The Curiosity Compass
- Difficulty
- Easy
- Time to result
- ~months to results
- Steps
- 6
- Confidence
- —
Simon's replacement for the paralysing search for purpose. Asking what your passion or purpose is places you in a future you cannot predict, which is why so many people stall before starting. Asking what you are most curious about right now grounds you in the present, where you actually have information. From that curiosity you name a vision — it can be a single word, like freedom — which acts as a magnetic charge pulling you forward and giving today's actions context. Then you think big but start small: one step a day. His mechanism for why this works is the map metaphor — you are never given the whole map up front, it opens as you take steps, so specificity is an output of movement rather than a prerequisite for it.
Origin
Extracted from Deep Dive with Ali Abdaal
How to run it
- 1
Swap the purpose question for the curiosity question
Stop asking what your passion or purpose is. Ask instead: what am I most curious about right now. It is answerable today with information you already have.
Watch out Simon's caution: nobody wakes up one morning knowing what they'll do for the rest of their life — that only happens in Hollywood films.
- 2
Name a one-word vision
Give the direction a label even if it's vague. Simon's example is literally one word — freedom — which is enough to give today's actions context.
Pro tip The vision needs to be compelling enough to create an emotional pull; without that magnetic charge, being positively charged in the moment leads nowhere.
- 3
Follow the curiosity into exposure
Convert curiosity into inputs — books, shows, events, community projects, new environments. These are the dots you'll later connect.
- 4
Take one small step today
Ask what is the one small step in my control that I can take today that contributes to the vision. Repeat the question tomorrow.
Pro tip A year of this is 365 steps forward — Simon's argument for why size of step matters less than frequency.
Watch out Thinking big and also starting big is what produces overwhelm; the balance is think big, start small.
- 5
Protect space to connect the dots
Collecting dots through podcasts, videos and conversations is useless without reflection space. If there is zero space, Simon's first intervention is to get space back before anything else.
- 6
Let the vision sharpen as the map opens
As new environments energise you, 'freedom' becomes 'freedom by doing X'. Expect specificity to arrive after movement, like a jigsaw picture forming as pieces go down.
In the wild
Simon never woke up deciding to coach and speak for a living. Disillusioned and unfulfilled in the financial industry, his curiosity was simply: what would life be like if I worked for myself. That led him to business books and shows about entrepreneurship, which led to a first business venture that failed. It led him into community projects, exposure to different people and environments, and a second business that also didn't work out — but that second business led him to the people who pointed him to a two-day coaching event. That weekend became the beginning of his career.
→ Two failed businesses became the stepping stones to a coaching practice, a Sky News and BBC speaking profile, and a Penguin book deal.
Ali tests the framework with the doctor scenario: working sixty-hour weeks, no clarity on purpose, but able to say that a life where he only worked three days a week would give him time. Simon accepts that as a complete starting vision. From there, small steps — reading different material, attending different events — expose him to environments that energise him. Each exposure lets him fill in more of the picture: freedom stops being abstract and becomes freedom by doing a specific thing, and the vision expands as the steps accumulate.
→ A single word replaces the demand for total clarity, so the first step can be taken this week.
Common mistakes
Waiting to discover your purpose first
Simon hears constantly that people aren't executing because they don't know their purpose. The purpose question points at a future nobody can predict — almost nobody had a pandemic in their business plan — so it can never be answered from where you're standing.
Demanding 100% clarity before step one
The map only opens as you walk it. Insisting the whole picture be visible before moving guarantees you never generate the information that would produce the picture.
Collecting dots with no space to connect them
Watching, listening and reading constantly feels like progress, but Simon's point is there's no value in collecting dots if you never give yourself the space to connect them.
From the transcript
“what am I most curious about right now”
“whenever we begin A New Path we don't get given the entire map up front that map opens up as we take steps forwards”
“thinking big and starting small that's the balance that we have to get”
From the episode
Life Coach: Why Your Energy Drives Your Success In Life - Simon Alexander Ong
Simon Alexander Ong