What if I were serious?

A thing I'm noticing I can ask myself is: What if I were serious?

That is, given some topic – what if I were serious about that? What if I were serious about this class I'm taking? What if I were serious about online dating? What if I were serious about friendliness? What if I were serious about making conversation? What if I were serious about that talk? What if I were serious about the hallway track? What if I were serious about writing? What if I were serious about tweeting? What if I were serious about Discord? What if I were serious about love? You can ask this about almost any topic or life area.

I like this because it's noncommittal. I'm not saying to myself I should get serious about this or that. I'm just wondering with myself: Hmm, what would that look like? This seems worth doing. I sometimes get myself into mild trouble by assuming I know something. This often happens without realizing. It would have been better to ask. It is easy to get myself into the same kind of trouble by not first asking what would that be like.

You can play with this. Once you have a basic picture you can say: Okay, and what if I were still serious, but a little less serious than that? What would that look like? You can explore the space of possibilities.