Potato Chips Are an Excellent Source of Potassium

Last week my chiropractor told me to get more potassium to help me heal after a minor injury.

I went on a potassium hunt. Beyond bananas, though, I wasn’t too sure about my options.

According to the website I found, there’s lots of potassium in avocados, raisins, potato chips (!), beef and dairy products.

But none in grains.

Which got me to thinking:

If there’s potassium in beef,
and there’s potassium in milk,
but none in grains,
and cows eat grains:

How did the potassium get into the cow?

And my brain got stuck marching down that path.

I got curious about how the potassium was getting into the cows.

And for three days, the question

How did the potassium get into the cow if it’s not coming from grain?

quietly bubbled around the back of my mind.

I started noticing things I usually ignore. The supermarket suddenly seemed to have a much larger dairy section, and there were a lot more avocados than I remembered.

Odwalla bars have a lot of potassium. Oreos have no potassium, (which doesn’t stop me from eating them).

And that question

How did the potassium get into the cow, if it’s not coming from grain?

kept bubbling, subtly changing the way I saw the world. I was surrounded by potassium-rich food.

I was starting to get annoyed. I wasn’t getting anywhere, answers weren’t coming.

And then I noticed the question I was asking, I actually listened to the noise in my brain. I realized that by including “it’s not coming from grain” made it impossible for me to answer my question.

It was suddenly obvious: there’s not a lot of potassium in a slice of bread, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t potassium in grain cows are eating!

It was that simple.

As soon as that question stopped buzzing around my head, my brain stopped noticing the yogurt and the avocados. It didn’t need to focus on them anymore.

This is a key aspect of how your brain works: It gets curious about something, and it starts paying attention to information that might answer the question.

Let a question float around the back of your mind, and your brain changes the way the world appears. Even if the question makes an answer impossible.

Change the question, change the world.

Ready to get curious how you can change the questions you’re asking? Go on the short (3-5 minute) Treasure Hunt, Change the question, change the world, and find treasures for yourself right now!