36 Questions for Creating Closeness

At many times in my life I’ve felt like I was alone and this made me feel extremely sad and lost. However in contrast, the really best times of my life have been where I’ve bridged that gap and managed to develop a genuine and real connection with someone and formed a meaningful friendship or relationship. Here are 36 questions that help to create closeness.

These questions below are rather famous were designed by social psychologists and husband and wife at UC Berkeley Elaine and Arthur Aron in the 90’s. The questions have an almost mythical quality and have gained an almost cult-status in how they work to bring people together. Lots of headlines followed about the ‘Love Questions’, but they needn’t just be used for fostering romantic love, they are also simply about connecting with people and forming friendships as well.

As an emotional, highly sensitive and feely INFJ, I have always been fascinated with the machinations of how people become closer and how to develop and cultivate these kinds of real connections. These questions should intensify and codify the feelings one has when sitting on an airplane or in close quarters with a stranger and finding yourself drawn into their world. Via the amazing website ‘Greater Good in Action’ by UC Berkeley.

In honour of this I am going to attempt to answer some of these questions (the less intimate and private ones) on this blog and invite other people to reply to me in the comments or in their own blog posts, with their own shared answers to the same question. I hope you will join in, it should be fun. Here are the instructions for the conversation style of using the questions with someone in person.

Time Required

45 minutes each time you do this practice. 

How to Do It

1. Identify someone with whom you’d like to become closer. It could be someone you know well or someone you’re just getting to know. Although this exercise has a reputation for making people fall in love, it is actually useful for anyone you want to feel close to, including family members, friends, and acquaintances. Before trying it, make sure both you and your partner are comfortable with sharing personal thoughts and feelings with each other.
2. Find a time when you and your partner have at least 45 minutes free and are able to meet in person.
3. For 15 minutes, take turns asking one another the questions in Set I below. Each person should answer each question, but in an alternating order, so that a different person goes first each time. 
4. After 15 minutes, move on to Set II, even if you haven’t yet finished the Set I questions. Then spend 15 minutes on Set II, following the same system. 
5. After 15 minutes on Set II, spend 15 minutes on Set III. (Note: Each set of questions is designed to be more probing than the previous one. The 15-minute periods ensure that you spend an equivalent amount of time at each level of self-disclosure).

Set I

1. Given the choice of anyone in the world, whom would you want as a dinner guest?

2. Would you like to be famous? In what way?

3. Before making a telephone call, do you ever rehearse what you are going to say? Why?

4. What would constitute a “perfect” day for you?

5. When did you last sing to yourself? To someone else?

6. If you were able to live to the age of 90 and retain either the mind or body of a 30-year-old for the last 60 years of your life, which would you want?

7. Do you have a secret hunch about how you will die?

8. Name three things you and your partner appear to have in common.

9. For what in your life do you feel most grateful?

10. If you could change anything about the way you were raised, what would it be?

11. Take four minutes and tell your partner your life story in as much detail as possible.

12. If you could wake up tomorrow having gained any one quality or ability, what would it be?

Set II

13. If a crystal ball could tell you the truth about yourself, your life, the future, or anything else, what would you want to know?

14. Is there something that you’ve dreamed of doing for a long time? Why haven’t you done it?

15. What is the greatest accomplishment of your life?

16. What do you value most in a friendship?

17. What is your most treasured memory?

18. What is your most terrible memory?

19. If you knew that in one year you would die suddenly, would you change anything about the way you are now living? Why?

20. What does friendship mean to you?

21. What roles do love and affection play in your life?

22. Alternate sharing something you consider a positive characteristic of your partner. Share a total of five items.

23. How close and warm is your family? Do you feel your childhood was happier than most other people’s?

24. How do you feel about your relationship with your mother?

Set III

25. Make three true “we” statements each. For instance, “We are both in this room feeling…” 

26. Complete this sentence: “I wish I had someone with whom I could share…”

27. If you were going to become a close friend with your partner, please share what would be important for them to know.

28. Tell your partner what you like about them; be very honest this time, saying things that you might not say to someone you’ve just met.

29. Share with your partner an embarrassing moment in your life.

30. When did you last cry in front of another person? By yourself?

31. Tell your partner something that you like about them [already].

32. What, if anything, is too serious to be joked about?

33. If you were to die this evening with no opportunity to communicate with anyone, what would you most regret not having told someone? Why haven’t you told them yet?

34. Your house, containing everything you own, catches fire. After saving your loved ones and pets, you have time to safely make a final dash to save any one item. What would it be? Why?

35. Of all the people in your family, whose death would you find most disturbing? Why?

36. Share a personal problem and ask your partner’s advice on how they might handle it. Also, ask your partner to reflect back to you how you seem to be feeling about the problem you have chosen.

You can try this practice with different people you want to develop a deeper connection with—but if your answers start to feel routine, consider making up your own list of questions that become increasingly more personal. Two couples can also try this practice together, which has been shown to increase closeness between the couples in addition to enhancing closeness and passionate love within each couple.