If My Question Offends You – A Remix

An offended heart is the breeding ground of deception. - John Bevere

Being offended is part of being in the real world. - Courtney Love

When you are offended at any man's fault, turn to yourself and study your own failings. Then you will forget your anger. – Epictetus

Yesterday, I observed a long time colleague terminate a 25+ year friendship with me because I dared to ask why he focuses on spreading doom and gloom, often referencing fanatical, fear-laden rhetoric written by people who are pushing their fear and paranoia onto other people.

Merely asking the question of why he does it caused him to terminate the relationship and as I reflected upon this with another long-time colleague this morning, A. made an interesting observation.

A. said, “Well, you know that you are very intimidating when you ask questions and these questions can be easily misinterpreted”.  He meant well by the observation and stressed that he wasn’t trying to insult me (and I wasn’t insulted by the observation – his heart and mind are always solution-oriented and I have deep respect for him for that).

I found the observation fascinating because the question that I asked that launched the relationship termination was “Why?”.  I didn’t even get a chance to follow-up with the often misunderstood, more detail-specific “How do you know?”.

When we are immediately offended by someone asking “Why?”, we forget that we are being invited to explain something, to strengthen support for an idea, to more fully flesh the idea out or perhaps to win a “convert” over to a new cause (or perhaps correct an incorrect behavior that is adversely impacting ourselves or others).

Conversely, when we get our backs up over someone asking “Why?”, we assume that our answer (or ourselves personally) will automatically be judged (or have been judged already).  It’s as silly as assuming that because someone asked you for the time of day that they are accusing you of being late for something.

So the same question of “Why?” is both a blessing and a curse, depending on how our ego chooses to respond to it.

Examples from the “how dare you?” camp …

A short while ago, colleagues of mine had an opportunity to invest millions in a small company that had run out of cash and the company chose to give priority to a $25,000 sale in lieu of accepting the investment.  When I asked “why?” they had made that choice, what was sent back was a barrage of “You don’t understand” excuses and insults.  They took burning bridges to a new level.

Last week, an investment opportunity for colleagues of mine that had been a year in the making went off the rails when the person, after taking more than a year to get to a decision on investment, went off the deep end when merely asked why it was taking so long for him to make any decision.  The investment decision had already been approved but the person in question went about convincing myself and others that the investment should not happen.

Examples from the “thank you” camp ….

Colleagues of mine in the middle of creating a game-changer in the area of predicting human behavior listened to my questions of “Why?” and “How do you know?” in November and the light came on.  They knew exactly why I was asking and enthusiastically set about answering the question, knowing that their offering would become stronger as a result (Well done, Greg and gang – you are changing the world).

A new colleague of mine, in exploring approaches to strategy, told me last night that answering these questions will make his organization stronger and will enable he and his team to serve others better. (Well done, Don – your work will impact generations).

The difference between the two camps is self-confidence in themselves and what they are building, the belief that what they are building will serve themselves and others well, the knowledge that anything that strengthens their offerings creates a win for everyone and the belief that what they are doing is so important that it is worth defending and strengthening.  These men, in their brilliance, know that ego is important for self confidence but can be a destroyer of worlds if not managed well.

The others are either not confident in what they are building, not confident in themselves, are unwilling to fight for what they believe in, know they have made an error, surround themselves with naysayers, compensate for insecurity with a projected overconfidence or have become so accustomed to being judged that they believe every question that is sent their way is in fact a judgement.

Such a heightened level of hypersensitivity robs people of the opportunity to learn, to strengthen their offerings, to improve their results and to connect with other people who want and need to collaborate in creating a better world.

And with that, and for those who don’t understand the importance of answering questions that are asked with an intent to understand and strengthen, I offer a remix of a post I originally shared in April of 2011.

If My Question Offends You

As a long-time strategy and global technology adoption architect, my opinion is often solicited, whether it be by a start-up, a not-for-profit, a Fortune 25 company or anything in-between.

Fortunately (or unfortunately) for the people who solicit my help, I am known as the “asker of audacious questions” (thanks to Barry G. for the title which I wear proudly).

People come to me expecting to ask a lot of questions of me, get a lot of answers from me and move on.

However, many are surprised that I may have more questions for them than they have for me and if they are unprepared or have weak egos, they will be offended by those questions.

Most often, I have two key questions but those questions are often more complex to answer than the questions others have for me.

The questions are “Why?” and “How do you know?”.

There is a little secret about why I ask these questions.

It’s not an attempt to assert one person’s intelligence over another.  We are all gifted in intelligence in different forms.

It’s not an attempt to embarrass them, create a contest of wills or play ego-Olympics.  What a waste of time and energy that is.

I ask the questions so that I can understand what is being presented to me.

The truth is that I find everyone’s ideas and potential to be fascinating.  I am curious to know if people find their own story as compelling and based on reality as they would like me to believe it is.

However, the most important reason I ask so many questions is because I believe, as I learned from Gerald Weinberg’s writings many years ago, that when people come seeking advice or a solution to a problem, they as the subject matter expert often have within their mind the very solution they hope to obtain from someone else’s mind.

Mr. Weinberg posited that if one listens carefully, the owner of a problem will actually state the solution in the first five minutes of dialog.  Mr. Weinberg named this rule …. gasp … wait for it … The 5 Minute Rule.  It is brilliant in its simplicity.

Many times, the owner of a problem or position is so buried with mental baggage that they don’t know the answer or their ego warns them that any answer has already been judged before it was even expressed.  They become so focused on proving that they are the “right person for the job” that their hypersensitive ego steps in and their effort to demonstrate intelligence, qualifications, rationalization or justification drowns out the person trying to help them.

However, if the right questions are asked, probing the mind of the person with the problem, if the problem holder listens carefully, if the problem holder respectfully / factually offers an answer and if the querent listens carefully to the answers, then answers / solutions often present themselves.

There’s a lot of listening there, isn’t there?

People like me don’t just help others find a solution or discover their strengths.  Oftentimes they have it within themselves – they just needed a little help finding it, bringing it out and expressing it.

Asking appropriate questions provide an opportunity to explore within another, the strength of an idea, the thoroughness of the foundation that converts the idea into a result, the willingness of an individual to collaborate in making the idea into a reality and in some cases, offers the opportunity to correct a behavior before someone gets hurt.

It is also an opportunity to assess how strongly someone feels about their willingness to do whatever it takes to make their dream come true (or to correct information on which execution is based).

If someone is offended by a question, there is a good chance that they prefer not to deal with realities, that their ego doesn’t want to acknowledge that they may need some help or in fact, they may have discovered a foundational error that can’t be corrected or is not based on reality, ethics, morals, etc (but their ego doesn’t want to admit this).

For those people, being offended by simple questions should sound an alert that they are either not prepared for success or are not hungry enough for it.

And so if my question offends you, forgive me if I tell you that I won’t apologize to you. 

If you are offended,  you, me or both of us may have been saved from a disaster.

Maybe ……. unless you choose to go somewhere else where you hear what you want to hear and not what you need to hear.  After all, there is comfort in hearing what you want to hear from a bunch of yes-people who have their own agendas or biases in play, often to your detriment.

Unfortunately in those situations, reality is a persistent beast.  It tells us what we need to hear repeatedly until we get it.

Or … if we ignore it too long … it gets us.

But then, you already knew that … didn’t you? :-)

In service and servanthood,

Harry

Related Posts:

• If My Question Offends You
• The Most Important Question of All
• Hope or Gloom – We Thrive and Die Together

PS: I am reminded of a similar phenomenon, being offended by what is not said. For example, if I make an anti-Clinton comment, people should not infer I am pro-Trump (or vice versa).  Too many people intentionally make this error in an attempt to be deliberately offended, thus rationalizing and justifying a feeling of anger or hatred.  Such actions are equally damaging if embraced.

Too Many Questions–Not Enough Answers

Before you start some work, always ask yourself three questions - Why am I doing it, What the results might be and Will I be successful. Only when you think deeply and find satisfactory answers to these questions, go ahead. – Chanakya

I don't pretend we have all the answers. But the questions are certainly worth thinking about. - Arthur C. Clarke

The wise man doesn't give the right answers, he poses the right questions. - Claude Levi-Strauss

We have no right to express an opinion until we know all of the answers. - Kurt Cobain

The #1206 “fiction” series continues …

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He stared at the mind map before him, an encapsulation of more than 45 years of unusual events in his Life and in the lives of people close to him.  For years he had sought answers to the mystery contained within these events and despite asking as many people as he could, their answers were fleeting, sparse, questionable and lacked any kind of supporting evidence.  As someone grounded in the 21st century who had built his entire life around information, he needed irrefutable data to accompany their answers and there was none.

He sought clarity to all of the events and so he had drawn a mind map to help him obtain the clarity.  After he had drawn it, he realized the enormity and complexity of the mystery.

“Now I see why this bothers me as it does”, he thought to himself as he stared at the mind map in front of him.

He allowed his eyes to roam randomly over the mind map as each bubble in the map triggered a memory for him.

He thought of the face he saw through his bedroom window when he was four years old.  The face was not human and stared at him coldly as the only thing between the 4 inches of space between himself and the face was the pane of glass itself.  He had leapt from his bed then and run for his bedroom door, screaming for his parents.  As he ran from his bedroom, he turned and looked towards the window.

The face stared at him unsmiling.

His parents went outside, searching around the house, but had found nothing.

Another bubble reminded him of the time he found himself getting out of bed in the middle of the night, looking through the window for “something” and seeing someone outside press up against the outside wall as if desiring not to be seen.  Suddenly, “others” were in the room with him and despite his struggles, proceeded to carry him outside through the closed window.

He woke up standing on the front lawn watching a group of lights retreat into the night sky.

Another bubble brought back a memory of driving down a highway in the rural town where he had grown up and as he came around a turn, he suddenly stopped his car when he thought he saw an accident blocking the road.  He was blinded by bright flashing lights and stopped quickly when he realized that a group of people were spread across the road and slowly advancing towards him.  They approached slowly and methodically and it wasn’t until he realized that someone was standing by his car that he became aware that something was wrong.  The figure beside the car started to bend down as if to look into the car window and his awareness of the event suddenly stopped.

He awoke two hours later parked on the side of the road and the “accident” and the people on the road were gone.

And yet another bubble reminded him of the night he and wife were sleeping with their newborn child asleep in the crib.  He had had a disturbing dream that night and over the course of breakfast the next morning, began to relate the dream to his wife and she interrupted him by completing the dream.  They were startled by the realization that they had both dreamt the same dream, of a group of “people” standing around their child’s crib while they were unable to get up and find out what was going on.  Later hypnosis would reveal that they both had experienced an event where they had been prevented from getting up by someone with its face in theirs telling them repeatedly “don’t be afraid” as “others” stood around their child’s crib for a reason unknown to them.

His eyes flicked randomly over the mind map again.

He remembered the time when his child was two and they were reading a Dora the Explorer book together.  For reasons unknown to him, there was an image in the book of an alien in the middle of the jungle and his child pointed to it, unprompted, and said “friend”.  He remembered with a chill that his child said “friend” every time the child saw that image.

And then about a year later, while reading that same book, his child pointed to the alien image and said “scary”.  Shortly after that, the child began having nightmares about “the invisibles” that came into their room to do “bad things”.  The child, while obviously frightened, could never remember details.

Then there was the time he was driving in the White Hills of New Hampshire about 11pm one midsummer’s night when suddenly the inside of his vehicle was bathed in an intense blue light.  Assuming that it was from a police helicopter above him, he looked through the windshield and couldn’t see anything nor was there anything shining a light in through any of the windows.  He also realized that the light inside the vehicle had no shadows, as if emanating from many sources simultaneously.  He shivered and thought, “I’ve been driving too long today – I need to find a hotel and get off the road.” and at that moment, the light winked out.  His wife slept in the passenger seat beside him, not stirring, and as he reflected on how fatigued he must be to be imagining such things, his son, sitting in the car seat behind him, asked in a quiet voice, “What was that blue light, Daddy?”

Another bubble brought back a memory of one morning when his child, at the age of four, came screaming into his bedroom that “an ugly man” was staring at him through his bedroom window.  He shivered when memory of that morning triggered another thought, that his child had experienced other unusual events at the same times in his Life and in the same order as he had when he was young.  He had never told anyone about them but had written them down.  He had checked them off one by one as his child experienced them in the same order.

He never told his child anything, preferring to observe rather than feed the potential imagination of a child who might make up things to make a father happy.

Their parallel lives and the shared events continued for years.

The mind map represented decades of a mystery that he had accumulated and that had accompanied his family wherever he went.

Unusual events, unusual dreams and even physical evidence left on his body that had been questioned and examined by doctors – all which yielded no answers to the many questions asked.

It tormented his mind – a mind driven to understand the “why” of things.

And yet no answers of any credibility came.

People offered theories of aliens, guardian angels, demons and practically everything else, each suggestion based on their Life experiences and their personal biases but to his frustration, were always presented without evidence to support their theory.  Some had suggested mental illness of some form or perhaps a brain tumor but opinions expressed by some of the best doctors in the arenas of psychiatry and psychology had strongly rejected any such suggestion.

And now he sat in front of his keyboard, burning with a desire to share his experiences while cognizant of the impact of possibly being lumped together with the mentally unwell, the faker looking to make a quick buck or the person whose life was so empty that they would do anything to claim their 15 minutes of fame.

He wanted nothing to do with any of them.

He only wanted answers.

Why had these things happened?

Why were they still happening?

Was his family in danger?

The bubbles on his mind map each contained a story – stories that ranged from the odd to the unusual to the terrifying.

The stories described events that had been experienced by others in addition to himself - events that intrigued him, frightened him, annoyed him and made him angry.

He had been frightened by it as a child but now he was concerned for the safety and well-being of his family.

And besides, he didn’t like mysteries in his Life.

Now this mystery burned in his mind, insisting on being shared and demanding to be solved.

He had no idea where to start.

And so he stared at his screen and wondered, “What do I do now?”

To be continued.

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© 2015 – Harry Tucker – All Rights Reserved

Background

This piece of “fiction” actually describes personal experiences that I have lived with for my entire Life.  What is the origin of the events described here and the many other events not described?  I have no idea.  Many suggestions have been made as previously noted – I have dismissed them all without data and had my sanity corroborated by people who know more about such things than I do.

I have subjected myself to hypnosis which terrified those present during the session.  I have no recollection of the events described in the session but occasional flashbacks from the session have not been pleasant.

I have subjected myself to analysis by some of the best minds in the psychiatry / psychology industry and all have come to the same conclusion – I am normal (whatever that means), have no physical or mental illnesses of any type and they believe that I have experienced the events as I described them.

Why I am sharing these events now?

Again, I have no idea – perhaps my mind believes that someone out there can provide the data that answers the questions I have asked for decades.

Perhaps my sharing will help others understand that they don’t need to hide from others who suggest that they have lost their mind.

And maybe it just feels good to get it off my chest.

Or maybe it’s all of the above.

Some have told me that it takes great courage to share such a story.  Maybe although I disagree.  Why is courage required to share a personal truth when many people fill the world with negativity, misinformation, hate or confusion without a second thought? 

People often fear what they don’t know or understand and are often uncomfortable around people who act in a courageous manner while they secretly wish they had the same level of courage to share their own story or pursue their own dream.  Lack of courage on their part then becomes their MO to discredit or disparage the alleged courage of others since it is often easier and “safer” to attack the courage of others than it is to exhibit one’s own sense of courage.

I know posting this will attract the crazy people – that’s what spam filters are for.  Some people are so crazy that merely saying “good morning” can launch them into a diatribe that demonstrates their insanity so I’m not concerned about them.

But perhaps someone out there can offer a nugget of knowledge to someone who requires data for practically everything he does.

Perhaps.

Series Origin

This series, a departure from my usual musings, is inspired as a result of conversations with former senior advisors to multiple Presidents of the United States, senior officers in the US Military and other interesting folks as well as my own professional background as a Wall St. / Fortune 25 strategy and large-scale technology architect.

While this musing is just “fiction” and a departure from my musings on technology, strategy, politics and society, as a strategy guy, I do everything for a reason and with a measurable outcome in mind. :-)

This “fictional” musing is a continuation of the #1206 series noted here.