X’s and (wh)y’s

“Why is the sky blue?”

“Why can an airplane fly but our car does not?”

“Why are you cooking without the fan on? Aren’t you feeling hot?”

“Why do I have to take a shower every day?”

These are just a handful of the questions I’ve grown up asking my mother. Every single unfamiliar occurrence around me paved the way for even more questions. A lot of the times – I asked her things she possibly could not have known the answers to; but she still tried to satisfy my inquisitiveness in the ways she knew best at the time.

As a result of her continued indulgence of my curious streak, I grew up to be a very precocious and observant person. I was always eager to learn more about every new and unfamiliar thing I encountered.

It wasn’t long before my tendency to ask these questions morphed into a compulsion of sorts. I just had to know why I was being asked to do something, regardless of how big or small the ask itself was. I told myself that I was just doing it so I developed a better understanding of my actions, but deep down, even I knew it was more than that. It was more about having the devices to defend my choices no matter what, not that I ever did anything that warranted extensive questioning.

A conversation with my friend and mentor Adi prompted me to look within, and truly understand where this thought process came from. Together, he and I hypothesized that it was possible I was using this ‘logical’ thought process as a crutch; either to rationalize my emotions or stop myself from feeling them at all.

[blockquote text=”The catch with logic is that it works well, until it doesn’t. We are faced with dozens of situations in our daily lives that cannot be explained by logic. The falling apart of a dear friendship, the passing away of a loved one, the betrayal of a family member – none of these situations can be analyzed.” text_color=”” width=”” line_height=”undefined” background_color=”” border_color=”” show_quote_icon=”yes” quote_icon_color=”#4285F4″]

Not fruitfully, anyway.

I recently cut off a very dear friend – someone I had known for over five years. She and I had met in junior college and hit it off instantly. As time passed, I began to trust her more and more – and we became very close friends. I shared things with her that I hadn’t with anyone else; I just really treasured that friendship.

A while ago, she started seeing someone, and her behavior changed drastically. I thought it was just the ‘newness’ of her first relationship, and things would simmer down soon. They did not. She continued to get closer to him, and more distant from me. I tried my best to rationalize the situation; to try and figure out what made her prioritize him so much – and I was left with no answers.

I simply had to accept that it was her choice to put her relationship first. And then, I had to accept that I was not okay being taken for granted like this.

It was probably one of the biggest incidents I can think of that I could not explain to myself. I could turn to Google and to other friends all I liked, but I was still left without answers about her behavior. No question I asked would ever lead me to the real reason behind what she did. The only way to move forward was to process what I was feeling and accept it for what it was.

Discomfort. Anger. Grief.

Not logic.

Even so, I still do believe there is a place for questions even in my personal life. I may not be able to answer why she did what she did, but I can answer why I put up with it for as long as I did. I know that I don’t trust people easily and hold on to them for longer than I should even when things go south.

While logic cannot solve everything, I believe it forms the base of what you can do to learn from the situation and prevent it in the future. Asking questions is an instrumental part of deciphering these lessons and analyzing what went wrong.

In the past few months at Enterprise, I’ve worked on several projects that have fed my curious streak. From questioning the general style of doing things, to enquiring more about the best ways to leverage Canva and Excel; being comfortable with inquisitiveness has allowed me to learn a lot more than I would’ve otherwise.

I remember getting some unexpected feedback and calling my friend Akash to see if he knew anything about it. Per usual, I just had to know where the feedback was coming from and try and address it as soon as I could. Akash reminded me that it was a delicate situation, and while I could be upfront in my ask for clear feedback, I did have to about it in a nuanced manner.

I was left with a profound understanding of asking something of anyone – it had to be done in a way that not just appealed to me, but to the other person as well. I had to take in some time to grasp the intricacies of any situation before delving deep with my questions.

[blockquote text=”As a result of these discussions, I have developed a deeper sense of understanding of the nuances that come with asking questions – knowing that just as I reserve the right to question people, they’re allowed to not answer. This sounds like a simple fact – but it’s helped me wrap my head around the fact that not everyone will be, or can be, for that matter, as indulgent as my mother is. .” text_color=”” width=”” line_height=”undefined” background_color=”” border_color=”” show_quote_icon=”yes” quote_icon_color=”#4285F4″]

While I continue to be partial to asking questions and trying my best to have an answer to every why that pops up in my head, I know now that that will not always be the case. There will be times when I will not receive any answer, and when that happens, I will need to accept that people can and do make choices that cannot be explained. And when that does happen, it certainly will not be easy – but it will also be something out of my control.

And just like I’ve done before, I will continue to ask questions to myself to learn more about the part I played in creating that situation. But this time, I will be at peace knowing that some questions will never be answered, and possibly jump to asking myself – ‘Why does your why matter so much?’