A single question to learn so much about the other person?

Question
What single question could you ask someone to learn the most amount of information about things you care about without it sounding like an interrogation?

Details
Half game, half serious. As I find myself single again and contemplating whether or not I wish to begin dating again... I also find myself wishing to learn a lot about a person in a short period of time. Give me some help here. What are your key questions that are still casual?

What holidays do you celebrate?

I think this shows what is important to the person, can give you a 30,000 foot view of their politics and religion and habits all in one.

I don’t think it’s a question you need to ask. I think it’s facts about your self you need to give for someone else to say I work with that. Ex for myself.
 42 male
Looking for female life partner must be ok with the fallowing
Hunting and fishing (don't have to your self but know i will be often)
Eating all meats and fish
Raising animals and growing gardens
Cooking together  
Staying home except when absolutely necessary that we need something or go to work.
Curling up on the couch together in-front of the wood stove
Children must be ok with having as many as we are blessed to have. I don’t do condoms hate them I will not get fixed.

There is more for me but that is a start. I’m getting out of a 20 year relationship. so I’m not sure where I’m going to land yet but that’s a start of how my future add will look. I’m getting out of the “normal world” and going to home stead for a more laidback lifestyle.

That is what I think they best way to approach a new relationship give them what you do, what you want to see if they will fallow and jive. If they see major thing they don’t like then that’s ok. But a one question to tell you the most information will not happen.

It sounds casual, but it quietly reveals a lot values, priorities, routines, energy level, relationships, work/life balance, and even temperament. Some people talk about family dinners, some about faith, some about projects, solitude, fitness, service, or adventure. You learn what actually pulls them forward, not just what they say they care about.

What do you think about chiropractors?

or maybe also add what do you think about naturopathic doctors?

I feel like that can tell you a lot about their philosophies of health and healthcare and could lead into conversations about diet and medicine.

What do you like to make?

How do you recycle?

What's the last book you loved? And couldn't finish? (I know...that's two questions...)

Do you vote?

Those are some great questions. I particularly like the "what do you like to make?" one. Very open ended with all sorts of possibilities.

Matt McSpadden wrote:What holidays do you celebrate?

I think this shows what is important to the person, can give you a 30,000 foot view of their politics and religion and habits all in one.

I wonder if it does. I celebrate, in order of importance: Christmas, Thanksgiving, Easter, tie: Memorial- / Labor- / Independence-Day. If I expanded on that a little, I'd talk about feasting (grilling in the summer, not in the winter). I'd have to expand more before you picked up that our celebrations are entirely secular and if I didn't you might think our religious views were more in line than they actually are. (OTOH, I guess there's only so much you can get out of a single question...)

To back into this, I would avoid any “why” questions.  From a linguistics approach as well as counseling, it is considered to be the most hostile word in the English language.

At a personal level, I like to ask a relatively simple question that can be answered with a yes or no.   Then I wait to see if there is a yes, no, or I don’t know in the answer.  If I get ”the speech” without one of those answers in it, I run.   For example, if I ask “do you like chocolate ice cream”, and the person gives me a speech about the time he had chocolate ice cream and he choked on it and had to go to the hospital…without saying yes or no. Then  if I assume the speech means no, my experience has been that this person will later come back and say, “I never told you I didn’t like chocolate ice cream, I just had one bad experience with it.”  That tells me the person, for whatever reason, does not communicate in good faith.  

What are you most happy doing?

What motivates you?

How do you try to benefit your community? the earth?

What are your long-term goals?

I think it is less a question but silence and a listening ear that lets us know the most. When we gain a person's trust that we are good listeners and not judgemental, they bring up what is important (most interesting) to them and there is so much we can learn from that.

An innocuous, in the moment question that is relevant, but never around sensitive topics, is a good place to start.

It’s a cliche that Americans are so weird because we habitually ask “what do you do?” (as in, for work) when we first meet someone, a question derided because it supposedly reduces people to their productivity in a capitalist system and so on, but for a long time I have come back to this in my thoughts and concluded it is an elegant and useful question and I am in favor of asking it.

It tells me what a person is drawn to, what their strengths are, and in the absence of greater quantities of specific facts about them, it can give me clues to their personality, disposition, predilections, even possibly their values and such. Or if they are in their career begrudgingly, that opens another interesting conversational path.

If I am able, it also serves as a secret handshake because I can ask follow-up questions about the particulars of their work that the average person doesn’t know. (In my previous career, part of it was spent learning “insider baseball”-type details about a wide variety of occupations, and my fascination with people’s work has persisted.) This can be refreshing for them if they are not accustomed to meeting people who know anything about their job.

The basic idea anyway is that your job is what you spend a third of your life doing, so why shouldn’t it contain an outsized amount of information about what you’re like?

Maybe start with something easy like " what makes you happy in a relationship" if it aligns with you, you have something to work with together as a start. Expand from there.

Is your diet currently omnivore, vegetarian, or vegan...and why?

Leaves a lot of room for further discussions if desired, but is essentially the core of a person's being/lifestyle - which could also make things a simple yes or no relating to compatibility.

If you had the power to fix the world, what would you do first?

"Whom do you admire?"

Hey Matt, love this post as I have found myself in this same thought process. A lot of people have told me it's because I am a virgo, but hey to each their own on that. But for me I've been shown more than ever recently how important my childhood memories of holidays and such were all surrounded by family. I love having my own space but sharing the little moments and things in life means a lot to us if that is truly important.

Haha guess that's why we find ourselves on here. For me living alone on a little Island in Florida where the right people don't just walk through the gate, right? But here, where I personally feel I can truly relate and am bound to connect with the most like minded people!

So I'm a straight 37y old male and always had a kind of knowing I would have a daughter and that would "settle me down". My three questions are what I've learned the hard way to ask to allow that person to show me they are a good partner. Otherwise I'm totally fine being alone.

1) It's got to be off the cuff, "What's your relationship like with your Father." Key word is Father, and just listen. Pay attention to body language and be ready to be supportive too.
  You'll see why that's such an important question as soon as you ask it. Definitely never used this online and I'm not on dating apps so this is just an in person thing I love. I may know it's not worth our time and energy right there. Best to not hurt each other and waste each others time.

2) As a child what did you want to be when you grew up/dreams were important? And what stopped that curiosity/passion?
Just listen, it tells me a lot about who they are at their core and kinda what they'd be like long term really. Are they ambitious and not willing to be held back by others telling them it's impossible? Super cool for me because I get to see if they're creative and love art as much as i do. Because artists aren't artists really, it's Art Life and that comes through.


3) If someone asked you to list everything you loved, what number would say Myself? Man.. you know how hard this is because most people we won't even want to ask.
Just listen because you have to love when you get people thinking and they want to talk. 💕

Hope that helps. For me every once in a while I'll have a friend of a friend in the real world I'll meet and hope to get to know but for me they've always had boyfriends. So that's obviously really important. I've had women tell me they wished a guy had told them he liked them when they were with some shitty guy. That I should always just at least tell them. Have to be respectful and leave it alone though. Man dating sucks now days huh? Jeez. Good thing we live the self sufficient lifestyle of creating and riding our own wave. 🤙🏼

If you could go back in time and tell your childhood self three important things, what would those things be and why?

I think rather than 'what do you do for work', 'what do you like to do when you're not at work', might give more insights into someones personality. Many people are stuck in a job that pays the bills for whatever reason, and what they do for a hobby or relaxation, I think would say more about themselves and their aspirations and inclinations. Do they slob out in front of TV? spend time with family? dig in the garden? travel? make creative things? It also leads nicely into sharing what you do, even if you don't know much about their topic. I'm not good at conversation, so a leading question would help me a lot.

Nancy Reading wrote:I think rather than 'what do you do for work', 'what do you like to do when you're not at work', might give more insights into someones personality.

I was just thinking about this!!
I recently read a suggestion saying that instead of the usual "what do you do" that it is so much more meaningful for both people when you ask "what do you do for fun". Everyone loves to talk about what they enjoy, and as humans we look for connection, it is a nice way to have a positive interaction. Plus the whole bonus of avoiding the minefield of work-related conversation.