Charles Duhigg

He never tries to be anything besides this person that he is.

And the authenticity of that actually gives him credence, right?

Think about, you know, he still slicks his hair back like he's someone from the 1990s or 1980s.

At any point, he could have stopped using gel in his hair, but he didn't because that's who he is.

He doesn't present to be anyone else.

So when he does turn to you and he says, look, I care about the same thing you care about.

Tell me about your problem or tell me or I'm dyslexic and I know how hard it is for you to have kids who have special needs.

You believe him because he hasn't been pandering to you the whole time.

His inauthenticity is authentic and that matters.

Yeah.

You know, whatever.

So there's an important component of matching, which is not only am I trying to match you, I have to be inviting you to match me as well.

It has to be a quid pro quo.

It has to be a back and forth, right?

And so I think it's fine if you're talking to someone really practical and you're asking them some practical questions to say, look, you know, this all makes sense to me on a practical level, but there's some real emotions that I'm feeling right now.

And I'm wondering what you're feeling because I know that these emotions are legitimate, at least for me.

When we announce our intention to move from one kind of conversation, what I'm doing in that case is I'm inviting you to join me.

I don't put you in control of the conversation the whole time.

This is a back and forth.

This is a quid pro quo.