This morning I spent a fair amount of time wondering where my curiosity went… I know I used to have it.
This all came to mind after listening to some awesome Buddhist postcasts from the Zune marketplace (if you have a Zune, you can download these podcasts with ease… they are called “Zencast”). The speaker, Gil, talks about brining a sense of curiosity and wonder to meditative practice and to life in general. He also talks about not taking things too seriously, because it can overwhelm the experience one is trying to achieve… to just go with the flow and notice without judging in life and in meditation.
And, I wondered… where did my curiosity go? Am I naturally a less curious person? Maybe I am. But, I think the answer is more complex than that…
The next time I have an appointment with my therapist (in several weeks), I will ask about the effect of trauma on curiosity. I have a gut feeling that there is a connection between my lack of curiosity and the various hells I have endured in abuse survival. Off the top of my head, I feel that it made no sense to be curious. Life just sucked. Curiosity seemed to get me in a lot of trouble that I would’ve rather have avoided. Asking my mother questions earned me punishment, scorn and lies. Trying to be playful, not gravely serious about everything I did and trying to give myself the space and time to be curious got me raged at and beaten by my step-father. In many ways, they broke my spirit.
I remember how much it annoyed me that my cousin (who I was very close to growing up) always told me to not take things so seriously. Ooooo… she made me SO MAD when she said that. If I didn’t take things so seriously, after all, I could be painfully punished. She didn’t know that. But, now that I’m an adult and living in a non-abusive environment, I’m starting to see her point. I think I’m going to call her today and tell her that and also to thank her for giving me good advice that I just couldn’t take at the time… however, the seeds she planted seem to now be taking root and I’m glad to have her voice in my head reminding me that not everything needs to be an emergency. 😉
I also have a gut feeling that some of my lack of curiosity has to do with just how I am. Almost like I was born this way. I have a strong drive to just get things done. It doesn’t always leave room for questions or curious observations. My therapist always tells me that she thinks my ADD may not be real-ADD. It may be something that looks like ADD that is caused by PTSD… a hyper-vigilance born of growing up in an insane home. I think it’s both. I have reactions that I have been told by doctors are only the result of real, honest-to-goodness ADD. For example, cocaine works like a sedative on me. I tried it a few times in my early twenties. I had the best sleep of my life, while my friends spazzed out. At first, they thought I had overdosed… but after a bit, they learned that I am simply weird. I look back fondly on that experimentation, because that was a turning point for me where I decided that messing with drugs was a really dangerous thing for me to do. I never know what they’ll do to me. The few things I’ve tried have given me ridiculous results. Even alcohol hangovers are weird for me. My psychiatrist is ever telling me how weird I am that ritalin can give me the loveliest naps and how klonopin was seriously unpleasant, while many people I know have used these drugs to get very different results than I do… Geez… get lost in tangents much? My point is… it is time to accept that I am the way I am. In some ways, I am like the average Jane. In some ways, I am not. My guess is that we are all like this to some extent. I bring this up, because this point helps me settle down and accept myself AS-IS. Not how others thing I am. Not how I “should” be. Just as-is.
This morning I did a little meditation on my curiosity. I sat back and listened to where some deep part of my mind thinks my curiosity went. It was like a daydream. I dreamed that as a child my curiosity wasn’t safe where I was, so it flew away like fluffy dandelion seeds on a wind. The seeds went somewhere save… some grassy place near a forest where they could bloom and grow. My curiosity is still in existence – it just went somewhere safe, you see… So, I imagined myself being in that safe place with my curiosity blooming all around me and I was glad to know that this part of me was at least somewhere I now know… that it doesn’t feel completely lost to me anymore.
My lack of curiosity has gotten me in plenty of trouble. It caused me to not question things that needed to be questioned… that were obvious to others around me that there should’ve been questions. This came up in my job a lot. I cannot tell you how tired I am of being asked why I didn’t think something was worth looking more into… well, heck… my brain doesn’t really work that way… at least not very well. Sigh… Otherwise, my lack of curiosity makes life boring… and lifeless. I’m not sure how to describe it better than that. Life simply loses all flavor and color when we close our senses to the world around us and our questions and wonder dry up.
I would really love to hear from ya’all how you cultivate your own curiosity. How do you do this? Have you had struggles in losing your curiosity like I have? Did you get it back… if so… how? I’ll definitely be bringing this all up at my next session, but in the meantime – I want to hear what you guys think. I’m all ears…
–AngryGrayRainbows
Angry Gray Rainbows 
I don’t have a lot of help to offer on the question of how to reconnect with your curiosity, but I’ve known several survivors of abuse, and most of them have used the same coping mechanism of simply not being curious to at least some extent. Curiosity for them, as it was for you, was simply an invitation to more pain, more manipulation, and more misery. I think it’s at least a not uncommon coping mechanism.
Call your cousin. I think it will probably do both of you some real good.
You know, I might have one suggestion for helping to jump start your curiosity. Maybe you could take a class that requires some active searching for answers on your part, say something like an acting course or a debate club. Or if you’d rather work on your own, try to come up with a subject you know little or nothing about and start researching it. It’s amazing what you can learn once you start asking questions.
Best of luck in your efforts.
The most important thing that I think I learned from my mother is Question Everything. Most of the time it did get me in trouble…I would question rules, guidelines and such…and then the mayhem would ensue. 🙂
I would question people why they thought a certain way…say on a political issue, and then I would think about it. I was a thinker, not a do-er as a kid. I got a vicarious thrill out of reading about people like Socrates…a bright man who could out think many of his peers. A man who did not conform to social ideals (he was unattractive in a culture that was obsessed with male beauty). His Socratic Method exposed the thoughts and feelings behind a statement – and is still used today.
The way he dug deeper into issues, bringing up new and interesting ideas using his method, inspired me to start questioning again; becoming more curious!
Hope this is useful to you….:D
AGR, you come across to me as very curious — I don’t know if this is something “natural” about you coming through or something you’ve cultivated. I don’t mean to argue with you… how you feel inside is how you feel… but I just want to say that when you ask me questions about my life, they come across as a healthy, warm curiousity and openness. Also, your exploration of other spiritualities from the ones you were exposed to as a child comes across to me as curiosity.
My observation of people who are really hard on themselves is that if there is a trait that they value (i.e. curiosity) they have a hard time seeing it in themselves, even if it’s there.
Maybe you feel you would be EVEN MORE curious without the pain and thwarting of this you endured, and that may well be true, but I wanted you to know that my perception of you is of someone with a healthy level of curiosity and openness.
I hope this isn’t too forward of me…
Just a thought – maybe you are still curious but in a more mature way. Also, if you are coming to peace with things you may no longer need to be actively curious about everything. Could you be confusing lack of curiosity with acceptance?
You must be curious on some level or you wouldn’t have written this post!
Thank you all for your input. 🙂 You have given me much to think about.
Let me start by addressing one bit by WRT2 – oh no, you didn’t delve into anything too private or anything. No worries. I’m pretty open in that regard.
Twistie,
You hit the nail on the head about curiosity being a big problem for me when I was living with the crazy parents. I think they beat it out of me in many ways…
Regarding the class… I’m so glad you mentioned it! You validated where my mind has been going over the last few days. I want to get out and do something… maybe get more into Buddhism (not as a religion… but as a way of life and spirituality). Maybe it’s time to create a Buddhist blog and get back to the temple where I met my hubby… 😉
Aud,
Your comment makes me wonder if there is some good book about Socrates out there. I know he wrote lots of things, but I don’t know if I’m up to parsing through his old timey way of putting things. Is there some more accessible book out there about his method? From what I’ve known of it, it has always facinated me… probably, because (at least to some extent) his method is so difficult for me to apply! To be so open… so curious… so questioning… I’m far more used to forcing my own perceptions on the world rather than being so open to what else might be out there if I only asked… or looked…
WRT2 & JennyRose,
You both bring up connected (in my mind anyway) points, so I’ll address it all together. 🙂
I think it’s awesome that someone out there thinks I’m curious. Okay… it’s true. In some ways I am curious. In some ways, I have worked VERY VERY VERY HARD to cultivate curiosity or… sometimes… to just appear curious.
When it comes to this blog and related topics, I am WAYYYYYYYY more curious than I am about anything else. These things interest me in ways that few things do. If I don’t have a passionate interest in something, it is very hard for me to even give it the passing time of day. I hear this is a classic trait of ADD… those things I like, I can really get into… otherwise, foggetaboutit… I cannot begin to scratch the surface of things that do not DEEPLY interest me… I cannot even get myself to look at the surface.
This became a problem in my job. I am a finance professional that thinks that the finance world is cold, heartless and otherwise idiotic. Sure, math is fun. If it was all math, there wouldn’t be a problem, I’m guessing. But, finance includes a lot of ass-kissing, manipulation, dealing with sociopathic personalities and things that have nothing to do with actual science or MATH. Sheesh. Had I known that, I would’ve just majored in math rather than freakin’ finance. Finance is so political. Yuck! Anyhoo… I was constantly being told by bosses that I didn’t see things that would’ve interested someone who was mildly interested… I wasn’t mildly interested. I was more than mildly disgusted with my job and my company and everything else… it caused problems. If I were a professional FA advocate or psychologist or something, I doubt my bosses would have the same complaints…
Regarding seeing a potential lack of curiosity as acceptance… I can see that perspective as well… however, I still don’t see that as a good thing really. I will tell you why. 🙂 Going through all the crazy abuse I went through for most of my life, to survive…. to stay sane… I learned to accept the unacceptable. Part of recovering from all that is learning to not accept lots of stuff…
On the other hand… as someone who appreciates Buddhism, I also can appreciate acceptance… acceptance of things that cannot be changed or acceptance of things that just ARE. Besides, how can we change anything if we don’t first accept that it IS… that it exists…
So, acceptance – to me – is one sticky wicket. I love it. I hate it. I try to cultivate it. I try to un-cultivate it in other areas.
Maybe I am just dissecting myself too much… ARGH… i just don’t know….
This is a good summary of the Trial of Socrates. It has been a long time but I think this is a start.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socrates
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socratic_Method