132: Clarifying Your Intentions Before Asking Will Change Everything" (reflections on Steve Toomey)
🧠 Erik’s Take
After sitting down with Steve Toomey, Erik found himself less interested in the mechanics of questions—and more interested in the conditions that make them meaningful. The original goal was simple: reverse engineer what makes a good question. The result? A much bigger conversation.
Steve didn’t offer a tidy framework. Instead, he pointed toward context:
- Who are you asking?
- Why are you asking?
- Are you genuinely interested?
- Do you share enough common ground to make the question land?
Erik walked away realizing that good questions aren’t just about phrasing. They’re about intention, presence, and alignment.
🎯 Top Insights from the Interview
- Interest precedes insight. It’s easier to ask profound questions when you’re genuinely curious about the person in front of you.
- Shared ground matters. A good question requires enough mutual competency or curiosity to create meaningful dialogue.
- Intent shapes impact. Are you gathering information? Solving a problem? Teaching? Serving? If you don’t know your motive, your question may miss.
- Turning outward reduces anxiety. Focusing on serving others is one of the most powerful antidotes to self-absorption, loneliness, and insecurity.
- Your meta-narrative drives your behavior. The story you tell yourself internally shapes how you show up externally.
🧩 The Personal Layer
Erik was surprised by where the conversation landed. He expected a tactical framework for crafting better questions. Instead, he got a philosophical lens: good questions emerge from good context. That insight felt bigger than interviewing.
- It felt like leadership.
- It felt like parenting.
- It felt like marriage.
Because how often do we ask questions with the wrong intent?
- Trying to fix when someone wants to be heard.
- Trying to teach when someone wants connection.
- Trying to solve when someone just needs presence.
The conversation with Steve also reinforced a recurring theme in Erik’s work:
The fastest way to improve your own well-being is to stop obsessing over it.
In a world saturated with anxiety—AI fears, financial uncertainty, social media overload, male loneliness—the reflex is to look inward.
But Steve’s reminder was simple and ancient:
Turn outward. Serve someone.
The paradox? That’s where joy tends to show up.
🧰 From Insight to Action
If Erik were to distill this reflection into practice, it would look like this:
- Before asking a question, clarify your intention.
- Check your interest level—are you genuinely curious?
- Notice when you’re trying to fix instead of understand.
- Audit your internal meta-narrative. What story are you telling yourself?
- Identify one person you can intentionally serve this week.
Good questions don’t just change conversations.
They change direction.
🗣️ Notable Quotes
“A good question isn’t just about wording—it’s about context.”
“The best thing you can do for yourself is turn outward.”
“If you don’t know your intention, you’ll ask the wrong question.”
“Who do I want to be—and how would I know I’m doing it?”
“Your internal story sets the tone for your external life.”
🔗 Links & Resources
