Jedi Mind Tricks

"These are not the droids you are looking for"

One of my favourite things is getting people to do what I need them to do. I like to call it my study of Jedi mind tricks but it's really just psychology. Here are a few tips to get you started:

Don't give people the option you don't want them to choose. If someone asked you "do you want a to go out or stay in" you will reply with one of the options you were given. It would be socially awkward to say "no" to that type of question. What two options are acceptable to you?
Then ask a question that only provides those two options.

Don't - "Do you want to have a drink this week?"
Do - "Let's get a drink this week, does Thursday or Friday work better for you?"


Give people ownership and make them your personal champion. Whenever I call customer service and I have a request I always open with something like this;

"Hi NAME, My name is _________, and I'm having some serious troubles, I need a hero to help fix all of this, do you think you might be that hero?"

Throughout the call, I talk them up, I thank them, tell them they've been such a help, it totally strokes their ego and generally solves your problems. People like to feel like heroes and this way gives them ownership. You can use this similar task with store clerks, police, etc.

Don't - "I know you mark these TVs way up, can you give me a better price?"
Do - "My wife/gf/dog said not to spend this much on a tv, she's going to kill me taking home a tv this expensive that was full price..."


Hijacking the Train of thought. I love this one.
Here's the situation: someone is in a emotional state and has their mind made up. They could be crying because something is going to happen, they could be mad because you did or didn't do something. Regardless these are the situations that you can't talk any sense or reason into them and it's probably going to work out negatively for you.

Here's what you do:
Ask them a completely off topic question. "If you could have any sports car what would it be?" "Do you think my feet are too small for my body?" "Can I ask you where is a great place to grab a coffee around here?" and then from there listen to the answer and follow up immediately with talking about what you want to talk about. You will have completely hijacked their train of thought they won't even be able to remember what they were talking about.

For example:

A girl I was seeing was crying, she often would get stressed to the point that she'd cry over relatively trivial things. In the midst of her tear fest I asked
"when do you think we'll see your nieces next? I really miss those girls."
She fumbled, trying to hold on to her thoughts and I just reasked the question. She replied and then I continued talking and moved the topic to something that didn't involve her irrationally crying.
A few hours later she says to me "was I crying earlier?"
"yup"
"what was I crying about?"
"I forget"
"yeah, it's strange, I do too".



Smile, be confident, expect no other outcome than the one you want. This really shines through. No one ever tries to fuck around with a nice, confident person, it's the people that act like jackasses that get treated like one. People are great at picking up on social cues and they don't want to step out of line. Finally, act like what you are doing is perfectly normal and no one will notice or even question what you are doing. If approached act like you understood that what you were doing was more than ok.


don't believe in jedi mind tricks?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RsgkYLkWlrE

Hands on the Wheels, Eyes on the Road.

You are in control of your emotions, your fears, your life.

It is your choice to decide to overcome that fear, to be happy, to be sad, to be doing something or nothing with your life.

Do something today that scares you, do something that challenges you, cause if you don't you are going to die the same person you are today, just much, much older.




Check out Project Hitch Hiker for my guest post on Jedi Mind Tricks. As well Liam over at This Year of Change has started shirts off Mondays, check out his posts to see him call someone out as well as taking his shirt off.

What are you living for?

Tonight I watched the new Joshua Jackson movie "One Week" I'll save myself sometime and post the trailer to give you an idea of theme of the film:



The movie is exceptional, even more so if you are Canadian, you have ever owned a motorcycle, feel that the brand of your appliances doesn't matter. For me these three things ring true. If you feel like I and project hitchhiker do you don't really need to see this movie or read this post, it'll only reinforce how you feel.

That being said, I know I often fall back in to the rut of life that can suck you in and see yourself repeating your life day in day out months, years and decades. This movie makes me ask:

What are you living for?
Are you living each day only so you can have the next?
What is holding you back from doing something awesome?
What are you going to do that's awesome?
What is your next adventure?
What can you do to enrich your life, your experience?

Why aren't you doing it? please, post up your reasons for not acting in the comments.

Why do these kind of things always happen to me?

Yesterday was a day.

I spent my morning consulting for a client and then promptly switched gears to work on a major campaign I was asked to coordinate. This campaign was to be a huge opportunity and if pulled off would have resulted in major recognition and an increase in future contracts. Until yesterday I had put in 40+ hours so far with another 30 to wrap it up. I had consulted with others in my industry, spent hours researching as well as coordinating and hiring people to work under me to complete the task. Everything would have built up to today with the bulk of the work happening today, tomorrow and Friday. Not only had I been working on the campaign but I had been videoing the entire process to use as a promotional video to show what myself and my team are capable of. Since I'm a bit of a control freak I had been shooting the entire thing "Survivor Man" style increasing the amount of work for myself on top of everything else.

On my way home from work my phone rings. It's the Hospital informing me that there was a cancellation for the following day and they were able to bump me to the top of the waiting list to have a required surgery that has been troubling me since Summer of 08. The issue? I would have to abandon the campaign completely, let go of all of the hired people and cancel the contract, all of this a few days before it was to be completed. What were my options? Not take the surgery and let the problem continue to worsen and affect my quality of life until another opportunity knocked? Take it and cancel my life for a month as I recovered? Lose the month of march? or possibly lose a summer or fall month when my industry is at it's busiest?

I had to take it. Fuck, balls, pissed!

I started making phone calls so I could start fires and then try to put them out. Oh what a shitty day. Yay for burning bridges.

Continuing my drive home I stopped to pick up some books to get me through the 2 weeks of bed rest I would be forced to endure. Distracted thinking about all of the things I had to complete in the next 24 hours I locked my keys in the car. I'm 20km from a second set, my keys are sitting on the seat next to thousands of dollars of equipment, laptop, etc. I can't just leave it there, it's a thieves dream, car full of goodies and the keys on the seat. I call my girlfriend, she can't get a hold of anyone she knows to borrow their car. Most of my friends are at work until 5 and I have a meeting in an hour and no way to get a hold of the people I'm meeting. I'm screwed.

I slink into Starbucks to have a coffee and think about my situation and the large dump that life has decided to take on me today. I start calling people. I finally reach Jon, he's free until 4pm and can come get me asap.

I return home, tired and frustrated. My phone rings, it's an out of province number, ugh, must be more bad news.

Wait, it's a client, they want to hire me, they ask for a quote there and then. I give them my rate (this is the point that most say it's out of their price range) They don't even hesitate, they hire me on the spot. This is great news, the initial payment will pay off my loans and I'm scott free from debt. Then my brain interupts. Turns out that this job will conflict with another job I agreed to well over a year ago, I have to bow out. BALLS! More crapping of life on yours truly.

So what kind of things happened to me today that always happen to me?

Well I got to go for a nice drive to do some consulting, listening to the new In-Flight Safety album, I can use the time already invested in this project to help improve for future projects, I learned many valuable lessons that I would have otherwise not if I had not signed on for this project.

The free medical care that we get in our country called me and said they had cleared a spot to relieve me from further pain and discomfort. I was able to contact my friends and family and have them offer their support for my recovery.

I called a client that was really happy to have me on their project and inform them of the situation, they were disappointed but looked forward to working with me.

I was lucky enough to have a car to lock my keys in which allowed me to sit down and enjoy a coffee reading the newspaper while a good friend dropped everything to offer me his help.

I got a call from across the country from a client that I've never met who was willing to pay whatever they had to so they could procure my services.

I honestly, laughed my way though the entire day yesterday. Sure I was disappointed but I didn't dwell on it. I know a lot of people that would have pretty much quit life after a day half that "bad".