"A statement claims to be finished, and that claim is exactly what time comes back to audit. A question never claimed to be finished." - Ken Woodward
"A statement claims to be finished, and that claim is exactly what time comes back to audit. A question never claimed to be finished." - Ken Woodward
Some ideas arrive like lightning. Others crawl. In 2016, one of my slowest ideas began with a turtle in John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath. Ten years later, it’s still walking.
This episode explores a new study on the “Aha! glow.” Professional writers and physicists logged their most creative ideas, then rated them again six months later. The physicists’ flashes of insight held up. The writers’ faded. The quiet ideas grew in both groups.
I revisit my year of daily questions, where the statements aged and the questions didn’t. I also return to Hank, an 85-year-old I nearly walked past during my walk of every street in DC, because I’d already decided he had little to say.
Along the way: submarine navigation, the cocked hat, and why one bearing is never a fix.
The question I’m carrying: What answer am I trusting because of how it felt when it arrived?
This Curated Questions episode can be found on all major platforms and at CuratedQuestions.com.
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Keep questioning!
Episode Notes
00:00 A Question Never Claimed To Be Finished
02:41 Steinbeck and the Turtle
03:54 Becoming a Writer
04:38 Two Kinds of Ideas
04:51 The Aha Glow Study
05:41 Writers vs Physicists
06:47 Lab Test Results
07:27 When Certainty Misleads
08:33 Questions That Age Well
09:48 Keeping the Glow
10:28 Hank on the Sidewalk
13:03 The Insight Pause
14:12 Submarine Bearings
16:10 Back to the Turtle