Curiosity.

5/9/22 

Curiosity 

Curiosity killed the cat. This statement I heard several times growing up. Is this the hard truth, or perhaps we have been misled? Is curiosity a bad thing?  

Curiosity, these days means so much more to me. Curiosity, defined by the Oxford dictionary (2022) as, “A strong desire to know about something”.  In recent days, a theme has risen to embrace a curiosity about the moment, the now, the self, the future, and the world around us.   Curiosity comes with an attitude of non-judgement as stated earlier today by a client.  

The words repeating in my head, over and over again, “the felt sense of the word”. Feeling curious.  

What can curiosity feel like? Can we grasp or hold on to it if we feel it in our body?  

In the words of Brene Brown in “Atlas of the Heart”, she states “We have to have some level of knowledge or awareness before we can become curious, we cannot be curious about something we know nothing about”. So, this begs to me then, the more I learn about something the more curious I can become about the topic. Take for example, the awareness of our mind, heart or our mental health in general. The more I understand about healing, the more curious I become about healing. But she also states, “This is difficult for some as it requires, the surrendering to not knowing” with curiosity. Therefore, she continues, “too much curiosity can hurt sometimes, and this can remind us we are alive and has correlated with deeper learning and knowledge” (Brown, 2021). 

I give the example for myself, as I sit in a guided meditation one morning, the author Bodhi Samuel Kahn states as you continue, “get curious about what is happening as you breathe”. He continues, “Be curious like a child on the first day of school, what will I learn today? What will be presented to me as I move through my day?” As I embrace my own curiosity, I realize that my mind starts to drift to moments of anguish and pain. I know that surrendering to the images and feelings is the avenue for healing although a deeper connection to these memories seems so hurtful right now. Embracing the feelings, by acknowledging, allowing and labeling decreases their power over me and I can state to myself... I am not hurt; I am experiencing memories that are painful and it is okay to feel them without completely unraveling. The midlife unraveling seeps in again. Breathe and move through the moment.  

Be curious. Embark on this moment with a curious feeling.  

Let’s get curious about our moments, our days, weeks, months and years. Let’s be excited for what the next page, chapter, or journey that may lie ahead of us.  

Brown, B. (2021). Atlas of The Heart: Mapping Meaningful Connections and the Language of Human Experience. Random House Audio. 

Oxford University Press (2022).