I finished reading the “Commitment and Consistency” chapter in Cialdini’s book ‘Influence’. For the past 2+ weeks I have attempted to stay aware of this bias in everyday life.
What I have observed:
I caught myself and others being automatically (and irrationality) committed to ideas (far too many times)
Some of personal beliefs exist simply because I committed to them when I was younger and significantly more idiotic
People are significantly more committed to goals when they publicly announced them
People say mind-blowingly irrational statements for the sake of consistency
Consequences of my observations:
I have stopped myself many times from automatically blurting out ideas I was committed to
I have had the chance to re-examine a few of my personal beliefs and update them accordingly
I have gotten people to do things for me/keep their promises by making them announce it or write it down.
I have gotten even closer to my cat because I publicly declared him as part of my family :)
Updates in my reality:
Human operate in a much more robotic way than I previously thought so (I only understood this theoretically, now I’ve observed it in real life)
Humans are controlled by this invisible program of commitment and consistency, and I’m sure I’ve only observed the top of the iceberg with regards to this bias. I’m seeing new things almost everyday.
What worked well:
Attempting something that I was genuinely interested in
Letting my momentum organically build up from my interest in the activity/subject and all my previous successful observations
What didn’t work:
Setting micro-goals (I tried to set myself a micro-goal of observing this bias 10 times during the day, and I failed)
Setting expectations for myself (even low expectations seemed to hinder my progress)
I finished reading the “Commitment and Consistency” chapter in Cialdini’s book ‘Influence’. For the past 2+ weeks I have attempted to stay aware of this bias in everyday life.
What I have observed:
I caught myself and others being automatically (and irrationality) committed to ideas (far too many times)
Some of personal beliefs exist simply because I committed to them when I was younger and significantly more idiotic
People are significantly more committed to goals when they publicly announced them
People say mind-blowingly irrational statements for the sake of consistency
Consequences of my observations:
I have stopped myself many times from automatically blurting out ideas I was committed to
I have had the chance to re-examine a few of my personal beliefs and update them accordingly
I have gotten people to do things for me/keep their promises by making them announce it or write it down.
I have gotten even closer to my cat because I publicly declared him as part of my family :)
Updates in my reality:
Human operate in a much more robotic way than I previously thought so (I only understood this theoretically, now I’ve observed it in real life)
Humans are controlled by this invisible program of commitment and consistency, and I’m sure I’ve only observed the top of the iceberg with regards to this bias. I’m seeing new things almost everyday.
What worked well:
Attempting something that I was genuinely interested in
Letting my momentum organically build up from my interest in the activity/subject and all my previous successful observations
What didn’t work:
Setting micro-goals (I tried to set myself a micro-goal of observing this bias 10 times during the day, and I failed)
Setting expectations for myself (even low expectations seemed to hinder my progress)