Mónica Guzmán

And that makes all of this so much harder.

So the reason that persuasion is not something that I recommend leaning into when you're having these conversations across disagreement, it's for a few things.

One, it doesn't work.

We're living at a time that's very on demand.

And one of the ways that that's infected our conversations is we tend to think, all right, I'm gonna have this conversation with my uncle and I expect to change his mind.

Why?

Well, because here's this glittering, beautiful reason that I'm holding in my hand for why I believe what I believe.

And it's awesome.

And when I understood it, it did everything to me.

And all I need to do is hand it over to him.

If I just hand it to him, it will have the same impact on him.

and then when it doesn't have the same impact on him we're infuriated and we begin to repeat ourselves except louder and louder and louder right we forget that people have these roots that go down through the years of their lives that their opinions are not just something they put on like a shirt it's it's something they've kind of grown into right and so it's really really hard to talk somebody out of something in the course of a conversation if you do influence their perspective

More than likely, it will be at a moment when they feel heard by you, where they feel connected to you, where they feel understood by you or like you're making the effort.

In order for that to quote unquote work, you can't be trying to change them.

Because changing people, trying to change people is a way of saying that we don't accept them the way they are.

And it's really hard to feel heard if that's what you're being confronted with.

Exactly.

I always think back to a friend of mine a while ago sent me forwarded me this text thread that he had with an old high school friend.

They were on two political sides.

And he's like, Monica, like I tried so hard.