Martha Beck's "20 Questions That Could Change Your Life"

(Oprah.com) -- If you're like most people, you became obsessed with questions around the age of two or three, and scientists now know that continuing to ask them can help keep your mind nimble however old you eventually become.

So when someone suggested I put together a list of the 20 most important questions we should all be asking ourselves, I was thrilled. Initially.

Then I became confused about which questions to ask, because of course, as I soon realized, context is everything. In terms of saving your life, the key question is, "Did I remember to fasten my seat belt?" In terms of saving money, "How much do I need to retire before I'm 90?" is a strong contender. If daily usefulness is the point, "What'll I wear?" and "What should I eat first?" might lead the list. And for the philosophically minded, "To be or not to be?" really is the question.

Because I'm far too psychologically fragile to make sense of this subjective morass, I made the bold decision to pass the buck. The 20 questions that follow are based on "crowdsourcing," meaning I asked a whole mess of actual, free-range women what they thought every woman should ask herself. Thanks to all of you who sent in entries via social media.

The questions included here are composites of those that were suggested most often, though I've mushed them together and rephrased some for brevity. Asking them today could redirect your life. Answering them every day will transform it.

1. What questions should I be asking myself?

At first I thought asking yourself what you should be asking yourself was redundant. It isn't. Without this question, you wouldn't ask any others, so it gets top billing. It creates an alert, thoughtful mind state, ideal for ferreting out the information you most need in every situation. Ask it frequently.

2. Is this what I want to be doing?

This very moment is, always, the only moment in which you can make changes. Knowing which changes are best for you comes, always, from assessing what you feel. Ask yourself many times every day if you like what you're doing. If the answer is no, start noticing what you'd prefer. Thus begins the revolution.

3. Why worry?

These two words, considered sincerely, can radically reconfigure the landscape of your mind. Worry rarely leads to positive action; it's just painful, useless fear about hypothetical events, which scuttles happiness rather than ensuring it. Some psychologists say that by focusing on gratitude, we can shut down the part of the brain that worries. It actually works!

4. Why do I like {cupcakes} more than I like {people}?

Feel free to switch out the words in brackets: You may like TV more than exercise, or bad boys more than nice guys, or burglary more than reading. Whatever the particulars, every woman has something she likes more than the somethings she's supposed to like. But forcing "virtues" -- trying to like people more than cupcakes -- drives us to vices that offer false freedom from oppression. Stop trying to like the things you don't like, and many vices will disappear on their own.

5. How do I want the world to be different because I lived in it?

Your existence is already a factor in world history -- now, what sort of factor do you want it to be? Maybe you know you're here to create worldwide prosperity, a beautiful family, or one really excellent bagel. If your impressions are more vague, keep asking this question. Eventually you'll glimpse clearer outlines of your destiny. Live by design, not by accident.

6. How do I want to be different because I lived in this world?

In small ways or large, your life will change the world -- and in small ways or large, the world will change you. What experiences do you want to have during your brief sojourn here? Make a list. Make a vision board. Make a promise. This won't control your future, but it will shape it.

7. Are {vegans} better people?

Again, it doesn't have to be vegans; the brackets are for you to fill in. Substitute the virtue squad that makes you feel worst about yourself, the one you'll never have the discipline to join, whether it's ultra-marathoners or mothers who never raise their voices. Whatever group you're asking about, the answer to this question is no.

8. What is my body telling me?

As I often say, my mind is a two-bit whore -- by which I mean that my self-justifying brain, like any self-justifying brain, will happily absorb beliefs based on biases, ego gratification, magical thinking, or just plain error. The body knows better. It's a wise, capable creature. It recoils from what's bad for us, and leans into what's good. Let it.

9. How much junk could a chic chick chuck if a chic chick could chuck junk?

I believe this question was originally posed by Lao Tzu, who also wrote, "To become learned, each day add something. To become enlightened, each day drop something." Face it: You'd be better off without some of your relationships, many of your possessions, and most of your thoughts. Chuck your chic-chick junk, chic chick. Enlightenment awaits.

10. What's so funny?

Adults tend to put this question to children in a homicidal-sounding snarl, which is probably why as you grew up, your laughter rate dropped from 400 times a day (for toddlers) to the grown-up daily average of 15. Regain your youth by laughing at every possible situation. Then, please, tell us what's funny -- about everyday life, about human nature, even about pain and fear. We'll pay you anything.

11. Where am I wrong?

This might well be the most powerful question on our list -- as Socrates believed, we gain our first measure of intelligence when we first admit our own ignorance. Your ego wants you to avoid noticing where you may have bad information or unworkable ideas. But you'll gain far more capability and respect by asking where you're wrong than by insisting you're right.

12. What potential memories am I bartering, and is the profit worth the price?

I once read a story about a world where people sold memories the way we can sell plasma. The protagonist was an addict who'd pawned many memories for drugs but had sworn never to sell his memory of falling in love. His addiction won. Afterward he was unaware of his loss, lacking the memory he'd sold. But for the reader, the trade-off was ghastly to contemplate. Every time you choose social acceptance over your heart's desires, or financial gain over ethics, or your comfort zone over the adventure you were born to experience, you're making a similar deal. Don't.

13. Am I the only one struggling not to {fart} during {yoga}?

I felt profoundly liberated when this issue was raised on Saturday Night Live's "Weekend Update." Not everyone does yoga, but SNL reminded me that everyone dreads committing some sort of gaffe. Substitute your greatest shame-fear: crying at work, belching in church, throwing up on the prime minister of Japan. Then know you aren't alone. Everyone worries about such faux pas, and many have committed them (well, maybe not the throwing up on PMs). Accepting this is a bold step toward mental health and a just society.

14. What do I love to practice?

Some psychologists believe that no one is born with any particular talent and that all skill is gained through practice. Studies have shown that masters are simply people who've practiced a skill intensely for 10,000 hours or more. That requires loving -- not liking, loving -- what you do. If you really want to excel, go where you're passionate enough to practice.

15. Where could I work less and achieve more?

To maximize time spent practicing your passions, minimize everything else. These days you can find machines or human helpers to assist with almost anything. Author Timothy Ferriss "batches" job tasks into his famous "four-hour workweek." My client Cindy has an e-mail ghostwriter. Another client, Angela, hired an assistant in the Philippines who flawlessly tracks her schedule and her investments. Get creative with available resources to find more time in your life and life in your time.

16. How can I keep myself absolutely safe?

Ask this question just to remind yourself of the answer: You can't. Life is inherently uncertain. The way to cope with that reality is not to control and avoid your way into a rigid little demi-life, but to develop courage. Doing what you long to do, despite fear, will accomplish this.

17. Where should I break the rules?

If everyone kept all the rules, we'd still be practicing cherished traditions like child marriage, slavery, and public hangings. The way humans become humane is by assessing from the heart, rather than the rule book, where the justice of a situation lies. Sometimes you have to break the rules around you to keep the rules within you.

18. So say I lived in that fabulous house in Tuscany, with untold wealth, a gorgeous, adoring mate, and a full staff of servants...then what?

We can get so obsessed with acquiring fabulous lives that we forget to live. When my clients ask themselves this question, they almost always discover that their "perfect life" pastimes are already available. Sharing joy with loved ones, spending time in nature, finding inner peace, writing your novel, plotting revenge -- you can do all these things right now. Begin!

19. Are my thoughts hurting or healing?

Your situation may endanger your life and limbs, but only your thoughts can endanger your happiness. Telling yourself a miserable mental story about your circumstances creates suffering. Telling yourself a more positive and grateful story, studies show, increases happiness. Wherever you are, whatever you're doing, choose thoughts that knit your heart together, rather than tear it apart.

20. Really truly: Is this what I want to be doing?

It's been several seconds since you asked this. Ask it again. Not to make yourself petulant or frustrated -- just to see if it's possible to choose anything, and I mean any little thing, that would make your present experience more delightful. Thus continues the revolution.

Ramblin'...where to begin? I taste the summer on your peppery skin...

This has got to be the first real snow day I've had in years. In college, school still happens regardless of the weather. You may or may not have class, depending on whether or not your professor has a car with all-wheel drive, but you still have that 15-page paper to write, that group project meeting at the library at 9:00 and that take-home test from the maniacal calculus teacher who thinks spending four hours a week in class, three hours in tutoring and God-only knows how long per week on homework just isn't enough. This is the closest I've come to a grade-school snow since grade school. I helped a friend dig out her car and her driveway, which was sort of like building a fort (not really), and work was canceled, so now I'm all cozy in my little apartment watching the snow continue to fly by the window and accumulate in the bittersweet vines across the way.

I finally talked to my dad about "the future" and he was wonderful, of course. I don't know why I still dread talking to my father about difficult things, like he's going to blow up on me like he did when I was a kid and be angry and disappointed in me. He's not that person any more; we've both grown a lot since those dark days and we've also grown closer. I honestly tell people that my dad is my best friend, because it's true. I thank my lucky stars every day to have a dad like him. He's kind and patient (except when he or I get lost) and funny and a blast to hang out with. He always gives me the best advice and he's so damn smart I can hardly stand it sometimes. Just the wisdom that comes from living a long, hard life, I suppose.

Anyway, I told him how much I hated my job and don't think I can survive another year and a half, let alone the six months I have left in my current contract. The work is boring and not challenging at all, the other AmeriCorps members (except Tiff and Mike, who ROCK) are catty and take themselves so seriously it's almost ridiculous. The trainings are crushingly boring and such a huge waste of time for the most part. I wake up every day and need the Jaws of Life to pry myself out of my bed and go to work, and on my days off, I spend half my time dreading having to go back. It's embarassing, frankly, because it's should be a great job--I'm helping people, I'm in an office full of nice coworkers, I'm learning a lot, and I'm getting paid. I should be happier, but I'm just not. Even if I can't explain it, it's honestly the way I feel, and it's important to be honest with yourself and listen to what your body is telling you. I told my dad all of this and he said he knew exactly how I felt. He remembers jobs that he hated more than anything in the world, and he also remembers working for companies that were closing down and playing solitaire as he counted down the hours (sounds familiar).

I told him I was still unsure about what to do next. He said, "Well obviously you need to look for a new job. Start looking now, because it very well might take that long to find one." He also said I should try to figure out what I'm passionate about, what I'm good at, and what makes me happy and pursue that. I honestly laughed out loud and said, "Funny you should say that, because I've been dreading telling you this, but...I know what really makes me happy is cooking..." and then braced myself for the hurricane.

Instead, he said, "Great! You can make a lot of money and be really happy in a cooking career." I was half taken aback and half completely unsurprised. Half of me knows my father is going to be supportive of whatever I decide to do, but half of me still remembers the old scars. I told him how scared I am of making such a huge shift and such a huge commitment, and told me "Why not start out small? Dip your toes in the water before you jump in? Take a few cooking classes and see if you like it; get a part-time job at a restaurant and see if you think you can cut it. If you fall in love with it, you'll turn 25 in less than two years and finally get your trust fund from when we lost mom. If you want to cash in some stocks and go to culinary school, it's your money and your life. I say go for it!" Seriously, he's so damn smart sometimes.

I love my dad so much it hurts sometimes. He's the best man that I've ever known and I'm so proud to call him father. I usually don't have the courage to tell him so (without a little "liquid encouragement" anyway), but I really should say it more often. He's the best dad in the world. Frankly, I think it makes it hard for me to find a boyfriend that measures up because my standards are so high. I'm not ashamed to admit I'm looking for someone just like my dad. It's a good thing, in my case, assuming that such a man exists (sometimes I'm not so sure). I guess that's enough mushy stuff about my dad. I think I'll go enjoy this snow day a little more: read a book, watch a Disney movie, play my guitar...did I mention my New Year's Resolution? It's to rediscover my passion for playing guitar. On New Year's Day my dad totally called me out on not practicing and losing my passion and I finally admitted to myself that it's because I miss my girls so much--Nina, Medina, Carlo, and Katy especially. I miss sitting around the living room at Park Street, passing the guitar around and singing along to songs we all know by heart. I've felt lost without them and so I've barely touched my guitar since graduation. I'm going to get it back though--the passion, the talent, the calouses and everything. I'm starting by leaving my guitar out of the case all the time. It sits on my sofa mostly, and so far I've been picking it up a lot more now that it's not "out of sight, out of mind" under my bed. It feels great, and I can't wait to show off my new songs to my dad and all our friends at the Luau in April. I'll show 'em I've still got what it takes!!!

For the record, my heart is sore.

Such a long time it has been since I posted last. I think I failed to finish my stories from the Sturgis trip, but I'll come back to that eventually. I had to set that aside for a while because when I got back from South Dakota the defecation really hit the ventilation with my boyfriend and he asked me to move out, so I did, and shortly thereafter he broke up with me. I have since been relearning how to be alone and how to be single. Some days I love it; other days I cry for the loneliness in my heart. I found a studio apartment in Chicopee, just a few miles from my old Alma Mater, Mount Holyoke, and moved in on October 1, 2010, just a few weeks after beginning my new not-job (it's technically a "service position") as an AmeriCorps Legal Assistant at a Legal Services office in Springfield.

For the past five months I've been helping impoverished immigrants file pettions for legal status in the U.S. and most of my clients have been women who are victims of domestic violence. It's an incredibly difficult job, emotionally, but not especially challenging mentally, so I've slowly grown to dislike it. Don't get me wrong, I'm incredibly grateful to have a job in this difficult economy and the people I work with are wonderful, but I've decided in my heart that I was not cut out to be a lawyer, as cool as it might be to put "Esquire" after my name.

I had a bit of an existential crisis this morning, as recent college graduates are wont to do. In my heart, I know I want to cook and to go to culinary school and learn to be a great chef, but I haven't yet accepted the drawbacks that come with that particular territory: low pay, grueling hours and no days off, no health insurance or benefits, very little room for career advancement especially in the current economy, etc. I know that becoming a lawyer or getting another desk job would have its own drawbacks, though: I wouldn't be as passionate about it, probably, it wouldn't be as much fun, I run the risk of becoming bitter and cynical in a job I might hate, and I'd be doing something for the money because I'm up to my eyeballs in student loan debt, not because I'm following my heart. Plus, sitting in a desk chair all day is wreaking havoc on my back.

I ended up having a decent day at work, which was encouraging, but I haven't made much progress on deciding what I want to do with my future. Do I apply for a second year with AmeriCorps because it's easy and safe and I can postpone/help pay off my student loans and put off making a real decision for another year? Or do I decide I can't take it any more and have to woman up and find a new job? Grad school is another option on the table, but I'm just not ready to go back to school yet, I don't think. Got a pep talk from my best friend from high school, Kyle, and feel a lot less panicked now, but eventually I have to decide, and eventually I have to tell my father about it. Horrors.

I had a dream a couple weeks ago that was a sequel to Mary Poppins all drawn in anime, including a flashback prequel to how she became a nanny and met Bert. I gotta lay off the sauce.