Page 232 - ConvinceThemFlip

convince them in 90 seconds or less
D. Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, or Nelson Mandela, and
identify the states they led their audiences through before
rousing them to action. When Churchill looked grand, you
could feel it yourself, and when he acted angry, you could
feel that, too. When Martin Luther King Jr. said, “I’ve been
to the mountaintop,” your spirit was uplifted with him.
The next time you want to get someone excited about
an idea, figure out ahead of time which three or four
emotional states make sense to link together to get the
person—whether it’s a client, interviewer, boss, team,
EXERCISE
Linking States
Here’s a charades-like exercise to help you practice
adjusting other people’s emotional states. It’s best done
in a group of three or four.
On separate pieces of paper, have each person write
three states of mind they want to rouse in the others.
These could include curious, excited, sad, confused, joyful,
confident, free, secure, adventurous, sexy, lonely—whatever
you like. Fold them, put them in a bowl, and mix them up.
Pick a state from the bowl and, without saying what’s
written on the piece of paper, attempt, in thirty seconds
or less, to elicit that state in the others. You can use
stories, metaphors, body language, and voice tone, but
224