was it like when people were quarantined and had to not see each other for a year?

28:10Or what was just a wonderful archive of humans conversing and sharing their relationships in the early part of the 2000s as internet was coming to birth and changing everything so people could relate to and see how humans were conversing, how they were feeling, how they were relating. Topaz, thank you so much for that explanation. And I want to tell you a little bit about a story. I am impressed you've done 1 ,200 interviews because I've done about 500 myself and realize everything that goes into that, but also the wisdom that you yourself gain from hearing from the different people who you experience.

28:54And one of the people who I interviewed is a friend of mine, Mark Devine, who's a former Navy SEAL. He's now an author, podcast host, really successful entrepreneur. But when Mark was younger, I think he, like a lot of people in Western society, was caught up in trying to get results where he was rewarded. And he started out by working for one of the big four consulting firms. And he was tying his identity to his work there, where as he was working there, he decided to go back and get a master's degree. And he had a time lag between the time he got off work and the time classes started. So he discovered a martial arts program.

29:39And through that, for the first time in his life as a young 20-something-year-old, he started to do self-introspection. And he came through this learning how to meditate. And he said to me that what I learned early on from this experience was it was the questions that I asked myself that were going to define me, not the answers I was trying to seek. And when he started to ask himself different questions, he realized he was on the wrong career path. And what he really was inside was a warrior, which led him fairly at a more senior level than most would get into the SEALs, becoming a SEAL and going through buds.

30:25But it had a number, I'm saying this because it had a number of interesting points to your work, because similar to Mark, what you've seen is the questions we ask ourselves are far more important than the answers we seek. And every answer is shaped from the question from which it springs. Therefore, asking insightful questions can only lead us to better, more helpful answers. And I think this is what's at the center of your project, if I had to spell it down into what I think the core is all about. Absolutely. Absolutely. So how do we change, especially in the Western world, this mindset? I certainly found myself in it that I was pursuing outward success instead of asking myself the inward questions.

31:19And when I started to do so, it's led me on this whole different pursuit in life that I'm doing today. But a lot of people, and you were asking me who are listeners of this podcast, a lot of people are stuck in that other world where they feel like they have all this stuff that they have to prove to themselves, to others. And so they're trying to get recognitions and awards and everything else. So my question to you is how do you start, given all these interviews you've done, what have you learned on how you cross this chasm? Well, so one distinction is I don't interview the people, they interview each other.

32:01I just present the questions. So my whole is watching, is witnessing these conversations that I'd never have be privy to otherwise, right? And what that has taught me is what you're saying is that, and this is the cliche, the power is in the question. You hear that as a cliche, but it really is. The power is in the question. The question actually shapes the answer. And if you, and there's many facets of that. I mean, if you ask your kids, you want to go to bed, they're going to say yes or no. They're going to say no, that's it. If you say, are you going to go to bed in the bed or in the couch?

32:32They're going to bed. It's not a question. It's just where is it going to be in the bed or in the couch? So you're already shaping the answer by the question you ask. If you ask yourself, why did they dump me? Why did this person dump me? You're going to get a long list of reasons why you think they dumped you, and it's not going to make you feel that good. If you change the question to, what have I learned from this last relationship that will prepare me for the next one? Then you're already shaping the answer to be an empowering one. it's not going to make you feel depressed and give you a reason of why you think they dumped you but instead okay what have i learned from that relationship and how will i carry it forward to make the next one better the power is in the question and we don't often look at the question because the power is in the question so we're offering answering other people's questions our fathers our mothers our communities our societies right the name the culture a lot of us are getting these whatever this thing is that you're answering a question that's actually not your own that you've adopted as almost a societal programming or cultural mantra so taking the time to introspect and just giving yourself a different question it doesn't necessarily mean you'll do something different but what it does mean is maybe you'll change the motivation by which you do it what do i mean okay maybe you have a great job and you're performing well and you're making money and you say, why am I doing this?

33:53Well, it's because I want to prove myself to my parents, or I'm supporting my family, whatever. Maybe you come up with a different answer as you ask yourself different questions. And so maybe you change the intention, the underlying source that is then, you don't have to necessarily change the action, but because you ask yourself questions, you're finding a different source of energy that gives you why you're doing what you're doing. Let me give an example. I have a brother who's a super talented artist, super talented musician. And for many years, he was performing at a top level with a lot of pressure because the reason he was doing it because he wanted to prove himself to his father and his parents.

34:32He told him he was going to be great, he's going to be a genius, and he had this pressure of having to be a genius. And by really exploring the question of why he was doing what he was doing, when he understood that, he said, you know what, I'm just going to make a slight shift. I want to do this not because of the pressure of my parents, to be a genius and prove myself to them and be as big as they have visions for me. But instead, I'm going to do it because I have a talent. I've put in years of practice. And I know I can change people's lives with the music I make. So he's still making music, but it's coming from a different place.

35:05And that system, the place from which it's coming and how it flows through his body out into the world is one with less internal tension and confliction and pressure. and it's a healthier way to live for him, more passionate way to live. And so when we ask ourselves questions, it's not that the answers may change or may not, but also the way in which we do them may change and that may be more helpful. And I really think for whoever's listening and I agree with you, at the crux of the book, it's pay more attention to the questions you ask, the answers you seek. Pay more attention to the questions you ask than the answers you seek.

35:47so i think this is a good entry point to discuss the book and how it's arranged because in it you ask 12 questions and you say that the conversation from the book works best if you use the questions in the order that they appear in this book and what is the reasoning for this jill an editor reached out for me and she said topaz i've been a fan of the ant for years. And I'm wondering, what have you learned? What are the 12 meat and potato questions that you know will really work to shape a question, to shape a cathartic conversation? And so I look back through all my work, through all our team's work and all the conversations, and what I'm presenting in the book are, here are 12 questions that are guaranteed to create a journey of a cathartic conversation that will amplify and give you greater appreciation and discovery of the relationships you're in.

36:43Whether it's with your partner, with your best friend, with your parent, with your child, whoever you're intimate with. Now, we have a number like 15 editions of card games that play in different relationships. So you go to our site, you go to Amazon, you buy the deck of cards, and there's a bunch of beautiful questions that you can play with the people in your life, friends, family, lovers, co-workers, right? And those work randomly. And there's a beautiful thing to asking these well-constructed questions randomly. But there's also a power to asking them in a certain sequence. And that's what I've done here.

37:17That's what we do when we do the productions of our videos, where people come in and they sit across from each other and we film that. And that's what we post across all the socials. There is a power in the architecture of the journey. And filmmakers, I'm very aware, is a five-act structure. So the first three questions are the first act, where you call on the past. You call on the eugenicness of your relationship, the bedrock of your connection, the love, the trust. And so those questions hark out answers that really give you a sense of why you're connected. And what is it about your connection that you love, that you cherish?

37:55What is the fundamental base layer that this relationship is built on? Then we go into Act 2, which is the next three questions, 4, 5, and 6, which we're exploring conflict. What are you hesitant to ask me? What am I hesitant to tell you? So keep in mind, in the end of the book, I offer different questions you can replace for any of them. I'll give you the 12, but it's a structure that's important. So the second one is conflict. What's our biggest challenge right now? What do you think it's teaching us? What is the sacrifice you've made that I haven't acknowledged, and why do you think that is?

38:32So those three questions deal with conflict and how we deal with them differently and it gives us room to explore that. And we built it. We built it based on trust. Now we're exploring some conflict, if you will. We built that up and now we go to question seven, which would be like the climax. Seven and eight are the climax questions. What is the pain in me you wish you could heal and why? Eight, what is one experience you wish we never had and why? we spend time there. Now you've built that trust up. You've gone on this journey. You're now, you know, if you got that question at first playing the card game, you may answer it in one way or not.

39:09But in this journey, because you've answered the preceding six, seven, eight questions, you're going to answer it differently because you've been through something together. You've already harped on things. You've already built that trust. And then 10, nine and 10, those two questions in act four are we are starting to land the plane acknowledgement of each other what are we learning from each other what do you think you're learning from me what do you admire most about me that i may not realize and then we end the last two which is something that we should really ask ourselves and not wait for life to present you with the perfect opportunity because you never know as when things can end so the number 11 is what is one thing you never want me to forget?

39:51If this were to be our last conversation, what is one thing you never want me to forget? And number 12 is, why do you love me? And that sums up Act 5, and that's the whole 12 questions. So there is a journey here built. Now, these questions are powerful. Now, we can double-click on each question, why I've constructed them the way they are. It's not like they are constructed in a certain way because they elicit a certain possibility, an opportunity. We can talk about that. But the structure pertains to giving you a journey to go on. And so therefore, when you get to why do you love me at the end, and you've answered the preceding 11, and all that you've been through in that wonderful conversation, it'll be that much deeper, even if it's just simply looking the other person in the I just do.

40:41Topaz, thank you so much for sharing that. And before I do any deep dives on any of these questions, I wanted to go deeper into how you ask these questions and interact around them. And one of the things I wanted to explore was the power of the space between. And I've heard you say there's a lot said in the space between we don't have to articulate everything to feel everything. How does this idea play into the conversations facilitated by the end? Bottom line, you don't have to answer all the questions. It's not about answering all the questions. It's about sitting in the question. It's about sitting in the question, feeling the question, because you're sitting there opposite someone you love, someone you're intimate with, So when you care about, you ask a question.

41:35Maybe you both don't want to answer at that moment. That's okay. When we play the end, the card games, or do the video production, the rule is, and it's part of creating a safe space, is that you don't have to answer it if you don't want. But just the fact that you ask it, your minds, both your minds, whoever's in the conversation, you're thinking about the answer. You're thinking about what you would answer. You're thinking about what they would answer. then even if they give an answer you're still wondering, ooh, that's surprising I didn't expect that, but that's exactly what I thought, or ooh, they're saying that but there's this other elephant in the room that we're not talking about, that's fine what I'm saying is it's about being with each other it's not about doing with each other, it's not about the perfect answer, we're not coming to the conclusion it's about being with each other and feeling that and there's a lot more that's articulated other than words verbally, it's also how we're physically being with each other You know, I don't know what percentage it is, but people say that it's not about the words, about how you say it.

42:35Right. So there's a lot there that's shared that's beyond just the articulation of the words. And I think that's what's key is that are you creating this space to sit in the uncomfortable questions with the people that are most important to you? and let's just make sure we don't confound safety with comfort. You can be safe and uncomfortable. As a matter of fact, that's a great place to be because you're growing, you're changing, you're learning. If you're safe and comfortable, you might not be learning, you might not be growing. So don't confuse safety with comfort. Safety is one thing and discomfort and comfort is another.

43:14So can we be in a place where we feel safe but we also feel uncomfortable just because we're sitting in an uncomfortable question. Can we hold that space for each other? And I think that's a great marker for healthy relationships. So thank you for that. And let's take this a step forward. So you have decided that you're not going to walk away from the questions if you're a person playing the game. You're now clearly outlined in the space and you're willing to explore these deep questions in a more powerful way. The next thing that comes in, because you mentioned articulation, is something that you have termed emotional articulation.

44:02How does emotional articulation differ from what most people might have heard as emotional intelligence? Emotional articulation is the ability to put words to a feeling, to articulate the feeling. Emotional intelligence is understanding what those feelings are, maybe understanding how other people are feeling, and understanding the relationship between emotions and the other person's emotions, but to actually put it into words, and to have that feeling conveyed and felt with the other person is an articulation. So that's the difference for me. And I think what's key in this whole conversation too is, look, from 1 ,200 conversations from doing this in 10, 12 countries, what I've learned is two parts.

44:49You need to create the space. It needs to be a safe space, albeit uncomfortable space, but you need to create that. We can talk about how do you do that. And the other one is you need well-constructed questions. Those are the two pieces that then present an opportunity for you to have an incredible conversation that will forever change your relationship by augmenting it, by amplifying it, but making you feel more alive because you're sharing your life with the people that you're intimate with. And so those are the two key pieces that I've found. And a result of that is that as you do this, you're improving your skill at emotional articulation.

45:29Not all of us are great at it. Not all of us are good at it. But just like when you were a kid, you weren't great at riding a bike. You got on and you did it a few times, you fell off a few times and you got better. Same thing. How do we practice the skill of articulating our emotions to others? We practice it. Are you practicing it? So I want to go into a couple of these questions, Topaz. Let's just start with question one. What are your three favorite memories and why do you cherish them? And what I wanted to know about this is you write that when you answer this question, you might find that the three memories you choose to share are different from those your partner selects, or that one of you is reminded of a wonderful memory they had forgotten until the discussion that this question provoked.

46:17Why is that the case? Well, because we're all different memory banks, right? We're all different. I mean, one of the greatest gifts my parents gave me by far would be my brother. He's 15 months younger than I, and we grew up together. And there are things that I might've forgotten about and that he can remind me of because he was there and he holds on to a certain memory that I might have let go of. Right? Or we both have the same memory, but we saw it from different perspectives. And so then it's having a second camera, a second recording at that pivotal moment. And I always thought it meant this, but when he tells me, actually, I saw this, ooh, maybe that memory can now mean something different.

46:55And I think that's a beautiful thing about sharing our lives with other people, is that it's not just us who is having that experience. We're sharing that experience. And in the sharing, there's different perspectives, which is a gift. Sometimes it creates conflict because we might interpret the same experiences or the same thing in different ways. But actually, that difference is a gift because it reassures that we're not alone. We're not alone. We're having and we're exchanging our perspectives. And there's a beauty in that. I just saw I just came back from a family reunion and I met my aunt that I hadn't seen in a few years, five or six years.

47:33She's about 78 and she told my wife about how she remembered this memory of me as a kid and I wanted to interview some druids in a village, some guy in a village in a cave and as a teenager because I want to be a storyteller. She told my wife a story I do not remember. I don't have a memory of that. so she just unearthed this memory that i totally forgot a treasure in the cave of my life she just pulled out into the light and shared it with me so that i could relive it for a moment isn't that beautiful i think it's beautiful i think that's what we can offer each other right we can offer that to each other and i think that's part of what shared humanity is sharing the experiences and the memories together so i think one of the ways we share those experiences you express in question three, which is, when do you feel closest to me and why?

48:25And in this chapter, you talk about the story of Maddie and Martin. And I was hoping you might dive into their story and why it was so meaningful that you wrote about it. Well, what I love about the book is that we had this library of conversations that you can find on YouTube. And in the book, every reference that we talk about, there's a QR code so you can scan it and you can go and actually watch the conversation and feel it and see it for yourself. So I love that about the book. It's offering you an experience in the relationships in your own life, but also you can see all these other conversations of people having that are exploring their relationships and might bring things up.

49:05I think that's a beautiful thing. And I think what comes up with me with that question is that oftentimes it could be the simplest things. Right? it's that moment in bed when they had to fight and then she looks over and she knows that it's not a big deal it's not a big deal what's a big deal that he's here sleeping in the bed with me every night it's that moment when you're sitting at a dinner party or an event with your partner and they someone says something and then you just look at each other and you share that same little secret that conspiracy that shared mutual because i have a mentor of mine ava holler who's about 90 something.

49:46She's an incredible woman. And I once asked her, what do you love about your relationship, your relationships, your partner? She said the shared conspiracy, that they're at a dinner event and they look at each other and they have a shared, they don't have to talk. They just look at each other and they both are thinking the same thing and they both have a shared conspiracy. I think that's beautiful. And I think when you feel closest to me, it just harks back to that in a relationship that it doesn't have to be big. can be very small. It's the mortar and the bricks upon you which you build your relationship.

50:20It's the thing that keeps us together. It's the smallest things. It's not always the biggest things. And I think asking that question offers, it can, oftentimes I've seen the answers that it's a reminder of that. Because also the beautiful thing about these small things is that you can have them a lot of the time. And it's absolutely true. Tobias, I have to ask, if you could have anyone in the world sit down and participate in the and who would it be and why that's a great question i've thought about that i always want to go back to some legendary characters but right now when i look at the world i really would love to have our presidential candidates do the and i would really like to have politicians who are having huge impact in our lives play the and with each other and the reason is i will construct questions that create greater empathy and connection versus disconnection and polarization and basically aggressive fighting.

51:19These are the leaders of our world who are creating public policy, who are setting the tone. I'm not just speaking in the U.S., I'm speaking in the world. And what if we presented them with questions that put them in each other's shoes, that created a certain environment of respect and acknowledgement and focused the problem, focused the solution on our ability to truly work together rather than being disconnected. And that's where I would really love to do now is I would really like to put public members in the political realm to have conversations with each other so that we can remind ourselves of why are they doing what they're doing to serve the people.

51:58And because this year, we had the greatest number of elections around the world. I think it's around 50 of them, 60 of them. All around the world, countries are voting or not, depending on their governments. But imagine if you have two political rivals and the question is, what do you think, what do you appreciate most about my leadership style? What is the greatest thing you think I've done for our shared community? What is the one value that we both share? What is the greatest misunderstanding we could both overcome and what would be the result of that? you know you again the question shapes the answer if you're asking why am i better than you i'll give you a long list of why i'm better than you that's not going to create connection it's not going to create integration coherence so i would love to do that and matter of fact yeah and it was close when chelsea when hillary was running against Trump the first time, there's an opportunity to put Hillary and Chelsea, I don't know if this is true, but apparently it went up two flagpoles at the top to do that and to have Hillary do it with her daughter Chelsea.

53:15I don't know if this is factually true, but that's what we were told. And just to give more humanity to Hillary so that you'd see the mother inside. But I don't know if that's true or not, but that would be great, right? To get a sense of these public figures and see the humanity inside them, not just the rough exterior. Would be a nice change from the constant attacks that we see them making on each other instead of really getting down to what they really believe in and who they are as a person.

53:48So one of the things that I talk most frequently about on this podcast is something that I've learned through behavioral science. And that is if we want to have these macro changes in our life, it all comes down to the concept of micro choices, meaning it's the micro choices we make throughout our days that determine either a tsunami of greatness or a waterfall of despair. And I've heard you say that big changes come from microchanges consistently. How do we implement this idea to make a lasting impact on our lives and our communities? The way I do it is I look at what's the big one, what's the big microchange I want to make?

54:39Okay, what are five small microchanges I can make daily that would lead to that big microchange? And I write them out and I say how many times I want to make them a week or day. And I literally quantify it. And I, because the great thing about quantifying something is that you can track it. And if you can track it, then you can see how you're doing. And so literally I have the macro change. What is it that I want to make? Okay. I'm not focusing on making that big change. I want to focus on consistently making these five micro changes. Is it taking a half hour walk a day? Is it making sure I drink two liters of water or three liters of water?

55:16Is it making sure i meditate is it making sure i have time to play with my kids whatever it is micro changes and i track that i don't choose too many choose five fit on your hand and i track that every day and i write it down so i see that i'm doing it or not and i think though you and though you do these micro changes that are let's say up river from the down river micro change does that make sense that's how I do it. I really cut it down to the micro things I can do because I can't make the big thing happen. What I can do is I can take the step ahead today. Am I doing that? And then the last thing I wanted to ask you is earlier on, you mentioned that you try not to think about your legacy, but rather your focus is on the future.

56:02How does that perspective influence your work and your future vision for the end? Well, where did you grab that, that I'm not focus on my legacy because it's true but is that from the book or is that from an interview? It's from another interview that I did research on. Great, great. No, thanks. No, because the legacy is how other people see me and that's not interesting for me. What's interesting is, though sometimes it gets to me, right? What gets to me is how I told you at the beginning of this call before we started recording that I have a number of friends that are battling cancer now are my age and that are very close friends and I'm not sure if we're going to see them next year.

56:35and that really brings up the thought of how do you show up in people's lives how do you affect other people how are you maintaining relationships that are important to you that's what i'm thinking about not because i'm thinking about the legacy thinking about how am i showing up for other people how am i helping other people the legacy is for them to decide not for me right like i don't and so i don't think about legacy i think really about just how i can help serve other people in the and format, which I think is this beautiful, powerful format of deeper listening, of creating empathy, of showing shared humanity, illuminating it, is a wonderful format.

57:16It's a wonderful tool. So how can I, my team, how can we apply it to as many conversations, as many relationships, as many experiences as possible? That's really where I put my focus and energy in the public, in the professional sphere. In the private sphere, it's on my children. How can I be a better father? How can I create the spaces and experiences so that they can flourish, be connected to themselves so that they can offer contribution and value to their community as they become adults? Those are the two things I'm focused on. Well, Topaz, you've been a wonderful guest today. Thank you so much for joining us.

57:54If people want to learn more about you and the work that you're doing, where are the best places for them to go? So all our work is at theskindeep.com and the social media channels are The Skin Deep. I do have my own website, topazadizes.com, but really all the content, all our work is at theskindeep.com. So you can look that up on social medias and that's where we're at. Thank you so much, John. It's been great to be on the show with you. The honor is mine. Thank you so much and thank you for the goodness that you're bringing into the world. What an incredible conversation that was with Topaz Adizas.

58:29His work in creating spaces for human connection through storytelling is absolutely transformative. The way he approaches relationships by asking the right questions and fostering open, intimate conversations has the potential to change the way we connect with each other on a deep, meaningful level. One of the key takeaways from today's episode is the power of questions. Whether it's the 12 questions from his book, 12 Questions for Love, or just knowing how to open up tough conversations, asking the right questions is a pathway to deeper relationships, as well as a more fulfilling life. So I want to leave you with this.

59:01What's one question you can start asking today to deepen your relationships? If today's episode resonated with you, I'd love to hear your thoughts. Please take a moment to leave us a five-star rating and review. It helps us to continue bringing these powerful conversations to you. And if you know someone who could benefit from Topaz's message, share this episode with them. Sometimes a single conversation can spark profound change. You can find links to everything we discussed today, including Topaz's book, 12 Questions for Love, and the show notes at passionstruck.com. Please use our website links if you purchase any of the books from the guests that we feature here on the show.

59:33Videos of this episode are available on YouTube, and don't forget to check out our sponsors and deals at passionstruck.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show. Before we close, I want to remind you that beyond hosting the podcast, I'm passionate about sharing these insights through speaking engagements. If today's conversation sparks something in you and you think my message could inspire your company, head over to johnrmiles.com slash speaking to learn more. Let's work together to create intentional change and ignite growth. Now, get ready for next week's episode where I sit down with Terry Cole to discuss her new book, Too Much, A Guide to Breaking the Cycle of High Function and Codependency.

1:00:10You know, when I have Terry Cole on the show, it's going to be a powerful conversation. And this one fulfills every expectation about breaking free from codependent behaviors and reclaiming your life. Don't miss it. So we're changing our blueprint by becoming aware of why we relate in our relationships, platonic, professional, and otherwise the way that we do. So that's really what the blueprint will do for you. You answer the questions and then you get clarity like, oh my gosh, I did not realize I was repeating my parents' relationship here or that I saw this and that's why I'm doing it. Or my culture taught me that this was the right way to be.

1:00:49And as always, the fee for the show is simple. If you found value in today's episode, share it with someone who could benefit from it. And remember, do your best to apply what you hear on the show so that you can live what you listen. Until next time, live life passion struck.