Curious About Curiosity? How to Make People Curious

Do you know when and how you get curious about something? Why should you care? If you want to make other people pay attention to what you have to say, you better know how to hook & reel them in. And one of the most effective ways of keeping their attention is to make them curious.

So when do we get curious?

Common experience tells us that we get curious when we encounter something new, or surprising, or perplexing. But think of the times when you got intensely curious about some conversation between total strangers in the next table at a restaurant, or some secret your friend was withholding from you. Surely, these aren't new, surprising, or perplexing.

These and many more are instances when we feel intensely curious.

Is there a common theme underlying all these divers phenomena?

Do we say, "We get curious when we see something new, surprising, perplexing, strange, secretive, gossipy, hard to remember, etc.?"

That seems to be an awfully clunky and unsatisfactory answer.

Rest assured, there is an elegant answer. Once you know it, it becomes easy to predict what makes people curious, deliberately induce curiosity in people, and keep their attention.

Curious about curiosity now?

About time.

How to Fix Your Psychological Problems in 20 Minutes

Here Be Dragons: The Psychological Problem, Cause & Cure by Manuel J. Smith


My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Total Read Time: 2 Minutes

Do you get defensive often and wish you didn't?

Are you afraid of being criticized?

Are you scared to death of people thinking less than perfect about you?

Do you hate it when you make a mistake?

Would you rather die than make a fool out of yourself in front of people?

Are you suffering from the loss of your loved ones? A painful breakup? A divorce?

Principles of Social Intelligence

I recommend everyone to read Dale Carnegie's old classic, How to Win Friends and Influence People.

It's amazing.

Granted, the book delineates very commonsensical principles to apply in social situations. But. That's an emphatic but. People don't use these fundamental principles in their daily lives. Why? Probably out of laziness. Or in other words, they understand the principles intellectually, but have not internalized them.

This is crucial.

Understanding and doing are totally different modi operandi. You can understand how to swing a tennis racket or spin on your head, but it's a whole 'nother story to be able to actually do them.

So with that caveat in mind, let's keep the following fundamental imperatives in mind and actually put them to use in our daily lives:

1. Don't criticize, condemn, or complain (or in a positive statement, "Be hearty in approbation and lavish in praise.")

2. Give honest and sincere appreciation

3. Arouse in the other person an eager want

Then comes six ways to make people like you:

1. Become genuinely interested in people
2. Smile
3. Remember that one's name is the sweetest and most important sound in any language
4. Be a good listener and encourage others to talk about themselves
5. Talk in terms of the other person's interest
6. Make the other person feel important and do it sincerely

The fourth imperative follows from the first. The fifth principle is KEY and neglected by so many people. Understanding and seeing the world through the point of view of another person is really, really, really crucial in influencing people.

Then the author goes on to describe twelve ways to winning people to your own way, but I think the most important of them are:

1. Avoid arguments, show respect for the other person's opinion, and never tell them they're wrong.
2. Let the other person do the talking
3. Let the other person feel the idea is theirs
4. Appeal to noble motives
5. Throw down a challenge
6. Start with questions the other person will answer yes to

As you can see, all of these are "common sense." But be careful. You might dismiss them as just that and not make any initiatives in internalizing them until you find yourself in a heated argument with your significant other and realize that you don't know jack.

Art of Social Intelligence: An Anecdote

Social intelligence is a form of art.

I was reading Daniel Goleman's Emotional Intelligence (highly recommended) and came upon a fantastic anecdote that demonstrates an art of social intelligence at its best:

One afternoon he [Terry Dobson, who in the 1950s was one of the first Americans ever to study the martial art aikido in Japan] was riding home on a suburban Tokyo train when a huge, bellicose, and very drunk and begrimed laborer got on. The man, staggering, began terrorizing the passengers: screaming curses, he took a swing at a woman holding a baby, sending her sprawling in the laps of an elderly couple, who then jumped up and joined a stampeded to the other end of the car. The drunk, taking a few other swings (and, in his rage, missing), grabbed the metal pole in the middle of the car with a roar an tried to tear it out of its socket.

At that point Terry, who was in peak physical condition from daily eight-hour workouts, felt called upon to intervene, lest someone get seriously hurt. But he recalled the words of his teacher: "Aikido is the art of reconciliation. Whoever has the mind to fight has broken his connection with the universe. If you try to dominate people you are already defeated. We study how to resolve conflict, not how to start it."

Indeed, Terry had agreed upon beginning lessons with his teacher never to pick a fight, and to use his martial-arts skills only in defense. Now, at least, he saw his chances to test his aikido abilities in real life, in what was clearly a legitimate opportunity. So, as all the other passengers sat frozen in their seats, Terry stood up, slowly and with deliberation.

Seeing him, the drunk roared, "Aha! A foreigner! You need a lesson in Japanese manners!" and began gathering himself to take on Terry. But just as the drunk was on the verge of making his move, someone gave an earsplitting, oddly joyous shout: "Hey!"

The shout had the cheery tone of someone who has suddenly come upon a fond friend. The drunk, surprised, spun around to see a tiny Japanese man, probably in his seventies, sitting there in a kimono. The old man beamed with delight at the drunk, and beckoned him over with a light wave of his hand and a lilting "C'mere."

The drunk strode over with a belligerent, "Why the hell should I talk to you?" Meanwhile, Terry was ready to fell the drunk in a moment if he made the least violent move.

"What'cha been drinking?" the old man asked, his eyes beaming at the drunken laborer.

"I been drinking sake, and it's none of your business," the drunk bellowed.

"Oh, that's wonderful, absolutely wonderful," the old man replied in a warm tone. "You see, I love sake, too. Every night, me and my wife (she's seventy-six, you know), we warm up a little bottle of sake and take it out into the garden, and we sit on an old wooden bench..." He continued on about the persimmon tree in his backyard, the fortunes of his garden, enjoying sake in the evening.

The drunk's face began to soften as he listened to the old man; his fists unclenched. "Yeah ... I love persimmons, too ...," he said, his voice trailing off.

"Yes," the old man replied in a sprightly voice, "and I'm sure you have a wonderful wife."

"No," said the laborer. "My wife died..." Sobbing, he launched into a sad tale of losing his wife, his home, his job, of being ashamed of himself. Just then the train came to Terry's stop, and as he was getting off he turned to hear the old man invite the drunk to join him and tell him all about it, and to see the drunk sprawl along the seat, his head in the old man's lap.

That is emotional brilliance.

__________________________

That perpetual and radiating cheerfulness and positivity the old man must have shown and exuded in such a tense situation is quite frankly something I would like to achieve. Studies have shown that emotions are highly contagious. If you can remain in that calm and happy state no matter what situation you're in, people will be drawn to you.

Inspirational.