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June 4, 2013 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
39:55
2398 Negotiation Part 1: The Opportunity
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Hi everybody, Stefan Molyneux from Freedom Aid Radio.
Hope you're doing well.
This is a podcast about negotiation.
And it's a very, very important podcast.
And it's something that will create a lot of problems in your life.
Ah!
Unlike all the rest of the shows that we talk about.
All the rest of the topics.
So...
I mean, the first question is sort of what is negotiation?
And the way that I think of negotiation is, you know, like two circles that overlap, right?
Right?
They overlap, you know, maybe like a quarter or a third.
That, to me, is...
It's a relationship as a whole.
You mingle.
You don't merge.
Like, it's not...
You don't sort of, like, reverse mitosis or mitosis, but you merge back together.
It's not like two separate blobs that merge into one blob.
And there was a red and a blue one that merged into some other color blob.
That's fusion.
That's not healthy and that can't be sustained because it's not biologically possible to merge with another human being.
You still retain your own thoughts, ideas and differences of opinion and so on.
And it's also not two separate, and it's also not one dominant one.
Like, if you think of two coins, one going on top of it and eclipsing the other, that's not a relationship either.
A relationship is where there's an overlap and still with a retention of identity.
And certainly, over the course of my semi-lengthy marriage now, you sort of continue to merge relationships.
But I think, you know, death interrupts the process before it's probably fully complete.
So, negotiation to me is the recognition that you have needs, that the other person has needs.
And we should try to find ways that we can meet each other's needs without a compromise.
So, it's basically a creative process.
Negotiation is a creative process.
There's negotiation like if you're going to buy a car and you want $2,000 taken off and they offer you $1,000 and you settle at $1,500.
That to me is not really a negotiation.
But there's nothing really creative about it.
I mean, unless they say, well, listen, we're not going to...
We'll give you any money off, but how about some free all-weather floor mats and a spare set of tires?
We'll give you something that's cheaper for us because we're paying wholesale for it, and it's a benefit to you because you don't have to pay retail for it.
So there's some creativity.
If you're just haggling over price, that's not really a negotiation.
It's just two positions and a compromise of some kind.
Negotiation is when you come up with something creative.
Simply having a position, holding your position until the other person gives in, that's not a negotiation.
Negotiation is where a win-win is found that is not evident at the beginning.
And I think that's an important thing to understand.
And negotiation, let's just talk about in a marriage.
So a negotiation comes out of some basic principles of identity and empathy.
So, negotiation comes out of principle A, which is our needs don't coincide.
Right.
Now, principle B is I don't want you to surrender your principles or your position for my happiness.
Right.
So let's say the wife wants to have sex, the husband is tired, so there's a difference of opinion.
And so what you can do, of course, is you can say, well, I think my husband should have sex with me even when he doesn't want to, because I want to.
Well, that is not really negotiation.
That's called entitlement.
It's, I should get my way no matter how other people feel.
It's just called entitlement, and that's really, it's very toxic.
Because using people as, in this case, masturbatory flesh-based dildos to satisfy your sexual urges, and it really, it costs you in the long run, right?
It costs you in the long run.
And so that's really important.
Now, if the wife comes up with some joyfully filthy thing that the husband's always wanted to do, but they've never gotten around to, and then the husband's like, whoa, my tiredness has suddenly vanished, that's more of a negotiation, assuming that she's not opposed to it and actually wants to try it.
So those kinds of things, that's the sort of creative solution to the problem.
But if you have a difference of opinion with someone you care about, and then your idea of a negotiation is that they should surrender their position and accede to your position, that's not a negotiation.
Right?
I mean, that's an expropriation of their position.
I mean, that's not a negotiation.
A negotiation is where you say, well, our We have a problem in that we both want different things.
Is there a way that we can find some solution wherein we both genuinely want, you know, we'll call it plan X, right?
You know, plan A is wife says I want to have sex.
Plan B is I don't want to have sex, I'm tired.
Plan X is let's do that filthy thing that, you know, we've always talked about but never done.
Yay!
You know, we'll get it going.
Or, you know, let's try a blowjob and see if that gets you in the mood.
That's got me in the mood even just talking about it.
So, all of that stuff is where you really do try and find the plan X. And the plan X is where you find something that is satisfactory to both parties.
Obviously, it's different from plan A and plan B, but plan X is something that is satisfactory to both parties.
And it's not the original thing.
And nobody is surrendering their position.
And in fact, in the third, like in the plan X, people are like, wow, this is even better than plan A and plan B. That's sort of the ideal negotiation.
Wow, that's even better than plan A and plan B. So I think that's sort of the essence or the basis of negotiation.
And it comes out of a kind of humility, because it comes out of a recognition that Plan A or Plan B may not be the best plan.
It's putting your heads together and saying, can we come up with the Plan X? That is, in fact, a better plan than plan A and plan B, right?
So, you're negotiating for a car.
If they say, well, I'm not going to give you $2,000 off, but I'm going to give you free gas for a year.
You're like, wow, you know, I thought the $2,000 off was a great deal, but this free gas for a year is a much better deal.
Yay, you know?
Maybe they had a promotional card lying around that was still valid.
Something like that.
If you only hackle over plan A and plan B, then it's going to be win-lose, right?
And negotiation is win-win.
I mean, that's a cliche.
But what I mean by win-win is not...
Everybody's happy with either plan A or plan B. Or everybody grudgingly accepts plan X. Win-win is where plan X turns out to be better than plan A or plan B. And it's your refusal to compromise on plan A or plan B that provokes the creative searching for the plan X which turns out to be better than plan A or plan B for both people.
Right?
So, There's the two different positions, plan A and plan B, and then there's two other different positions, which is plan A slash B versus plan X. The win-win is when you will choose plan X even over plan A or plan B. Even if you want plan A or plan B,
you'll choose plan A. That's the real win, where the third way that the plan X wins over plan A and plan B. Because a lot of people think that negotiation is you give a little, you get a little, and you come up with some way that you can grudgingly accept some, some, some.
But plan X is where you're like, wow, I'm really glad we kept working on this negotiation because we found out a way that we can come up with something much better than plan A or plan B. So that to me is the goal.
I'm not saying you can always achieve it, but that really should be the goal, and that's Well, the stimulus to creativity occurs.
A lot of what I do in this show is try to grow your creativity brain, the creative part of your brain, by constantly hitting you with new ideas and new options and new approaches and so on that obviously...
You haven't really heard before and give you the chance to be creative.
Now, the creativity stuff is great and it's fun, but the creativity stuff, I think in particular, is really important for your relationships because with creativity, you can come up with solutions that work better for better people, right?
So, there's an old Mad Magazine I used to read when I was in my early teens.
Is it Mad?
Yeah, Mad Magazine.
And there was a great series of cartoons.
I think I mentioned this before.
And Roger something or something or other.
Anyway.
Sure, better than Spy vs.
Spy.
It sucked.
But it's infatuation when, it's love when, it's a relationship when.
So, it's infatuation when it doesn't matter where you go for holiday as long as you're both together.
It's love when the husband wants a holiday in the mountains, the wife wants a holiday on the beach, and so the husband goes to holiday on the beach to make the wife happy.
And it's a relationship when he wants to holiday on the mountains, she wants to holiday on the beach, so he goes to holiday on the mountains and she goes to holiday on the beach.
And, I mean, it's a little bit cynical, of course, right?
But I do remember thinking that.
Everybody wants to stay in there.
It doesn't matter.
As long as you go together, it doesn't matter.
And that, of course, is actually where I am.
I'm still infatuated with my lovely wife.
But he wants to go to the mountains, she wants to go to the beach.
Well, find some other place that you both prefer to the mountains.
Like, I mean, if the husband and wife were offered a free trip to the moon, it probably would be a little bit better than either the mountains or the beach.
So, the goal is to find some creative solution wherein both people get more than their initial position.
I mean, gosh, you can't get better than that, right?
So, the idea that negotiation involves compromise is not a true statement.
Occasionally, negotiation will involve compromise.
When you simply can't have another solution, or you can't think of one, or there's no time, then yes, okay.
There are occasions in which negotiation involves a compromise, but that is a failed negotiation.
And failed doesn't mean bad, it just means that you didn't get to plan X, which you both wanted more than plan A or plan B. So you may be fighting over housework, and you may...
Find, you know, that, oh my God, you know, it's...
I don't like doing the bathrooms.
Well, I don't mind doing this.
Or, you know, the general division of labor where the man does what's outside the house and the woman does more of what's inside the house and so on.
I mean, you may go back and forth and all that kind of stuff, right?
But you may come up with a plan X, which is...
Let's start blogging for money and use that money to pay the maids instead of cleaning.
And therefore, all the time that we used to spend cleaning, we'll pay maids to come by, and the maids will clean, and we will aim to make that money back on blogging, which is a lot more fun, or vlogging or something like that.
That's a plan X. Well, now we don't have to clean, we get to vlog, and that's much better.
And we don't have to fight about it.
About who cleans.
Again, these are just possibilities or options or whatever that you can figure out.
I don't like maintaining the cars.
Well, maybe we'll lease and get it all.
There's lots of ways that you can come up with something that's better or more fun or different.
And remaining open to the creativity of searching outside the box.
Because so often when we're looking at plan A and plan B, all we think of is who wins or how can we tweak plan A and plan B so it's not too bad or whatever.
But always focus on the plan X. You know, let's think way outside the box and try and figure out how we can figure this stuff out, right?
Like, so you want to go to the beach, I want to go to the mountains, let's go to Rio, Rio, and there's a mountain and a beach right next to each other, and so on, right?
The other thing, too, is let's say the boyfriend is really into playing video games and the girlfriend is feeling neglected.
Well, what a great opportunity to find out about your partner, which is, wow, I don't really understand the video game thing, but maybe you can step me through it and really help me to understand what the attraction is of the video games for you.
I mean, that's interesting to me.
And you get a chance to figure it out.
And maybe, just maybe, you can...
Play some video games together or something like that.
Or maybe you could say, I really love the first-person shooters.
You know, they're very exciting for me and they're very immersive and so on, right?
You know, in my hour a week, maybe hour every two weeks, I get to play video games.
I'm going through Crisis 3, which is causing my computer to wind like a World War I biplane.
The graphics card is finding it quite exciting, but the technology is really quite astounding.
So, maybe you could say, oh, the first-person shooters, those are really exciting.
Why don't we go and play laser tag or paintball?
And those can be, I've done both, they can be a huge amount of fun.
They can actually be quite hysterical, giggly fun, I think, anyway.
Or, you know, maybe we'll buy the jackets for home and arrange some games with our neighbors.
So I get to know our neighbors and you get to do live video games, which is even more exciting.
Like, you know what I mean?
Like, there's just things that you can do.
Differences of opinion are also very important opportunities to learn more about your partner.
So if your wife is really into soap operas, then you can learn about her history with soap operas.
You can learn about the characters.
You can learn about why she's interested in soap operas.
You know, sort of any number of things.
Maybe you can script a soap opera and film it for YouTube shits and giggles.
I mean, I don't know.
Just find out more about your partner.
Stuff, particularly isolated stuff, like older gamers before the online gaming became the big thing.
Gaming comes a lot out of solitude, boredom, isolation, as does excessive TV watching.
And so it's a great opportunity to learn not just about the TV watching or video gaming, but it also helps you to learn about What, you know, where it started with the person.
No, where did it start with the person?
Like for me, Mr.
Robertson, the math teacher, brought in an Atari 400, I think it was.
Yeah, an Atari 400 and showed us Star Raiders.
And I was mesmerized and I would go up to the computer lab every Saturday.
Every Saturday I could.
And learn how to program and learn how to make games and play games and all that.
And it was just...
I mean, I thought they were incredible.
I still think they're incredible.
It's the relationship that grows every year.
So, you know, another win-lose is, oh, you know, I'm really into porn and, you know, my girlfriend is not or whatever.
It's the opportunity for the girlfriend to find out what is it about the pornography that is exciting.
To have a conversation about it.
What do you like?
What do you not like?
And why?
And when did you first start to get into it?
And have you noticed any changes over the years?
Or, you know, that kind of stuff.
How do you feel when you don't get it?
These are all just curiosity questions.
So...
That's sort of what I'm talking about.
So something which could be win-lose, like, oh my god, I found my boyfriend looking at porn.
That's terrible.
He's bad.
I'm good.
He's shamed.
I'm virtuous and all that.
Well, what an opportunity to learn about the person, about the sexual etymology of his desires and all that kind of stuff and how porn has affected positively or negatively or both his sex life and all that kind of stuff.
Yeah.
I mean, porn is nothing new, right?
I mean, the reason that we're wired to...
To get turned on.
Our muscles don't develop when we look at someone working out.
It doesn't work that way.
I've tried, trust me.
But when we see sexual activity, we are turned on simply because things were pretty open and tribal throughout most of our history.
And when you would see sexual activity around you, it would remind you that you really should be spreading your seed and that sexual availability was going on.
And you might even get some sloppy seconds and all that kind of stuff, right?
Which, you know, it's not bad in terms of passing your genes.
It's a race to the finish.
Little tadpoles could get to the egg first.
And so, you know, like it or not, it is sort of hardwired into us to be sexually aroused by views of sexual activity.
That's That's one of the ways in which our genes were reminded to pay it forward.
And so these things are just worth discussing.
They're worth talking about.
I mean, going to the old Victorian shame model is tempting.
It's tempting, for sure.
But I think it's not particularly productive, right?
Because whenever you're leveling, like whenever you're superior and your partner is inferior, you are chipping away at the base of your relationship.
Like whenever you are superior and you are bossing around or morally superior or shaming your partner, you are taking an axe right to the base of the relationship.
Relationships cannot survive hierarchies.
Right.
And, of course, we're grown in the hierarchy of the church.
We're grown in the hierarchy of parents so often.
We're grown in the hierarchy of public schools or most kinds of education, really.
So we're just used to hierarchies.
And we get a thrill of power because of these horrible histories.
We get a thrill of power when our partner has done something That's wrong.
This very car, this 98 Volvo that I'm still driving on, like whipping a half-expired headless zombie, I bought like 15 years ago.
I was in a relationship with a woman and she dinged the bumper like the third day I got it.
And I do remember being angry, but I also do remember feeling a thrill of like, gotcha!
Now I have something that I have power over you with.
Now I have something that I can use to excuse anything that I do myself.
I can be nice to you about it.
And then when I do something wrong, I can say, whoa, whoa, whoa.
Remember when you dinged my car and I was like, it became something that I could use as a way of having leverage or self-protection or dominance in the relationship.
So there's a thrill, and it's a little bit sadistic, and it's definitely hierarchical, and it's definitely win-lose, non-negotiation power-based.
I mean, it's where I was, and this was before therapy and all.
And for me, to be fair, it was mostly around self-protection, rather than grinding somebody's gears down to a tubercular puddle.
But anyway...
All differences of opinion are opportunities for greater knowledge about your partner and opportunities for applying your creativity to find a plan X that could really work for you.
So I really want to point that out because it's really important to understand.
Now, why is it that negotiation...
It's so rare.
And why are you never taught this?
Or why is almost no one ever taught this when you are growing up?
Ah, well, you see.
Plan X is freedom.
Plan X arises out of empathy.
And what is called normal these days remains almost unabashedly entitled and narcissistic.
I mean, how could a public school teacher teach you how to negotiate for win-win, when up until very recently, and still in many states in the U.S. and other places in the world, they have the power to hit you for noncompliance.
To hit you with a ruler, or in my case, to spank your ass with a cane.
So that is not a plan X, right?
That's just a sadistic discharging of prior abuse, turning the child into a poison container for all the wretched stuff that occurred in the past.
So you can't teach children about creatively finding A solution to a conflict of interest when you hold power.
And the entire relationship is based upon the exercising of win-lose power in that relationship.
You go to the principal.
You have a detention.
I'm going to send you a note home with your mom.
I'm going to call a parent-teacher conference.
You're going to get in trouble.
Bad things are going to happen.
You are going to suffer.
I mean, this is all.
And how on earth could you have a creative instruction towards problem solving and coming up with a truly win-win plan X from a priest?
Right?
The priest is basically representing, in most cases, representing a deity who's like, do this or fuck you.
Do this or I give you to Satan and he scrubs your genitals with steel wool dipped in acid and on fire for the rest of eternity.
Right?
This is not a plan X. It's a plan X for the sadism.
So you get that Satan is just a projected sadism of the priest.
Right?
I'm sure you understand that.
Of course you understand that.
So, that is...
It's all pretty important to understand that this is what is actually occurring.
That the sadistic capacities of the priest...
Just to reiterate, right?
So, the sadistic capacities of the priest are what gives Satan his power, right?
Because there's no Satan who's saying, here's what I'm going to do.
Just read Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce to get a truly terrifying example of how all this works.
But...
It's the unconscious sadism of the religious writers and authorities and priests and so on that produces all of this supposedly, this is what hell is all about.
It is a description of early childhood.
It is not a description of Satan who doesn't exist.
It's all just projection, the projection of the priest and the capacities and sadism of the priest.
And, of course, it's the same with the state, right?
I mean, with the state, you do what they say, or you go to jail, or you get harassed, or...
I mean, harassed is...
you get stalked.
I mean, it's just psycho stuff, right?
Poor Aaron Schwartz, the PayPal 11 or whatever it is.
I mean, this goes on for years, you know, the...
There's a lawsuit that started, I think, in the late 80s or early 90s, where 60 minutes faked the sudden acceleration problem with the Audis.
And this caused a huge drop in value for the resale of Audis.
And that lawsuit is still going on, like 20, 30 years later.
Unresolved.
Because, you know, how will people get justice without the government?
What a head-scratcher that is!
And so, almost our entire social structure is based upon a narcissistic, entitled, sociopathic, win-lose, obey-fuck-you paradigm.
Of course, I mean, all these things have been inherited from a very primitive society.
Era of our species.
You know, it's so funny about atheists.
They talk about how, you know, all of these rules and these ideas, they all inherited from the childhood of our species and get replicated without thought, and then you start talking to them about the state, and they look at you like you're crazy.
Well, the state hierarchies, top-down parenting, religious authority, education, this is all...
Inherited from a very primitive time in our species, and it's simply been replicated because it's a value to the worst among us, right?
I mean, it's hard for people to see this.
And the reason it's hard to see this is that, let's say you have a mom.
Let's say you have a mom who is kind of a bully, right?
Let's just say.
Could happen.
And let's say that you start trying to truly negotiate with her.
Well, you can't negotiate well without curiosity, without empathy, without sympathy, without...
Without creativity and without the knee-jerk reaction to impose your will.
The moment you start imposing your will on someone and just start bullying and manipulating them, then you're being a jerk.
Socrates had a great face for it.
Asshole.
Yeah, that's what you're being.
And I can have sympathy for the fact that you were taught how to be an asshole and that you were not You know, you weren't taught how to speak non-arsholery, but nonetheless, you remain in practice and in practicality and empirically aforementioned orifice.
Anyway, so once you really try and start negotiating with people and you resist the top-down win-lose hierarchical imposition of will...
What happens is you reveal people's narcissism.
You reveal their entitlement.
That's why they don't want you to negotiate with them.
Because you start to speak a language that they hate and fear.
I mean, it's like holy water to the undead.
Right?
This is like the wood elf glades to the giant spiders.
Yes, I've been reading quite a lot of The Hobbit to Isabella lately.
But the moment you start trying to really negotiate with somebody who doesn't negotiate and never has negotiated, their deficiencies become clear.
And those who live by the sword die by the sword.
The only reason you would submit to someone else's will is because they have the power to punish you.
And the only reason that you would desire to punish someone and impose your will on them is because you have no self-esteem.
And because you are a short-term consumer of the value of the relationship at the expense of the relationship.
Talk about eating your seed crop.
Imposing your will on someone you claim to love will get compliance and will remove an apparent conflict.
But man, talk about eating the future for the sake of gorging in the present.
It undermines the whole relationship and turns it into a non-relationship.
They just become an obedient, occasionally broken, smacked-upside-the-head robot.
And that's not good.
Thank you.
Thank you.
I mean, it's good in the moment.
It's good in the moment.
And if you have no self-esteem, like if you don't have the self-esteem to look for creative win-wins, if you don't care enough about yourself to want to maintain the value of a relationship, to want to really make sure that the other person is happy in the relationship, Right?
Then you have no self-esteem because of that.
And that means that you have been crushed and humiliated in the past, right?
And you have internalized the win-lose paradigm of entitled narcissistic feasting on the flesh of the relationship.
You learned that from someone else.
And because you were humiliated, you in turn humiliated.
And bloody, bloody, it's also bloody obvious.
It's ridiculous, right?
Broken, wind-up robots are past trauma.
This is the vast majority of the population of the planet.
And obvious stuff, too.
I mean, that's the part that's really depressing is how ridiculous it is.
Figuring people out is not an episode of House, right?
It's an episode of C-Spot Run.
So, the reason why dysfunctional people desperately don't want you to start negotiating with them is because they are incredibly prone to feelings of humiliation.
Right?
And people who are incredibly prone to feelings of humiliation can't stand it when even the slightest deficiency is exposed.
And they bully because they can't negotiate.
And so when you start to negotiate with them...
Then what happens is their incapacity to negotiate, their incapacity to show empathy, their incapacity to find a win-win, their incapacity and lack of care for you and for your relationship with that person is revealed.
And the longer they have been a bully, the worse it is when you reveal that they're a bully.
Of course, right?
And after a certain amount of time being a bully, you can't undo it.
So if you've had a mom who's bullied you for 25 years, manipulated you and threatened you and withdrawn from you and all the bullshit marionette stuff that these weak people use, well, that's your relationship.
Right?
That's your relationship.
Right?
And it's not a relationship, of course, right?
I mean, it's a master-slave, mistress-slave relationship.
It's not a relationship.
It's proximity.
Proximity and transfer of resources.
It's like saying that you have a relationship with a pickpocket.
No.
Proximity and transfer of resources, i.e.
your wallet and watch.
So, after a certain, like, if you've had a quarter century of that and not much else, then you start to negotiate.
The deficiencies of empathy are almost immediately revealed.
I mean, the stuff is always so close to everyone all the time.
It's always right beneath the surface.
Right beneath the surface.
And this is particularly true when those around you, let's say the aforementioned hypothetical mom, have said, I love you, I care about you, I want nothing but the best for you, your happiness means the world to me, I would do anything for you, blah-de-blah-de-blah.
Once they've settled, right, then when you start to negotiate with someone who's used the cover story of love...
But hasn't actually taken into account your preferences and feelings and thoughts and emotional reality, then what you're doing is you're calling a con woman's bluff.
You are.
Somebody who says, I'm the greatest tennis player that ever was, and blah-de-blah-de-blah, and you're like, hey.
And in full view of everyone, in full view of the people that this bracket cares about the most, you say, hey, here's a tennis racket, let's play.
So I'm pretty good.
Let's play.
And then he doesn't even know which end of the tennis racket to hold.
Well, that person is going to loathe you for revealing the fraud.
That he or she has been perpetrating, right?
I mean, that's just about tennis.
Who cares about that shit, right?
But if somebody has said, well, I really care about you, and I want the best for you, and I love you, and I'd do anything for you, and then you say, great, well, I'm not happy with these win-lose interactions, so I want to really start negotiating, and blah-de-blah-de-blah.
Well, you're then revealing a deficiency that the words have just been a con for a quarter century.
Now, I mean, in some rare individuals, and I have got some evidence in my inbox of this, but in some rare individuals, they realize that they've just been talking to a good game, but they haven't actually been doing it.
And with all humility, they submit to learning about how to interact better and so on.
And this is heroic.
I mean, it's wonderful.
Massively great.
Couldn't be happier.
But they are in the extreme and distinct minority.
Most people will just double down, right?
They just continue to bully and escalate and so on, right?
I mean, there are choices, I think, even in those kinds of situations.
So, most people will just double down and, you know, well, the robot is not doing what I want, so I'm going to keep hitting it on the side of the head, physically or metaphorically, until it does what I want, you know?
I'm going to change the bat.
I mean, you never think of negotiating with your iPad.
Well, do you mind if I play Angry Birds or do you want to play Tunnel Shoot?
And if it doesn't work, you just get annoyed at it, right?
Or frustrated or whatever, right?
Sure.
Sure.
People have that relationship with their bodies as well, with much less reason.
But the reason why you're not taught negotiation and why, for many, many people, your efforts at negotiation are going to...
Raise fists against you.
It's because for people incredibly susceptible to humiliation, you are exposing something that is extremely humiliating to them.
The only reason you brag is because you feel lesser and lower, because you've been previously humiliated and so you brag to make up for that.
When your brag is exposed, your original humiliation is revealed, which is why braggarts are actually unconsciously in many ways desperately trying to find someone who isn't going to buy their bullshit.
But...
The original humiliation is exposed and in hearts, because now the original humiliation for which someone deserves sympathy, the humiliation they experience as children, has now been mixed in with the humiliation that they're experiencing as a braggart, right?
And that they've lied.
And of course, if you've been a bully to children and so on, it all becomes pretty toxic and unbearable.
But, you know, this idea of negotiation, it's not that complicated, and we do it quite a bit.
Right?
How many times have you said, I really want to buy this.
It's too expensive for me.
I don't think I can handle with the clerk.
So, the A is I'll buy it and spend more than I want, or the B is I'll go without.
Right?
Right?
Plan X is I'll wait for a sale.
Or I'll buy it second-hand.
Or I'll buy something like it that's cheaper.
Or I'll see if I've got a friend I can trade something with for.
So you get it without...
So these are all other solutions for getting things that you want.
But it requires self-empathy, requires empathy with others, requires being steadfastly dedicated to a win-win situation.
To refuse, to simply refuse to...
Settle for a win-lose, right?
Unless all other conceivable options, given time constraints and so on, have been exhausted.
I simply refuse to submit to a win-lose.
And you find, of course, as you refuse to submit to a win-lose, you will find, you know, quite quickly that you can do quite well.
You get better at figuring out how to How to negotiate.
You get better at all these things.
And that stuff is really, really important to understand.
So, I hope that this helps.
We'll do a part two of this, and I hope that that will make some kind of sense.
Thank you so much for listening, as always.
If you find this stuff useful, fdrurl.com forward slash donate is the place where we can come up with a win-win paradigm called You Get Some Podcasts and I Get Some Lunch.
So, thank you everybody so much.
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