Or maybe they understood you just fine?
Sure, sometimes people don’t get it.
But quite often, they do.
They just don’t agree.
Or they don’t see why it matters to them.
Or they’ve heard you, but nothing in what you said made it worth acting on.
From the outside, all of that looks the same. No change.
And the most comfortable explanation is always: It must be them. They didn’t understand.
But is that plausible? Knowing that these are smart people?
Let’s assume for a moment it’s true. If they truly didn’t get it, the fix is easy. Just explain it better. Maybe ask them, what exactly they didn’t understand and give them the background required to understand it.
But if they got it and still don’t move? That’s a different problem.
Now it’s about relevance.
About tradeoffs.
About whether they believe it’s true. Reasonable. Worth it.
In other words, before repeating it a fourth time, I’d ask:
What if they understood it perfectly?
What might be true for them to still not act?
Then start from what matters to them, not what makes sense to you.
Keep lighting the path,
Michael
