curiosity is a strange emotion.
to some, its frowned upon. its seen as impolite, overstepping, or not minding your own business.
to others, including myself, it’s the highest form of intimacy.
to be fully curious about someone means you care enough about them to want to understand everything about their past history, present life, and future goals. there’s really no bigger compliment than that.
and yet, so often, we consciously or subconsciously suppress it.
do any of these ring a bell?
- you want to ask someone a specific question, but stop yourself for fear of being seen as ‘weird’ or ‘too intense’
- the conversation flows smoothly, but never dips below the safety of surface-level substance
- neither of you would call, but both of you would answer
all of these are a result of either you or the person you’re speaking to suppressing curiosity.
this may not seem like a big deal at first.
the loss isn’t tangible, after all: by limiting your curiosity, you’re only losing out on potential information. and potential is incredibly easy to dismiss.
dismissing potential feels like a logical conclusion; a protective measure against rejection.
ironically, that same ‘protection’ is exactly what’s damaging. allow me to explain.
the limitations of logic
if you watch my content in any capacity, you already know how much i value logic when looking at human behaviour.
but when it comes to curiosity, logic has a distinct limit.
logic relies strictly on certainty. it picks the option with the highest probability of success, and that makes it a necessity for a lot of the decision-making we do.
but curiosity is inherently founded on uncertainty.
the curiosity contradiction
according to Loewenstein’s (1994) ‘information-gap’ model in psychology, curiosity is structurally similar to a physically uncomfortable sensation.
in other words, when your brain realises it’s missing a piece of information about its environment, it treats that gap like a physical hunger or thirst. this manifests as a restless, mildly anxious drive to solve the mystery.
suppressing curiosity is therefore denying a natural, internal signal from your own body. that doesn’t sound very logical to me.
yet, modern culture seems to think otherwise: digital discourse frequently tells us to ‘respect boundaries’ and ‘keep your cards close to your chest’. and honestly speaking, that’s a pretty good starting point. in fact, that’s how i recommend you start most relationships; iykyk.
but never in the mix do we stop and ask ourselves the overarching question:
what’s the point of having cards if you can never actually play them?
because hiding your cards can be a strategy initially, but you can’t win anything if you never play.
at some point, the game plan to ‘protect your peace’ just becomes ‘living a life so calculated nothing has meaning anymore’. and now we’ve just swapped one problem for a worse problem.
so how do we find the ideal balance?
i’ve left you a voice message breaking down my experience with this:
if you’d like me to go deeper on this topic, just reply ‘yes’ to this email. i read this inbox personally x
that’s all for today. speak wisely, choose intentionally, and look after yourself x