Real Coffee with Scott Adams - February 14, 2020


Episode 820 Scott Adams： Valentines Whiteboard Lesson on Winning Versus Losing Frames


Episode Stats

Length

9 minutes

Words per Minute

168.0273

Word Count

1,674

Sentence Count

139

Hate Speech Sentences

1


Summary

People who are having a tough time making it in this world have very similar but different thinking patterns to the people who are doing so well. And I want to show you so you can choose the one that works for you.


Transcript

00:00:00.280 Bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum
00:00:05.480 Hey everybody, it's a very special single-topic periscope today.
00:00:11.760 I'm going to wait for a thousand people to jump in, and then we're going to jump right into it.
00:00:16.680 It's going to be short. There will be no simultaneous sip. We already did that today.
00:00:21.180 It's going to be on one topic, and this topic will change the lives of some of you.
00:00:27.800 Others of you will say, I kind of knew that, but it will give you a new way to package it
00:00:33.420 so you can convince other people, maybe change somebody else's life by using this communication method.
00:00:40.540 So, this is about the losing way to look at the world versus the winning way to look at the world.
00:00:48.160 This is something I've noticed over my lifetime, that people who are having a tough time making it in this world
00:00:55.200 have very similar thinking patterns, and the people who are doing great
00:00:59.780 have also very similar but different thinking patterns from the people who are not doing so well.
00:01:05.680 And I want to show you those so you can choose the one that works for you.
00:01:11.080 Let's start with the loser frame.
00:01:13.560 This is an unproductive way of looking at the world.
00:01:17.080 It doesn't mean that the people who think this way are losers.
00:01:19.980 It does mean that the technique is not a winning technique.
00:01:24.640 And it goes like this.
00:01:25.800 This is one way of looking at the world.
00:01:28.660 There are people in the world who are continually doing stuff you don't like.
00:01:33.400 And those people are having a big effect on you.
00:01:36.720 They're making your brain register all this stress.
00:01:39.880 And then your brain is sending that stress into your body, and it's making you feel bad in a variety of ways.
00:01:45.800 It's making you sick and unhappy and lose sleep and everything else that stress does.
00:01:50.800 And then all of that is, of course, going back into your brain figuratively, or at least conceptually.
00:01:57.400 You can think of it as a loop in which it just makes you sad.
00:02:01.700 Now, how do you fix this situation if that's how you see the world?
00:02:06.640 It's tough.
00:02:07.380 The only thing you can do is wait for other people to act different than normal people.
00:02:14.680 That's it.
00:02:15.860 Your only hope of getting out of this is if other people stop acting like regular human beings all of a sudden.
00:02:23.700 Because they're acting like normal people.
00:02:26.100 It's not really reasonable to expect that they will just stop acting that way.
00:02:31.360 So here's a permanent losing framework.
00:02:34.280 If you see the world like this, you see yourself as a victim of these other people who just don't seem to change.
00:02:41.900 So what's the productive way to look at this?
00:02:44.440 Well, without changing any facts in the world, without making anything different about what you perceive,
00:02:51.540 here's the way winners look at the world.
00:02:55.160 And it's pretty consistent.
00:02:56.440 I think you'll notice that the winners often think this way.
00:03:01.340 It goes like this.
00:03:05.240 The way winners think is that your brain has different parts.
00:03:09.220 And again, this is conceptual.
00:03:10.640 I'm not saying everybody who does well in life thinks of it exactly this way.
00:03:14.140 But once you see it, I think you'll agree.
00:03:15.740 But we have this little executive decision part of our brain, just a small part that can make rational decisions.
00:03:23.820 For example, that part of your brain could say, I'd better go to college.
00:03:28.520 I'd better learn a skill.
00:03:30.380 Just a rational decision.
00:03:32.120 This part says, I hear it's good to go to the gym.
00:03:35.600 So I'll build that into my schedule.
00:03:38.640 Rational decision.
00:03:40.140 We're not rational species.
00:03:41.800 This big part of your brain is doing a whole bunch of irrational stuff.
00:03:45.800 But still, there is a little part of our brain that can make perfectly rational decisions about the easy stuff.
00:03:52.000 Do I go to the gym?
00:03:53.480 What kind of a diet do I have?
00:03:55.160 You know, the things that take care of yourself.
00:03:57.460 Now, let's say you make good executive decisions.
00:04:00.600 You do the things that people through the centuries know work.
00:04:06.200 Increasing your talent stack works every time.
00:04:09.040 Learning works basically every time.
00:04:12.400 Being nice to people.
00:04:13.640 Having good manners.
00:04:15.020 Staying out of jail.
00:04:15.900 There are easy, logical things that you can make your body do.
00:04:20.340 You can make your body not pick up that piece of cake.
00:04:24.740 And instead, you can make your body pick up something that's a little healthier for you.
00:04:29.040 You can make your body have the right body language so people appreciate you, etc.
00:04:34.460 Under this model, you make these little executive decisions about what your body will be doing.
00:04:40.320 Now, that includes your mind.
00:04:41.600 It includes what you say.
00:04:43.020 I'm not talking about literally just your arms and legs.
00:04:46.440 I'm talking about going to school.
00:04:48.400 I'm talking about driving across town, if it makes sense to do that.
00:04:52.520 All the things that your body does.
00:04:56.260 And in this model, everything you do influences other people.
00:04:59.240 Do you notice how this is the reverse of the loser opinion?
00:05:03.540 In the loser framework, other people are the cause of all your problems.
00:05:09.060 In this framework, you're making decisions.
00:05:11.540 Your body is going out and doing things.
00:05:13.460 And you are the one influencing other people.
00:05:16.460 The way they treat you is an outcome of your executive decision and what you did.
00:05:23.000 Let's say your executive decision was to go to school and get a degree.
00:05:27.040 Does that affect other people?
00:05:28.400 Absolutely.
00:05:29.980 Those other people now feel differently about you.
00:05:32.800 They act differently.
00:05:33.620 They offer you jobs.
00:05:35.380 If you tell your body to act polite, even when you're not feeling polite, does that affect other people?
00:05:42.540 Absolutely.
00:05:43.880 Other people will respond to your politeness, usually with politeness.
00:05:48.040 They will like you better, etc.
00:05:49.960 If you tell your body to show interest in people, even if you don't really feel it.
00:05:54.740 So you ask them about themselves, you listen, you're a good listener.
00:05:59.020 Does that affect other people?
00:06:00.980 Absolutely.
00:06:02.080 If you act like a good listener, even if you're not feeling it, but if you act like it, if you get your arms and legs and mouth to be a good listener, these people will be influenced.
00:06:12.440 They'll say, I like that person.
00:06:14.100 Good listener.
00:06:14.880 Cares about people.
00:06:15.900 Empathy.
00:06:16.200 I think that would be a good manager, somebody I want to mate with, etc.
00:06:21.020 Now, in this model, if your executive decision moves your body, your body influences other people, both the things that your body is doing and the things that other people are responding with are making you happy.
00:06:33.160 In this model, you are controlling the entire flow.
00:06:37.720 Now, does that mean that the loser frame is 100% debunked?
00:06:42.340 No.
00:06:42.940 They both run at the same time.
00:06:45.020 It is true that other people are just doing stuff that's making you unhappy.
00:06:49.060 You can't change that.
00:06:50.480 But you can understand your world differently and take control.
00:06:54.300 If you understand that your executive decisions that move your body are what is programming other people, at least the other people that are affected by you directly, you're programming those people.
00:07:07.160 And that programming is the thing that makes you happy because they are loving you.
00:07:11.180 They are hiring you.
00:07:12.040 They are giving you raises.
00:07:13.260 They're saying good things about you.
00:07:14.760 They're becoming your friends.
00:07:15.860 They're doing you favors.
00:07:17.140 And it's all because they're getting something out of it.
00:07:19.660 They're not doing it because they're good people, although some might be.
00:07:22.900 They're doing it because you program them.
00:07:25.720 You program them by the way you act.
00:07:29.700 That is the winning frame.
00:07:31.960 Now, you're probably thinking to yourself, who do you know who has the winning frame versus the losing frame?
00:07:40.100 And this is the sort of lesson that is going to become more profound as you think about it.
00:07:45.800 The more you think about it, you're going to start noticing people, the people who just can't figure out how to make it in life.
00:07:52.900 Are all the people who think they're victims of what other people are doing.
00:07:57.320 The moment you can reframe that as you are programming other people, which, by the way, is a different way of explaining the Dale Carnegie method.
00:08:09.060 There's a reason that Dale Carnegie has been a best-selling book for how many decades?
00:08:16.120 Decades after decades.
00:08:17.800 It's because it works.
00:08:19.520 And the Dale Carnegie method, among other things, teaches a wide variety of things.
00:08:25.780 But one of the things that I find most important is that you learn that you are the agent of reprogramming your environment.
00:08:33.940 People will respond to you based on what you do.
00:08:37.560 So you are programming them all the time.
00:08:40.480 If you allow them to program you, they will.
00:08:44.440 They will.
00:08:44.980 They'll fill in the blank.
00:08:46.600 If you're not programming the people around you, they will program you.
00:08:50.300 Guaranteed.
00:08:51.140 So you only have those two choices.
00:08:53.520 Get programmed and have no control over your life.
00:08:56.940 Or become the programmer.
00:08:59.500 Somebody in the comments is saying,
00:09:01.720 Hello, Jordan Peterson.
00:09:02.880 I would contend, I haven't heard Jordan Peterson say this exactly, but I'm pretty sure it's compatible with the things he says.
00:09:11.460 You will notice that all the people that you recognize are good at this stuff, meaning good at understanding strategies for being successful.
00:09:20.760 I would be willing to bet that 100% are compatible with what I just said.
00:09:27.800 Probably every person who really gets it.
00:09:30.720 Probably every person who's ever made a billion dollars understands that they are the agents programming other people.
00:09:39.200 As soon as you think it's the other way around, that's what's going to happen.
00:09:42.980 It's self-fulfilling.
00:09:44.620 So, yes, I think you'll see this quite a bit.
00:09:47.880 I thought I would put this in one crisp little video, and I'm going to end it right here.
00:09:53.720 But I hope that was helpful, and happy Valentine's Day.