How do you make friends? How do you maintain and strengthen your relationships? Our ‘people skills’ might have become rusty over the past couple of years. What’s more, the fast-paced nature of our world often means we rush through life which impacts the formation of meaningful connections with others.

To help you improve your relationships, we took inspiration from these romantic questions and created a Grid-style approach to meaningful conversations. This blog is designed to help you get talking about things that matter: life, how we look after ourselves, work which is and always will be important, and career and purpose.

Use these 20 questions as a guide for meaningful conversation with just about anyone. From your family members and parter to your coworkers and even complete strangers – these questions will facilitate an illuminating dialogue in which you can share perspectives, discover new things about one another and build more trust and understanding. Let us know if we succeeded!

Building Relationships: Life Questions

1. If you could wake up tomorrow having gained just one thing, what would it be?
2. What do you feel most grateful for in your life right now? What was it 5 years ago? What do you think it will be in 5 years?
3. If you could make a single change in your childhood, what would it be? How would it affect the present?
4. What are 3 specific things you’d like your best friend to be or do?
5. If you could take just 2 minutes to tell others the main story of your life, what would you say?

Building Relationships: Self-Care Questions

1. When did you last do something just for you? What was it?
2. What is your most treasured self-care habit or pleasure?
3. What roles do love and affection play in your personal wellbeing?
4. What’s your greatest personal indulgence?
5. What do you like about yourself?

Building Relationships: Work Ethic Questions

1. What did you work hard at even though it didn’t pay well or at all?
2. What is one job that you really disliked and why?
3. What do you like about the people you work with or your clients?
4. What is one thing you wish your workplace knew about you? How would this change your experience working there?
5. Complete this sentence: “I wish I had someone with whom I could… “

Building Relationships: Career View Questions

1. Do you believe in life having a purpose? How do you see yours?
2. If you made a positive difference to other people’s lives, what would you like this to be? 
3. Is there something that you’ve dreamed of doing for a long time? Why haven’t you done it?
4. What was the proudest moment of your career? What do you think of it now?
5. Which subjects or topics really excite you? 

Next steps to make friends and maintain healthy relationships

We hope you took this invitation to connect with others on a deeper level and strengthen your relationships. If you tried them out, write to us and let us know the outcome! Here are more ways you can take action towards building better relationships:

• Get your copy of these free emotional connection worksheets and discover more ways you can improve your communication with loved ones.
• Join our community’s Facebook Group to get more productivity and wellbeing tips and learn about new free courses we are launching.
• Save yourself a seat on our online 90-minute session on Strengthening Relationships. This is an interactive session where you will get to ask questions, connect with a small group of people and get insight on how you can fit meaningful relationships in your life – happening February 24th!
• Check out these 25 proven ways to raise your emotional intelligence. This is a key factor in how you perceive and act around others!

Your journey is your own to walk, but we are here to help you make the best of each moment.