Chapter - 14

How To Expand Your Personal Influence Over People

A highly successful man once told me, "Whenever the experts used to tell me that I could achieve ten times as much as I thought I could, I used to think that they said it just to make me feel good. Now I know the real reason they said it—because it's absolutely true. I know. I've proved it in both my business affairs and in my social life."

You can have ten times more of anything that you have at the present time. This includes money. It certainly includes peace of mind—also love. It includes everything which you now possess in limited quantity but which you want to enlarge.

By expanding your personal influence with people you can change your life spectacularly. This is true. It is not just something that we want to be true. It is not something we hope is true. It is not just something that Vernon Howard says is true. It is simply true. The fantastic fact merely awaits your discovery.

Down in the South American country of Ecuador the natives keep a sharp lookout on the beaches. Gold coins from sunken treasure ships are washed ashore constantly. Those alert people find treasures because they are watching for them. So you can find your treasures by remaining alert to the opportunities that people constantly send your way.

The plain and regrettable fact is that the man who wants things from other people barely scratches the surface of his possibilities. His thinking confines itself to a limited circle because he mistakenly believes that the only opportunities that exist are those that he can presently see. With that negative attitude he is hardly in a position to spot those gold coins that could be his own.

The salesman reaches a bare portion of the customers that could be on his list were he to use some new techniques that carry him beyond his current thinking patterns. The man who wishes new ideas for improving his business or personal life hasn't the slightest idea of the extended worlds that lie beyond his vision but not beyond his attainment. In matters of romance, one investigation by a psychologist showed that the average male ventured no more than 14 blocks beyond his own home in search of a marriage mate.

Why don't people get one-tenth of their possibilities? Because they live and move on Friday in the very same routine way that they lived and moved on the preceding Tuesday and Wednesday and Thursday. Happily, anyone who really wants to break through to new worlds of accomplishment can do so with astonishing ease.

One way for crashing through is to make up your mind that you are all through with self-limitation.

Don't limit yourself. Never fall into the trap of believing that what you want must necessarily come from this or that particular person. It just isn't so, even though you may insist upon it. A man thinks in this limited fashion because he confuses familiarity with certainty; he mistakenly thinks that just because this known person has what he needs, then this known person is the only one who has it. That kind of thinking is just as foolish as declaring that the single ship we see on the ocean is the only ship at sea.

In human relations, people deliberately make themselves believe that another person is wonderfully exclusive; they do this because they deeply yearn to believe in someone who is stronger or wiser or nicer than anyone they have ever met. This prevents them from venturing forth to discover a new acquaintance who is just as nice as the original person and maybe even nicer.

How would you apply these ideas to a practical matter of life, for example, to your finances? Like this: Never believe that your increase must necessarily come from this client or from that method of advertising or from this employer or from that use of your talents. This kind of disbelief frees you to believe accurately, that is, in the financial expansion that lies just beyond you.

Perhaps you remark, "But what about my abilities to expand my personal influence in the world of people? Do I have them in the first place? If so, won't I wear myself out in excessive use? Exactly how can I build my capacities for authority and leadership?"

These are good questions. The answers are just as good. We will let Dr. Erich Fromm take over. He starts off by speaking about those who habitually limit themselves:

These people tend to feel that they possess only a fixed quantity of strength, energy, or mental capacity, and that this stock is diminished or exhausted by use and can never be replenished. They cannot understand the self-replenishing function of all living substance and that activity and the use of one's powers increase strength . . ,1

With fresh confidence in something better and something beyond, let's next attach ourselves to some practical plans for expanding our personal influence.

Speech Secrets With Some Surprising Rewards

I would like to challenge you to do something with the following secrets for persuasive speech. Do this: Select any one of them and dedicate yourself to it for a single week. Read it over several times a day, remind yourself of it constantly, and especially put its message into practice wherever you mingle with people. The next week, do likewise with another selection. Things will happen. Good things. The first thing that will happen is that you will find yourself influencing others in a new and gratifying manner.

The second result is surprising—and extra rewarding. You will find that you are influencing yourself toward additional confidence and clarity of action. These pointers have been designed to help you understand yourself as well as the other person. Work with them and you will have double enrichment.

1. The legend goes that James McNeil Whistler, the famous artist, was once sketching an outdoor scene when a friend passed by. Whistler asked his friend how he liked the painting. The visitor looked over the yellow meadows and green woods with only casual interest. Whistler, who had a sharp mind, told him, "Let me show you how I can make this the most fascinating picture you have ever seen." With a few skilled strokes the great artist added something to the canvas. The visitor leaned forward, studied the painting eagerly, smiled and exclaimed, "You are right. You have placed me in the picture."

Get the habit of including others in your conversational canvases. Bring up topics of interest to both of you. Ask them questions, draw out their opinions. Who knows, some of their ideas may be as brilliant as your own!

2. "Gentle words, quiet words, are after all, the most powerful words. They are most convincing, more compelling, more prevailing." (Washington Gladden)

1 Erich Fromm, Man for Himself (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc., 1947).

3. I once saw a training film produced for the purpose of showing businessmen ways to become more efficient in the office by building a more harmonious home life.

In one of the scenes, an executive arrived home in the evening, gave his wife an affectionate kiss, held her back at arm's length, then smilingly told her, "I know something nice about you." While she melted in his arms, he told her several nice things about herself.

At the conclusion of the film, the man sitting next to me exclaimed, "Wow, what a way to win a wife! 7 know something nice about you!"

There is no more simple nor intelligent way to become a zestful speaker than to observe those impressive words and phrases used successfully by others. If you are influenced by another's selection of words, it is most likely that you can use those same words to persuade others. Not that you will imitate another, of course; the idea is to become aware of the type of speech that hits the mark. Your very awareness supplies you with new and natural word-power.

4. Use tactful suggestions to influence those who carelessly impose upon you. One businessman avoids last-minute demands upon his time by remarking, "If you will let me know of your need a few hours in advance, I can set the time aside for you especially."

5. Thousands of years ago a Greek poet named Menander set down six words of immense wisdom which are just as true today as in his time. He wrote: "Nothing is more useful than silence."

You can use silence for studying the other man. Once you get to know how he works you can effectively work him around to your side of the fence.

Silence sets a trap for the unreasonable or unkind individual. Never contradict an obstinate person; just let him talk long enough and he'll contradict himself.

Silence keeps you from saying the wrong thing or the empty or ineffectual thing.

When you silently listen to the other man you extend him a courtesy he won't forget. At the time of your courtesy he will not be aware of it, for he is too busy talking, but when he goes away with a good feeling of being released from some of his pressures, he will like you for permitting him that good feeling.

"After speech, silence is the greatest power in the world." (Lacordaire)

6. Don't let a person with a sober or expressionless face scare you off from speaking to him. He or she is probably using the expression—or lack of it—as a mask for timidity. He is the very one who yearns most of all for you to speak to him; so do so. You yourself have noticed how quickly the atmosphere warms up once the conversation gets going. The shy ones are excellent practice for your program of winning others to you.

7. Make sure that you make yourself understood to the other man. Get your meaning over to him. A man who is confused about your program is not inclined to accept it. Speak to him in simple and easy-to-understand terms.

People are both smarter than you think they are and thicker than you think they are. They are shrewd enough when the matter on hand does not involve their emotions or convictions. Once personal feelings or cherished beliefs enter the picture, they tend to weaken a person's judgments and reasonings. (Now you know why we find it so easy to advise the other person on his problems but get so mixed up with our own!)

Always explain your program several times and in several ways. This assists you in getting around the other man's fixed opinions and it helps him to get your point.

There is one language you can speak which is always understood and appreciated by everyone: It is that of self-advancement. We all want to rise to higher stations and to have more of the good things life holds out to us. So ask yourself whether your man clearly understands all that he will gain from going along with you. Watch the growth of your influence with the person who sees how much he profits from agreeing with you.

8. "In conversation, avoid the extremes of forwardness and reserve." (Cato)

9. I was calling on a friend at his furniture store when he brought out two signs, one reading SORRY, WE'RE CLOSED, and the other reading the single word CLOSED.

Which is best?" he asked me. "I like the one with the sorry in it. It seems politer."

"Toss it out," I advised. "Use the single word closed."

"Why?" he protested. "Isn't the other one more courteous?"

"You have to understand how some people react," I told him. "When you tell them that your shop is closed, that ends the matter right there; they have no emotional responses. But when you tell them that you are sorry they react, 'I don't want you to be sorry; I want you to be open when I need you.' They tend to turn your attempt at courtesy against you. They are not conscious that this is their hostile response, for it happens at a deep level of mind, but that is what they are thinking."

The point is: Don't let your spoken words label you as having an apologetic nature. Watch out that you do not overdo such words as "Please" and "I'm sorry" and even "Thank you." People sometimes interpret the use of these words as weakness. And, sad to state, some people tend to take advantage of any supposed weakness in another.

10. In some countries with a chronic fuel shortage it is the custom to heat only one room of the house. By this act of concentration they accomplish their purpose of keeping everyone comfortable.

Do likewise by concentrating all your words on your goal. Don't wander off into trivialities; don't let the other man's objections put you on the defensive. In one way or another, let all your words promote your cause.

Be An Approacher

"People are funny," a Los Angeles doctor remarked to me recently. "They will confidently go after everything they want —with one glaring exception. They hesitate going after new friends who can do them some good."

"How do you mean that?" I asked.

"When a man wants a haircut he heads straight for the barber; if he wants a new watch he marches directly to the jeweler. But far too often it is a different story when it comes to wanting new people in his life."

"Where do you think he goes wrong?"

"Well, everyone wants to think of himself as being wanted and needed by other people. Now, there's nothing wrong with that in itself. But people go wrong whenever they sit around and wait for evidence that they are wanted. They eagerly look for phone calls and letters and visitors. They are waiters. They wait for others to approach them.”

"That's not good," I remarked. "It only builds up a damaging consciousness of being unwanted, of being left out. And that destroys self-assurance."
"Right. The whole problem revolves around this poor business of waiting for a sign that one is needed and necessary. Too many people think, 'If the other person will only surprise me with a phone call I'll be glad to return the favor.' They don't realize that the other person is thinking the very same thing. Someone has to have the courage to break the stalemate. The one who does so will change things dramatically. People are delighted with the person who takes the initiative in the making of or the furthering of a friendship. They usually show their appreciation by returning the friendly gesture."

One of the problems faced by President Lincoln during the Civil War was the timidly conservative attitude of some of his generals and political advisors. So fearful were they of a sudden sweep northward by the Confederate armies that they insisted on unreasonable defenses of Washington, D. C. That obsessive viewpoint, Lincoln realized, could only be held at the cost of winning the war by aggressive action. One of the over-cautious military men was General George Brinton McClellan, a soldier whose over-active imagination always saw the enemy troops triple in number to his own—even when the reverse was the case. The President, utterly weary of McClellan's idleness, sent him a telegram emphatically pointing out that an enemy army cannot be defeated by merely sitting and glaring at it. Lincoln made it clear that the resources of the nation had been built to be thrown into bold and aggressive action against the enemy.

As it turned out, it finally took the firm forwardness of General U. S. Grant to bring victory to the North.

The lesson? Be an Approacher. Every way you can as often as you can. Devise new ways to meet new people. You don't have to think of clever ways to do it; simply do it. Walk on over and say hello just to see what happens. If you are unknown to the other person, so what? Everyone you now know was once unknown to you. There are no strangers; only friends you have not yet met. Dare to be the one who breaks the ice. This is how you start attracting those good people and rich relationships you need.

Especially never mind whether or not the other person seems approachable. It is the shy and distant people who appreciate your advance most of all. Never mind if they don't invite you; invite yourself. This isn't brashness; it's commonsense courage and a sure way to boom your self-confidence sky-high.

Besides all this, your advance toward the other person is just about the highest compliment you could pay him. He appreciates your forward movement, for it tells him, "Whoever you are, I like you."

Remember, everyone is instantly attracted to the person who dares to make the first friendly move. The Approacher gives us a glimpse of the superior person we could become. As Dr. Sidney M. Jourard writes in his book Personal Adjustment, "If we see someone doing something which we wish we had the moral fortitude to do ourselves, we admire them for the exemplary deed." 2

Since almost everyone mistakenly believes that the world in which he lives is the only world that exists, the daring personality hints to us of the brighter world which we might also find. The Approacher delights us when he frees us ever so slightly from the chains of fear and frustration.

A man once told me, "No sense kidding myself. I really am pretty shy when it comes to other people. As long as I'm that afraid I'll never make a resounding success of my life. I hope for the day when I get over it."

I told him, "I hope for the day when you get so sick and tired of being afraid of people that you make up your mind once and for all to find the solution which surely exists."

When two shy people meet, something rarely happens. When a shy and a confident person meet, something sometimes happens. When two confident people meet, something always happens. Do your part!

As a next move, let's discover one way in which you can make your approaches pay profits.

There was the clergyman who arrived home an hour late for dinner, to have his wife ask, "What kept you, dear?"

"Well," he replied, "you know Mrs. Green?"

"Yes."

"She has a slight cold."

"Yes."

"Well, I stopped long enough to ask her how she was feeling."

"And?"

"She told me."

2 Sidney M. Jourard, Personal Adjustment (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1958). Reprinted by permission of the publisher.
You can always expect eager cooperation from others when you ask them to tell you about themselves. And while they are talking you should be listening. The idea is to let the other man himself tell you know he can best be turned into a friend or customer or helper. If you will listen carefully he will tell you every time. Do things the easy way. Let him tell you what he wants and needs. Now you can intelligently proceed to win him over by satisfying those desires.

This is how intelligence agents extract valuable information from captured enemy soldiers. They encourage their prisoners to talk about themselves, about their home towns, about their favorite foods and their plans for after the war, about anything at all. The agents know that a freely flowing tongue has a way of trickling through with valuable information, even when the prisoner is aware that his captors are after something. A captured German pilot of World War II was encouraged by his Allied guards to chat about his fishing experiences. The prisoner casually mentioned his luck while fishing in a certain Italian lake. From that clue his captors deduced that the pilot had come from a German airbase near that lake. Two days later an Allied bombing raid left the enemy base a wreck.

Make it your habit to encourage others to talk. You listen. Put your information to practical use for mutual benefit.

Summary of this section: Expand your influence over people by being an Approacher. Make full use of your contacts. "Be bold, be bold, and everywhere be bold." (Edmund Spenser)

Good Business for You

The fable is told of the powerful African lion who felt the need for some dinner. Stalking in the grassy plains he spotted and ran after a lumbering zebra. When a deer crossed their path the lion abandoned the zebra and set out after the deer. A moment later a gazelle caught the lion's attention, so the king of beasts again changed directions to race after the new game. In rapid turn, the fickle lion sped back and forth after a goat, then a lamb, and finally, hours later, ended up wearily pursuing a white-tailed rabbit. The bobbing bunny easily escaped this exhausted—and pretty unwise—king of beasts.

The moral is, even powerful kings need to pursue their game in a business-like manner. Such practical virtues as consistency, concentration, and stability should not be ignored by anyone who really means to satisfy his needs.

In this final section of the chapter, I want to encourage you to place your plans for winning people on a systematic basis. But I want to emphasize that this does not mean that you have to proceed grimly or with strain. So many people mistakenly believe that a business-like approach means painful effort and struggle. Nothing could be less true. As a matter of fact, I have made it a point in previous pages to show you that the relaxed and even the light-hearted approach is by far the more productive one. "A cheerful spirit is one of the most valuable gifts ever bestowed . . ." (Aughey)

Mr. A. is an inconsistent student of human relations. Mr. B. is a business-like one. What is the difference in attitude in the two of them? This:

Mr. A. looks at a successful man and puzzledly asks, "I wonder why he was lucky enough to win all that good fortune?"

Mr. B. studies the same successful man and curiously inquires, "I wonder how I can also win all that good fortune?"

The whole idea is to concentrate your cheerful energies toward the sole goal of understanding human nature as a means of winning your way in the world. That is the most profitable business you could ever get into.

Let me tell you a story about one man who used the business-like approach to increase his sales volume.

A manager of a supermarket, who was an eager student of human behavior, decided to put his knowledge to work in a practical way. One of the lessons he had learned from his studies was that most people have a certain amount of hesitancy about buying luxury items. Having been taught from childhood to be economical and conservative in spending habits, many people feel somewhat guilty about splurging beyond the practical necessities of life. Even though these subconscious guilts were pointless and unnecessary, still they were there.

That manager asked himself some interesting questions: What would enable his customers to break through these fixed feelings? What would persuade them to buy items which mistakenly meant "luxury" in their minds? That was the problem. He started to think about persuasive words and phrases. In particular he ran through his mind various "permissive" words, that is, those words which would free shoppers from their conditioned guilts, which permitted them to feel at perfect liberty to buy whatever their fancies chose, with no regard as to whether they were "luxury" items.

He printed a large sign with a single word on it. The word was followed by an explosive-looking exclamation point. The sign was set over the counter displaying some of the higher-priced items, like imported Italian sausage.

The result? Astonishing and gratifying. Sales of these particular delicacies rose a rewarding 23%.

The sign? It invitingly called out:

LIVE!

All of us without exception want to live more fully, with greater freedom of action, with less mental restriction, with more zest and enthusiasm, with greater thrills and multiplied pleasures. We have the constant urge to break through and crash out. "The cry of the soul is for freedom." (J. G. Holland)

That is why that single word produced the desired result. Shoppers increased their purchase of those items because they had been given permission to choose and live a bit more richly.

Your business-like application of your knowledge of human behavior can reward you similarly. Choose your objective and let other people give it to you. If you are tired of turning in a circle and always the same dull circle, here is your freedom.

For Expanding Your Influence Rapidly

1. Spectacular changes will occur in your life if you will proceed with self-expansion-through-other people.

2. Think constantly in positive terms of growth and prosperity and enrichment. These are your rights which you should claim.

3. Become aware of your tendency to make contacts only within your known world. Decide to break through to refreshing experiences.

4. Every desire you have is matched by nature with a power for attaining it.

5. Employ the techniques offered in this chapter for empowering yourself through your daily speech.

6. Remember that your words, spoken and written, are inexhaustible forces for influencing others. "Speech is. power: speech is to persuade, to convert, to compel.'* (Ralph Waldo Emerson)

7. Go straight after what you want from other people. "Dare to act!" (Tibullus)

8. Read and review the rich rewards won by an Approacher. Next, be one!

9. Listen attentively. Other people will tell you what you need to know for winning them.

10. Place your people-persuading programs on a professional basis. Diligence is always a wonder-working force.

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