What you don't ask decides for you too

We think humans always want to know the truth.

Not necessarily.

There's even a field of research dedicated to something called information avoidance.

Researchers Russell Golman, David Hagmann, and George Loewenstein reviewed decades of studies on situations where people avoid information even when that information is useful, accurate, and free. Their review, published in the Journal of Economic Literature, shows that knowing something can have psychological costs: it can trigger unpleasant emotions, threaten beliefs we want to hold onto, or create decisions we'd rather not face.

That means sometimes the problem isn't:

It might be:

And those two sentences are completely different.

Think about an undefined relationship.

Maybe you've spent months trying to read the signs.

How long they take to respond.

What they meant by that.

Why they came back.

Why they pulled away.

Why they watch your stories.

Why they reach out and then disappear.

You ask the Tarot.

You look for signs.

You notice synchronicities.

You talk to your friends.

You try to feel what your intuition says.

Everything except ask one question:

"What do you really want with me?"

Why?

Because as long as you don't hear the answer...

you can still build your own.

And maybe the uncertainty hurts.

But an answer we don't want to hear might hurt more.

This doesn't mean you have to stop believing in signs.

You can find meaning in a coincidence.

You can consult the Tarot.

You can meditate.

You can write.

You can watch the Moon.

But maybe there's an important difference between using those practices to reflect and using them to answer questions another person could answer directly.

You can ask:

But you could also ask:

You can ask:

But maybe you also need to ask:

You can ask for financial clarity.

But maybe clarity starts with opening the bank statement.

Sometimes the spiritual answer we're seeking is hiding a much more earthly question.

Here's where something fascinating appears.

In Difficult Conversations, Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton, and Sheila Heen—from the Harvard Negotiation Project—explain that beneath many difficult conversations there are actually several simultaneous conversations happening.

One is about what happened.

Another about what we feel.

And another about something even deeper:

what that situation means about who we believe we are.

They call it the "identity conversation."

Maybe that's why some questions feel so difficult.

We're not just asking:

We might also be asking ourselves:

We're not just asking:

We're also asking:

We're not just asking:

We're also asking:

So we avoid the question because we feel the answer might say something about our worth.

But a negative answer doesn't necessarily define who you are.

It can simply give you information.

And information, uncomfortable as it may be, lets you decide.

Money is a perfect example.

You can avoid checking the credit card.

You can not add up the debts.

You can stop opening emails.

You can not calculate how much you spent.

For a few hours maybe that reduces the anxiety.

But the number doesn't disappear.

The information we avoid keeps existing even when we choose not to look at it.

Golman, Hagmann, and Loewenstein's review points out precisely that avoiding useful information can have costly consequences.

And that brings us to an uncomfortable idea:

Not deciding also produces results.

Not asking how much you owe is a decision.

Not asking what the other person wants is a decision.

Not asking what your boss expects is a decision.

Not asking why you're exhausted is a decision.

Not asking why you keep going back is also a decision.

Maybe it wasn't a conscious decision.

But it's still moving your life in a direction.

When we don't have information, the mind tries to fill the space.

We interpret.

We assume.

We build explanations.

Sometimes favorable.

Sometimes terrible.

And it's interesting because two people can live through exactly the same uncertainty and create completely different stories.

So the question becomes:

What do I know and what am I filling in myself?

That difference might seem small.

But it changes everything.

On September 30th, Mercury enters Scorpio in tropical astrology. Cafe Astrology records the ingress for that day.

There's no scientific evidence that this transit makes people more inquisitive or triggers difficult conversations.

But as symbolic language, it strikes me as an interesting moment for something very specific:

to stop talking only to the surface.

Don't ask:

when you really want to know:

Don't ask:

when you need to know:

Don't ask:

when the real question is:

Sometimes going deeper doesn't mean finding a mystical secret.

It means daring to ask the right question.

This matters too.

A difficult conversation isn't about interrogating.

Or pressuring someone else until they tell us what we want to hear.

Asking requires another ability:

being willing to listen.

Because there's little point in asking:

if any answer different from our own is going to be argued with until it changes.

Stone, Patton, and Heen point out that difficult conversations contain our own interpretations, feelings, and identity concerns; part of the work is recognizing them so we can listen better to the other person.

A real question means accepting that the other person might surprise us.

For better.

Or for worse.

Try something tonight.

Think about an area of your life where you feel a lot of uncertainty.

A relationship.

Money.

Work.

Family.

A project.

Yourself.

And then ask yourself:

Not which one would be interesting.

Which one you're avoiding.

Now go a little deeper.

Maybe you're not avoiding asking:

Maybe you're avoiding:

Maybe you're not avoiding:

You're avoiding:

Maybe you're not avoiding knowing how much you owe.

You're avoiding:

Often that's where the real fear is.

Not in the answer.

In what comes after.

You don't need to ask ten difficult questions.

Choose just one.

And write down these five things:

1. What do I really need to know? Not what I want to confirm. What I need to know.
2. Why haven't I asked it yet? Fear of rejection, conflict, shame, disappointment, change...
3. What story am I telling myself while I don't have the answer?
4. What will I do if I get the answer I want? And if I get the one I fear?
5. What would be a respectful and direct way to ask the question?

And then decide if it's really appropriate to ask it.

Because not every question needs an immediate confrontation.

But every avoided question deserves at least to be acknowledged.

We have a very nice image of clarity.

As if discovering the truth automatically meant taking a deep breath and feeling:

"Finally."

But sometimes clarity hurts first.

Clarity can confirm that something's over.

That someone doesn't want the same thing.

That a debt is bigger than you imagined.

That you need to start over.

That you've been waiting too long.

That there's no sign coming.

That you simply have to decide.

And maybe that's why we avoid certain answers.

Because we confuse clarity with comfort.

But they're not the same thing.

There's a quiet way of giving away our power.

Not asking.

Not looking.

Not speaking.

Not checking.

Waiting for time to answer for us.

And sometimes time does answer.

It's just that maybe it doesn't choose what we would have chosen.

So before September ends, I want to leave you with a question:

What truth in your life remains uncertain only because you haven't wanted to ask yet?

Maybe you don't need to resolve it today.

Maybe you don't even need to talk to anyone yet.

But you can stop pretending the question doesn't exist.

Because there are silences that protect our peace.

And there are others that only protect our indecision.

Learning to tell them apart is also a form of clarity.

🌙

There are texts that try to give you answers.

With MÍSTICO I want to do something a little different.

I want you to sometimes leave here with a better question.

One you can take with you.

One that appears when you close the screen.

One that might help you see something from a different angle.

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That support helps me keep researching books, studies, traditions, and tools to create content that preserves mystery without giving up discernment.

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If you decide to leave a tip, thank you.

Not for buying an answer.

But for helping me keep asking questions worth asking ourselves.