We all struggle in business and life, trying to carve a path and do our best. A lot of us feel guilty about taking time for ourselves and following our interests. Spending time “just reading” articles that seemed tangentially related to your industry, or tinkering with ideas that might never amount to anything concrete can feel like a waste of time. This reveals a fundamental misunderstanding about how real progress happens, both in business and in our personal development.
The truth is that curiosity isn’t a luxury you indulge when everything else is finished. It’s the engine that drives innovation, problem-solving, and the kind of strategic thinking that separates successful professionals and businesses from those that merely survive. When you tell yourself that reading broadly or exploring tangential interests is a waste of time, you’re not being disciplined or focused. You’re avoiding the uncomfortable reality that meaningful work often looks unproductive in the moment. The most valuable insights I’ve gained in my legal practice didn’t come from studying more case law or memorizing statutes. They came from understanding psychology, economics, and human behavior through seemingly unrelated reading and exploration.
Leaders who consistently make better decisions are inevitably the ones who follow their intellectual curiosity wherever it leads. They see opportunities others miss because of the breadth and wealth of knowledge gained through their curiosity. They read outside their industries, they tinker with ideas that may never generate revenue, and they invest time in learning things that don’t have immediate practical applications. This isn’t because they have more time than everyone else. It’s because they understand that curiosity is an investment in themselves and their business. They recognize that the connections between disparate ideas often produce the breakthroughs that define success.
The resistance to curiosity usually comes from a need to feel productive in every moment. We’ve been conditioned to believe that unless we can draw a straight line from an activity to a measurable outcome, we’re wasting time. This mindset is particularly dangerous for entrepreneurs and business leaders because it encourages short-term thinking at the expense of long-term competitive advantage. The truth is that if you stop exploring or learning things that don’t have immediate utility, you begin to calcify. Your thinking becomes predictable, your solutions become generic, and your business becomes vulnerable to disruption by competitors who maintained their intellectual flexibility.
The most successful people I know have learned to protect their curiosity like a sacred priority. They block time for reading, for experimentation, for conversations that might lead nowhere immediately useful. They understand that innovation and success aren’t something you can schedule or force. It emerges from the intersection of diverse ideas, from the collision of different perspectives, from the willingness to explore without knowing where exploration will lead. So, the next time you catch yourself dismissing curiosity as a waste of time, know that you’re not being practical, you’re being afraid. Don’t be afraid to start something that might not work or to invest time without a guaranteed return. In business, as in life, the things that matter most rarely announce their value upfront. They require faith, patience, and the courage to follow your curiosity wherever it leads.
