At age 97 and counting, guess.
What is your greatest fear?
Question
When was the last time you changed your mind about something?
Change of mind
Question
What would you like to leave your children?
Death & what remains
Question
What is the most important lesson life has taught you?
Time & hindsight
Question
Which moment embarrassed you most?
Failure & regret
Question
What would you like to be remembered for?
Death & what remains
Question
What is the trait you most deplore in others?
Values & belief
Originally asked
Vanity Fair, to its interview subject, The Proust Questionnaire
The exact prompt is fixed in Vanity Fair's Proust Questionnaire and independently sustained in The Guardian's The Q&A over multiple decades.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
Getting to the end and thinking that I haven’t laughed enough.
The Q&A, The Guardian, 3 January 2026 source ↗
Others on this question
View all 256 →I am petrified of bikini waxing. I had a very bad experience in 1978.
Endless vomiting. That comes from my emetophobia, which is a huge part of my OCD.
Kellie Maloney
Retired boxing manager, promoter and politician
Losing my family.
More from Helen Skelton
View profile →There’s a house near me that I adore and it came up for sale, and I got to the point of nearly buying it and then pulled out because I’m trying to be sensible.
Good memories. When I’m gone, I want them to feel that they were always my No 1 priority.
That you get out of life what you put in. When you grow up on a farm you literally reap what you sow.
After the 2012 Olympics I hosted the parade. I had on a little skirt and when the prime minister came on everyone cheered. I thought: “Oh my God, they love David Cameron,” but they were cheering because my skirt had blown up, and I’d flashed my knickers at him.
As someone who made you think that anything’s possible. I did three marathons in a day once but walking the high-wire at Battersea Park station was the challenge I loved most because I had to master a skill.
Jealousy. It’s the thief of joy.
More on identity & self
- Which trait do you most dislike in yourself? 243 answers
- What did you want to be when you were growing up? 195 answers
- What most recently made you cry? 193 answers
- What is your idea of perfect happiness? 158 answers
- How would you describe yourself in three words? 111 answers
- What are you most proud of? 103 answers
Also answered this
Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard, Tim Peake, Charles Dance, Roger Ebert, Rose Tremain, Charles Osgood
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- All identity & self questions
- The The Proust Questionnaire questionnaire — 5 questions from the same format
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