Which trait do you most dislike in yourself?

Originally asked

The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A

The Guardian's The Q&A has retained this Proust-derived prompt from at least 2007 through 2026, and ABC independently put it to the Obamas in 2011.

You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.

Recorded Kareem Abdul-Jabbar said elsewhere, not written here
Laziness. After 30 years of being a disciplined athlete with an intensely tight schedule, I still can’t forgive myself for letting things slide.

Vanity Fair, The Proust Questionnaire, Vanity Fair, August 2020 source ↗

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I can be horribly smug and conceited, and yet always in the back of my mind is the thought that things could go terribly wrong at any moment.
Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 11 October 2025 source ↗

More from Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

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Question What do you do when you feel creatively blocked or stuck? Craft & work
I don’t think that is tough, because if you have an idea of something meaningful to communicate, you can move forward on that. You might not be successful in communicating what you want to communicate, but at least you have an idea of something that needs to be said, or something that you think should be said, and I think you go from there.
Recorded Academy of Achievement source ↗

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