Intuition is not always reliable

Chris Brogan is a blogger I have been following for some time. He’s operating in the social media space, but also offers a lot of practical content that I find motivational.  In a recent post, he discussed the concept of “mind-reading,” which means you’re trying to guess what the other person is thinking. The operative word is “guess” because you could easily be wrong.

Instead, he suggests that it’s better to just to say directly what you want to know — or what you want them to know — cutting out  misinterpretation. From his post:

For instance, you can walk up to someone and say, “I’d love to introduce myself, if this is a good time.” That takes your worry away that the person might be thinking now isn’t a good time, because instead, you’ve given them the opportunity to say that maybe you can connect later. Make sense?

Another way to do it is to communicate more of your position so that the other person doesn’t try mind-reading you. Remember, you’re not the only one doing this. So, for instance, you might say, “I’m usually a bit quiet during negotiations, but please don’t let that silence seem like I’m upset. I’m actually quite excited about this opportunity.” See how that puts everything back in their hands?

This is so helpful. There are many times when I’ve wanted to approach someone, but was waiting for visual cues altering me that they weren’t too busy. Why not just ask? Or when I’ve hoped people understood that I was acting a certain way because it is my nature — why not just tell them?