Without question, Sleight of Mouth Language Patterns are the easiest way to covertly sneak your ideas inside somebody else’s head without any detection whatsoever. When used correctly, they will take your ideas and suggestions as their own, thereby offering no resistance at all. These patterns have been used for everything from sales and seduction to therapeutic belief change and drastically increasing personal resources.

Today’s pattern is a fun one to play with, and is called the “What If Frame.” In this particular reframe, you accept your listeners’s beliefs, and then ask them to imagine what would happen if things were different. Simply by imagining an alternative reality (or what we think of as reality) we can discover untold resources that we didn’t even know existed before.

Before getting into this reframe, a little bit about conditional grammatical structures. (huh?)

Basically there are two types. The first type (first conditionals for all you grammar nerds) is when speaking about an event that is likely to happen, or has a decent chance of happening. This pattern uses “if,” present tense verbs, and the auxiliary verb “will.”

If it rains tonight, I will wear my raincoat.

If I run out of money, I will go to the ATM.

If I eat too much past, I will get gas.

The second type (second conditional for the aforementioned grammar fans) is when something has very little chance of actually happening, or is impossible. This uses “if,” past tense verbs, and the auxiliary verb “would.”

If I saw a UFO, I would grab my camera.

If I ate one million hamburgers, I would be very sick.

If I could slam dunk, I would be very famous.

The reason for bringing this up, is that sometimes using the second conditional is better. Even though few people will consciously discriminate between the first and second conditionals in casual conversation, we pick up on it subconsciously.

When speaking in a “What If” frame mind, using the second conditional can help your listener to fantasize about how things would be if they were different. They will subconsciously pick up that you’re speaking in terms of things that can’t really happen anyway, and they’ll be much more likely go to along with it.

And when they start imagining a different reality, one with much more possibility and resources, their mind will automatically start thinking of ways to get there.

To construct this pattern, simply accept their belief (stated as X causes Y, or X means Y), without arguing, and then playfully talk about how things would be if they were different.

If what things were different? Anything you want. If they didn’t believe that X causes Y, if X caused something else, If X only caused Y in certain circumstances, anything and everything is fine for this. So long as they go along with you in their imagination, this will work like a charm.

Make sure when doing this, not to take on the tone “Yea, if things were different, but they’re not, so we’re stuck.” Try and take on the tone of a little kid who can pretend that some box is a space ship fighting against aliens.

Some examples.

I can’t get a good job because I don’t have a college degree.

Yea, I can see how that’s one way to look at things. But what if you could? What if there were some way that you could start at a job without a college degree, and then work your way up through the system? What if there really were companies that based their promotions and management positions on the actual work that you did? If those companies did exist, how would you find them?

I can’t get a date because I’m overweight.

Yea, lots of people would reject you for that, that’s for sure. But what if there were some people out there who were more concerned with your personality and your ability to communicate and really connect with people? (Notice the presuppositions?) If there were people like that out there, how would you find them, and start a conversation with them? How would you know them if you met them?

I can’t make money because I don’t have very good skills.

Yea, I’m sure it seems that way. But what if you could? What if you already had the skills to make money in some market? If that were true, how would you go about finding them?

I can’t buy your product because it is too expensive.

Yea, a lot of people say that, and I can’t disagree. But what if there were something about this particular product that made you want to buy it regardless of the cost? What if you were to realize that this product/service could help you out so much, it would be worth twice what we’re asking for it? How would you know if that were true?

I can’t learn these patterns because they are too complicated.

Yea, there certainly are a lot of them. But what if there was a way to learn them that made them fun and interesting, some way to imagine how your future would be if you mastered these patterns? How would that make you feel?

I could never use these patterns in real conversation. They’d feel too strange and awkward.

Yea, some of these patterns do sound pretty off the wall. But what if you could use these in a conversation, and nobody would know? What if these were so powerful, that they would send people on an internal search for various new meanings, and they wouldn’t even notice that you said anything strange or different? How cool would that be? How much extra money could you make?

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With the powerful Sleight of Mouth Language Patterns you can easily get inside somebody’s head (without them realizing it) and covertly twist their ideas around to give them a much more resourceful outlook on life. These can be used for destroying limiting beliefs, to drastically improve your sales, and to seduce whomever you please.

Today’s pattern is called the “Both Frame.” The basic idea is that when people express a belief or an objection, it’s set up as either a complex equivalent (X means Y) or a cause and effect (X causes Y). Although often times only one side will be stated, and you’ll have to extract the other side with your intuition based on the context of the conversation.

When people express these statements or ideas, they are usually in an “all or nothing” frame. There is no halfway point. When somebody says that they can’t get a good job because they don’t have a college degree, in their mind they mean that every single job they will get with their education will be a bad one.

If somebody says that being upset makes them eat ice cream, in their mind, anxiety creates one and only one response: Get the bucket of ice cream and the spoon. (Actually that doesn’t sound too bad right now, but I digress).

The idea then is to carefully introduce some kind of “halfway point” so that they have some more responses. When people express an objection or a limiting belief, they are expressing how they are stuck. They have built a rut in their minds, and they can’t think any other way. By introducing more choice, they can experience a new perspective. They can get that, “wow, I never thought of that before” feeling.

To use this conversationally, take the belief or objection at face value, and then wonder out loud about any other possibilities.

Some examples:

I can’t make the basketball team because I’m too short. (ALL assumption = height is the ONLY consideration by the coach).

Is that the first thing the coach checks, is how tall you are? Does he have any other criteria besides height, like teamwork, leadership, hustle, free throw shooting ability, inside shot, outside shot, anything like that?

I can’t get a date because I’m overweight. (All or nothing assumption: Other people only care about weight and physical appearance)

Is that the only consideration people have regarding a potential relationship partner? I read this interesting article in Cosmo that said most people have about three or four different things that are important to them, and being in good physical shape is not the most important.

or

(All or nothing assumption: I can’t talk to anybody because it won’t turn into a relationship)

So you don’t want to talk to anybody and maybe be friends unless you are sure from the first minute that you are after them for a lifelong relationship?

I can’t buy your product, because it’s too expensive.

Do you always only look at the price when considering buying something? Have you ever bought something only because of price and later were disappointed? Does value, desire and expected pleasure from owning this product ever come into consideration?

I can’t learn all these language patterns because they are too difficult.

Do you have to learn all of them in one session? Is it possible to learn one this week, and another one next week? Imagine how powerful and persuasive you’d be six months from now!

I could never use these in a conversation, they would sound too awkward and uncomfortable.

(note: In this situation, the person is likely imagining using them for the first time in a high pressure sales situation, or an important point with an important person, like a boss or significant other, where losing an argument would mean a big deal.)

What would happen if you just playfully used these on Skype with somebody that you didn’t really know that well, when talking about something that didn’t really matter?

or

How does it feel to imagine using these with a practice partner, until you feel confident to start using them with others about inconsequential things, so you can better appreciate how powerful they really are?

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Sleight of Mouth Language Patterns are powerful linguistic phrases and arguments that can easily obliterate any objection and turn a limiting belief on it’s head. They can be used to improve any persuasive conversation from selling cars to seducing the lover of your dreams.

Today’s pattern is called “Metaphor Framing.” This is not a pattern per se, but it can be used to deliver any other pattern in manner that is conversational, non confrontational, and deeply effective on a subconscious level.

There are plenty of different definitions for metaphor. He is a brick house, is a metaphor describing some guy, who happens to be very large, in terms of a house.

The movie, “The Day The Earth Stood Still,” (the original version, at least) was a metaphor for the dangers of the cold war.

If you are a fan of Freud, sometimes a cigar is not just a cigar, if you catch my drift. (Just ask Monica Lewinski).

A metaphor, then, is any kind of language, story, or description, that is used to describe something else, without referring to it directly. It allows us to think about one thing in terms of another.

With these patterns, it allows your listener to try on some different ideas regarding their objection of belief, without really having to confront their objection or belief on a conscious level. Often times the belief merely vanishes.

This is how Milton Erickson did most of his amazing work. He would tell story after story about seemingly meaningless things, but when he was done, is clients problems were solved.

My favorite was a boy that came in because he wet the bed. Erickson told him stories about baseball, where it’s important to squeeze the glove just at the right time in order to catch the ball, as well as release just at the right time when you are throwing to home plate all the way from the outfield.

He also told him stories of big factories and valves and shut off switches.

So how do you use a metaphor with these patterns?

Use any of the other patterns, but talk about something completely different, but within the framework of the particular pattern you’d like to deliver.

For example, somebody says, “I can’t get a date because I’m too fat.”

One possible reframe could be that plenty of other overweight people are in happy relationships.

To put it into a metaphor, or a story, you could remind them of the story of Beauty and the Beast, and the moral that the person inside is more important in the relationship. Or tell some story of an old friend you haven’t seen in a while that was really big, but was always surrounded by attractive members of the opposite sex because he or she had such an outgoing and charming personality.

The important thing is to think of a story, and use a character in your story that is representative of the person you are speaking of. You can either have them take on the same objection, with disastrous results, or explain how they found a way around their obstacle and everybody lived happily ever after.

I can’t get a good job because I don’t have a college degree.

That reminds me of this neighbor I used to have. He was always grumpy and unhappy. Never got married, never had any kids. Said he couldn’t afford them. He said he never was able to make much money because he barely finished high school. I didn’t have the heart to tell them that our other neighbor, who was the same age as him, was a high school drop out and was making six figures in some company where he started in the mail room and worked his way up.

I can’t learn these patterns because they are too difficult.

I’m glad Moses didn’t have that attitude when God charged him with leading the people out of the desert and into the promised land. The world would have been a much different place than it is today. It’s amazing that they were out there for forty years, living on who knows what, and they still made it to their destination.

I can’t use these patterns with others because it would be too awkward.

I wonder what the world would be like today if St. Paul felt that going into the various cities and preaching the Gospel felt too awkward?

or

I remember reading this poem by Rumi, this ancient Sufi poet. I don’t remember the words exactly, but it described the difference between fire and water. Fire seems to harsh and dangerous, but as soon as you step into it, you are in cool, relaxing water. But water, on the other hand, seems to inviting and peaceful on the outside, but once you step into it you are bathed in anguishing fire. I guess his point was that things that seem difficult on the outside are actually pretty useful and easy once you get past them, while things that seem easy and comfortable can keep you stuck in a living hell without hope for escape.

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Sleight of Mouth Language patterns are little known about but incredibly powerful linguistic tools that you can easily use during normal, everyday conversations with powerful effects. Easily dismantling beliefs and quickly and effectively overcoming objections, these patterns have been used for powerful therapeutic change and incredibly profitable sales techniques.

The focus this article is the “Identity Frame” pattern.

First, a bit about the concept of “identity.”

Many times, most times, we think of ourselves in various tenses of the “be” verb. Functionally, this verb is a linguistic equals sign, equating everything on one side of the equation, with everything on the other.

The simple sentence, “I am happy,” is equating the speaker with the feeling of happiness. Sounds simple and a bit pedantic, but it bears some consideration. Not so bad, but what happens when you don’t do something as well as you’d like, and you say, “I am a failure”? Now it gets a bit trickier. The moment you say that, your subconscious searches our memories and judgments for every other instance that you labeled somebody or something a “failure,” and puts you in that category as well.

Technically speaking, you are nothing. You do things, you think things, you remember things, you feel things, but what you really are is always changing. Even the atoms, molecules and cells that make up your physical body (including the brain you are using to read this and hopefully store some of this information for later use) are always being recycled.

You are a process, a process that is always changing. You can’t be anything.

So how do you use this idea in a conversational reframe?

You could take the two sides of the statement, and equate them as being one in the same. This is similar to the “Allness” frame.

Or you could take whatever belief or objection they are saying, and identify them with that particular belief. It’s a way of showing the person that they really are a lot more resourceful than letting their mind be held captive by some imaginary belief or objection.

For example, somebody says to you “I can’t get a good job because I don’t have a college degree.”

What could you identify about that belief, that the listener wouldn’t particularly like to be identified with?

How about:

• Somebody that lets others determine their potential
• Somebody who allows their future to be determined by a set of exams
• Somebody who only follows what the crowd does without much thought
• Somebody who quietly takes their spot in society and hopes for some table scraps from the big kids

To phrase this, it sometimes helps to assume they are the opposite of that identity, and let them prove it by living up to it. It’s tempting to cop an attitude (Oh, you’re on of those people!) but that only puts them on the defensive, which will strengthen their belief, and destroy your rapport.

What? I didn’t think you were the type that allowed some arbitrary rules set up by society to determine their life. I thought you were the kind of guy who made their own luck and did whatever you wanted despite what the so called “experts” said was best. Since when are you letting a bunch of goofball academics who don’t even know you set some imaginary limit on your career and earning potential?

Some others examples.

I can’t play basketball because I’m too short.

You mean there is some kind of height limit on playing basketball? Do the laws of physics change, making it impossible to make a basket if the ball is shot below a certain elevation?

I can’t get a date because I’m overweight.

So everybody who doesn’t date is fat? And everybody who is fat can’t get a date? That can’t be true, because I see overweight people in relationships all the time. What would happen if you were skinny in a relationship and then got fat? Would it automatically stop? How does that work? Do you each get some kind of post card in the mail telling you it’s over? Who’s in charge of this system, anyway?

I can’t learn these patterns because they are too hard.

I thought you were the kind of person who likes a challenge, especially when learning something can make you a lot of money, and make it easy to have wonderful relationships. You didn’t give up when you started walking, did you? Unless you parents had to hire some kind of personal walking trainer for you when you were a year old…

I could never use these in a real conversation, it would feel too awkward.

Do you really identify yourself as somebody who never tries anything unless it feels totally comfortable the first time? You’re not one of those people that are afraid to leave the house, and have to wash your hands every fifteen seconds are you? (said in an obvious joking manner, after building a lot of rapport).

I can’t buy your product because it costs too much.

I read this article once about an old lady who hated to spend money. She would even sell the daily newspaper after she read it. She died a rich woman, but she wore the same ugly dress every day, and her kids hated her. You’re not like her, are you? (said in joking manner, after building a lot rapport).

(end examples)

Some of these are bit tough to stand by themselves, so in this case it’s a good idea to throw these reframes out jokingly, and then change the subject, and then come back with another pattern or two.

Even when you change the subject, your listener will have at least in part considered the idea of what it’s like to identify themselves with the belief in such a way. When you come back later with a couple more patterns, it will be much more easier to dismantle their belief or objection.

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Sleight of Mouth Language patterns are incredibly useful for not only covertly dismantling limiting beliefs and objections, but also for drastically increasing the resourcefulness of both yourself and whoever you happen to be using them with.

Today’s pattern is called “Have To Framing.” This particular pattern applies some Cartesian logic and invites the holder of the belief or objection to consider other alternatives.

Cartesian logic was created (or so people say) by some super smart French guy named Rene Descartes a few hundred years ago. You might have heard of him. It basically takes a cause/effect statement, or relationship, and expands on it, like so:

Statement: Doing X causes Y

Applying Cartesian mumbo jumbo gets you these questions:

• What else does X cause?
• What else causes Y?
• What doesn’t cause Y?
• Does X ever not cause Y?
• Does X ever cause the opposite of Y?
• Does Y ever happen without X?
• What would happen if you did X?
• What wouldn’t happen if you did X?
• What would happen if you didn’t do X?
• What wouldn’t happen if you didn’t do X?

When you conversationally bring up these questions about a belief or an objection, it’s almost impossible for your listener to maintain that the belief is some set in concrete law of reality from Heaven.

A great way to introduce these questions is by way of presuppositions. You can presuppose that there are other alternatives by asking what evidence they would see if one of the other Cartesian mumbo jumbo logic phrases were correct.

For example, somebody says “Being stressed makes me angry.”

So you have Stress causes anger.

Some Cartesian statements could be:

What else causes you to get angry?
What doesn’t cause you to get angry?
What else does stress cause you to do?
Does stress ever not make you not angry?

And then you could stick them in some presuppositions by asking something like follows:

How do you know when stress doesn’t make you angry?

Even if they look at you with a completely blank or confused look, in order to make sense of that sentence, they’ve got to search through their history and see if there actually are any memories of stress not causing anger. Just by searching, they will subconsciously realize that

stress causes anger

is only true sometimes, not all of the time. When they come to that realization, the belief loosens up a bit, and they’ll realize that there are other things to consider.

To generate this pattern, mull over some questions like:

• Do you have to feel that way?
• What would happen if you didn’t believe that?
• How would you know if that wasn’t true?
• What’s it like when that isn’t true?
• What stops you from believing otherwise?
• What would it look like, sound like, feel like, if the opposite were true?

Merely by asking some well phrased questions will send them into a quick trance as they search their memory. They will likely come up with some contradictory evidence of the belief or objection. This would be a great time to hit them with some other patterns to really fry their circuits, er I mean, share with them some other language patterns to help them become more resourceful.

(And naturally, once their previously held beliefs are swirling around their mind like wisps of imaginary smoke, you can lay on some heavy Milton Model patterns and really have some fun.)

Some more examples you say? Sure. I thought you’d never ask.

I can’t get a good job without a college degree.

How would you know if you really didn’t need a college degree to get a good job?

I can’t find somebody special because I’m overweight.

What’s stopping you from finding somebody special despite your concern with your weight?
What would you feel like if you really could find somebody that would accept you just the way you are?
How would you know if you could find somebody that would accept you just the way you are?

I can’t buy your product because it’s too expensive.

What would have to happen in order for you to be convinced that it really was worth the price?
How would you know once you decided that the high price meant it had exceptional value?
Have you ever bought something specifically because it had a high price?

I can’t learn these language patterns because they are too difficult.

How do you know that you don’t already know most of them?
What will feel like if you did master them?
What’s stopping you from thinking they are easy and fun to learn?

I could never use these patterns in a normal conversation.

What would it feel like if you did, and they worked tremendously?
What’s stopping you?
How would you know if that was gone? (Whatever is stopping them)
How would you know if it was actually really easy to use these in a conversation?

(end examples)

The best way, in my experience, is to be as playful as possible when using these particular patterns. If you try and come across as some super smart person sage your wisdom of enlightenment, it usually doesn’t work. If you come across like some amateur psychotherapist trying to help them discover their hidden power, that usually doesn’t work either.

But if you act like a little kid who just discovered that by twisting the handle on the drugstore gumball machine just right gets you a free gumball, and you’re anxious to try and find other ways to get free gumballs, people will usually play along.

Remember, your job, when people whine, ”But what if doesn’t work,” is to say,

“yea, but what if it does work???”

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When you use Sleight of Mouth Language Patterns, those powerful set of linguistic judo that come from NLP, you avail yourself to an incredibly powerful set of skills with which you can quickly and easily overcome any objection, obliterate any limiting belief, and drastically increase the resourcefulness of both yourself and your listener.

The pattern for today is called “Allness Framing,” and is very useful to quickly kill the idea that the belief or objection is “out there,” like some unbreakable law of reality delivered from heaven. In a round about way, it forces the listener to consider that their belief is completely subjective, and therefore malleable.

Basically, you take their belief, apply it to everybody and everything that ever lived, is living, and will live, and ask them if it really makes sense. They will naturally find that others in their same situation or circumstances have a different take on the same events. Since others have come to the same conclusion they have, perhaps their own belief isn’t as true as they once thought it was.

For example, somebody says they can’t get a date because they are overweight. They likely have an idea in their head that overweight people can’t be found attractive by others. You then casually ask them if all the other overweight people share that same belief. Since they obviously don’t, they are forced to reconsider their reason for not finding a date.

Since losing weight is pretty difficult, it can be a huge barrier to success if you feel that your weight is holding you back. Once you realize it’s not your weight, but something else, then that “whatever else” can be a much easier obstacle to overcome.

In some cases, shifting this one belief can be enough.

For example, if they walked into a social gathering, and had the belief “people don’t find overweight people attractive,” they wouldn’t likely be very sociable, and would have difficulty starting conversations.

But if they walked into a social gathering without that belief, or even the opposite, “plenty of people find overweight people attractive,” it could be much easier for them to start a conversation.

You can also apply the Allness Frame to your listener, but throughout their own lives.

For example, somebody says, “I can’t buy this product, it’s too expensive.”

You can ask them if they’d ever bought something before that was “too expensive,” but as it turned out, that particular thing, whatever it was, was well worth the money.

It may not get you the sale right away, but it will likely bring out what may be the “real objection,” such as product features or something else that you can more easily work with.

Some more examples.

I can’t get a college degree because I didn’t get a scholarship.

You mean nobody who gets a scholarship ever gets a scholarship? Wow, that’s pretty rough. I didn’t know that. Wait a minute, I didn’t get a scholarship and I’m getting a college degree. What exactly are you talking about?

Being stressed forces me to eat a pint of ice cream every night.

Ever since you were a kid you’ve been eating ice cream every single time you get stressed? You mean you have a portable freezer in your car, and every time there’s too much traffic, and you may be late to wherever you are going, you pull out the ice cream and start munching away? That’s pretty ingenious of you! But what happens when you are stressed because there is no more ice cream? What do you do then?

It’s too difficult to lose weight.

Really? Nobody who ever lived has ever lost weight? I wasn’t aware of that. I guess I’d better be careful.

I can’t learn these language patterns, they are too difficult.

If they are too difficult to learn, how did so many books get written about them? Surely those people had to learn them enough to write the books? Maybe they were born knowing all these patterns?

I’ll never be able to use these patterns in a normal conversation, it would seem to weird and unnatural.

So nobody has ever learned a new way to talk? Nobody has ever taken a risk in public or in a social situation? The words that you know now, you knew them right when you were born, and you never went through the natural language learning curve, where you used words incorrectly or strangely? You are a fascinating person. What other talents were you born with?

(end examples)

Be a bit careful with these, as often times when you take away the “out there” hallucination that people hold with their beliefs, they are sometimes forced to confront their own shortcomings.  It can be difficult to accept that other people can do certain things, but you can’t. So people tend to fight tooth and nail to hold on to their “out there” hallucinations about their beliefs.

As with all the other patterns, introduce these conversationally, spaced out enough over time, and allow them to slowly come to their own conclusion about their beliefs.

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Conversational reframes are great way to covertly invite your listener to “think outside the box” when facing an objection or limiting belief.

The Sleight of Mouth Language Patterns are specific verbal strategies to use conversational reframes skillfully so any objection, obstacle, or limiting belief you come across doesn’t stand a chance.

The pattern for today is “Model Of The World Framing.” This is based on the idea that “The Map Is Not The Territory.” This truism from NLP holds a lot of weight, and deserves some attention.

We humans move through the world, and collect information through our five senses. Every idea, every thought, every fear about the future or feelings of the past are created with memories involving these five senses.

However, something happens in between the world “outside” and our representation of that world that is constructed in our brains from that sense information.

The data is distorted, deleted, and generalized. This is necessary, since our conscious minds can only handle a few bytes of information a second, but the amount of information constantly being presented to our fives senses runs in the millions or even billions of bytes per second. Our brain has to make some hard choices, and make them in real time.

So what happens?

Our brains are filled up with interpretations of what we really think is “out there.” And these interpretations are often generated by the meaning we give to events. However, most of us don’t see things that way. We don’t feel as if we give meaning to events, we feel as if we discover meaning in events.

By using this particular pattern, the Model of The World Pattern, we invite the listener to question their interpretation of certain events.

Simply by labeling their belief, which they likely assume is absolute set in stone truth, as merely a “model of the world,” it gives them some mental wiggle room to come up with some different interpretations of the same events.

Some ways to help them along these lines is to give some examples of others who see the same events, but don’t draw the same conclusions. Another way is to carefully find out how long they’ve held that particular model. Yet another way is to ask who they learned that particular model from. Speaking in these terms, it makes their belief or objection seem much more pliable and easy to shift around until they find something more resourceful.

Other ways are to use words like “seem, appear, feels like, etc.” to give the belief or objection a subjective frame, rather than a frame of absolute truth.

Some examples.

I can’t get a good job because I don’t have a college degree.

That’s an interesting way of looking at things. I’m sure it seems like that right now. Do other people believe the same thing? Do most people that don’t have good jobs that have college degrees believe that? How about people that have good jobs, but don’t have a college degree, what about them? What do you suppose they believe?

I’ll never fall in love because I’m too fat.

You feel like you won’t ever meet somebody if you are overweight? Have you always believed that? Can you remember a time when you didn’t believe that? Do you remember who you learned that from? There are plenty people that are overweight, and happily married. What do you think they feel about finding a partner while being overweight?

My friend is angry at me because she didn’t return my phone call.

Yea, it sucks when somebody doesn’t call you right back. Has that always meant that she was angry with you? Can you remember a time when you knew she wasn’t angry and she still didn’t call you back? What about others? Do other people’s friends not calling them back mean they are angry with them, or could it mean something else? What if you called somebody you didn’t know, and they didn’t call you back, would that mean they were angry with you?

Learning these patterns is difficult. I’ll never be able to use these conversationally.

I met this guy who happens to be a sales rep other night at my Toastmasters club. He said he learned these patterns several years ago, and he’s been easily making six figures ever since. He said this was the best time investment he’d ever made, even more so that his formal college degree. I wonder if he thinks these patterns are difficult and too complicated to use conversationally.

An easy way to practice this pattern is to simply look at things, and practice giving them different meanings. Or find something you think is absolutely true (like ‘math is hard,’ or ‘it’s tough to make money in a down economy’), and find three or four different people (as different from you as possible) and try and guess what they believe regarding this.

Another way is to practice is on Internet forums, where the topics of discussion are easily flammable, like politics, religion, etc. Find some beliefs that people state relatively clearly, and practice using this pattern, either on paper, or actually posting to that particular forum.

Practicing this pattern on your own beliefs will give you an incredible amount of mental flexibility that can serve you very well throughout your entire life, so take some time to get familiar with this.

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When you use Sleight of Mouth Language Patterns, you suddenly have the capability to conversationally reframe arguments, objections, and even beliefs that have been held since childhood. Their power and effectiveness is only limited by your willingness to learn and use them.

Today’s pattern is along the same logical lines as the previous two, but takes things to an extreme. They can easily put something into perspective, removing the sting from any belief or objection.

This pattern is called “Eternity Framing.” You simply take the objection or obstacle, and conversationally move your listener out in time to the end of their life. From this vantage point the argument seems almost silly, and can easily be dealt with back here in the present.

This can work on a personal level as well. Whenever you find yourself facing a seemingly insurmountable problem, simply imagine you are on your death bed looking over your life. Compared to all the things you’ve accomplished, and all the things you will accomplish that you are remembering in your hallucination, the present problems won’t seem so bad.

So basically, you take the person’s objection, accept it at face value, and then casually move them out into the distant future, and have another look at the objection. You can either look back from the future, and make the objection seem small in comparison to everything else, or you can show them what a horrible life they have ahead of them if they persist in hanging on to it.

Let’s take a look at some examples.

When you watch football it means you don’t love me.

Well, maybe you feel that way now, but when we’re in our nineties, and remembering all the wonderful times we’ve had together, and all the ups and downs, I really don’t think football will seem like much of a problem.

I can’t buy this because it’s too expensive.

Yes, I agree. It sure seems that way now. But if you could imagine looking back on this decision in twenty or thirty years, and your in position to really see all the value you’ve received from this product, I think you can safely feel glad to have bought this today.

I’ll never get a good job without a college degree.

Well, when you’re retired, and living off a meager pension of a day laborer, I hope you don’t mind looking back over your life, just above the poverty line, and only being able to afford to buy something nice once in a while, while some of your neighbors, who are also living the good life, will have been comfortably retired for many years.

I just can’t exercise, it’s too difficult.

When you’re laying on your death bed, I hope you don’t mind having given up an extra twenty or so years of life because you decided to take it easy.

Learning these patterns are too difficult. Besides, I could never use these in a real conversation.

Yea, they are difficult. When you look back on reading this blog post when you are in your eighties, I guess you won’t mind having given up the opportunity of a lifetime, one that could have easily earned you extra hundreds of thousands, or perhaps even millions of dollars, over the course of your life. I guess you really like your comfort zone.

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When sufficient skills in Sleight of Mouth Language patterns, you can easily obliterate objections and limiting beliefs without even losing a step in your conversation. Unlike other objection dismantling procedures, these don’t steamroll your listener, using strong arm tactics. Rather, they covertly invite your listener to consider other points of view.

When they do change their mind, and come to the obvious conclusion that their previous belief or objection doesn’t really make much sense, no one will be the wiser.

Today’s pattern is called “Outcome of Outcome Framing.” It’s a step further than the previous pattern, “First Outcome Framing,” as it goes further out into the future.

Kind of like when George Bailey, in the Christmas favorite, “It’s A Wonderful Life,” was invited into a world where he didn’t exist, and decided that jumping off that bridge wasn’t such a good idea after all. He saw how worse off people were for him not having involved himself in their lives.

Similarly, you can conversationally paint a future for your listener, taking their belief as a starting point, and extrapolating out five or ten years into the future.

Sometimes we are comfortable with our beliefs in the present, even if at some level we realize they are limiting, but when we see how our lives will be five or ten years, often enough that is enough to shock us out of our complacency.

The basic structure of this pattern is to simply accept their belief or objection at face value, and then wonder, out loud, where that will lead them in a few years. It can also help if the future you extrapolate to will give them the exact opposite of what they think the belief or objection is doing for them in the present.

Let’s take a look at some examples.

I can’t help eating ice cream when I’m stressed. (X causes Y, Stress causes me to eat ice cream)

Yea, that’s one way to deal with stress. I suppose if you keep it up, eating ice cream like that every other night, you’re going to be a lot heavier in five years. Imagine how stressful that will be, what with all your extra blood pressure and cholesterol that you’ll be carrying around with you along with all that stress.

I can’t talk to girls/boys because I don’t know what to say.

Yea, I totally understand. I think so too sometimes. It’s gonna be embarrassing, ten years from now if somebody sets you up on a blind date, and they ask you when was the last time you dated somebody. They’ll probably think you a bit strange if you say you haven’t been on a date in ten years.

My friend didn’t return my phone call. That means she’s angry with me. (X means Y).

So you aren’t going to call her back? You’re call, man. But just think what it will be like if everybody who doesn’t call you back right away is your enemy all of a sudden. It’s gonna be a lonely world.

I can’t buy your product, it’s too expensive.

Yea, lots of people say that. I wonder about the people that didn’t decide to buy this product if they even realize how much continues value that this product provides for several years, that they’re missing out on, after only making one payment in the beginning.

or

Yea, that’s true. Some of my customers who bought this a few years ago, and are locked into all the free upgrades for life, are really happy they made the decision, before the price went up, just like it does every year.

(Note that in sales situations, it tough to build enough rapport to use this pattern directly, so telling stories about other people along the same lines is often times a good approach.)

Learning these patterns is too hard and complicated.

Yea, most people feel that way. That’s why I’m glad I decided to bite the bullet a couple years ago and really dig into them. Looking back, it was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made. I feel sorry for people who’ve known about these patterns for years, but never took the time to learn them. Their lives could be so much better now.

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With Sleight of Mouth Language patterns you can easily overcome objections and dismantle limiting beliefs with a few carefully crafted phrases.

Today’s pattern is called “First Outcome Framing,” and invites your listener or conversation partner to think of the results, or eventual outcome, of their particular belief or objection.

Just speaking about it in these terms is sometimes enough to shake it loose. When people express a belief or an objection, they are usually “set in stone,” at least in their mind.

But when we speak in terms of consequences, it somehow allows them to think of their belief or objection that they have a measure of control over.

The structure is fairly simple. You accept their belief at face value, and merely extrapolate out into the future, and get a less than desirable outcome of this particular belief. One that they would likely not want to experience.

This causes them to do a quick, mental double take on their original belief, oftentimes rethinking it. This works great when you follow it up with a couple of other patterns. You can either do this right away, or depending on the conversation and the relationship with the person, you can steer the conversation somewhere else, and then occasionally come back to the belief or objection, and throw another pattern at them.

They’ll have no idea why their objection or limiting belief went up in smoke. They’ll likely feel like they had some kind of divine inspiration or remembered something incredibly important that they didn’t know before.

To make this pattern, just take the belief, and casually wonder out loud what it will lead to, and let them come to their own conclusions. Just make sure that when you are wondering out loud, that the outcome it leads to isn’t all that great. You don’t want to support any objections or limiting beliefs.

A couple examples.

I can’t get a date because I’m no good at talking to boys/girls.

Wow, that’s pretty tough. I suppose just thinking that will keep you from going and talking to somebody that is really cool, and maybe starting a good friendship. I would kind of suck if somebody was waiting for you to go and talk to them, but you decided not to because you think you’re no good at talking to people.

My friend didn’t respond when I said “hi,” so she must be mad at me.

Wow. That’s pretty rough.So how do you treat people that are made at you? I usually get mad right back at them. So are you going to yell at your friend the next time you see her? That wouldn’t be very nice if she just had lots of things on her mind.

I can’t get a good job because I don’t have a college degree.

Maybe. But I’m sure that you won’t apply to many place if you believe that. And I’m pretty sure you can’t get a good job if you don’t apply anywhere. So I guess you’re right on track. That cool with you?

I can’t learn all these patterns, they’re too many, and they are too difficult.

Wow, that sounds pretty bad. Whenever I think something is too hard, I usually quit to. Do you know how many people are using these patterns to make tons of money in sales? I guess you don’t want that, right?

(end examples)

These particular patterns can sound a bit harsh if said without any judgment whatsoever. It’s important to remember that when you use these, you aren’t looking for an ego boost, or the person to say something like:

“Wow! I never thought of that! You’re so smart! Thanks for convincing me!’

Rather, you are simply throwing some ideas out there, and making it sound as if you are wondering about them yourself. Then leave it up to the listener to come to their own conclusion. (Which happens to be the exact conclusion you want them to.)

So long as you have no problems with your listener keeping their belief or objection, and you are throwing these out in a “Hey, cool if it works for you…” frame, then you should be OK.

Just make sure when they do decide to buy into your idea, you stick around to reap the benefits.

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Sleight of Mouth language patterns have been used in everything from therapy and sales, to seduction and getting elected (even to President). You can use them in any situation where you find yourself up against a verbal objection, or an expression of limitation based on some model of the world.

Today’s pattern is called “Positive Prior Intention Framing,” and is a bit of a doozy. It may seem a bit presumptuous, as you are assuming you know something about why a person is saying or believing something. But in this case, you are assuming a positive intention, and most people don’t get offended when somebody assumes something about them that’s positive.

The basic structure is like this. Somebody has got this objection, or limitation. That means in their mind, the way they are thinking about something, there is a problem preventing them from getting what they want. Maybe they think they can’t afford a product, or maybe they don’t think they can successfully convince their boss to give them a raise. In their mind, on that particular topic, there is something out of reach, and some big hairy (imaginary) monster keeping them from getting it. Not the best state to be in.

Then you come along, and listen to and understand their (imagined) predicament and come up with a positive reason they have constructed their own predicament. They can mentally step back from the situation, feel more resourceful (as most people will generally agree, at least in part, with the positive assumptions others express about them) and have a much higher likelihood of figuring out their limitation, or coming up with a way around their objection.

Underlying this particular reframes is one of the presuppositions of NLP, namely, that behind every behavior or belief lies a positive intention. People don’t eat too much because they want to get fat, it’s because the food gives them comfort, and seeking comfort is a positive intention. People don’t drop out of college because they want to limit their options, it’s because they fear failure, and avoiding pain is one of the oldest positive intentions of human nature.

To use this conversationally, you’ll need to think of some positive intention, or some possible positive intention behind their stated belief or objection.

• What are they really after?
• What are they protecting themselves from?
• How has this helped them in the past?
• How can this help them now?

Then you phrase in a positive, complimentary way, and carefully show them that they are much more resourceful than they think. Their mood will improve, their outlook will become brighter, and they will discover resources and ideas they hadn’t thought of before (either on their own or with your covert help), and may very well convince themselves of another way around their imagined obstacle or limitation.

Some examples.

Stated limitation:

I can’t get a good job because I don’t have a college degree.

Possible positive intentions:

They want to maintain their safety. They don’t want to compete with others they consider “out of their league.” They want to stay with what’s familiar and known. They don’t want to get in over their head. They don’t want to try, and fail.

Possible conversational reframes:

So you want to get a job that’s stable, I can totally understand that. With today’s economy, focusing on maintaining a stable job is an extremely valuable trait to have. Many employers, in fact, are starting to shift their focus on from people with specific qualifications to those that can really focus and learn on the job, in order to create that stability both for the employee, and the employer. You might consider that when sending out your resumes.

Stated limitation:

I can’t find a romantic partner because I’m overweight.

Positive intentions:

Safety, security, emotional stability.

Reframe:

Sure, I can understand that. Nobody likes being rejected. It seems like more and more people these days are looking for somebody with exactly those characteristics. Somebody that is going to commit to something long term, rather than a short time fling.

Stated limitation:

I can’t learn all these language patterns, they are too difficult and time consuming.

Reframe:

Yea, I can relate. I hate studying all kinds of esoteric knowledge that has very little application. There’s only twenty four hours in the day, and you’ve simply got to decide what’s important and what isn’t. It’s good that you recognize that. Most people don’t. One of the reasons I like these patterns so much is that they make your communication so much more efficient, you don’t have to spend all day trying to convince somebody to do something. Just a few minutes is all you need.

(end examples)

A really good way to practice this pattern is to simply observe people you see. You don’t have to look very hard to see people that are engaged in behaviors and conversations that don’t appear to be very useful or healthy. Instead of judging, simply take a step back and imagine three or four different positive intentions behind their behavior.

Just doing this one exercise, even if you don’t bring it to the level of conversational reframes, has the interesting effect of making the world seem a lot less hostile.

And that can brighten your mood considerably.

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Sleight of Mouth language patterns are incredibly effective in overcoming objections, turning big issues into non issues, and covertly removing limiting beliefs in yourself or others.

Today’s pattern is called “Reflexively Apply to Self.” Since that definition is about as clear as mud, let’s take a closer look.

In this, the “Self” is the person saying or expressing the objection, belief, or argument that you’d like to easily demolish with your linguistic Jedi skills.

And the thing you apply, is their own stated belief. This creates a kind of infinite feedback loop,and sometimes is enough to break the pattern.

When I was a kid, my Dad bought this video camera. You could plug it into the TV, so you could see on TV what you were filming. If you pointed the camera at the TV, you saw an endless stream of smaller and smaller TVs going off into infinity. This is what this pattern will do to the mind of your listener.

So basically, the idea is to take whatever belief they say, and apply that same thinking right back at the belief itself.

For example, if the person says something like:

I don’t have a college degree, so I can never get a good job.

The belief is not having some kind of certificate or training, and that being a limitation of obtaining something deemed worthy and valuable (e.g. a job).

So to throw it back at the belief, you might say something like:

Did you need any special training or courses to come up with that belief? Or did you decide that without any professional assistance?

Or even more abstract:

Did that belief need a college degree to be true and shape the way you look at things, or did it just decide to do that without any “official” approval from some accredited belief creation review board?

Or if somebody says:

I can’t afford your product, it’s too expensive. (Expensive product means I can’t buy it.)

How expensive do you think it is to limit yourself to products based on a cursory review of their immediate benefits without taking a look at the long term value?

Was it affordable to buy that belief that seems to be controlling what you can or can’t do?

Or if somebody says:

I’ll never find true love, I’m just not an interesting person. (Me not being interesting means nobody will ever truly love me.)

Did that belief need to be interesting in order for it to convince you of it’s truth?

Do you truly love that belief enough to let it go, so you can share your uninterestingness with others?

That belief sure isn’t interesting, yet look how much you are attached to it!

Or if somebody says:

My parents were always poor, so I’ll be poor myself.

That belief doesn’t sound like it’s worth very much.

Is being poor very valuable to you?

Did that belief’s parents share similar outlooks as it, or were they completely different?

Keep in mind these particular reframes aren’t particularly logical, and sometimes don’t make a lot of sense. The way they work is by getting the listener to take something that perceived as solid, and written everlastingly in stone to pause and say, “Huh, wait, wha?”

This is often enough to show that their belief isn’t as rock solid as they thought it was. This can either be enough to let the belief or objection die a natural death, or to leave the door wide open for you to throw in some other patterns that can continue to weaken and eventually destroy this old belief or objection.

Usually, it’s best to just keep on talking while you get them in the “wait, huh?” state of mind. Otherwise they might circle their wagons around their belief and dig in for a protracted siege. This will have the opposite effect, as people’s beliefs are strengthened whenever they defend them.

Also, keep in mind to be very careful to not make your listener feel as though you are putting them on the spot, or using their own words or beliefs to insult them. There’s a fine line between coming from a point of curiosity, where you show your listeners beliefs to them in a new and interesting way, and taking them and throwing them back in their faces.

The first way works well, the second only works to make enemies, so be careful.

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This article is one in a series of training modules on Sleight of Mouth, an extraordinarily powerful set of linguistic tools that you can easily use to quickly defeat any argument, destroy any limiting belief in yourself or others, and overcome any imagined obstacle or objection that you come across.

In short, these language pattern will give you a tenth degree black belt in verbal Judo.

There are 24 patterns in all, and today’s pattern is called “Specificity,” or “Chunking Down.” This pattern won’t usually work on its own (although it does on occasion), but it is very powerful in ‘loosening up’ the mind of your listener, and give you some mental wiggle room to get in their and move ideas and beliefs around.

The basic structure is to ask questions in order to elicit more specific elements of the belief. Recall that these need to be in the form of “X causes Y,” or “X means Y” in order for these patterns to be most effective. It can sometimes be tricky to tease these out of your listener, especially if you are covertly or conversationally changing their beliefs.

Let’s look at some examples. Say a friend of yours says something like, “I don’t have a college degree. I’ll never get good job.” Or more likely, you will on the subject of high paying jobs, and they’ll simply say “Yea, but I don’t have a college degree.”

The implied complex equivalent, (X means Y) is:

Not having a college degree means ( = ) getting a decent job is impossible.

First of all, notice that the statement is framed as an established truth , and not only for the individual(e.g. getting a job is impossible, vs. I can’t get a job). This takes the pressure of him or her, and makes it a little bit easier to look at this belief more objectively.

In order to get more specific, (or to “chunk down” to use NLP lingo) simply ask questions for more details. Questions like:

• What degrees do you need?
• What jobs require what degrees?
• What kind of degrees? (Bachelors, Masters, PhD)
• What exactly is a decent job?
• How exactly do you know this?
• What information did you use to come to this conclusion?
• If I had to come up with the same belief, what would I have to imagine? What part of my past would I have to remember?
• Did somebody tell you this?
• Did you read about this somewhere?
• How exactly did you come to believe this?
• What age group does this hold true for?
• How do you know this is true? What pictures, sounds, feelings do you generate?
• Could you teach me how to reproduce those same exact sounds, feelings, etc?

This sounds like you’d be giving the person the third degree, so it’s best to ask these from a frame of genuine curiosity. As if you find the idea intriguing, but you haven’t made up your mind yet.

If you sound at all confrontational, or as if you’ve already made up your mind, the other person will shut down and go into defensive mode fairly quickly. To see this in action, go to any online forum, and hunt around until you find somebody expressing a limiting belief like this.

If you show up unannounced, and start firing off questions like the above, you’ll make an enemy real quick.

The trick is to ask the questions, and show no indication that you think the answers are right or wrong, or silly. Remain neutral, and curious. The idea is to expand the other persons idea of their own belief while feeling safe enough to talk about it.

Sometimes, if you can develop enough rapport, and refrain from ‘proving the person wrong,’ this can go to great lengths to weaken the belief so that it dies a natural death later on.

The most fundamental thing to keep in mind when using these patterns is to let go of any need to “take credit” for changing the persons belief. Your goal should be to covertly convince them to change their belief on their own, and honestly believe it was due to their own skills of introspection.

Your mission, then, if you choose to accept it, is to find some heavily trafficked forums regarding touchy issues (loveshack is a great one) and get some practice getting people to get more specific about their beliefs.

Just realize that more often than not, you’ll get a “Who the HELL are YOU?!” response. That’s OK. In this stage of your learning, it’s sufficient to just get a handle on the operational use of these patterns. Once you are more fluent with them, you can go back and practice using them with more elegance and finesse.

Have fun.

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You’re about to learn a set of skills that can instantaneously and obliterate any argument that comes your way, any objection that gets thrown up during a conversation, and any verbal obstacle you find in your path.

These verbal skills are so powerful that you will never lose an argument again, and if you happen to be in sales, you can easily double your closing percentages. They are a small subsection of NLP Language skills, skills that have been developed over the past several years for therapy, sales, and persuasion.

Namely, these are the Sleight Of Mouth NLP Language Patterns. When combined with Linguistic Presuppositions, and the Milton Model, they will give you irresistible powers of persuasion in any situation.

The basic premise behind the power of these skills is that any argument is in the from of either a “Complex Equivalent,” or a “Cause Effect” statement. If you haven’t watched the learning modules on the Milton Model, it would be a good idea to do so before you dive into these.

If you’re chomping at the bit to get to some powerfully persuasive language patterns that can easily destroy any argument, here’s a brief summary.

A complex equivalent is any statement that can be expressed as “X means Y,” or “X is Y.” Think of them as a linguistic equation, with one idea on one side of the equation, another idea on the other side, with the “is,” “means,” “implies,” etc. as the equals sign.

Anytime somebody expresses a limitation in that format, it is ripe for verbal destruction. If you are in sales, that means more money. If you are in a relationship, that means closer and more intimate communication, as you will drastically reduce the self imposed limitations in your partner. (And yourself,for that matter.)

A cause/effect statement is anything stated in the from “X causes Y,” or “X leads to Y,” or “X makes Y happen,” or any variation.

Being able to understand these in everyday speech is critical, and not as easy as it sounds. Most people will only express one half the equation, and you’ve go to be able to extract the other half from the context of the conversation.

You’ve also got to be very careful how you deliver these, as most people will become very defensive of their beliefs, and that’s what you’ll be destroying in many cases. When somebody feels their beliefs are under attack, they can take very personally. If you’re not careful, you can ruin any rapport you’ve developed and quickly find the opposite of your outcome coming true.

There are a total of 22 patterns, and in each subsequent post you’ll learn a new one. Take your time, and soak these up one by one. Once you start to learn these patterns, you ears will hear a whole new level of verbal communication, and you will begin to feel incredibly powerful with your language.

Most people, when they speak, simply blurt out a bunch of words, and hope they make sense. By combining presuppositions, the Milton Model, and now these virtually indestructible sleight of mouth patterns, you will be a force to be reckoned with. A Jedi Knight of Communication.

You’ll be amazed how horrible politicians are at getting their point across once you learn just a few of these patterns. While politicians have been known to use a few sleight of mouth patterns (whether they know it or not) they usually only use one or two familiar ones, and they quickly become ineffective, since they use them over and over again.

Your first assignment, should you choose to accept it, is tune your ears to pick up both complex equivalent statements, and cause/effect statements. TV programs, casual conversations with your friends, YouTube videos, or even politician speeches and TV news discussion shows.

Once you get the hang of picking them, up, take your time going through the following posts so you can learn how to dismantle any limiting belief or objection that comes your way.

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Who would you trust with a diet recommendation, your best friend? Or some fast talking guy on TV with a cheap suit and a big belly? Who would you prefer to buy an expensive item from, somebody roughly the same age and gender as you, a well being an alumni of the same school, or somebody that is as different from you as Lady Gaga is from Pavarotti?

In this final installation of the seven magical laws of influence, beautifully described by Cialdini in is oft referenced work, “Influence, Science and Practice,” we’ll take a look at something called “Liking.”

We tend to be much more open to ideas from people that we like, rather than people we don’t like.

Duh.

But what surprised some is not only that some aspects of ‘liking’ are a bit on the politically incorrect side, but also that some are rather easy to fake if you know what you’re doing.

First, as you are reading this, think of one of your good friends. One you’ve had for a while. There was a time when you didn’t know this person. Then you met them. Something clicked, and you decided to hang out together, as friends usually do. Maybe you shared the same experiences, lived in the same neighborhood, liked the same obscure micro brew, or shared a prison cell together.

The first aspect of liking, then, similarity. We like people that are like us. The more you spend time with somebody, the more shared experiences you have, and the more you grow similar by those shared experiences.

This might seem hard to fake, but it’s actually pretty easy. In NLP they teach something called “mirroring and matching.” When you are in a conversation with somebody, matching their body language, tone of voice and speed of speech will do a great deal to persuade them, on an unconscious level, that you are similar to them.

This goes way beyond the transparent, “No Way! You Like cheeseburgers? Me too!”

When you mirror and match the way somebody is sitting, talking, and gesturing, this will quickly create a very strong and unconscious bond. Unless they are specifically on guard against this, they will start to get a strong “feeling” that they really like you for some reason. Top salespeople are keenly aware of this.

Another aspect of liking is physical appearance. Unfortunate, but true. Better looking salespeople make more sales. Taller presidential candidates have a slightly better chance of being elected. Attractive people make for more trusting news anchors. This can enhanced of course, with various clothing and accessories. If you are in sales, or need to persuade somebody, make sure to wear some nice threads, and give yourself a clean shave, or dress attractively with appropriate make up. Leave it to your true friends to deal with the “real you.”

Another aspect of physical appearance is how you carry yourself. In an interesting study on posture, John Molloy did some research that indicates better posture can increase you attractiveness by a full two points. He arranged a double blind study where college students would enter and mingle in bar for a few hours, and purposely hold their posture a certain way. Those that stood up straight with their shoulders back got, on average, two more points (on a scale from 1 to 10) than when they had their shoulders slumped and their heads down.

Even you weren’t born a beauty queen or fit to be on the cover of Men’s Health, there’s plenty you an do to boost your attractiveness.

Another factor in “liking” is association. If people associate good things with you, they will like you. In the presidential debate between Clinton and Dole, whenever Clinton would say words or phrases that had a good chance of evoking good feelings, (like “strong economy,” “security,” “safety,” etc.) he would point to himself. (There’s a reason he got the nickname “Slick Willy”) This is another trick from NLP. By pointing or gesturing toward yourself while saying positive emotion inducing words and phrases, people will start to associate those good feelings with you.

One final aspect of liking is probably the oldest in the book. A genuine, honest compliment. People love hearing compliments, despite how embarrassed they may feel. Compliments on behavior or choices are much more powerful than telling them what lovely eye they have. Just don’t over do it.

How do defend against these?

As always, your conscious, rational mind is your best means of defense. Would you buy the same product or sign up for the same service if the guy selling it was twenty years older than you and smelled like he hadn’t showered in a week? Focus on the product or the idea, rather than the person selling it or delivering the message. This can be incredibly difficult if they are attractive, have done a good job matching your body language, and given you a few genuine, honest compliments.

The best way to make sure you don’t get carried away by these unconscious triggers is to simply have an intention to either buy a certain product at a certain price, or to only shop and not buy anything until you’ve thought it over in the safety of your own home.

And any time you start to feel compelled to do or believe something, when you hadn’t made any plans on doing it, check your instincts for warning signs. If it’s worth doing right this minute, it’ll still be worth doing a week from now.

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If you want to quit smoking, the best way is to tell everybody you know that you will quit this Friday. If you want to lose weight, the best way is to promise your close friends and relatives that you’ll be down to a certain weight by a certain time. If your boss wants to guarantee you’ll finish that report by next Wednesday, he’ll make you commit to it at the weekly meeting, so that everybody can hear.

The persuasive power of Commitment and Consistency is just as powerful as the other laws, but a bit more subtle. This law requires the persuader to elicit some kind of behavior or action from the person they are trying to persuade. It isn’t as passive as the other laws, yet it is just as powerful.

In his book “Influence, Science and Practice,” Dr. Cialdini demonstrated this beautifully. Several researchers canvassed few blocks in a residential neighborhood. They asked if they could place a small, non-controversial, discreet sign in one of their windows facing the street. They sign said something obvious like “be careful in the street” or something.

Then they canvassed the same neighborhood a few weeks later, only this time they asked people to put up a rather large, ugly sign in their front yard.

The people that had previously allowed a small sign in their windows were overwhelmingly accepting of a much larger, uglier sign. Those had rejected the small sign also rejected the big sign.

To demonstrate that they weren’t simply sorting the neighborhoods for people that liked signs, they first went through a neighborhood, and only asked to put up the big, ugly sign. Virtually everyone soundly rejected the idea.

In order to put up big signs, it helped significantly to find people willing to put up small signs. Once the small signs were up, and there proverbial foot was in the door, the larger signs were much more acceptable.

Some psychologists believe that this stems from the idea of cognitive dissonance. We don’t like truths that contradict what we believe about ourselves, so we tend to ignore them.

In the case of the small sign acceptors, they created an image of themselves as somebody who accepts a sign on their property.

Later, when the big sign request came in, in order to maintain their identity, they had to accept it.

Whenever we say or proclaim something in public, we are effectively making a statement about who we are and what we intend to do. When something happens in the future, we will tend to act in a way that is congruent with our previous statements.

Another powerful example.

Studies have been done on jury trials. When the defense and prosecutors have finished,the trial goes to jury. They retire to the jury room to work amongst themselves whether the defendant is guilty or innocent.

Frequently, they will take a “straw vote,” meaning they will get everybody’s gut instincts before they start to argue the particulars.

Cases where people state their belief in the defendant’s guilt or innocence out loud tend to last three times longer than when they write “guilty” or “not guilty” anonymously on a slip of paper.

When they commit their opinions for the other jurors to hear, they are much less likely to later change their opinion.

In “High Probability Selling,” by Jacques Werth, he demonstrates a particularly powerful sales method. The sales person is consistently asking the client “If this happens, what are you going to do?” Along the sales presentation.

For example, if the client says he wants to pay over sixty months, with no down payment, the sales person would say, “If I could get you a deal for nothing down and payable over sixty months, what would you do?”

Once the client says what he or she would do, they are effectively applying the law of Commitment and Consistency on themselves, and literally convincing themselves to buy the product.

This can be very powerful if you are a manager and would like to motivate your employees. Give them a positive label, and get their buy in. Once they publicly agree with that label,they will do everything they can to maintain it. Labels such as being creative, working together well as a team, or pushing to meet a deadline will be greatly enhanced by the application of this law of influence.

A powerful story (albeit it a bit old fashioned and having a slightly religious angle) illustrating this is the tale of Johnny Lingo. A wealthy, local trader in the Polynesian islands comes in one day to buy a wife. They are all shocked to find that not only has he chosen who is considered the ugliest girl on the island, he pays many many more cows that they think she’s worth. (While he is negotiating with her father, the other island women are bragging how many cows their husbands paid for them).

Fast forward a couple of years, and Mrs. Johnny Lingo is the most beautiful, gracious and noble women on the entire set of islands.

The moral of the story is to give people a positive imagine, and they will live up to it. If you give anybody a positive imagine, they will almost certainly agree with it, especially if there is physical proof (like eight cows in the transaction) and a public ceremony.

The take away from this to twofold.

If you want to improve yourself, or do something particular beneficial for yourself, tell as many people as you can. Tell them in positive terms what you will be doing, whether it be losing weight, getting a degree, passing a test or asking out a girl. This will have a powerful effect on your motivation. Be as specific as possible.

If you want to avoid committing to something you may later regret, be very careful about stating your intentions of the future. Reserve the right to withhold any commitments until you’ve given your conscious mind adequate time to think it over.

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You can dramatically increase your powers of persuasion with the simple application of some incredibly effective but not widely well known laws of persuasion and influence. These are not esoteric theories thought up by ivory tower professors, these are hard and fast rules proven time and time again by social experiments on the street.

The law of persuasion you’ll be learning today is Comparison and Contrast. This is a simple rule that has been applied to
salespeople, real estate agents, and government ministers of propaganda for incredibly massive results of compliance and dramatic increases in income.

This law affects how you view one item, or idea when compared to another. When viewed against something similar, the idea or thing in question is viewed much differently than when viewed alone. There’s the old joke (that pre-dates email circulated jokes) about the kid who wrote a letter home from school. He’d gotten a girl pregnant, wrecked his car, accidentally set fire to his dormitory, and accidentally killed the school mascot. He ended the letter by saying, “just kidding, but I really did fail maths.” The idea being that failing maths was much less horrible when compared to all those other things.

This has been proven in studies with university students. They held their hands in a bucket of water, and then guessed the temperature. They took data from several students, got an average, and then repeated the experiment. Only this time they had them hold their other hand in a bucket of cold water. Again they took several data points from several students. Next they repeated the experiment, only the other hand was now placed in a bucket of warm, almost hot water (they didn’t want them to hurt themselves.)

The results were as you would expect, in light of the compare and contrast law of influence. With their other hands in hot water, they underestimated the temperature in the test bucket. With their other hand in cold water, they overestimated the temperature in the test bucket.

More proof.

A restaurant served several bottles of wine. The most expensive bottle was $80. They sold very few. Then a marketing expert suggested they add another bottle at significantly higher price. Over $200. That’s all they did. They didn’t increase advertising, the wait staff didn’t suggest buying wine any more than they did before. The mere presence of a much higher priced bottle of wine made the 80 dollar bottle seem like a bargain in comparison. Sales went through the roof.

Countless retailers have noticed this phenomenon. They have an old product, that sells at a certain rate. They introduce a new product, which is new and improved, and costs more. They naturally expect people to buy the new product, which a few do. But they old product suddenly jumps in sales.

Why?

Two reasons. One is that it looks a lot cheaper now, that there is a more expensive product sitting next to it. Secondly, the law of scarcity is now in play, as a new product presupposes that the old product is being phased out, and won’t be around much longer.

Combining any two of these laws together can give you an incredible persuasive edge.

Real estate agents have been known to use this law in a way that borders on the unethical. The real estate company maintains a house that is in not such good shape, and in not such a good part of town. The new clients come in, and ask to see houses within certain budget.

Guess which house they see first?

The broken down house in a not so good neighborhood. And it happens to be right at their price range. Of course, the next house they see is only a little higher than what they wanted to pay, but it’s so much nicer! It’s a bargain!

Just like any particular art of persuasion and method of influencing people, there are ethical ways, and unethical ways to apply them.

If you happen to be selling things, then it may be a good idea to keep around a much more expensive product, or display one on your web site in order to boost sales of the more inexpensive one.

If you are persuading someone of an idea, give them two choices. The one you’d really like them to choose, or one that sounds absolutely horrible, expensive, painful, and complicated.

If you are on the receiving end of a persuasion, this one can be hard to dodge, as it usually comes in unexpected. The best defense would be to take as much time to weigh the pros and cons of your decision, to give your conscious mind a fighting chance against these ancient human hot buttons. In the case of the wine, it may be a good idea to decide how much you want to drink wine, and how much you’re willing to pay before you take a gander at the wine list.

If you’ve been reading this articles, then you might be starting to see these laws in effect everywhere you look, which they are. Once you get a handle on all seven of them, you’ll open up a hold new world of persuasion, both on the persuading side, and on the defensive side.

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There are few things that work more to create a unconscious desire to buy or acquire something that scarcity. Even though
scarcity is the oldest trick in the book when it comes to sales, it still works. Any time something is in limited supply, or the time is
scarce, in the form of an impending end to a sale, buying desire can quickly reach feverish pitches.

Why is this? Is this some ancient form of mind control or conversational hypnosis? Is this massive brainwashing on a collective
scale? Some believe that we are trained by governments and industry to become attached to things that we can’t have, so that
we’ll continually be in a buying state of mind.

It’s actually the other way around. For hundreds of thousands of years, Mother Nature, or God, has been programming humans
through evolution to react strongly whenever scarcity rears its head.

Imagine this situation. You have a group of a hundred or so primitive humans. They are largely nomadic, and agriculture is a
thing in the distant future. They have to hunt for every meal. When somebody comes back with a particularly large catch, say a
giraffe, its time to eat, as they don’t know how long it will be until they catch another giraffe.

Now imagine two different genetic makeups. One is a person who takes his time eating, doesn’t push to the front of the line, and
passively waits his turn. The other is a person that when valuable resources show up, he steps on toes, pushes others out of the
way, and gets what he wants.

Which one of these pair do you think will be more likely to pass on his genes? Remember, to mind of a primitive human, an
attractive member of the opposite sex is also a resource. Men fight between each other for the best women, and women fight
between each other for the best men.

So here we are hundreds of thousands of years later. We’ve build cathedrals, sent men to the moon, and create beautiful works of
art that have lasted millennia. Yet deep within us all is that drive to “get it before somebody else does.”

There are plenty of ways that savvy markets use this aspect of the human condition. There are plenty of ways to imply scarcity
about any given situation. Time running out is a scarcity of time. If you receive special information, that is not given to the
general public, that information is trusted much more, as it triggers the scarcity response.

Even waiters, when they use the law of reciprocity when they casually mention to a customer that the fresh fish isn’t all that
fresh, can greatly leverage the effect simply by prefacing their statement with, “I don’t tell this to everybody…” This powerfully
combines the power of scarcity (scarce information) with the power of reciprocity (free, useful information).

When something is on sale, and there are only a few of them left, there is a powerful combination of scarcity and social proof.
Scarcity because the item is limited, and social proof because everybody else wants it. Is it any wonder that every year on Black
Friday (the Friday after Thanksgiving when all the sales start in the U.S.) there are many injuries, and sometimes even deaths due
to stampeding crowds after a discounted X Box?

It is all to easy to succumb to these ancient evolutionary hot buttons. One way to defend against the law of scarcity is to ask
yourself a few questions:

Did I plan to purchase this, or is this an impulse buy?
Could I get a better one someplace else?
Would I be better of waiting for the next model? (As many people should have asked with the recent iPhones).
Would I be so incredibly determined to buy this if there were an unlimited supply and nobody else wanted one?

Sure, it’s tough to think rationally when evolutionary programming kicks it, but if you want to avoid mindlessly following the
crowd, your rational mind is all you’ve got.

If you in sales, you should be applying scarcity every chance you get. Scarcity of time. Scarcity of product. Scarcity of
information. All of these will increase buying temperature of your potential clients, and can make you a lot more money.

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There is a proven law in the world of persuasion that is so effective, it allowed a cultish religious group to go from barely scraping by to raking in millions of dollars a year in donations. So much so that this particular organization was later busted for tax evasion.

This simple law has also been shown by waiters and waitresses in the know to drastically increase the amount of their tips, merely adding a few extra words during the time in which they take their customers order.

Even cultures are based around this law. Ridley, in his book “The Origins of Virtue,” described this as “gift giving as a weapon.”

What is this powerful tool? This irresistible law of influence that it has been used, even by you?

Reciprocity.

The aforementioned religious group was the Hare Krishnas. Before they discovered this law, they would simply ask people for donations in the airports. Most people wouldn’t give them the time of day.

But then they switched their tactics. They gave a small flower to their “mark,” and then asked them for a small donation. It’s important to understand they way they gave it to them.

Giving a flower, and asking for a donation sounds similar to a “you scratch my back, and I’ll scratch yours kind of arrangement,” but the way the exchange happened, it was anything but.

The flower was first given, as a gift. No strings, no expressions of future expectation. Simply, “Here, this flower is for you.” Then they would ask if they could possible get a small donation.

They made no statement about the flower, or even motioned towards the flower. The two incidents, the giving of the flower, and the asking for the donation, were treated completely separately.

Once they Krishnas started handing out flowers, they money started coming in.

In a famous experiment described in Cialdini’s “Influence, Science and Practice,” this was shown experimentally several times.

It was set up with two people, A and B. Then a third person came in, C. B and C were in a room, looking at pictures, and writing down their impressions. C thought that A was doing an experiment, and B and C were participating in the experiment.

However, C was the only test subject, with A and B in on the game.

Half the time, B would disappear momentarily. He came back with two cokes, and gave one to C.

But all of the time, B would ask C if he would buy some raffle tickets for his kids baseball club (or some other club.)

The times that B gave C a coke a few minutes before asking, C bought a raffle ticket over 70% of the time.

The times that B didn’t give C a coke, he bought one less than 30% of the time.

A great way to use this law of influence if you are a waiter or waitress, is to give your customers some “inside information.” The apple pie isn’t so fresh, or the fish is actually frozen. They’ll appreciate the advice, and when it comes time to tip, they’ll be more generous. Reciprocity in action.

One thing to keep in mind, is that the feeling of reciprocity does have a shelf life. It generally dies very quickly, so if you are going to apply this law, keep in mind a couple things.

Don’t ask for the favor too soon after you did something nice. Then it will appear to obvious and underhanded. But if you wait too long, the effect will die out.

If you are on the receiving end, there’s not much you can do. Simply refusing a request, after you’ve accepted a gift is a hard thing to do. The best bet is to simply beware of Greeks bearing gifts.

Studies have shown that the more personalized, and unique a gift or favor is, the more effect it will have.

Buying a beautiful woman a drink at a bar may be a step in the right direction, but it won’t likely have any strong effect of reciprocity. Unless of course you do it in a personal and unique way. I suppose you could spy on her and watch what she’s drinking, and eavesdrop so you can learn her name, and then show up, call her by name, and give her her favorite drink, but that would probably be too creepy.

This works best in established relationships. If you get to know a person, and really get to know their likes and dislikes, then giving a personalized, unique gift can have tremendous effects.

The best salespeople are the ones that develop genuine relationships with their clients, and really pay attention to what they have to say.

Getting an automated email on your birthday is one thing, but sending a hand written note on a card, that speaks to who you really are will put you ahead of the pack.

This is one automatic hot button that you should be aware of in today’s world where we are seemingly surrounded by marketers. Pay attention to the giver, not the gift. What do they want? Do you know they well? Would you feel comfortable granting them a favor in the future?

As the saying goes, nothing is more expensive than a free gift.

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Imagine that you’re walking down the street on a lazy, Sunday afternoon. Maybe you’re going to the mall, or to meet up with a friend for lunch. You’re in no hurry. You’ve walked down this street many times before; you know all the shops inside out.

As you’re strolling down the sidewalk, you happen to glance a large crowd across the street. They seem to be clustered around the entrance of a particular store. You think you know which shop they’re in front of, but you can’t make out the name because there are so many people. The people all looking intently at the shops entrance. They’re not idly chatting amongst themselves, or starting mindlessly at their cell phones. A few seem to be standing as high as they can, stretching their necks to get a better view.

What is going on?

If you are curious at all, simply be reading this, then you’ve fallen prey to the irresistible pull of social proof. Had this been a real occurrence, there’s a fifty-fifty chance you would have crossed the street at the first opportunity to see what all the fuss was about.

The basic mechanism of social proof is that whenever in doubt; check your peers for guidance. The group usually knows best. At least that’s the assumption.

Sometimes referred to the herd mentality (perhaps a bit derogatorily), social proof is not something many would admit to falling under the influence of. When asked why you are wearing that particular clothing item, most people wouldn’t readily admit it was because everybody else was.

We humans don’t like to admit that we are sometimes mindless herd following automatons, going wherever the crowd goes.
But study after study shows that social proof wields a very powerful influence on personal decision-making. There are several different kinds of social proof of varying strength.

In the above example, you weren’t in any hurry, and it wasn’t dangerous nor did it cost you anything to cross the street to see what was going on. In this case, social proof can be very, very strong. Marketers love things like this, as it gives them nearly free advertising.

For example, if you were to click on Youtube, and see five or ten different videos, all with relatively the same title, and all with relatively the same thumbnail image, what would you use as your guide to decide? Most quickly check the view count, and simply choose the one with the highest views.

Social proof in action.

The strange thing is that although study after study bears this out, few people will admit to doing so. We like to believe we have rational reasons for doing things, and due to the wonders of cognitive dissonance, we actually convince ourselves that we made a rational decision microseconds after we were unconsciously swayed by social proof.

Is this some kind of deficiency of our celebrated human mind that has created language, culture, and spaceship to the moon?

Not at all.

Our brains and bodies (at least in their latest revision) evolved and were refined for hundreds of thousands of years in a time when our daily existence was a struggle for survival. For the vast majority of human history, we were a relatively nomadic people, having to deal with ever changing geographic and whether conditions. Uncertainty was a part of life.

So we developed an instinct to follow the crowd. It was safer, it helped us survive, and our ancestors passed down those genes to us.

Sure there were the non-conformists of the day who zigged when everybody else zagged, but they didn’t survive long enough to pass on any of those non-conformist genes. They either got eaten by tigers or fell of cliffs while the rest of the group was safely following the riverbed, in a large, protected group.

Even today, social proof can be an extremely useful tool. Once I took a trip to a foreign country, and I was at a complete loss of where to go to get my baggage. I couldn’t read any of the signs, and instructions had been given in a language I didn’t understand.

Luckily, social proof came to the rescue. All I did was follow everybody else, and stick close to people that I recognized from my flight. Sure enough, I arrived at the correct baggage carousel (there were about eight) along with everybody else. Social proof does have its benefits.

In other cases, social proof can take some time to take hold. Consider the following example.

In the 50′s in farm country in the United States, a new type of corn was created that yielded 20% more corn per plant. This would mean a direct increase in salable product by 20% for the farmers, without any increase in land or water use. The plants had been adequately tested and shown to consistently produce 20% more corn.

They gave the new seed to a few farmers, and despite their success, the neighboring farmers were reluctant to try it at first. Then they slowly introduced it into their crops, in small percentages at first. It took a full 9 years before all the farmers had switched completely over to the new crop.

In this case, the social proof of the farmers using and benefiting from the new seed was tempered by a sense of protection of their current state of affairs. Surely they wanted to increase their yields and their income, but they also wanted to make sure they protected what they had.

There are still plenty of ways that social proof is beneficial. It saves thinking time, and it ensures you aren’t making any horrendous mistakes. Be careful though. Don’t fall into the trap of thinking, “It’s better to fail with the crowd than succeed on my own.” This has tendency to limit your success in life.

Social proof is everywhere you look. In advertising, in the clothes that you wear, and even the precise moment you decide to cross the street, when waiting in a crowd.

Despite our vast advances in technology, science, arts, literature, space exploration and human development, we are still, at heart, pack animals.

One powerful way to make sure you aren’t getting sucked into anything is to try and imagine doing whatever it is you are doing, if nobody else was doing it.

Would you suddenly cross the street to look into that shop if nobody was gathered in front?

Would you wear that particular clothing style or brand name if nobody else was?

You’ll find that if you take the time to question your choices, and choose based on your own consciously determined preferences, and not those of the crowd, you will gain much more self confidence, as well as stand out from the crowd.

And pretty soon everybody else will be following you.

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We humans fancy ourselves as highly evolved animals that have rational minds, advanced language, arts, society, culture and a host of other advanced technologies. We don’t like to think of ourselves as irrational creatures that are at the mercy of ancient evolutionary hot buttons.

The truth about us, however, is that we are far more susceptible to seemingly innocuous external factors than we’d care to admit.

There have been seven demonstrated elements, or influence hot buttons, that we, unfortunately, have a hard time resisting. When they are effectively combined, either by design or by accident, they can cause us to buy useless gadgets like pet rocks, or go bezerk and follow a dictator and stand by while millions of innocents are put to death.

It also caused our ancestors to live long enough to reproduce, and pass on their genes that made them susceptible to this kind of influence to us.

This can be good news if you are a salesperson, or in need of some skills of influence. It helps to know what these are so you can both use them to persuade others, and to defend against them when you find yourself doing or buying something that you wouldn’t normally do.

This article will be a brief overview of these six elements, and each one in particular will receive further examination in a further post.

All six of these are described by Dr. Robert Cialdini, PhD, in his book “Influence, Science and Practice.” It is a must read no matter your profession or position in life.

These are not theories, based on some esoteric branch of psychology. These are laws of influence that have been ascertained by careful, scientifically designed social experimentation.

These Laws of Influence are as follows:

Reciprocity

When somebody does something for you, you will feel an unconscious desire to repay the favor. This can be exploited when somebody gives you something that you don’t really want, or need, and then later asks you for a favor. When this happens, it is almost impossible to reject the request.

Authority

The more authority somebody has, the more persuasive their message will be. If some homeless guy on the street tells you to buy gold, you’ll likely ignore him. However, if Warren Buffet buys a 15 second TV commercial, and tells you to buy gold, there will be a lot of people buying gold. Same message, different source.

Social Proof

Safety in numbers. When in doubt, look to the crowd for guidance. Humans are highly social animals, and depend largely on the group in order to make our decisions. Much more than we’d like to admit. If you see one guy standing on the corner staring up at the sky, you’ll look at the guy and wonder what’s wrong with him. If you see ten guys standing there looking up in the sky, you’ll stare up into the sky.

Scarcity

The scarcer something is, the more valuable it is. If you go to the DVD store, and there are fifty copies of the latest movie, it may seem interesting, it may not. But if all fifty copies save one have been rented out, you’ll be much more inclined to rent the one that’s left before you miss your chance.

Comparison and Contrast

Our judgments on the value or other attribute of something is largely influenced if it is compared to something similar. That fifty-dollar bottle of wine may seem too expensive, but not when the only other bottle of wine on the menu is $350.

Commitment and Consistency

We are much more likely to follow through with an action, or hold to an opinion, when we make a public statement to that effect. Jury trials where each juror actually verbally states his or her vote last much longer than jury trials that use the secret ballot system. Once people make a public statement of opinion, they are generally resistant to change it.

Liking

We are much more prone to believe an idea or suggestion when it comes from somebody we identify with, or like on a personal level. Waiters who discreetly tell the customers which menu items are overpriced receive much higher tips. The customers feel they are getting special, personal treatment.

Stay tuned for an in depth look at each influence factor. You’ll learn how to use them in sales and persuasion, and defend against them in life.

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This article is in a series of articles on linguistic presuppositions. These are simple yet powerful language patterns that when used effectively, can be very useful to covertly and conversationally persuade and influence others.

The pattern for today is “Repetitive Cue Words.” These are words like “too,” “again,” “back,” “also,” and “either.” As they are single words, and not a grammatical pattern like many of the other presuppositions, they are highly flexible and can be used a number of ways.

In general, when you use these words, you are “revisiting” an idea in a sentence, either an idea you’ve explicitly stated, or one that has been implicitly thought of by either you or another person, and you are simply referring to it again.

For example, for the idea of “exercise is the best way to lose weight”:

I heard that exercise is the best way to lose weight, and no matter how many diets and methods I’ve tried, I keep coming back to that simple truth.

In this case, the idea has been expressed once, and then come “back” to by the speaker, effectively repeating it as a “rediscovered truth,” something that would be difficult to disagree with.

Another example, using the same idea:

Most leading dieticians, while agreeing that what you eat is important, always come back to the basic principle that daily exercise is the best way to lose weight.

In this case the first instance of the idea is only implied, and is only actually mentioned when it is “come back” to. This implies that these dieticians (whoever they are) knew this at the beginning, and keep coming “back” to it.

For the idea of “dollar cost averaging is the best way to make money in the stock market,” consider the word “again.”

Again and again, people consistently realize that dollar cost averaging is the best way to make money in the stock market.

In this case, combining “again and again” with “people” implies that many people, over the course of some vague period of time, are independently realizing the power of dollar cost averaging. As stated above, it is hard to argue with.

How about this one:

Investment bankers also realize the wealth building of power of dollar cost averaging.

Here a group of people is implied. Investment bankers realize the power of dollar cost averaging, in addition to some other unnamed group. The reader or listener will generally assume this “group” to be of the same expertise, from a financial perspective, as investment bankers. This is very powerful, as it implies social proof from whatever group of people the listener or reader cares to imagine.

How about the power of presuppositions?

Sales people that consistently outperform their peers again and again understand the power of simple linguistic presuppositions to give them an incredible edge.

Top closers in any company also understand the subtle power of presuppositions to give them incredibly lucrative skills in sales.

Despite the many years of training and seminars, top sales people come back again and again to the simple power of presuppositions, which can be learned in their entirety by reading this blog on a daily basis.

You can either continue to try method after method, or you too, like many others, can come back to the simple strategy of combining subtly powerful presuppositions which will lead you again and again to increasing sales and personal income.

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This is another article on linguistic presuppositions, the powerful language patterns that you can use to covertly persuade others to happily give you exactly what you want.

Today’s pattern is the comparative structure. This is a powerful pattern that you can use in many different ways. I will cover two of the basic ways.

First, a little bit about comparatives. These are simply adjectives with the –er suffix attached to them. Higher, taller, fatter, bigger, longer, etc. Or with irregular adjectives (e.g. adjectives with more than two syllables) you simple put “more” in front of them. More beautiful, more expensive, more exciting, etc.

You can also join two actions using “the more…the more…” or “the more…the (comparative),” as follows:

The more I eat, the fatter I get.
The more I study, the smarter I get.
The more I type, the more tired my fingers become.

A good way to use the first comparative is to think of something you want to persuade your listener of, and then ask a question of they know anything that is (better, easier, faster) than your idea.

Examples.

Idea = exercise is the best way to lose weight.

Sentence:

Do you know of any way that is more effective than consistent daily exercise to lose weight?

If they answer no, (either out loud or in their head) then they admit that exercise is the best way to lose weight. If you are a personal trainer, then you’re in a great position to sell them some of your services.

Even if they answer yes, (either out loud or in their head) they must accept that exercise is a great way to lose weight, otherwise the sentence wouldn’t make any sense, as they would have anything to compare their “other” method to.

Idea = dollar cost averaging is a great way to make money in the stock market.

Do you know of anything simpler than dollar cost averaging to consistently make money in the stock market over the long term?

Again, no matter if they say yes or no, they will implicitly accept the idea that dollar cost averaging is a great way to make money in the stock market.

To use “the more… the more…” pattern, you set it up so that the idea you are trying to convince them of naturally leads to a desirable outcome. Or you can use “the more…the less” to set it up so that when they accept your idea, something that is undesirable will decrease.

Idea = exercise is a great way to lose weight

The more my clients realize that exercise is the best way to lose weight, the less they have to worry about fad diets, or how many calories they eat with every meal.

Or you can even use this to set up increasing social proof for your message:

More and more people are starting to discover that exercise is the best way to lose weight.

Idea = dollar cost averaging is a great way to make money in the stock market.

The more our clients understand the power of dollar cost averaging, the more they are starting to really look forward to their retirement.

The more our customers start to see the wealth generating capacity of simple dollar cost averaging, the less they are worried about their future.

More and more of our clients are using simple dollar cost averaging to make their financial future brighter and brighter.

Now I’m sure you’re starting to realize that there aren’t many methods out there that are more powerful and elegant than linguistic presuppositions to covertly persuade somebody to your way of thinking.

More and more salespeople are starting to realize that the more they study these simple patterns on a daily basis, the brighter their future becomes, as more and more opportunities seem to start showing up out of nowhere.

And I can’t think of anything more exciting than gaining such incredible persuasive power, both socially and professionally, through studying some simple language patterns.

And the more you start to realize that, the more you’ll understand how much potential is all around you, just waiting for you to leverage it to your benefit.

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This is another article in a series on linguistic presuppositions, those powerful language patterns that can easily give you the persuasive power of a Jedi Knight.

Today’s pattern is stressed sentences, or stressed words within a sentence. Although they can be used in written form, with boldface type, they are much more powerful in person.

Here’s how they work. You take your idea that you’d like to persuade the other person, and place a commentary adjective in front of it, and simply say the sentence. When you combine a commentary adjective, (amazing, wonderful, fantastic) with some voice stress, and some obviously happy facial expressions, the rest of the sentence has a much better chance of being wholly accepted as true.

Idea = exercise is the best way to lose weight.

Sentence:

I think it’s AMAZING that exercise is the best way to lose weight because all you really need is a few minutes every morning.

The results you get from just a little bit of exercise are truly AMAZING.

You can get some really AMAZING weight loss results form just a few minutes of exercise every day.

Idea = dollar cost averaging is a simple way to consistently grow wealth in the stock market.

Sentence:

I just read this AMAZING article that showed how much money you can make by this AWESOME technique called dollar cost averaging.

My friend showed me ASTOUNDING proof of how he made tons of money through dollar cost averaging.

Idea = presuppositions will skyrocket your persuasion skills

Sentence:

The AMAZING thing about presuppositions is not how powerful they are, but how simple they are to learn.

I’ve gotten such FANTASTIC sales results once I started using these simple things called linguistic presuppositions.

Now, I don’t know how many AMAZING discoveries you’ll find regarding these POWERFUL patterns, perhaps you’ll drop in a comment to let us know of the FANTASTIC things you can imagine doing with them in the future.

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This is an article in a series on linguistic presuppositions. These powerful patterns can dramatically increase your capacity for covert, conversational persuasion, as they are structured to deliver ideas to your listener or reader that will bypass their conscious “critic” and go straight into the unconscious.

Today’s pattern is cleft sentences. Cleft sentences are sentences that start with either “It is…, ” or “it was…,” that can be used in various ways; here I will go over two powerful methods.

The first is to insert a commentary adjective (interesting, wonderful, fantastic, surprising, etc) after the “It is..” and then insert the idea you want to persuade your listener or reader.

Some examples:

Idea = Exercise is best for weight loss
Adjective = interesting

It’s (it is) interesting that exercise is one of the best ways to lose weight.

Idea = dollar cost investing is the best way to make money
Adjective = surprising

It’s surprising that dollar cost averaging is such a great way to make money. I had always thought that you needed to have inside information, or be an expert.

Idea = presuppositions are powerful persuasive tools
Adjective = amazing

It’s amazing how much you can increase your persuasive ability by studying presuppositions.

Another way to use this pattern is to use a reference, and then put them in the past tense. Then phrase the sentence as if the outcome has already been accomplished. Just find somebody who has already exhibited the idea you want to persuade your audience.

Some examples:

Idea: dollar cost averaging is a great way to make money
Reference: friend (or somebody you read about) who already made money through dollar cost averaging.

I was talking to (reading about, etc) this rich guy the other day. It was his consistent application of dollar cost averaging that allowed him to amass so much wealth in the stock market.

Idea = exercise is the best way to lose weight.
Reference = friend of yours who lost a lot of weight

I have this friend who looks great. I asked her how she did it, and she said she tried all kinds of different weight loss methods, but in the end, it was consistent daily exercise that made it easy to lose the weight.

Idea = presuppositions can skyrocket your persuasion skills
Reference = a friend (or somebody you read about) that is the top salesperson in their company

I was reading this article about this guy who always comes in first in his company’s annual sales competition. He said that it was his relentless study of presuppositions that gave him such powerful sales and persuasion skills.

One thing that never ceases to amaze me is how wonderful it is that there are these language patterns that can give you incredible power in your social life as well as your business, whatever it may be.

Indeed, most of the most successful people you’ll meet will tell you that it was their continued desire to learn more information and techniques that gave them their edge.

I don’t know if it’s your desire to increase your success that makes you optimistic about the future, or your capacity for continued improvement in all areas of life that drives you to continue to learn and improve yourself, but one thing is for certain: It is presuppositions that can give you a powerful edge that most people aren’t even aware of.

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This is an article in the series on linguistic presuppositions. Linguistic presuppositions are powerful language patterns that can dramatically increase your ability to persuade others.

Today’s lesson is on the subordinate clause of time pattern.

A subordinate clause is when one idea in a sentence is linked to, or dependent on another idea in the same sentence. A subordinate clause of time links when temporally, or according to time. When one thing happens, another thing will automatically happen. Commonly used time words are, when, after, as soon as, once, before, prior, while, yet, etc.

Consider the difference between the following two sentences:

If I go to the store tonight, I’ll buy some apples.

And

When I go to the store tonight, I’ll buy some apples

In the first sentence, the “buying apples” part is dependent upon “going to the store,” but the “going to the store” part is not a done deal. Maybe I’ll go, maybe I won’t. Maybe it’s dependent upon something else that I haven’t mentioned.

On the other hand, the second sentence, going to the store is assumed to happen, no mater what. It has already been decided. And buying apples, which is dependent on going to the store, is already decided as well.

The best way to use this pattern is to use the thing, or idea, you are intending to persuade your audience to think or do, in the place of “going to the store,” in the above example, and then put something that most people would generally desire, in the place of “buying apples” in the above example.

Let’s look at a couple of examples:

Persuasive idea = dollar cost averaging is a good investment strategy

Generally desired outcome = make money

Linking words = (as soon as, after, once, since)

As soon as you realize that dollar cost averaging is really the best investment strategy out there, you’ll understand how easy it is to consistently make money.

Persuasive Idea = presuppositions are powerful

Desired outcome = able to easily persuade others conversationally

Linking words = after, as soon as, once

After you really appreciate how powerful presuppositions are, you’ll find that persuading people through regular conversation can become second nature.

Persuasive Idea = exercise is the best way to lose weight

Desired outcome = increased attention from the opposite sex

Linking words = as soon as, once, after

Once you understand that the easiest way to consistently lose weight is with a few minutes of exercise everyday, you’ll be surprised to notice all the additional attention you’ll be getting from (men/women/boys/girls).

You can also flip it around, and use before, prior and other words, and simply reverse the sentence.

(Before/Prior) + (desired outcome) + (intended persuasive message)

Before he started getting all kinds of massive attention from girls at school, he understood that exercise is the best way to lose weight.

Prior to making so much money in the stock market on a regular basis, he read a book explaining why dollar cost averaging is the best investment method there is.

Before he became the best salesperson at his company, he really took the time to master linguistic presuppositions, so that he could easily skyrocket his sales.

Now, I don’t know what it is you’d like persuade others to do, maybe you’re in sales, maybe you’d like to increase your social skills, or maybe you’d just like to feel more powerful and in control of the conversations you find yourself in. Whatever the reasons are, once you really take the time to learn and practice these presuppositions on a regular basis, you’ll really see an improvement not only in that particular area of your life you’d like to improve, but in many other areas as well.

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The human brain is a wonderful computational machine that will likely not be understood for many years to come. Only now are scientists starting to scratch the surface of how the brain operates, and how the microscopic circuitry can give rise to complex emotional and psychological behavior.

One thing that mystifies many is how exactly language works. Until only recently, it was thought by many that the mind was a “blank slate,” and how we are raised, our culture, our religious, and even our language is determined by what we are taught.

While that may be true in some cases, in the case of language, there is more and more evidence that our brains are pre-wired to soak up language, and use a specific grammatical structure to translate our thoughts into sounds that others can easily understand.

At first glance, it may seem that different languages have nothing in common. If you’ve ever studied a language that differs from English in its SVO (subject verb object) structure, it can be easy to fall into the trap of thinking that the languages of the world are vastly different, so different that we can’t share a common grammar “organ” somewhere in our brain.

Yet experimental researchers in recent years are discovering that indeed, we seem to have a grammatical structure, and it is only a matter of flipping a few internal switches in the first few weeks of our life to figure out what the particular grammatical flavor of our culture of birth is. After that, it’s simply a matter of filling in the blanks.

This leads to some interesting phenomenon. One that is particularly useful, and particularly sneaky, it to leverage the pre existing structure of our language to carefully construct our speech to make it much easier to persuade somebody that by suing old fashioned logic.

There is a special class of language patterns called “Linguistic Presuppositions” that when used correctly, can have a powerful and dramatic effect on your ability to persuade unconsciously. And that means you can get other people to do what you want, and think what you want, all the while thinking that it was there idea.

There are 28 identified patterns of linguistic presuppositions, all of which will be described here in detail over the next few weeks.

Once you get skilled in using them, you will literally see the world in a whole new light. You will also be able look underneath the speech of others with laser like precision, to see precisely what they are thinking, and what is on their mind.

This can have profound effects on your ability to persuade, as well as dramatically increase the quality of the communication within your relationships.

Linguistic presuppositions are at once the least understood, yet one of the most powerful language patterns you can use for easy and natural persuasion.

Stay tuned for more information.

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Due to the overwhelming response to something that happened before I even knew that I wasn’t aware of it, I’ve decided to do what most everyboyd already figured out. Which is precisely what you’ve probably been thinking.

Exactly.

My tale starts out with a vague feeling of déjà vu, although not quite. I had walked into this shop, and I’m positive I’d never been in there before, but for some reason I knew where everything was. Not that that is such a big deal, because most shops are pretty much laid out with the customer in mind, and to make it as easy as possible for them to make a purchased and get on out without excessive lingering.

But something about this store seemed odd, but at the same time, strangely familiar. The shopkeeper even looked at me with a sort of expectation, like I was in there a week before and I’d just come back to finalize my purchase or something. But then again, it may have all been my imagination. That has been happening a lot to me lately.

Déjà vu is an interesting, widely experienced, but often misunderstood brain phenomenon. It seems to happen at random, so they can’t really do any experiments to reproduce the effect. And they can’t very well hook electrodes into people’s brains, and have them sit around in a laboratory waiting to get hit with passing cloud of déjà vu.

According to various esoteric theories of probability and philosophy, combined with a few cold and hard facts about the known universe, there may very well be an infinite number of worlds just like this one, but only with sleight differences. The theory goes that since the universe is infinite, there are an infinite number of particles that can combine in an infinite number of combinations, making every possible combination a highly probable event. So somewhere in some corner of the universe is somebody just like you, reading a post just like this, sitting in a chair just like that, only something is slightly different. Like instead of that thought that just entered into our head, your counterpart in the parallel universe is thinking the thought that you are about to think, or perhaps the same thought that you thought the same time yesterday.

They theorize that déjà vu is some kind of vague and brief connection between you and one of your other universe counterparts. Some kind of a long distance resonance between bodies of particles that happen coincidently share congruence before phase shifting into randomness.

Our eyes only connected for about a second, before I realized my feeling of connection wasn’t backed by any game plan, so I just broke off eye contact, like you do when you are too embarrassed to say anything, and you’d like to just pretend your eyes never met. But our eyes did meet, and I could still feel them following them throughout the store.

“Did you forget something?” She asked.

Wait, what?

“Huh?” I turned, surprised.

She looked around helpfully, and then looked at me with her head cocked.
“You weren’t carrying any bags, did you put something down that was in your pockets?” She asked with genuine concern.

My pockets. I stuck my hands in both of them. Nothing there but my keys, and my wallet. Which is what I always carry when I leave the house. No bag.

I shook my head, and stood hoping for some more unsolicited information that might help me out.

“Did you change your mind? About the machine?”

Machine?

“Um..” I started. Not sure. Starting to feel a real desire to get the hell out of there.

“I can’t really go any lower. It does sound it could be very useful to you. It does come with a three month guarantee.”

I had an idea.

“Um, could you show it to me, once more?” I asked. Staring directly her, so I wouldn’t look in the opposite direction by accident, and look like an idiot. (Who am I kidding here?)

“Sure.” She said, smiling and pulled out a catalogue. It was big, and thick. About half as thick as a phone book. It looked very expensive; all the pages were glossy and full color. She was slowly thumbing through the pages; I couldn’t quite glimpse what sort of things was in there. I stepped closer to get a better look.

“Aha, here it is.” She announced, turning the book around so I could see.

I was looking at that? What in the world. I checked the price. Sixteen thousand dollars. She must have noticed my eyes.

“As I said before, I can go as low as twelve thousand. We’ll scarcely make any money on this.”

I have to admit, even though I wasn’t quite sure what you would use a contraption like that for, it sure looked nice. Twelve thousand really wasn’t that much, considering. What the hell.

“Uh..” I started. How to start.

“Payment is, uh…” I hoped she’d finish for me. She did.

“Don’t worry sir, we won’t need to check your credit again.”

Again? Wait, if they ran my credit, that would mean…

“Ten percent down, and then the balance is up to you. Most of our customers secure financing on their own, but with your unique circumstances, that won’t be necessary. As I said before, you can just pay us twelve monthly payments on the balance. No interest.”

That did sound like a pretty good deal. What the hell.

“Ok,” I heard myself say.
“I’ll take it.”

That was just when I’d noticed the wedding band on my finger. When did I get married? I just hoped that my wife, whoever she was, wasn’t going to be angry at this purchase.

To be continued…

(And now for something completely different)

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So the other day I was having an argument with a friend of mine. Not really an argument, although it could have easily turned into one if either one of us had a hugely vested interested in our opinions, which we both agreed were merely opinions. We’d argued/discusses several issues at length enough times to know that pretty much either issue we choose, it’s fairly easy to shoot holes in each others arguments, and we almost always end up agreeing to disagree.

One of the things we do sometimes is to play devils advocate one each other, if that’s even the right term. We pick an issue, an issue that we disagree on, and which is highly controversial, such as gun control, or abortion, or animal rights, and argue the opposite that we normally would.

I actually met this guy several years ago in a sales seminar, and that was one of the ways they taught us to overcome objections, was to put yourself in the customers shoes, and come up with as many objections as possible. The seminar itself was based on the overcoming objections part of the sales process. One of the things we learned was that the best way to overcome an objection is to not only defeat it, but to bring it up before the other person even thinks about it. In technical terms this is called “pre framing” as opposed to “re framing.” When you reframe something, you take an already stated objection, and try to twist it around so it’s not such a big objection. The problem with this is that many times, by the time the person has formulated the though well enough to present a coherent objection, they’ve usually been thinking about it for a while, and it’s pretty well entrenched in their mind.

So a great way to get rid of objections is to simply reframe them before they come up, or preframe them. That way when the client starts to formulate the thought that would have otherwise turned into an objection, instead they’ll think what you want them to think.

Here’s a great example that I witnessed in real time, several years ago. While you may object to the content of my example, the structure of how the particular objection in question was handled before it came up was particularly elegant. I was eating dinner at a restaurant with a group of guys. One of the guys, who was around 40 years old at the time, liked the younger ladies. He wouldn’t date anyone older than mid twenties. (If you find this distasteful, please press on. The example lies in the structure, not the content.)

At the time of this incident, the TV show ER was really popular, and starred George Clooney, who was the latest heartthrob. I believe at the time Clooney was late thirties. So my friend was flirting with this young waitress. I don’t think he intended to actually follow throw, he was just practicing his “game,” so to speak.

They were flirting back and forth, with eye contact, and conversations that lasted jut a tad bit longer than your normal waitress/customer interaction. He asked what she did when she wasn’t waitressing. She mentioned that she was in nursing school. He smiled and said, “Oh, you want to be like on ER, right?” And she blushed, as it was obvious that she liked that show, and at least entertained the idea of being a glamorous nurse like on TV.

So my friend, noticed a golden opportunity to preframe the “how old are you” question, that younger girls sometimes ask seemingly older guys. While she was still smiling about the thought of being a nurse “like” on ER, my friend says:

“Me and George Clooney have the same birthday.”

Now if she fantasized at all about being a nurse on ER, she surely fantasized, at least a little bit, about George Clooney. And my friend put himself in that same category in her mind. If he decided to pursue this girl (he didn’t,) and the age question ever began to arise in her mind, she would remember him having the same age as George Clooney, and of course she wouldn’t have a problem with George Clooney, so the age question was deflected and dismantled before it ever came up.

When I asked him later on how he was able to think in the moment like that, and preframe a pretty powerful objection right there on the spot, in real time, he told me it was simply through practice. He had dated quite few younger girls, and they would inevitably come up with the same questions. So what he did was to write out all the questions he got over and over, on some business size cards. And everyday, while he was taking the train to work, he would flip through the cards, look at the questions, and think of the best way to answer them that would respect the questioner, and also put himself in the best possible light.

He said that after he did that for a while, he began to see the questions coming long before they were ever actually expressed verbally, and easily preframe them. After a while, they never, ever came up again, and he enjoyed much more success (take that however you will) with his pursuit of dating younger girls.

In that sales seminar I went to, they taught us the same thing. To make a list of all the objections you get on a regular basis, and figure out the best way to answer so that you’re not disregarding or disrespecting your client, but you’re also putting your product or your service in the best possible light.

If you take the time to actually write down the objections you get the most, and practice going over some possible answers, you’ll find that they begin to come up more and more, and you’ll even be preframing them conversationally without even realizing it. To the untrained eye, they will seem to have magically disappeared.

Another thing we learned at the seminar was a way to increase mental flexibility and open mindedness. And that was through purposely arguing a point that you don’t believe in, with a willing partner. Take an issue, like some of the ones I’ve listed above, find a willing partner, and choose opposite sides that you’d normally take, and let the battle begin.

Use all your skills of persuasion and sales to convince the other person, while resisting their argument (which is the way you really feel). Do this few times and you’ll never look at the same old issues again.

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Recently I’ve been hearing a lot of talk about colonizing other planets. Well, maybe not so much as hearing as I’ve been reading many articles on the Internet about the subject. You know how that goes, you find something online, you find this pretty interesting, and you read more and more about this, and click around on the links, and pretty soon you find that you suddenly have developed an interest in this topic that you only maybe were vaguely aware of before now.

When I think back, I think it was all started by something I saw on TV, some crime drama involving some guys that were on this privately owned space ship that offered millionaires the chance to go into orbit for a few days. One of the characters mentioned that this is the golden age when it comes to space entrepreneurial ship. Whether that’s actually true obviously remains to be seen. But it doesn’t take much imagination to see the correlation with Europeans setting out across vast unknown bodies of water search of new lands hundreds of years ago to setting out across space to set up colonies on other planets.

Of course, then there’s that recent movie that is a fairly thin metaphor of what to do when you meet up with people already living in the new area that you’d like to colonize. Human strategies have ranged from killing them, joining them, assimilating them, and pitting them against one another.

Probably the most useful strategy, and resulted in the spread of the most culture, at least according to some historians, is Alexander of Macedonia, or Alexander the Great as he is commonly referred to. He lead a coalition of Greek forces across Persia, and to this date is the second greatest conqueror of all time, if you measure how great a conqueror is by the amount of land they took over. In the number one position is Genghis Khan. An interesting side not is that Genghis Khan was a peasant who’s parents were murdered by a rival chieftain, and yet he rose to become the greatest conqueror in human history, while Alexander was born into a royal family, and inherited his kingdom, which already had quite a bit of support from the various Greek city states when his father was murdered. So you don’t need to be born with a silver spoon in your mouth if you want to conquer the world.

But while Genghis Khan swept through land with fury and terror, and slaughtered everything in his path, Alexander took a more diplomatic approach. Much of the land he conquered, he didn’t even have to fight for. The Persian Empire at that time had undergone quite a bit of upheaval, and they were spread far and thin. Many times Alexander and his troops would ride into a city, and the city government would simply switch their alliance from Persia to Alexander.

But one thing that Alexander did that helped spread Greek culture throughout the world was to encouraged his men, at least the single ones, to take brides from the new cultures. Often times he would pick up fresh soldiers from the cities, and many of his soldiers would stay and build new lives. Of course, this wasn’t always the case. When Babylon fell to Alexander’s troops, he gave them free reign over the city. They raped, plundered, murdered and burned the city to the ground, as was fairly common practice back in those days. (And unfortunately today as well in many places).

Another interesting strategy is the divide and conquer strategy. This was used particularly effectively by the Catholic Church during the colonization of South America and part of Asia in the 1500′s and 1600′s. First they would send the priests, who would convert as many people as possible, including the leaders. Of course, not everybody would convert, and would stick to the old “pagan” religion. Including in some that converted, and some that didn’t would of course be those involved in government. Once there was sufficient division in the ruling classes, then the solders would come, their jobs having been made much easier by the priests that preceded them.

This was attempted in Japan during the same time period, but all the Christians were expelled, or executed before they could finish their plan.

Anytime you want to expand influence into a new area, there is going to be resistance, and there are always several different strategies to take to best overcome the resistance. Brute force, cooperation, or subversion, it depends the desired outcome, and what an appropriate level of risk you’re willing to take, and what skills you possess and how they could best be used. I doubt Alexander or Genghis Khan could have gotten very far by sending in priests. I also doubt that the Spanish Conquistadors would have done well with Alexander’s or Genghis Khan’s fighting strategies, as they required open fields, and many men galloping furiously on thousands of horses. That strategy doesn’t work well in the jungle.

One interesting, and some say natural, application to all these battle, warfare, and conquering strategies is in business. Classic books on warfare, like Sun Tzu’s “The Art Of War,” And Miyomoto Musashi’s “The Book Of Five Rings” are usually found in the business section of the bookstore.

The huge success of the British Empire was largely do it’s effective application of these strategies of warfare to business. One could argue that English is the second most spoken language in the world today, behind only Mandarin, is due to the effective application of timeless warfare strategies to business purposes.

If you own a business today, whether it is a twenty-year-old brick and mortar shop, or an online start up that you are doing in your spare time, it might help to keep some of these ancient warfare strategies in mind.

Because I guarantee you, whatever it is you are trying to sell to your customers, there’s several other people fighting for their attention, and would be pleased as punch to get their business instead of you.

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