Unconscious Mirroring

I just got an e-mail from Jakob Greenfeld, the author of Play Permissionless. It talks about how you can change what happens to you by changing what you do to other people.

Here’s a quote that’ll change your life forever:

[…] in the study is that they went to high schools and they surveyed kids for their popularity rankings and tried to figure out why certain kids were popular. The biggest factor? The popular kids themselves actually liked the most of their other classmates.

So, the secret of popular kids is… to act like other kids are popular.

What we can infer is that if you want a behavior to appear in someone (let’s say, smiling), you have to first adopt this behavior yourself (smile at the person!)

I know, it sounds like “law of attraction” bullshit. This mirroring concept is one of those that you need to see in action to integrate it.

How to get gifts and love letters?⌗

Smiling is a pretty low-level action, but the mirror effect might happen with other phenomenons like:

  • giving gift
  • lending an understanding ear
  • complimenting

There might be prerequisites to the mirroring effect taking place. (having OK looks, smelling good, not being depressed).

So, once you have these prerequisites done (you are a polite human), you can try implementing behaviors that’ll get mirrored to you and make your life feel wonderful:

  • get interested into someone (someone will get interested into you)
  • give a small, easy gift (a chocolate bar goes a long way—you’ll understand it when you receive one in return)
  • compliment someone (that’s a whole art right there)
  • …and countless other behaviors. I’ve included a Christmas gift list of behaviors at the end of this post.

I’ll repeat the principle: by acting that way towards others, they will start acting towards you similarly. This works because people try to match the energy of each others.

Hacking beliefs⌗

Beliefs are foundational to the outcomes of a human’s life. If you believe that you will stay poor, there is a good chance it stays so because you get blinded to opportunity.

I’ll quote Jake again because it was written so elegantly:

The same is true when you frequently have an expectation that the situation is going to go poorly, that people will do you wrong, and that you’re not going to get what you want. Our brains have incredibly powerful filter mechanisms and will make sure you only pick up the signals that confirm your beliefs and suspicions.

The prices you’re confident charging others are really just a mirror reflection of the prices you’re comfortable paying yourself.

If you never lift others up and give them glowing reviews, you will always be scared to ask your customers for help.

The takeaway here is that you can change your outcomes. How? By changing your beliefs. How? By changing your behavior.

The mirror effect will make you expect other people and situations to reciprocate what you did (go better). Your brain will then make you subconsciously act in order for that to happen. And starting from here, it’s all a self-reinforcing machine.

Behaviors to start implementing today⌗

… to reap benefits tomorrow. They are here for you to get inspiration. Start by picking one and measuring the impact it has on your life.

Human behaviors⌗

Behavior Expected outcome
Strike up conversations with a stranger Become more approachable
Give a chocolate bar Receiving a banana bar
Compliment someone on their shirt Get complimented on your hair (if they didn’t fall off yet)
Look at someone in the eyes Get looked into the eyes, into the depths of your soul (maybe weird, but I think it feels good)
Introduce people to each other Get introduced to other people
Invite people to events Get invited to events
Flirt with someone Get flirted with
Reply soon to messages Get replied soon to messages

Business behaviors⌗

Behavior Expected outcome
Buy things that cost much Price your items higher
Write to influential people in your domain Get contacted by Jeff Bezos

Conclusion⌗

Do cool stuff, and cooler stuff will happen to you.

References⌗