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Episode 226 - Asking The Right Questions Can Radically Change Your Life

Are you tired of trying various solutions to fix your finances, only to find yourself stuck in the same financial rut month after month? If so, you might be looking for a solution to the wrong problem. In today's blog post, we'll explore a simple yet powerful task that can help you identify the real root of your financial struggles and pave the way for financial success. 

 

Identifying the Real Problem 

It's common to believe that the answer to your financial woes lies in finding the right solution. But what if the problem you're trying to solve isn't the root cause of your financial challenges? Asking the right questions is key to uncovering the true problem. 

The Power of Asking Questions 

Chris emphasizes the importance of asking the right questions to get to the heart of your financial issues. By delving deep and challenging your assumptions, you can uncover insights that may have been previously overlooked. Through a series of thought-provoking questions, you can unravel the layers of your financial situation and pinpoint the real problem. To help you on this journey of self-discovery, Chris suggests a simple exercise borrowed from engineers - asking a series of questions that begin with what, why, or how. By questioning your beliefs and behaviors around money, you can gain clarity on the underlying factors contributing to your financial challenges. 

Example Scenario 

Let's walk through a hypothetical scenario to illustrate how this questioning process works. Imagine you're struggling to pay your bills. Instead of focusing solely on the lack of funds, delve deeper by asking why you can't pay your bills. With each subsequent question, you'll peel back the layers until you uncover the root cause of your financial dilemma. 

Finding Life-Altering Answers 

Asking powerful questions can lead to life-altering answers. By reframing your perspective and challenging your assumptions, you can identify the true problem and pave the way for transformative solutions. Whether it's tracking your expenses, budgeting effectively, or making lifestyle changes, the answers you uncover through this process can lead to lasting financial success. 

The key to overcoming financial challenges lies in asking the right questions and uncovering the real root of your problems. By embarking on this journey of self-inquiry and introspection, you can gain valuable insights that can reshape your financial future. So, the next time you find yourself struggling with finances, remember to question, explore, and challenge your assumptions to unlock the path to financial freedom. 

Resources Mentioned

Get better results with your finances in 30-60 days - GUARANTEED. Watch this video to learn how! - https://www.debtfreedad.com/payoff-debt-in-60-to-90-days 

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Episode Transcript: 

Speaker 1:  

Have you tried a variety of solutions to fix your finances, only to fail? Do you feel like nothing is working and that your tires are sort of stuck in the financial mud and all you keep doing is spinning your wheels over and over, finding yourself each month with the same struggles? Well, maybe, just maybe, you're looking for a solution to the wrong problem. Today, I want to give you a short task that just might help you identify the real root of your problems and get you out of the mud and back onto the road of financial success. This is the Debt Free Dad podcast, where we help normal, everyday people like you take control of your finances so you can live a happier, less stressful life. My name is Chris Hawkins and I will be your host for today's episode.

Speaker 1:  

From 2005 to 2008, my wife and I paid off just under $100,000 in debt, and we've been debt free except for our house now for over 15 years. So, speaking of 2008, back in 2008, just the month before I paid off my last debt, I started a doctorate degree program in workforce education, and the first semester that I was in class, I took a statistics course and a workforce education policy course. Well, that course started off with eight people in the class and all but one of us was in our very first semester and the course. It met in a small conference room around an oval table and the professor who was going to be teaching that class he was starting his very last semester before retiring and recognizing that all but one of us was sort of new to this doctorate degree process, he took about an hour out of the first three hours on the first class day to walk us through the whole process, and he started by telling us that a doctorate degree is a terminal degree. Terminal degree, well, by that he meant that there's no other higher degree that we would be able to achieve, sort of there's nothing past the doctorate degree. You can get a bachelor's degree, master's degree, but after a doctorate degree, that's it. So that's what he meant by terminal. He also meant that professors would no longer be telling us what to learn and that professors wouldn't be teaching us but rather guiding us. They wouldn't be giving us a test and asking us to sort of regurgitate what they've taught us. He went on to explain that a doctorate degree would be our opportunity to prove to a panel of professors called a committee that you have mastered the art of lifelong learning, and so through this program we would learn to sort of ask great questions and then find great answers to those questions. So we would, in essence, be the one doing both the questioning and the answering, and if we made it through the program, we would sort of gain a confidence in our ability to both ask questions and then find answers to our own questions.

Speaker 1:  

So fast forward to the year 2018. I had completed my degree way back in 2011, and I happened to pick up a copy of the book the One Thing by Gary Keller and Jay Papazone and if you listen to this podcast regularly, brad actually referenced the same book back in our episode about financial fables. So as I was reading through the book, I chuckled a few times while reading the chapter titled the Focusing Question, and that chapter took me all the way back to that conference room Listening to the professor talk to us about asking great questions and finding great answers. So let me read to you just a portion of that book that made me think back to that one day when I began my doctorate degree program, and that small conference room around a noble table.

Speaker 1:  

The authors say quote answers come from questions. Well, think about that. Answers come from questions. Okay, I get it. And the quality of any answer is directly determined by the quality of the question. Ask the wrong question, get the wrong answer. But ask the right question, oh, you get the right answer. And here's my favorite part Ask the most powerful question possible and the answer can be life altering. How we phrase the questions we ask ourselves determines the answers that eventually become your life End quote.

Speaker 1:  

Now, what does all this have to do with personal finance? I'm sure that's what you're asking. Well, I've talked in this podcast about the journey that most people will go through, and that journey begins with recognizing that you have a problem, which inevitably leads to searching for answers. And for most, this is where the tire sort of gets stuck in the mud. The answers you think you have found end up not working and you're right back at the beginning. Well, because you never find the right answers, most people end up giving up. So I wanna suggest to you that the problem that you're trying to find the answer to in your finances isn't really the problem, because you're searching for an answer to the wrong problem. You're not able to find the solution to what actually is your problem. So remember what the author said Ask the wrong question, get the wrong answer. Ask the right question, get the right answer. Ask the most powerful question possible, and the answer can be life altering. So if you feel like you aren't finding the best solution to your financial problems, let me suggest that you think differently and look for the real problem. So if that's you, I've got a simple exercise that I want you to try Now. I actually learned about this from several engineers many, many years ago who told me that this is a common task that they do as part of their engineering work, and it involves going all the way back to your childhood.

Speaker 1:  

Now, if you're a parent, one of the things that can drive you nuts is an inquisitive child who asks a very important question over and over again. It's sort of like Chinese water torture. So when a child is curious, they ask the question why? And when you give them the answer to that question, what do they do? They ask why, and you again answer, only for them to ask why? And this charade seems to never end. Well, is the child doing that to annoy you? No, they're simply trying to find a better understanding. They're seeking answers through asking just a simple question why? And the more times that they ask, the more detailed answers they get from you.

Speaker 1:  

If you're struggling financially and nothing seems to work, try and ask a series of questions so you can drill down to the most important question, the one that just very well might be your problem. And so the way this works is ask yourself a question and then answer that question. Then use that answer to ask a follow-up question, and that follow-up question needs to begin with what, why or how. When you get an answer to that question, use that answer to create another question, and do this four or five times altogether, or four more times after the initial one, each time asking a question that begins with what, why or how. Now notice I didn't include the words when or who. Now, sometimes those are valuable questions, but for now, stay away from them, because they often lead to the question. They often lead to blame, to hatred and to you doing nothing to help you find the right problem for which you can't find the right answer.

Speaker 1:  

Now, when you try this out, rule number one rule number one's got to be be honest with yourself. If you're not, it's not going to work. You also have to be dedicated to discovering the best question to get the best solution. So this isn't a one-time thing. So let me walk you through a quick example that I just jotted down. First and foremost, there could be a billion answers to each of these questions. I just happen to come up with an answer in order to show you how this process works.

Speaker 1:  

So, for instance, let's say that you think your problem is you can't pay all of your bills. I can't pay my bills, I can't pay my bills, I don't have enough money. Well, trying to find a solution to that problem more than likely isn't going to help you find an answer that can be life-altering. You might try and ask yourself why can't I pay all of my bills? That's question number one, and notice, it began with the word why? Answer because I have too much debt. Question number two taking that answer, turning it into a question why do I have too much debt? Answer I don't know. Question number three why don't I know? Answer well, because I've never really tracked my income and expenses. Question four why haven't I tracked my expenses? Answer I've never really known how. Question five what can I do to learn how? Answer might be to read a book on budgeting, now that you've gone through this process.

Speaker 1:  

If this happened to be you and again, this is a hypothetical situation what should you probably do? Well, consider reading a book on budgeting. That's going to help give you the confidence. It's going to help give you the knowledge to get started budgeting. It's not going to make you perfect at it. It's going to at least give you the confidence to get started. And the more that you budget and the more you track your expenses, the more you're going to learn. Then you just might discover through this whole process that you eat out a lot more than you thought and you spend a large amount of money at restaurants. So you do the math and you realize that if you didn't eat out as much, you'd be able to pay your bills. So that becomes the catalyst to repeat the process.

Speaker 1:  

So now the problem is I eat out too much. Question number one why do I eat out as much as I do? Answer well, I never. I never have enough time to cook. Question number two why don't I have enough time to cook? Answer we get home too late. Question three why do we get home too late? Well, we've got to take the kids to practice most nights. Now let me stop here real quick. I'm not going to suggest that you tell the kids they can't play sports or that you're not going to take them to things anymore. All right, so then let's figure out a different question here. Number four what can we do to make it quicker to cook meals at home? Answer well, maybe we can make extra meals in the weekends. Question five what do I need to do to make meals ahead of time? Answer well, maybe I can double each recipe when I cook and then freeze the extra.

Speaker 1:  

So, going back to the problem you were trying to find a solution to, which is you can't pay your bills. Well, why couldn't you? Well, it's because you ate out too much, right? No, no, your problem is you have a busy schedule, and taking your kids to practice and to games leads to you getting home too late to cook. So you take the easy way out, and I get it. We've been there and done that. You go out to eat, you stop by a fast food restaurant on the way home, and so by doing this questioning, you might just find that your problem isn't that you can't pay your bills, but rather that you just get home too late, you're tired and you don't want to cook. So making meals ahead of time so you can overcome getting home late and not wanting to fix dinner, might leave you more money in your account, which would allow you to pay your bills.

Speaker 1:  

So see how far you've moved away from that generically worded, wrong problem to something more specific, and it just might possibly be the problem that you need to find an answer to. And when you've identified a possible great answer to help you find the money to begin paying your bills on time, that might make your life a little bit better, a little less stressful. And this exercise of asking yourself have I really identified the right problem? And then going through questions to create a better question. It's an exercise that takes time to get practice at, and you very well might come up with a variety of different answers in each question, and so you might have to repeat through this process several times. But make sure you're honest with yourself. Go through it each time, varying your answers, and eventually you will probably find a problem that most closely resembles the one that you truly have, and when you can identify that problem, that's going to help you find answers that just might alter your life.

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