Self-improvement and growth are a big topic for me and I think it is everyone's duty to become the best version of himself. I try to read every day and with this blog, I want to summarize the books that I have read and say my thoughts about them.

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Devin Hasler


## 🚀 The Book in 3 Sentences

1. We should learn to understand our emotions better.
2. Romanticism has failed.
3. Sometimes it is good to be bad.

## 🕵🏼Who Should Read It?

The book is generally written for a wide audience since improving ourselves and understanding ourselves should be the goal of every person and firmly implanted in our school system. However, I would say that if some knowledge is already present in these specific areas, the book can feel repetitive and lengthy.

## ☘️ How the Book Changed Me

I learned a lot of concepts in the subject of emotional maturity and improved my understanding of the importance of learning these subjects in school. As the author Alain mentions in the introduction, we sadly pay too much attention to scientific matters and principles and neglect the emotional side of life. It would be wrong, on the other hand, to dismiss all scientific learnings from school, but we should find a better balance between these two subjects.

## ✍️ My Top 3 Quotes

> “We need to become better friends to ourselves.” Alain de Botton

> “Contented people have no need to hurt others.” Alain de Botton

> “Our degree of satisfaction is critically dependent on our expectations.” Alain de Botton

## 📒 Summary + Notes

The book has set itself a challenging goal since catching up in emotional education with just one single book is quite a big task. Nonetheless, the book manages to achieve this by structuring the content into five topics, which are then explained in greater depth.

### I. Self

Alain mentions in this chapter how strange it is that we have so little knowledge about our inner selves. Although it seems like we are the owners of our skulls since we carry them with us all the time, most of the time we remain strangers to what unfolds within them.

The author mentions the importance of having fundamental emotional skepticism. Skepticism comes from the Greek word “skepsis” which means questioning. I find this an immensely important concept as questioning your own thoughts can make a huge difference. In this lies the concept of Socrates, who says, “I am wise not because I know, but because I know I don’t know,” which couldn’t be more true.

Further, Alain mentions the relevance of understanding his own past since every person has their own primal wounds, as he calls them. Primal wounds are experiences that were made in childhood which have strongly shaped our emotional side and our character. There is always a logic and a history behind another person.

It is interesting that a child who suffers at the hands of an adult almost always takes what has happened to them as a reflection of what is wrong with themselves. This then takes a lot of effort to reflect on oneself to acknowledge that most of the mistakes were not made by the child but by the adult instead.

One really interesting thing that Alain mentions in this chapter is a list which consists of things that can be expected of an emotionally healthy childhood. This list, as he said, can help to check for dislocations that happened. The list is pretty long, which is why I am unable to provide the whole list in this summary, but I nonetheless want to list the most important things that stuck with me:

- In an emotionally healthy childhood, someone will put themselves profoundly at our service.
- In an emotionally healthy childhood, we’re given the benefit of the doubt.
- In an emotionally healthy childhood, we aren’t always required to be wholly good boys or girls.
- Importantly, in an emotionally healthy childhood, plenty goes wrong.
- In an emotionally healthy childhood, the child can see that the good career isn’t either entirely good or wholly bad and so isn’t worthy of either idealization or denigration.

### II. Others

Our society is much more interested in winners than it is in losers. In addition to that, you get what you are, which means that there is no such thing as bad luck. If you failed, you just did not do enough, and it is solely your fault. Because of this, the suicide rate in our modern world is so high, as we judge failing so harshly. But in ancient Greece, there was another alternative: you can be good even if you have failed.

Also in this chapter, the concept of the weakness of strength is mentioned. This means that the very same character trait that we approve of will be inseparable from tendencies we end up regretting. This is why we should understand that there is no person with only strengths. This leads to the importance of kindness, which Alain explains as follows:

“Kindness is built out of a constantly renewed and gently resigned awareness that weakness-free people do not exist.”

This is something I struggle with a lot because I try to get rid of all my weaknesses. This then leads to myself having goals and expectations of myself which are very hard to meet. Also, it diverts my energy into multiple directions which makes it hard for me to become very good in just one thing and accept the lack thereof in another area.

In this chapter, Alain also mentions something important. It is the formula of self-esteem:

$$\text{Self Esteem} = \frac{\text{Success}}{\text{Expectations}}$$

The quest of building self-esteem can be easy since you can just lower your expectations, but in my opinion, this is not the right way to do it. But this can lead to a problem since although tremendous success cannot lead to any self-esteem because the expectations are set so high. Finding the balance between having high expectations and allowing oneself to build good self-esteem is a challenge one has to solve for oneself, and it is something I personally struggle with since I always set myself high expectations.

### III. Relationships

When we Western people talk about love, we talk about Romanticism. It’s the only thing we love, and it’s what we have always watched as children when we watched the newest Disney movie. Romanticism has managed to display the concept of love in an enjoyable and beautiful manner. They were extremely talented at displaying their hopes and longings. But Alain states that Romanticism has failed miserably. Romanticism told us things like:

- We should meet a person with extraordinary inner and outer beauty.
- We should have no secrets.
- We should understand each other intuitively.
- We should raise a family without any loss of sexual or emotional intensity.

All these things were advertised by Romanticism. The problem is that finding partners that check all these boxes is nearly impossible, which is why a lot of relationships fail because we always think about the things our partner does not check. Alain suggests replacing Romanticism with a much more mature vision of love which says:

- It is normal that love and sex do not always belong together.
- Discussing money early on, up front, in a serious way is not a betrayal of love.
- Realizing that we are rather flawed, and our partner is too, is of huge benefit to a couple in increasing the amount of tolerance and generosity in circulation.
- We will never find everything in another person, nor they in us, not because of some unique incapacity, but because of the basic operations of human nature.
- We need to make immense and often rather artificial-sounding efforts to understand one another because intuition will never be enough.
- Practicalities matter—so, for example, there is special dignity around the topics of laundry and domestic management.

### IV. Work

In this chapter, Alain talks about the danger of being a so-called good boy or girl. This is the sort of person that is happy all the time, that tries to make it right for everyone, and is just generally the person that our school system tries to “produce.” The problem, though, is that these people suppress their emotions so badly that they feel strong side effects after. They have sudden outbursts of anger, they become bitter and harsh, and much more. Also, it can lead to us becoming timid when we are overexposed to other people’s good sides.

Another thing that happens in our childhood is the building and experiencing of imposter syndrome. From an early age on, we experience our parents as very different from us since we don’t have the same hobbies, capabilities, and so on. This then leads to us thinking that we are not the type of person to be successful and happy. In that regard, there is also the fact that we know ourselves from the inside and from the outside, and we experience every thought and emotion we have. But from other people, we only see what they do and what they tell us, which is a far narrower source of information. This leads to us feeling much freakier, stranger, and less competent. We have to start to acknowledge that other people have the same strange thoughts that we do and that they make the same mistakes.

### V. Culture

This is the chapter where Alain talks about the values we have in our culture. He compares Romanticism with Classical Culture in different aspects. Because of the number of differences discussed, I will not be able to list them here without making this summary unpleasantly long, but I want to mention one thing. Why do we value price so much? It seems that in our culture, price is the only thing that matters to us. It is not the quality (look at Louis Vuitton and Gucci with their exceptionally bad quality), it is not the emotional value, it is just the price. This is something where we should go back to the mind of a 4-year-old who does not understand the concept of price and chooses things based on their instinct.

Because of the sheer amount of things to learn from this book, it was very difficult to choose which things to add to this blog. This is why I apologize for the length of this blog and hope that it was interesting nonetheless. I strongly advise everyone to read this book as it holds very interesting concepts that I believe everyone should have heard of. With that, I thank you for reading this blog, and

I look forward to seeing you reading my next blog post and wish you all the best.

Regards,  
Devin Hasler


A book by Alain de Botton about Emotional Education

The school of life


## 🚀 The Book in 3 Sentences

1. The most important thing in a negotiation is to listen
2. Try to find the Black Swans (Unknown Unknowns) in every negotiation
3. three

## 🕵🏼Who Should Read It?

There is probably no person on which this book is not able to be beneficial if read. The skill of negotiation can be applicable to everyone's life since negotiations don’t happen just in a business context. The well and easy writing style of Tahl Raz is very pleasing which guarantees a pleasant reading experience. Also, the summaries at the end of each chapter help remember the book's content and rereading.

## ☘️ How the Book Changed Me

Since this book was the first book I read about negotiating, it consisted of a lot of valuable information. The negotiation strategies taught in this book are very reasonable and socially acceptable as well, since the goal is not only to reach a certain price point but also to manage and build a good connection with your negotiating partner. All through the book, interesting and applicable examples are provided, which can help improve the understanding of the book's content and strategies.

## ✍️ My Top 3 Quotes

> “Negotiation is not an act of battle; it’s a process of discovery.” Chris Voss
>

> “Know the emotional drivers and you can frame the benefits of any deal in language that will resonate.” Chris Voss
>

> “No, is the start of the negotiation, not the end of it.” Chris Voss
>

## 📒 Summary + Notes

### 1. How to establish Rapport and build Empathy

To negotiate over something with a pretty much unknown person, it is important to gather information. This can best be done through listening. Psychotherapy has shown that when individuals feel listened to, they tend to listen to themselves more carefully. This also means that people evaluate and clarify their own thoughts and feelings better.

Once the listening part is done correctly, it is important to build rapport with the negotiating partner. To accomplish this, there is a simple process that can be followed for reaching success.

1. Use the late-night FM DJ voice.

2. Start with “I’m sorry . . .”

3. Mirror.

4. Silence. At least four seconds, to let the mirror work its magic on your counterpart.

5.  Repeat.

The late-night FM DJ voice can be used to sound calm, assertive, and sure about what you do. It can be accomplished by inflecting your voice in a downward way.

Mirroring in step 3 is also called isopraxism, and it is the process of essentially imitating the other person. Humans and other animals do that to comfort each other. Isopraxism can happen verbally but also non-verbally, for example, with body language. In a negotiation, mirroring is when you repeat what the other person said.

### 2. Beware “YES”—master “NO”

A very interesting thing taught in the book is that a negotiator should beware of a "yes" and instead try to accomplish a "no". Because most of the time, "yes" can have multiple meanings. "Yes" can be a counterfeit, which means that the "yes" is often followed by a "no", but saying "yes" was the easier option. "Yes" can also be a confirmation, which has no real effect on the negotiation, or a "yes" can be a commitment, which is the desired response. The problem is that you have to be able to know which "yes" you received, and that can sometimes be challenging.

"No", on the other hand, is much simpler and easier to say because most of the time it means one of the following things:

- I am not yet ready to agree
- You are making me feel uncomfortable
- I do not understand
- I don’t think I can afford it
- I want something else
- I  need more information
- I want to talk it over with someone else.

After you hear a 'no', you can then ask questions about why it doesn’t work for them and what the problem is. This leads to gaining information and a better understanding of the other person.

As you can see, “No” has a lot of skills

- “No” allows the real issues to be brought forth;
- “No” protects people from making—and lets them correct—ineffective decisions;
- “No” slows things down so that people can freely embrace their decisions and the agreements they enter into;
- “No” helps people feel safe, secure, emotionally comfortable, and in control of their decisions;
- “No” moves everyone’s efforts forward.

### 3. How to get permission to persuade

Since a 'yes' does not always mean the 'yes' you are hoping for, it is generally much better to try to achieve a 'that’s right'. This phrase is where the magic happens and represents that you are on the right track. But be careful about 'you are right', since this is mostly used to signal the end of the conversation. Because most of the time, there is nothing to be discussed after one is perceived to be right. A 'that’s right' can be accomplished with a combination of labeling and mirroring.

### 4. How to shape what is fair

When trying to reach a good result in a negotiation, it is important to know some tips and tricks. It is good to know that although most people think they act on behalf of rational thinking, most decision-making is governed by emotions. This is important since humans are prone to reject unfairness. This keyword 'fairness' can be very powerful if used correctly. The authors explain that the word should be used when starting the conversation like this:

'I want you to feel like you are being treated fairly at all times. So please stop me at any time if you feel I’m being unfair, and we’ll address it.'

This sets you up as an honest dealer and creates a constructive environment. To not make this blog longer than it has to be, I will provide the next tips in a short format:

- **Anchor their emotions**: If you have negative news try to anchor the emotions so that when you say your offer it does not sound as bad.
- **Establish a range**: When negotiating for a price or salary try to talk in ranges to not force the counterpart into defensive mode.
- **Pivot to non-monetary terms**: This can make a negotiation reach a succesful end although not all parties agreed on monetary terms
- **When talking numbers use odd ones**: This makes the number seem calculated and fixed.
- **Surprise with a gift**: People are prone to respond to generosity with generosity.

### 5. Create the illusion of control

Another thing to do in a negotiation is using what are called calibrated questions. These can be used to say no in a non-confrontational way or make your counterpart understand your side without aggression or confrontation. Ask calibrated questions that start with “how” or “what”. For example:

- What about this is important to you?
- How can I help to make this better for us?
- How would you like me to proceed?
- What is it that brought us into this situation?
- How can we solve this problem?
- What’s the objective? / What are we trying to accomplish here?
- How am I supposed to do that?

  Also calibrate your questions to point your counterpart to solving your problem. This will make them finding a solution for your problem.


### 6. Guarantee execution

In this chapter, the authors talk about the importance of not only getting a yes but also talking about the how. Clarity on how something will be done or implemented can lead to a lower execution hurdle. In the context of investigation execution, the authors mention the 7-38-55 rule, which says that only 7 percent of a message is based on words, 38 percent on the tonality of your voice, and 55 percent on your body language and face. Understanding your counterpart's body language can also greatly increase your possibility of catching them lying since a disparity between words and body language exists when someone is lying.

### 7. Bargaining hard

This chapter is about how to reach a desired price in a negotiating situation.

1. Set your target price (your goal).

2. Set your first offer at 65 percent of your target price.

3. Calculate three raises of decreasing increments (to 85, 95, and 100 percent).

4. Use lots of empathy and different ways of saying “No” to get the other side to counter before you increase your offer.

5. When calculating the final amount, use precise, non round numbers like, say, $37,893 rather than $38,000. It gives the number credibility and weight.

6. On your final number, throw in a non-monetary item (that they probably don’t want) to show you’re at your limit.

### 8. Find the black swan

The black swan theory says that things happen which previously were thought to be impossible. In a negotiation, this theory suggests that there are unknown unknowns which, if brought to light, can be used as leverage. To uncover black swans, one has to see everything with a beginner's mind to not miss information due to our own perception.

### The one sheet

This is a sheet that the authors suggest to prepare before every negotiation. This sheet helps you stick to your defined strategy and helps you keep memorising vital information.

**The Goal**

Think through best/worst-case scenarios but only write down a specific goal that represents the best case.

- Set an optimistic but reasonable goal and define it clearly.
- Write it down.
- Discuss your goal with a colleague (this makes it harder to wimp out).
- Carry the written goal into the negotiation.
- Carry the written goal into the negotiation.

**Summary**

Summarise and write out in just a couple of sentences the known facts that have led up to the negotiation.

**Labels and accusation audits**

Prepare three to five labels to perform an accusation audit.

It seems like _________ is valuable to you.

It seems like you don’t like _________.

It seems like you value __________.

It seems like _________ makes it easier.

It seems like you’re reluctant to _________.

**Calibrated questions**

Prepare three to five calibrated questions to reveal value to you and your counterpart and identify and overcome potential deal killers.

What are we trying to accomplish? How is that worthwhile? What’s the core issue here? How does that affect things? What’s the biggest challenge you face?

Additionally it makes sense to prepare questions to diffuse deal-killing issues or questions that unearth them.

**Non cash offers**

Prepare a list of non-cash items possessed by your counterpart that would be valuable.

I've made it this far, and I want to thank you for reading this blog. I hope you've learned as much about negotiations as I have. May you have many successful negotiations ahead, and I wish you all the best.

Regards
Devin Hasler

A book about the art of negotiating and being a better negotiator.

Never split the difference


## 🚀 The Book in 3 Sentences

1. Rapport is when two people “get” each other.
2. Rapport help create a real honest connection.
3. Two use rapport, use the HEAR principle and the animal circle.

## 🕵🏼Who Should Read It?

The book aims at a very broad spectrum of people because every person communicates in their daily life. The techniques and models presented in the book address the problems and solutions for everyday communication. The book will help understand relationship dynamics better and also generally improve your relationships. Because of the authors simple writing style the book is an easy read. During the book there are a lot of example conversations where the techniques learned from this book are used.

## ☘️ How the Book Changed Me

The content of the book is simple and easy understandable but not groundbreaking. This is why I did not learn a lot of new knowledge. What I never heard of though is that you can split the people in 4 communication types.

## ✍️ My Top Quotes

> “Do not use a hatchet to remove a fly from your friend’s forehead.” Alison Emily, Alison Laurence
>

> “The real key to communication lies in what you do before you even open your mouth.” Alison Emily, Alison Laurence
>

## 📒 Summary + Notes

The book Rapport teaches a simple model for understanding conversations and interactions. The two authors of this book have a lot of experience with interrogations and their experience as well as multiple studies have shown that building an innate connection with the person you are talking to is the better option than trying to get what you want with force or manipulation.

### The cornerstones of rapport

Rapport as described before is the practice to create real meaningful relationships. In other words rapport is when two people ‘get’ each other. Rapport should be based on four cornerstones as suggested in the book:

- **Honesty**:Be objective and direct when communicating your intentions or feelings. 
- **Empathy**:Understand someone based on recognition of their core beliefs and values. 
- **Autonomy**:Emphasise other people’s free will and right to choose whether to cooperate. 
- **Reflection**:Identify and repeat back those elements that are significant, meaningful and tactical to help guide a conversation towards the goal.

These cornerstones can be grouped in what the book calls the HEAR principle. These cornerstones where found to be the core tenets of how to maintain engagement with other people in a positive and productive way, regardless of how adversarial or awkward the situation.

### Rapport: what is it good for?

As mentioned before, the two authors of this book, Emily Alison and Laurence Alison, both come from a background of interrogation mostly criminal investigations. Most of us don’t interrogate criminals as a hobby or even once in our life. The thing is rapport should not only be used when wanting to get information, like in an interrogation, but in every  communication during the day. With rapport you will let you leave conversations with your confidence, integrity and moral compass intact. Instead of letting a shouting battle destroy your day you will let it go. Also Rapport will make people perceive you as a better listener and as a nice person to talk to.

### The animal circle

The HEAR Principle will serve you well in improving your communication and connection across all relationships but it is important to acknowledge that not every communication. This is due to the fact that people are different. Some are natural leaders, some thrive on conflict while others prefer to stay in the background. This is where the animal circle provided by the book comes into play.

<img src="/images/blog/rapport/animalCircle.png" alt="Animal Circle" title="Animal Circle" width="50%" height="auto" />

*The good and bad animal circle*

During every interaction a person can be categories in one of four animals, Lion, Monkey, T-Rex and Mouse. Every Animal has its own characteristics:

- **Lion:** The Lion like to be in charge, advised and sets the agenda
- **Monkey:** The monkey is very friendly, likes cooperation and working in as a team
- **Mouse:** The mouse is humble, seeks guidance and likes to capitulate
- **T-Rex:** The T-Rex is forthright, critical, frank and likes conflict.

The quick shorthand for using the model to diagnose an interaction is to ask two simple questions: Does this person want me to be psychologically higher (Lion) or lower (Mouse) than them in this situation? Does this person want a psychological scrap with me (T-Rex) or a hug (Monkey)?

It is important to note that no animal is bad or not as good as another. Every animal and with that every characteristic has its place in the world otherwise the world would be boring and blunt. Also every animal has a bad counterpart which can be found on the bad circle. The goal is now to find out in every interaction in wich animal your counterpart is. If you think your counterpart is acting on the bad cycle, then you should try to counter them with acting on the good circle.

In the book there are multiple questions to answer the question of wich animal you are the best in and which you are not as good in. After the assessment you will have a spider chart of your good and bad animal circle. The ultimate goal is to communicate more and better  in the good circle and less in the bad circle.

Now equipped with this new communication model I hope you enjoyed reading this blog and recommend checking out the book if you want to learn more about the animal circle, rapport and how to use it in everyday life. I look forward to seeing you reading my next blog post and wish you all the best.

Regards
Devin Hasler

A book about how to create real honest communication and how to become a better communicator

Communication

The school of life

Never split the difference

Rapport