questions-journey skill

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name: questions-journey
description: "Question template for Journey stories ('How I learned X'). Arc: Challenge → Struggle → Discovery → Integration → Wisdom. Use with question-design skill."
---

# Journey Story Questions

**Story type:** "How I learned X"
**Arc:** Challenge → Struggle → Discovery → Integration → Wisdom

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## The Shape

Journey stories follow a learner through transformation. The reader travels with them from ignorance to competence, feeling the struggle and sharing the victory.

**What makes it work:** Authentic struggle. If it was easy, there's no story. The reader needs to feel "I might have quit there too" before the breakthrough lands.

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## Question Sequence

### Opening: The Before State
*Establish who they were before the journey began.*

- "Tell me about who you were before you started learning [X]."
- "What was your relationship with [X] like back then?"
- "What did you believe about [X] or about yourself?"

### The Call: Why Begin?
*What initiated the journey.*

- "What made you decide to start?"
- "Was there a specific moment or event?"
- "What were you hoping would happen?"

### The Struggle: Where It Got Hard
*The authentic difficulty - this is the heart of the story.*

- "What was the hardest part?"
- "Tell me about a time you almost quit."
- "What did failure feel like? What did you do with that?"
- "What took longer than you expected?"
- "Where did you get stuck?"

### The Turn: When Things Shifted
*The breakthrough moment or gradual dawn.*

- "Was there a moment when things started to click?"
- "What changed? Was it sudden or gradual?"
- "What did you finally understand that you hadn't before?"
- "Who or what helped you through?"

### Integration: The New State
*Who they became through the journey.*

- "How do you see [X] differently now?"
- "How has this changed how you approach other things?"
- "What can you do now that you couldn't before?"
- "What's your relationship with [X] like today?"

### Wisdom: What Transfers
*The teaching that serves others.*

- "What would you tell someone just starting this journey?"
- "What do you wish someone had told you?"
- "What's the one thing people get wrong about learning [X]?"
- "What did this teach you about learning itself?"

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## Tacit Knowledge Triggers (Journey-Specific)

- "What did you have to unlearn?"
- "What surprised you about yourself?"
- "What's obvious to you now that was invisible before?"
- "How do you know when someone else is about to have that same breakthrough?"

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## Walking Adaptation

**First quarter:** Opening + The Call (warm-up territory)
**Second quarter:** The Struggle (go deep here - movement helps process difficulty)
**Third quarter:** The Turn + Integration (meaning-making)
**Final quarter:** Wisdom (synthesis, looking forward)

Allow extra time in the Struggle section. This is where the gold is.

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## Example: CS50 at 53

**Opening:** "Tell me about your relationship with coding before CS50."
**The Call:** "What made you decide to try CS50 at 53?"
**Struggle:** "What was the hardest week? Tell me about when you almost quit."
**Turn:** "When did you first feel like 'I can actually do this'?"
**Integration:** "How do you see coding differently now than when you started?"
**Wisdom:** "What would you tell a 50-something considering this path?"

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*The journey story earns its wisdom through authentic struggle.*