But Why?: The Power of Questions
Last year, our book club read Rule Makers, Rule Breakers: How Tight and Loose Cultures Wire Our World by Michelle Gelfand. The book goes through a series of research projects that the authors had conducted in various countries and regions. They posited that for various reasons including population density and outside threats, cultures could be either tight or loose. Tight cultures had a lot of unspoken rules. People were expected to conform, dress was very uniform and transgression against those norms were addressed immediately. They also were better equipped to deal with wars, epidemics, and unrest. Loose cultures had fewer unspoken rules. People dressed how they wanted, conformity was frowned upon, and if someone did behave oddly, it was either ignored or embraced. They also fostered greater innovation and creativity.
These cultures were not connected by geography. For example, Japan and Germany were tight cultures, whereas Israel and Brazil were loose cultures. Within the same country, there were differences. Rural New England was different from Southern California. Even within the same place, different people prefer tight norms or loose norms, leading to conflicts if the area and the person don’t match. The book was interesting and showed the pros and cons of both sides, making for a good discussion.
It was also a personal revelation for myself. I am a relatively loose-normed person who was raised in a tight culture. Pennsylvania Dutch Country has a lot of the same cultural characteristics as tight-normed Germany. I now live just outside Seattle, which has some of the loosest norms of anywhere in America. Let me tell you, I notice the difference when I go back.
The biggest difference I felt was in the power of questions. I always felt that asking someone questions about their choices was a way of communicating disapproval. (A way to reinforce tight norms.) I remember telling Forrest that it felt like an interrogation when he would ask lots of questions about how I was thinking about things. That was a tight culture thing.
Out here, I learned about asking questions to gain understanding. A dear friend of mine taught me the art of reacting to difference with curiosity. When a friend did something she didn’t understand, she’d try to get to the heart of it. Not to judge, but to comprehend. How? Why? What was the value behind the choice?
We replayed that game a few weeks ago at dinner. She’s a minimalist and doesn’t love the gift giving frenzy around Christmas. I, on the other hand, love it, even and especially for my many nieces and nephews. She asked me, “Why? You probably got them something they don’t want, another toy forgotten. Why is it so important to you?” I thought about it and expressed the importance to me of keeping family connections, of letting children know that they are loved by more people than they know, and that if the day should come when they need help, maybe they’ll remember that there’s some aunt out there who cared enough to send a junky plastic toy just so they would know who she was. It wasn’t about materialism or competition for more and better stuff. It was about expressing love and loyalty through Legos.
When we don’t understand how or why people make choices, we need to start with honest, kind questions. Maybe we still won’t get it. But maybe they’ll show us a new way of looking at things and we can appreciate that perspective, even as we make our own decisions.
How can you find new a perspective today?
