Curiosity Kept The Cat Alive

And community needs it to thrive.

Curiosity is always running in the background of life. “What will happen when I _____?” is a question that we answer countless times a day by taking action. We are propelled with a constant but subtle undercurrent of “what’s next” coursing through our veins. Without it, we’d likely just do nothing. Meander around with no purpose because it just wouldn’t matter.

But even in the smallest of ways, curiosity keeps us going just to see what the hell will happen next.

So if you think about it, what is curiosity?

Curiosity supports information gathering (and can become information hoarding if you’re not careful). This is where education, the love of books, and verbally passed-down practices thrive. It leads you to begin in one area and to continue your intellectual collecting over time simply by living and responding to what is happening around you.

The information hoarding occurs when people allow information to not be passed on out of fear or resistance. Maybe they don’t want you to be better at a skill than them, or in some cases, there is a fear of what happens when you become too enlightened. Will you become a threat? This is where curiosity and knowledge are used as control mechanisms. You can witness this happening with the banning of books (with the subversive intent to rewrite narratives and history) and Critical Race Theory. But I digress…let’s continue on where we were going.

Curiosity is a part of our desire for connection when we want to know more about a person, place, or thing. The part of you that watches a movie and goes to Google to learn about the cast is an example of how this plays out. The way you listen to a song and want to know about the backstory of the artist and the inspiration for what they created.

If you want to be in community with others then curiosity has to be present. Without it relationship dynamics are lopsided and don’t support everyone involved. Interest in some but not all leaves people behind and can cause them to feel left out and excluded. This doesn’t foster interdependent, supportive community dynamics.

And yet, it begins with your curiosity about your own self-exploration and healing. Coming from such a hyper-independent existence requires us to work on ourselves to understand what we want to offer and receive within community dynamics. So to foster curiosity as a very natural state that is a part of our daily existence with others begins with our curiosity about ourselves.

• How do you feel about yourself?

• How does it feel to give and receive support?

• What experiences contribute to who and how you are?

• What do you need to become the next best version of yourself?
  

However, what would happen if you stopped being curious?

What would you miss in your life by not being curious?

I want to dig more into this, but I want you to start with the prompts above. Give yourself some time to explore them this week. We’ll continue to dig deeper into this one.

Journal on them in the way that works for you and share your takeaways with me on social at @ericacourdae

✨ Erica