chapter18.1

Wouldn't you like to have a magic phrase that would stop arguments, eliminate ill feeling, create good will, and make the other person listen attentively?

Yes? All right. Here it is:

"I don't blame you one iota for feeling as you do.

If I were you I would undoubtedly feel just as you do."

An answer like that will soften the most cantankerous old cuss alive.

And you can say that and be 100 percent sincere, because if you were the other person you, of course, would feel just as he does.

Take Al Capone, for example. Suppose you had inherited the same body and temperament and mind that Al Capone had.

Suppose you had had his environment and experiences.

You would then be precisely what he was—and where he was.

For it is those things—and only those things—that made him what he was.

The only reason, for example, that you are not a rattlesnake is that your mother and father weren't rattlesnakes.

You deserve very little credit for being what you are – and remember, the people who come to you irritated, bigoted, unreasoning, deserve very little discredit for being what they are.

Feel sorry for the poor devils. Pity them. Sympathize with them.

Say to yourself: "There, but for the grace of God, go I."

Three-fourths of the people you will ever meet are hungering and thirsting for sympathy.

Give it to them, and they will love you.

Joyce Norris, a piano teacher in St, Louis, Missouri, told of how she had handled a problem piano teachers often have with teenage girls.

Babette had exceptionally long fingernails.

This is a serious handicap to anyone who wants to develop proper piano-playing habits.

Mrs. Norris reported: "I knew her long fingernails would be a barrier for her in her desire to play well.

During our discussions prior to her starting her lessons with me, I did not mention anything to her about her nails.

I didn't want to discourage her from taking lessons, and I also knew she would not want to lose that which she took so much pride in and such great care to make attractive.

"After her first lesson, when I felt the time was right, I said:

Babette, you have attractive hands and beautiful fingernails.

If you want to play the piano as well as you are capable of and as well as you would like to, you would be surprised how much quicker and easier it would be for you, if you would trim your nails shorter.

Just think about it, Okay?'

She made a face which was definitely negative.

I also talked to her mother about this situation, again mentioning how lovely her nails were.

Another negative reaction. It was obvious that Babette's beautifully manicured nails were important to her.

"The following week Babette returned for her second lesson.

Much to my surprise, the fingernails had been trimmed.

I complimented her and praised her for making such a sacrifice.

I also thanked her mother for influencing Babette to cut her nails.

Her reply was 'Oh, I had nothing to do with it.

Babette decided to do it on her own, and this is the first time she has ever trimmed her nails for anyone.' "

Did Mrs. Norris threaten Babette?

Did she say she would refuse to teach a student with long fingernails?

No, she did not.

She let Babette know that her finger-nails were a thing of beauty and it would be a sacrifice to cut them.

She implied, "I sympathize with you—I know it won't be easy, but it will pay off in your better musical development."

Sol Hurok was probably America's number one impresario.

For almost half a century he handled artists—such world-famous artists as Chaliapin, Isadora Duncan, and Pavlova.

Mr. Hurok told me that one of the first lessons he had learned in dealing with his temperamental stars was the' necessity for sympathy, sympathy and more sympathy with their idiosyncrasies.

For three years, he was impresario for Feodor Chaliapin -one of the greatest bassos who ever thrilled the ritzy boxholders at the Metropolitan, Yet Chaliapin was a constant problem.

He carried on like a spoiled child.

To put it in Mr. Hurok's own inimitable phrase:

"He was a hell of a fellow in every way."

For example, Chaliapin would call up Mr. Hurok about noun of the day he was going to sing and say, "Sol, I feel terrible. My throat is like raw hamburger.

It is impossible for me to sing tonight."

Did Mr. Hurok argue with him? Oh, no.

He knew that an entrepreneur couldn't handle artists that way.

So he would rush over to Chaliapin's hotel, dripping with sympathy.

"What a pity, " he would mourn.

"What a pity! My poor fellow. Of course, you cannot sing.

I will cancel the engagement at once. It will only cost you a couple of thousand dollars, but that is nothing in comparison to your reputation."

Then Chaliapin would sigh and say, "Perhaps you had better come over later in the day. Come at five and see how I feel then."

At five o'clock, Mr. Hurok would again rush to his hotel, dripping with sympathy.

Again he would insist on canceling the engagement and again Chaliapin would sigh and say, "Well, maybe you had better come to see me later.

I may be better then."

At seven-thirty the great basso would consent to sing, only with the understanding that Mr. Hurok would walk out on the stage of the Metropolitan and announce that Chaliapin had a very bad cold and was not in good voice.

Mr. Hurok would lie and say he would do it, for he knew that was the only way to get the basso out on the stage.

Dr. Arthur I. Gates said in his splendid book Educational Psychology: "Sympathy the human species universally craves.

The child eagerly displays his injury; or even inflicts a cut or bruise in order to reap abundant sympathy.

For the same purpose adults...show their bruises, relate their accidents, illness, especially details of surgical operations.

Self-pity' for misfortunes real or imaginary is in some measure, practically a universal practice."

So, if you want to win people to your way of thinking, put in practice …

Principle 9—Be sympathetic with the other person's ideas and desires.