A Kitten Demonstration of Persuasion
7th July 2009
Meet Zeus, new kit of the house and both inspiration and assistant for today’s post.
As you can see Zeus already has a flair for the dramatic pose and the attitude of a runway model. Perhaps, Zoolander, Zooey for short, would be a better name?
Zeus enjoys many toys and games as a kitten – but of course to a kitten life itself is merely a game and a toy – but now he prefers to punish a turkey feather.
While we were playing Zeus demonstrated an interesting observation about doing persuasion. Actually, he inspired a metaphor with his dramatic fights to the death with Mr. Turkey Feather. Look closely at this.
Note Zeus’s eyes. While this looks a snap of random cat eye fixation, in this case, the eye fixation is not random. Young Zeus only attacks the tip of Mr. Turkey Feather. When he loses sight of the tip, but not the feather, he thinks it is gone. Much like a human infant in the first Piagetian stage of development, Zeus is still learning and right now incapable of feats of cunning and intelligence older cats possess.
But Zeus can also be read as a metaphor for persuasion. He is the receiver, the target, the thing with the TACT, a source (me, just right of camera) wants to change. My hand holding and manipulating Mr. Turkey Feather is the persuasion play aimed at changing the way Zeus thinks, feels, and most importantly, acts.
Zeus does not see the entire feather (the persuasion play), but only sees the tip which drives him wild with mad kit killer fever. As long as my play with Mr. Turkey Feather keeps the tip in front of Zeus, my sweet new kit will run himself ragged until he is hungry and exhausted. Then a quick snack and a long nap for Zeus and I’ve attained my persuasion goal: Enough free time to write this post!
And that is a visual demonstration of how persuasion works. You want to create a persuasion play that hides in plain sight, but presents a “tip” that moves your target when you want the target to go. Zeus “sees” the feather, but doesn’t (yet) realize the feather and my hand holding it makes the tip so interesting. Soon he’ll figure out my persuasion play and instead of falling for the tip, he’ll just jump at my face! Which is what people do when your persuasion plays fail. (Remember the Rules: If you can’t succeed, don’t try!).
And you thought kits were only good for props!
Stay tuned for the continuing persuasion adventures of Zeus, the persuasion kit!