Be your own bad guy

When sharing ideas, pure enthusiasm can be an enemy. People seem to recoil from the appearance that you have not considered the other side, and so they put themselves on that other side as a matter of due diligence. This can get ugly, and turn into real opposition. Your tendency may be to push harder to make your point, but that only widens the divide.

Alternatively, if you can play that role for them, they often come to your aid. In other words be your own bad guy so that someone else doesn’t have to do it for you. It’s not a matter of tempering or crushing down your own enthusiasm (please don’t!), but rather leaving space for others’.

Ryan Melsom has a PhD in literary studies and has spent over twenty years working in communications, design, and writing. His third book Clickbait: A Seeker’s Guide to Meaning in the Modern World is now available everywhere. For more by Ryan, follow him on Twitter @ryanmelsom, or subscribe to his Facebook page.