You are trying to enter a building. You have an important meeting and have been invited over. You’ve even been sent emails telling you about the security clearance. You have all the paperwork to take you in. However, for some reason the security team is not letting you in. You are stuck outside, the guard is being an idiot and you can’t enter the building. You reason with him at first,you plead and you may even argue – yet no access!

How many such encounters do you have?  Encounters where you are trying to tell people to do the right thing, yet people remain stubborn. Encounters where people are being downright Idiots and getting in your way.

But hold on.. Who is the idiot here? At the end of the encounter – you lost your right to enter the building, you lost your cool and perhaps lost a lot of energy. He is having his way. So he maybe an idiot, but you are the bigger idiot aren’t you?

We communicate to get an idea across. We interact to influence the other person. If we can’t, we are perhaps the idiot.