Questions I Ask Myself Daily

These are a set of questions I think about almost daily. I find them useful for pushing my thinking, so I thought there might be value in sharing them.

#1: What are the pain points in my life?

I think about this all the time. If I find something annoying or painful, there’s a chance others do, too. That means there’s an opportunity to fix it. If a lot of people find something annoying, there’s probably a big opportunity to fix it. Noticing pain points (and figuring out how to fix them) is an easy way to identify a product or service people may want.

#2: Why does something cost what it does?

Why is one cup of coffee $3 vs. another $5? Why is the onion at the grocery store $0.70? Why is the T in Boston $2.40 per ride? I’ve found this exercise has really expanded my thinking - pushing me to consider input costs, transport expenses, inventories, demand dynamics, and durability (to name a few).

#3: Why am I interested in the things that I find interesting?

I’ve come to grips with the fact that there’s little chance I ever fully answer this.

#4: When am I fine with something being inconvenient?

I’ve written before about how I think people will always want convenience. So far, the only time I’ve seen people consistently forgo convenience is for an experience (e.g., going to a concert vs. watching a music video). I wonder if there are other examples. To date, I haven’t really found any.

#5: What am I going to write about next?

I sit on most ideas for ~3 months before I write them. I’ve been thinking about this piece since I turned 23 in January, when I spent some time reflecting on the prior year (as I bet many do around their birthdays).

Asking myself what I should write about next is less a prompt for publishing and more a prompt for going out and learning something new.