Your brain, left to its own devices, doesn't optimize for your wellbeing. It optimizes for threat detection. Give it free rein and it will scan for danger, replay failures, anticipate disasters, and generate worst-case scenarios—not because this is useful, but because this is its default mode.
The solution isn't to fight your brain. It's to redirect it. And the most effective redirection tool is a well-crafted question.
"Your mind will search for whatever you ask it to find. Ask better questions, get better results."
How Questions Work
When you ask yourself a question, your brain treats it as a search query. It goes looking for answers. Ask "what's wrong with this situation?" and your brain will generate a list. Ask "what could go wrong?" and your brain will generate a list.
The brain is remarkably obedient this way. It will search for whatever you ask it to search for. The problem is that most of us, most of the time, are asking it to search for problems.
Meaning-Making Questions
A meaning-making question redirects your brain's search function toward something more useful. Instead of asking what could go wrong, you ask something that bounds your cognition into functional territory.
Examples:
- "How can I get more contentment in the next hour than I would on autopilot?"
- "What's one small thing I could do right now that would make today slightly better?"
- "If I were advising a friend in my situation, what would I suggest?"
- "What am I assuming that might not be true?"
- "What would 'good enough' look like here?"
- "What's the most useful thing I can do with my attention right now?"
Each question does the same thing: it gives your brain something productive to search for instead of letting it default to threat-scanning.
Why This Works
The human mind has difficulty attending to two things simultaneously. When you're actively searching for answers to a meaning-making question, you're not simultaneously ruminating on worst-case scenarios. The question occupies the space that worry would otherwise fill.
Moreover, questions create a sense of agency. You're not passively receiving anxious thoughts; you're actively directing cognition. This shifts you from reactive mode to proactive mode, which feels very different psychologically.
"You can't stop your brain from thinking. But you can give it better things to think about."
The Time Horizon Question
One particularly powerful meaning-making question involves the time horizon: "How can I get more contentment in the next hour than I would on autopilot?"
This question does several things at once:
- It shrinks the time frame to something manageable (one hour)
- It orients toward contentment rather than problem-solving
- It acknowledges that autopilot isn't optimal and invites you to do better
- It requires your brain to search for possibilities rather than threats
Try asking yourself this question a few times throughout the day and see what happens. Your brain, obedient as always, will start generating answers.
Building the Habit
The value of meaning-making questions increases with repetition. The first few times you ask yourself "how can I get more contentment in the next hour?" it might feel awkward or forced. But with practice, the question becomes automatic—and so do the answers.
Eventually, you develop an alternative mental habit. Instead of defaulting to "what's wrong?" your mind starts defaulting to "what's possible?" This isn't about positive thinking or ignoring problems. It's about giving your brain a more useful job than endless threat-scanning.
The brain is a search engine. Feed it better queries, and it will return better results.