Whipped Ice
Lauren Breuer
De Wi'Ce
How we talk to people is an important aspect of how we achieve certain goals. Knowing the room, or how people around you act, feel, etc., also determines the success of the action you are executing. You may think that you can tell what people are thinking, or what they like and what they don’t, but if you reflect back on the times you tried to persuade someone, or get something from them, for example, a connection, or a business deal, were you right with your thoughts?
ETHICALLY EXPOSED
An analogy I like to make about life and its situations is Whipped Ice. We all know the basics about ice, it melts, it freezes, it’s cold, it can burn, etc. It has many qualities. Now, take the word whipped into account.
What do you first think of when you hear this word? Someone in a relationship who does what they’re told? Whipped cream? If we apply these two terms to people, we basically can define/work with humans.
When you are trying to speak on a particular topic, and the other person isn’t interested, can you normally tell? I can! Haha, because usually the topics I speak to, are not of interest to many. But, I know that and I accept it. The more you force things on people, the more they resent the topics, or perhaps, you. When you let people make moves on their own, oftentimes they end up following your path without even realizing it. It just happens to be that no one likes anything forced on them in the sense of knowledge. We all have those times when someone tells us something, and we immediately say “I know,” regardless if we actually know it or not.
With Whipped Ice, if you think of people like a game, you are trying to figure out if what you are speaking about is cold, meaning brand new information to them, hot, meaning in their knowledge, warm, melting into their brain, etc., etc.
When you identify people and categorize them based on their interests with your tone of voice, presented information, and personal relationship to you, you then have figured out the ice part. Now, the fun part of the game is whipping them.
If you can master the art of whipping, and make people interested in what you have to say, even if it isn’t to their liking, you have won. The more you learn about peoples’ body language, and their tone of response, the more you will be able to whip them into the version of ice you want.
Essentially we all want the melting phase, in which the information we speak of melts into their brain and they remember it. Even though this isn’t always the case, we have the ability to make it happen.
Take an example such as dancing. If you want someone who hates dancing in public to dance with you. You must first understand their ice state. Are they cold, hot, warm, melty, etc.? Next, getting them to the floor is based on your tone, and your persuasion. How will you do this? Play into their current state. If they are cold, be relatable, talk about how you felt in the beginning, mention your current state of mind, and where you strive to be with the following action (dancing). Persuasion complete. Next, dancing. Remember, this person is cold, they have no experience, they don’t want people to watch them, they are wondering what people think, etc.
Your line of work is to erase these worries from their head. How? Dance. Show them that it is so fun, or that it is so freeing that they are the oddball out for not doing it. This doesn’t always work, but a lot of the time when you show someone, and lead by example, people tend to follow and forget about their initial concerns.
This was just a fun example, but if you apply this to business, relationships, trying new things, food, you will win regardless of the outcome. Because remember although the goal is to persuade the person and peak their interest, some people are very good at hiding their emotions and will likely show little to no interest with people around.
Once they get home, they might do research, try the action on their own, or maybe go somewhere and try it around people they don’t know. This is a part of identifying their ice state. Ice is in the before, middle and after stages, and maybe they don’t melt in any, but either way, you won. Truthfully, you will never know if you reach everyone you speak to, but even if you don’t reach them directly, your knowledge will still be with them subconsciously, and maybe the next time someone brings the topic up, they can speak to it, or they can give the information they know to help.
You win, and so do they.