1. Introduction: experimenting with examples Think of a context that is important to you that involves at least one other person. Keeping that context the same, experiment with several of the questions below, in order to discover how different questions alter your experience. Notice how your experience of the same event changes when you ask each question internally. Particularly notice how the scope of your attention shifts, and also any shifts in the three major sensory modalities — visual images, auditory sounds, and kinesthetic feelings.
What can I get here? What do you want? Aren't I clever?
What should I do?
Am I safe?
Do I have a place here?
What's wrong?
What do they want from me?
Have I done everything I could have?
Am I included?
How does it work?
What is my place here?
Am I well?
How else could it be?
Do I want this?
How am I doing?
What's most important?
What do I have to contribute?
Am I good enough?
Is this all there is?
Who's in charge?
How can I help?
Do they love me?
Is it right?
What's happening to me? If I survive this, what's next?
Do I belong?
How can this give me pleasure?
Will I survive this?
Am I being understood?
How could this be better?
What's missing?
What should I do next?
How can I make the most of this situation?
Pause to share your experience of a number of these questions, and compare what you noticed with what others noticed… .
2. Select a context Now think of an example of an important context in your life: "home," "work," "relationship," "children," etc. that includes at least one other person. Notice how you represent this example in all three major modalities (images, sounds, and feelings). Also notice the submodalities of your experience — the smaller elements within each modality. For instance, the brightness, size, color, distance, moving/still, 3–D/flat of the visual image, the loudness, tonality and tempo of any auditory words or sounds, and the intensity, extent and qualities — hardness, temperature, etc. — of any tactile kinesthetic feelings you have… .
3. Eliciting your core question
a. Method 1 While thinking of your experience of this major life context, ask yourself, "Ifthere were a question, always in the back ofmy mind, that quietly
guided all my experience and behavior in this context, what would it be?" Imagine that this question is just underneath your conscious awareness, directing your attention, and guiding all your behavior.
Write this question down, and then think of your important life context again, and imagine asking it there. If this question changes your representation of this context, it's probably not quite the right one. Your core question will fit the context so well that it won't change your representation when you ask it. Try adjusting your question until you find one that fits better… .
Now think of the opposite of your core question — whatever "opposite" means to you. Write this question down, and then notice how it changes your experience of your important life context when you imagine asking it… .
Experimenting with the opposite of your question offers a vivid contrast for realizing the impact of a question, and it often clarifies what your question might be. You can also try the alternate method below for eliciting your core question:
3b. Method 2 Think of a profoundly altered state you have experienced that was pleasant… .
Put yourself back into this state, experience it, and identify what makes it strikingly different from your usual experience. In an altered state the core question is either not asked or is completely answered, and this is one of the factors that makes this state altered. This altered state will be the opposite of your usual state.
For example, one man said, "When I was in that state I thought, 'What are people afraid of?' I was amazed that people could be scared of anything. I felt completely safe." This indicates a core question that might be something like, "Am I safe?" or "How safe am I?" Since he usually continually focused on safety, being completely safe and not needing to test for safety was a very altered state for him. Another person said, "In that state it was very clear that there was nothing to be done; everything was perfect as it was." The opposite of this might be something like "What shall I do next?" or "What needs to be done?"
Using these understandings, determine what is different about your altered state… .
Then choose a core question that is the opposite of your experience in the altered state… .
4. Try out your core question in some other major life contexts to see how well it fits there. Make any adjustments that you can think of to make it fit better in all those contexts. For instance, "What food shall I choose," would be limited to only a few contexts, but "What should I do next" is more general, so it could be used anywhere.
5. Share your experiences Share what you found in steps 3 and 4 with the other people you are doing the exercise with… .
6. Experimenting and adjusting Next, try on the questions of the others in your group, one at a time. Notice how these different questions change your experience. When you try on these different core questions, what aspects do you like, dislike, find interesting or useful, etc.? …
Again, share your experience with the others in your trio… .
7. Examine a question As a trio, take one core question and examine it, using the checklist that follows, to identify possible problems or limitations. Keep in mind that a core question is a very condensed distillation that is embedded in all of a person's presuppositions, beliefs, and ways of organizing their experience Also keep in mind that each word in a core question can have many different meanings to different people. A question that works well for one person may work very differently for someone else. The checklist is only a way to alert you to possible limitations that you might not otherwise notice, and these can be a focus for experimenting with modifications or alternatives in the next step of this exercise.
8. Checklist (items are not listed in order of importance or any other hierarchy.)
a) What is presupposed? (Negate the question and notice what is still true. An effective core question presupposes choice, ability, resources, good feelings, etc.)
b) What modal operator(s) are contained in the question? Modal operators are words that indicate possibility, choice, desire, or necessity — and their negations. A useful core question will usually include possibility, choice, and desire, rather than necessity or negations of possibility, choice, or desire. (For more on modal operators: (sbe2, chapter 4)