The Rebirth of Childlike Curiosity

allowing myself to ask "What If?"

You hand the cute, bright-eyed, 1-year-old a block. They grab the block with their little hands and then they drop it. As the block clatters on the floor, they watch it in amazement. Maybe they laugh or maybe they cry - they’re amazed by the phenomenon of releasing their grip on the block resulting in the block clattering to the floor. So they do it again. The block clatters again. The baby just discovered gravity, or in their minds when you drop a block you hear a clatter and see it fall. This fact wouldn’t amaze you or me, we’ve seen it a thousand times. But to the baby, it’s magic. 

Babies naturally explore and try to understand the world through experimentation. When their stroller is rolling down a rocky road they’ll make noises to hear the vibration. They’re curious, not because they want to be, but because it’s ingrained in our human biology to be curious and learn when we're young. Over time the way and intensity this curiosity is expressed changes. As we learn more we become less curious as we already know what’s going to happen, or we’ve learned it’s stupid to ask “what if”.

I vividly remember one Autumn day at the beginning of kindergarten. Why do I remember this day? It was the first time I was told off by a teacher. I had great respect and fear for my teacher, so being told off was memorable. But what’s even more memorable, is what I was told off for. I was told off for asking a “what if” question during a science lesson. I asked, “What if the dinosaurs aren’t dead?”. My teacher immediately told me off, she said “what if” questions were a waste of time and I should be serious. So curiosity is unserious?! I understand where my teacher was coming from, a class of 20 kindergartners all asking “what if” sounds chaotic. But at the same time, that small interaction had an unfortunate impact, it taught me to be less curious and ask fewer questions.  

Something similar happened in 6th grade. We were learning about the caste system in India. And I, as an Indian, had some points to share during the class discussion. The textbook discussed how there were 4 casts; I discussed how that was an oversimplification and that there were actually many more casts. This type of discussion, questioning the text, should be allowed. Even if the student is wrong, questioning the text is vitally important to a child learning how to think. Yet in this situation, I was told off and told to stick to the text. 

As you get older, your curiosity is further killed by practicality and “focus”. In high school, you’re told to stick to a set of interests, because colleges like to see long-term interest. And as a driven Bay Area kid I was hyper-focused on getting into college. So I bought this narrative, focus above all else. And it worked! I focused and it paid off, but at the expense of losing my curiosity.

A great example of my lack of curiosity is when I’m reading the news. Every morning I religiously read Morning Brew. They have a section discussing stocks and will share a tidbit about an especially interesting stock move from the previous day. I’ll read this. But I won’t ask why, or investigate further than what’s in the newsletter. If I had I may have learned about the downstream impacts of the Boeing strike and what opportunities/problems it creates. 

Recently, I've been trying to rediscover and follow my curiosity. For example, I’m running a marathon with bicoastal cowriter Raj in March. When researching marathons in March I found it tedious and laborious to click through the marathon listing websites. So, I asked why. And what I found was that there are very few marathon listing websites, they’re all pretty much archaic and hard to use, and they all have pretty high traffic. This seemed like an opportunity. So I spun up a lightweight marathon listing website that was modern and easy to use (shameless plug findmarathons.com). If I hadn’t followed my curiosity and asked why, I would have never discovered the opportunity. To increase your range of opportunities you must increase your range of inputs - be curious. 

As I’ve embraced exploration, experimentation, and curiosity, I’ve found the other end of the sword. What if you’re too curious? Every article you read, you’re going down a rabbit hole. This is also not good. While I want to learn new information, I cannot consume all information in a finite time. I need to explore my curiosity with focus.

I think of my brain’s information flow and digestion as a funnel. The top of my funnel is very wide - I want lots of inputs. As the information moves down the funnel I prune them such that only a few are at the bottom of the funnel - the zone of deep interest. The hard part is knowing how the funnel should be shaped - the rate at which the funnel bisection shrinks. Or in simple terms, your curiosity function.

- Ajay