You’re not lonely—You’re just not curious enough

10 tips on how to avoid loneliness by being curious & asking questions

Photo by Luca Franzoi on Unsplash

If you are not curious about others, curious about the world or even yourself, you will end up feeling lonely.

This is not something I read somewhere, not a scientific study, just my own, personal observation.

So today I will share with you why I think that no being curious leads to people feeling lonely and how to avoid that.

The basis of curiosity is asking questions.

But first, what is curiosity?

Curiosity to me means an interest in “something”. It can be a hobby, a type of job, a specific person, an activity, a process, a topic, really anything.

If you are curious about this “thing”, you want to spend time with it and engage with it.

Let’s say it’s a hobby: you love to spend time doing it, learning about it, practicing it.

If it is your job you love: you enjoy learning, wondering, asking questions and growing.

If it is a person you are curious about: you like to spend time with him or her, you enjoy talking, doing activities together, asking questions etc.

Curiosity needs an interest and an active engagement from your side.

Its basis is to ask.

If you want to get better at a hobby: ask yourself, what to do to improve your skills.

If you want to get to know a person: ask them questions & listen to what they say.

If you want to grow in your job: ask yourself or colleagues what you can do to accomplish that.

If you don’t ask:

You won’t get better at your hobby.

You won’t get to know the other person.

You won’t grow in your job.

Now, how does all this leads to loneliness?

• If you don’t ask yourself what you want to improve upon in a hobby, you won’t find like-minded people that can help you & who you could connect to.

• If you don’t ask another person any questions, you won’t connect to them.

• If you don’t ask how to improve in your job, you won’t get in touch with your colleagues & you wont build healthy bonds at work.

Asking = connection

Not-asking = disconnection = loneliness.

There can be many reasons for feeling lonely. I am not saying that you are lonely cos you don’t ask.

But in case you do feel lonely, being curious and asking questions is the easiest way out of it.

Not questions like “How are you?” “Fine.” “How are you?” “Fine as well.”

Be more lively, not that stiff.

10 tips to get out of loneliness by asking someone else questions:

1. Ask about their work (people like to talk, so thats an easy entry)

2. Ask about their hobbies (if they have some, they most likely love to talk about them! Give them this opportunity!)

3. Ask about their recent travels (great vacation memories? Who wouldn’t want to re-live them?)

4. After asking these basics: listen deeply and don’t become passive.

5. Reply or ask about something else that the person mentioned, show interest & be curious.

6. If you want to connect deeper: ask about a feeling they mentioned

7. Pay attention to the person & keep eye contact. Don’t stare, but be present & engaged. Do not check your phone, do not look around. Stay present.

8. If it fits, share something from you, make it clear that you are open to engage both ways, that they can ask you too & it doesn’t feel like an interrogation.

9. If you feel comfortable, make a joke, say something funny. Humor usually connects people.

10. Celebrate if you managed to connect to someone else & make it an interesting conversation. In that moment, you defeated loneliness!!!

If I am honest, this is super weird to write. Because I am a very curious person and I really dislike superficial small-talk.

But! The thing is, that there is something much deeper here! It’s not just about others!

If you never ask yourself questions, if you don’t reflect upon your own thoughts, behaviors, actions and feelings, it is very difficult to ask someone else something deeper.

Meaning: if you don’t connect to yourself first, you won’t know how to connect to others. Others will feel if you just ask for the sake of asking, but don’t really mean it.

So now, if that is the case, how do you connect to yourself?

Freaking question of the century :D

In my case how I do that is, by being mindful about my inner world. I do all these following points & would recommend you to try some of them to connect to yourself!

How to first connect to yourself: