The 4 Questions We’re All Unconsciously Asking
There are four questions we unconsciously ask each other all the time. These questions are based on interviews I listened to between both Oprah and beloved writers Maya Angelou and Toni Morison, respectively.
Toni Morison was describing how her child came to her one day and noted that every time they walked in the room, she made a request for them to straighten up, clean up, fix something about the space or themselves.
One day, her child came to her and said something to the effect of, “Every time you see me, you see what’s wrong with me first.”
From that moment on, Toni Morison noted that she made sure to allow the love she felt inside be animated on the outside when her children walked in the room.
She said that children were looking to see if your face lights up when they walk in the room, so she started to light up.
This question, “Does your face light up when I walk in the room?” as well a subsequent conversation Oprah had with Maya Angelou on the topic, spurred the four questions.
We ask the people we love, we ask the people who matter to us professionally, and on a broader level, we ask the people we encounter as we go about our everyday lives: the cashier who takes your coffee order, the jogging neighbor you wave to from the car on the way to work, the elderly woman sitting across from you on the train.
The four questions rarely get asked with words, just as they’re rarely answered with words.
They’re almost always silent questions, because they’re almost always unconscious.
When the silent answer to each of the four silent questions is a definitive YES, the love (or basic sense of humanity, in the broader examples) in the relationship becomes more palpable and is in turn felt.
In the broader context, people who don’t get an answer to these questions (or worse, who receive a ‘no’) feel increasingly disconnected from a sense of belonging and community.
Here are the 4 critical questions:
Do you see me?
Do you care that I’m here?
Am I enough for you, or do you need me to be better in some way?
Can I tell that I’m special to you by the way that you look at me?
Whether it’s your kids, your colleagues, your partner, or someone in your community, when a person feels seen by you, it’s because you treat them in a way that affirmatively answers each question consistently. It’s because when you look at them, you actually take the time to see them.
One reason why some people love dogs so much?
Dogs answer the four questions with a big, “Yes!” near constantly.
Those furry little spiritual masters are always in the present moment, so their quality of connection is always heightened (subsequently, so is the level of palpable connection they emit).
Unlike our K-9 counterparts, we regularly slip out of the present moment and go somewhere else.
It at least makes more sense when we evade the present moment during ostensibly mundane activities, like an unnecessary meeting, doing laundry, our commute, etc. But invariably, the habit of not being present spills over into the moments we really mean to be present for:
The love of your life walks into the room before bed and you barely look up from your phone.
You meet your best friend for brunch and go through the motions of the hug, the compliment about something, and the ‘it took forever to get here!’ without actually feeling much.
You’re tying your daughter’s shoe and when you’re done, you get up to reach for her packed lunch and hand it to her while you’re simultaneously grabbing your bag and keys, all without ever looking at her.
We all do this. We blaze through darling moments every single day.
Sometimes we don’t really remember much about our week because we weren’t present for most of it.
How do we answer the 4 questions with a definitive ‘YES’?
I’m not encouraging intense stare downs with every single human you encounter, but what I do hear so often in my work is this:
She’s looking at me, but it’s like she’s looking past me.
I know he cares and I objectively know he loves me more than anything, but he’s so checked out.
I know my parent loves me but they don’t show it, and that hurts.
If you see someone, let them know you see them.
Slow down, and though it feels strange to write this because it’s so simple: take a second to actually look at another person.
Just one extra second.
One second is all it takes to let the love you feel show on your face, in your eyes and in your quality of presence.
Slowing down and taking the one extra second is how you connect.
That one extra second is the secret to the people whom we find so charming, it’s what the best leaders do — helping people feel seen and valued will totally shift your life.
We can all get by without connection for a little while, but if we want to be healthy and feel alive, we have to connect to each other.
Connection isn’t based on how much time we spend with someone or what we do with them, connection is based on quality of presence.
Being present isn’t as complicated as the wellness world sometimes makes it out to be.
Being present is a one second decision, “Ok, I’m gonna be present now.”
Being present isn’t a decision you make in the morning and then never have to think about again, it’s a decision you make over and over and over again throughout the day.
Ooops, wandered away from the present moment? No probs. The return flight is one second long.
If you’re interested in experimenting with the idea that people are always asking the four questions, for one week, use an image of the number “4” as the wallpaper on your phone.
Let the number be a cue to help you remember to answer the questions, not out loud, but on your face, in your touch, in your eyes, with the quality of your presence.
Taking the one extra second doesn’t have to be constant to be improve your quality of connection to yourself and others. Just do it as you remember to, do it as you please, and that will be enough.
Katherine Morgan Schafler is an NYC-based psychotherapist, author and speaker. For more of her work, get her book, visit her website, or follow her on Instagram.