TIME OUT:Discover how you change over five years
IT MAY SEEM odd to write about a diary in the middle of the year, but springtime, on the cusp of summer, is a good time for reflection. Q&A a Dayis a diary, published by Potter Style in the US this year, that invites such reflection. But it is not an ordinary diary. It is a five-year journal which asks a different question every day of the year.
There is just enough space on each page to answer each question, each day for five consecutive years. That’s 365 questions, or 1,825 answers to be written over that time if the diary is completed each day for the entire five-year period.
That’s a lot of questions to answer. That’s a lot of answers to analyse. That’s a lot of soul searching to undertake.
The questions range from the trivial to the profound: from what your favourite TV show is to where you life is going. For example, the question for today, May 3rd, is this: ‘If you could have a superpower just for today what would it be?’ A question that must capture all our thinking is the one which kicks off the diary – whether or not you believe people can change. Now that is a complex question. What is most interesting about it is whether or not your belief that people can or cannot change will itself change over the five years.
And if the answer changes, will writing in the journal reveal why it changed?
Q&Ais an interesting concept at two levels. By answering questions devised by others we discover much about ourselves, our attitudes, opinions, preferences, ideas, prejudices, moods, values, past experiences, relationships, our achievements, aspirations and future plans. Second, by answering exactly the same question, on exactly the same day, annually, for five years, we can track change, or lack of it, in our responses, which reveals a lot about our lives and ourselves over half a decade.
The art of therapy lies in questioning: in asking questions that are apt, timely, direct, sensitive and perceptive through which the client can gain an understanding of him or herself. The questions are the therapy because within them and their answers lie access to clients’ emotional and psychological worlds.
The Q&A a Dayconcept taps into this. It provides the questions. You provide the answers. The answers provide insights. Such self-revelation is always interesting, always challenging and always unsettling: especially that which reveals how we change psychologically over time. But change in ourselves, unless it is sudden, significant, life-event change, is usually progressive and so subtle as to be imperceptible. This diary provides an indisputable written record of what we think and do, believe and want, over five whole years.
The questions asked are interesting. There are questions such as, “If you were a literary character who would you be?” or “What are the ingredients for a perfect day?”; “What can you live without?”; “What is the craziest thing you have done for love?”; “How could today have been better?”; “What makes you cynical?” and “What is your biggest obstacle right now?”
With a touch of irony, it asks questions such as “What’s your favourite question to ask people?” and “Where do you see yourself in five years’ time?” The answer to the latter can be checked for accuracy at the end of five years.
Of course, the concept of the five-year diary is not new. Children given a five-year diary are often amazed at the visible shift from childhood to adulthood revealed in their interests, activities and aspirations when they compare entries over that time. But the rigour of having to answer the same question honestly on the same day each year does provide an innovative opportunity to discover oneself in the process of change.
There is a crucial question we all must ask of ourselves at some time: “Who am I?” If you had 10 additional significant questions to ask yourself, or those close to you, what would you ask and what answers do you think you would get? And if there were 10 questions you would hate to be asked, what would those be?
You might be surprised by your answers.
Marie Murray is a clinical psychologist and author