Curiosity Can Change Your Life

Pomp's Notes on A Curious Mind by Brian Grazer

To investors,

I have been reading one book per week this year. This past week’s book was A Curious Mind: The Secret to a Bigger Life by Brian Grazer. Highly recommend reading it. If you are interested in the individual highlights that I made in the physical book, you can read those here. Hope you enjoy these notes.

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Book’s main argument:

Curiosity is a superpower. We often don’t talk about, nor think of, curiosity as an endeavor worth pursuing on its own. Many people talk about creativity and innovation, but Grazer argues that curiosity is the more important pursuit. He uses his personal experience with “curiosity conversations” to highlight the benefit.

8 Big Ideas:

💡 Idea #1 — Intentionally seeking out other people to learn from them, especially when coming from a place of genuine curiosity can completely change your life. Brian calls these “curiosity conversations” and he has been doing them for about 40 years with some of the world’s most successful or famous individuals. He writes:

It was suddenly clear to me that curiosity was the way to uncover ideas, it was the way to spark them.

I started having what I called curiosity conversations. For a long time, I had a rule for myself: I had to meet one new person in the entertainment business every day. But pretty quickly I realized that I could actually reach out and talk to anyone, in any business that I was curious about. It’s not just showbiz people who are willing to talk about themselves and their work — everyone is. 

The goal for me is to learn something. 

Brian then continues describing the curiosity conversations:

I’ve done hundreds and hundreds of curiosity meetings. It’s the thing I look forward to, and often the thing I end up enjoying the most. For me, when I’m learning from someone who is right in front of me, it’s better than sex. It’s better than success. 

Brian also describes how asking questions in the curiosity conversations has prevented people from thinking he is stupid:

The curiosity conversations give me a reservoir of experience and insight that goes well beyond my own firsthand experience. But the conversations also give me a lot of firsthand experience in exposing my own lack of knowledge, my own naïveté. I actually practice being a little ignorant. I’m willing to admit what I don’t know, because I know that’s how I get smarter. Asking questions may seem to expose your ignorance, but what it really does is just the opposite. People who ask questions, in fact, are rarely thought of as stupid. 

💡 Idea #2 — Curiosity requires courage and a willingness to be different. Brian writes:

No one today ever says anything bad about curiosity, directly. But if you pay attention, curiosity isn’t really celebrated and cultivated, it isn’t protected and encouraged. It’s not just that curiosity is inconvenient. Curiosity can be dangerous. Curiosity isn’t just impertinent, it’s insurgent. It’s revolutionary.

💡 Idea #3 — Curiosity is a defiant act that can give you power. Brian writes:

Here’s the remarkable thing. Curiosity isn’t just a great tool for improving your own life and happiness, your ability to win a great job or a great spouse. It is the key to the things we say we value most in the modern world: independence, self-determination, self-government, self-improvement. Curiosity is the path to freedom itself. 

The ability to ask any question embodies two things: the freedom to go chase the answer, and the ability to challenge authority, to ask, “How come you’re in charge?” Curiosity is itself a form of power, and also a form of courage.

💡 Idea #4 — Curiosity can break you out of your bubble, show you different perspectives, and help you gain a broader understanding of how the world works. Brian writes:

We are all trapped in our own way of thinking, trapped in our own way of relating to people. We get so used to seeing the world our way that we come to think that the world is the way we see it. 

One of the most important ways I use curiosity every day is to see the world through other people’s eyes, to see the world in ways I might otherwise miss. 

The variety in my work (and my life) comes from curiosity.

Brian then continues and says:

Being able to imagine the perspective of others is also a critical strategic tool for managing reality in a whole range of professions. 

The very best doctors, detectives, generals, coaches, and diplomats all share the skill of being able to think about the world from the perspective of their rivals. 

Successful business people imagine themselves in their customers’ shoes.

💡 Idea #5 — Curiosity can be a cure for fear. Brian writes:

As I mentioned earlier, when I have a fear of something, I try to get curious about it — I try to set the fear aside long enough to start asking questions. The questions do two things: they distract me from the queasy feeling, and I learn something about what I’m worried about. Instinctively, I think, we all know that. But sometimes you need to remind yourself that the best way to dispel the fear is to face it, to be curious. 

Brian elaborates on this argument by saying:

I’ve learned to rely on curiosity in two really important ways: first, I use curiosity to fight fear. I use curiosity to instill confidence — in my ideas, in my decisions, in my vision, in myself. 

💡 Idea #6 — Human connection is built on curiosity for thousands of years. Brian writes:

Human connection is created by curiosity. Human connection is the most important element of our daily lives — with our colleagues and bosses, our romantic partners, our children, our friends. Human connection requires sincerity. It requires compassion. It requires trust.

Human connection is the most important part of being alive. It’s the key to sustained happiness and to a sense of satisfaction with how you’re living. And curiosity is the key to connecting and staying connected.

💡 Idea #7 — Asking questions may be a better management technique than the one that you are currently using. Brian writes:

I don’t like to boss people around. I don’t get motivated by telling people what to do, I don’t take any pleasure in it. So I manage with curiosity by asking questions. I think asking questions creates a lot more engagement in the people with whom you work. 

I think asking for people’s help — rather than directing it — is almost always the smart way of doing things, regardless of the stakes. 

The real benefit of asking rather than telling is that it creates the space for a conversation, for a different idea, a different strategy. 

If you’re the boss, and you manage by asking questions, you’re laying the foundation for the culture of your company or your group. 

To get at the possibilities, you have to find out what ideas and reactions are in other people’s minds. You have to ask them questions. 

Questions create both the authority in people to come up with ideas and take action, and the responsibility for moving things forward. Questions create the space for all kinds of ideas, and the sparks to come up with those ideas. 

People are more likely to consider a piece of advice, or a flat-out instruction, if they’ve asked for it in the first place. 

If you can start using curiosity in the office, you’ll find that after a while, the benefits are remarkable. 

The questions, in other words, have to come from genuine curiosity. If you’re not curious enough to listen to the answer, all the question does is increase cynicism and decrease trust and engagement.

💡 Idea #8 — Curiosity leads to good ideas, but we must prevent the internet from destroying our curiosity and stripping of us our superpower. Brian writes:

We need to be careful, individually, that the Internet doesn’t anesthetize us instead of inspire us. There are two things you can’t find on the Internet. You can’t search for the answer to questions that haven’t been asked yet. And you can’t Google a new idea. The Internet can only tell us what we already know. 

The more I know about the world — the more I understand about how the world works, the more people I know, the more perspectives I have — the more likely it is that I’ll have a good idea. The more likely it is that I’ll understand a good idea when I hear it. The less likely I’ll agree that something is “good enough.”

Memorable quotes:

1. Curiosity gives you power. Curiosity is power for real people, its power for people who don’t have superpowers.

2. Genuine curiosity requires respect.

3. And one thing I know about curiosity: it’s democratic. Anyone, anywhere, of any age or education level, can use it.

4. But even if your curiosity is suppressed, you can’t lose it.

5. Make the hardest call of the day first.

6. Inspiring curiosity is the first job of a good story.

7. Curiosity is a more exciting way to live in the world. It is, truly, the secret to living a bigger life.

Pomp’s Takeaways:

My first big takeaway was that people rarely talk about curiosity. Brian nailed it when he said that the vernacular used focuses on creativity and innovation, but not curiosity. As we know, words matter. By incorporating the word curiosity into our daily language, it forces us to think about questions, not answers.

The second big takeaway was that Brian and I have similar lives. He may produce movies, while I build companies and invest in others, but we both create content for public consumption. He calls his conversations with interesting people “curiosity conversations.” I call mine “podcast episodes.” This realization made me understand how fortunate I am to do this on a daily basis, while also creating a higher degree of importance on each episode.

The third takeaway was that you can learn something from anyone you meet. Brian shares example after example of his curiosity conversations, including the LA Police Chief during the Rodney King riots, Fidel Castro during a trip to Cuba, Oprah Winfrey during a hotel breakfast, and many people you have never heard of. Some of the conversations were hours long and others lasted 20 minutes. Ask good questions and be genuinely interested in the answers. Curiosity can take you anywhere.

Lastly, the fourth takeaway is that being exposed to a variety of fields, perspectives, and people can be an incredible competitive advantage. As I mentioned in the book notes for Robert Greene’s Mastery, my wife and I are constantly talking about how to expose our daughter to as many ideas as possible. It feels dumb that parents think this way for their children, but we lose sight of the importance for ourselves as we get older. We are all children at heart.

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As I mentioned, this past week’s book was A Curious Mind: The Secret to a Bigger Life by Brian Grazer. Highly recommend reading it. If you are interested in the individual highlights that I made in the physical book, you can read those here. Hope you enjoyed these notes. Let me know if you would like me to continue writing these in the future.

-Pomp

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