This has also been driven by looking over my years at uni now that I've reached the end; I've come to realise that I just did not have any questions. So many seminars, so many lectures, and they always end with 'If there's any questions my student hours are open', and not once did I utilise that time. It's meant I've always just slightly accepted things and whilst I did disagree, it wasn't enough to them inspire questions that could be taken to lecturers.
I've also noticed it in my day-to-day conversations. Questions are a large part of the conversation format and they have been something I have had to manually and consciously do when speaking to people. I first realised this actively when I was in about Year 8 (12/13) and we were doing a Spanish speaking exam. You had to maintain a conversation with the teacher with the format 'statement, follow up question', where you lost marks if you failed to ask a question. I am quite frankly piss poor at language and so there was only one question floating around my brain: ¿y tu? This has led me, nearly ten years later, to mentally scream 'Y TU' whenever I am in a conversation that becomes rather stagnated.
But I will be (hopefully) in a new place by September and that means new people. Not only that but maintaining the friendships that I've made in undergrad, as I do not want a repeat of sixth form. Previously, the strategy was blindly believing that people were interested in my day to day life, if something happened I would just tell them. Except that makes you look self absorbed. So now I need to learn how to ask proper questions outside of 'how was your day' or 'any plans coming up' to ensure that my current friends know that I care about them and their thoughts.
Let me leave you with some questions:
- Have you been watching anything recently, if so how does it measure to your favourite show?
- When was the last time you bought flowers?
- Has your coffee order changed over time?
i agree asking questions is hard, i would say conversations and socializing in general are very hard to me. i've gravitated towards people who speak a lot my whole life, maybe to compensate my silent, which means most of my friends don't need me to ask questions to tell me everything, so that's great for me. but it's true when i find myself having to talk to someone that i'm not close to, i can look awkward and uninterested :(
ReplyDeletethose are great questions !
⋆ i am not currently watching anything but i am reading liar city by allie therin, it's fun and gay ! but it has nothing in common with my favorite books, i don't think i can even compare them.
⋆ i don't think i've ever bought flowers, i bought a little pot with a cactus 2 years ago, he's still thriving !
⋆ and i don't drink coffee, i don't like it, but my best friend moved to a tiny rural town for a job and she had to change her order because they don't have vegan alternatives to milk there, so now she takes it black.
¿ y tu ?