Engaging when you don’t want to

Do you ever not want to engage? I have a love/hate relationship with social media in this regard — but you could apply it to any meeting, project, person, going to the gym, eating healthy, whatever.

It’s worth remembering how you feel when you don’t want to engage, because that’s how many of the people you want to engage may well feel.

Here’s how to engage — and be engaged — when emotions are low:

1. If persuasion doesn’t work, STOP

If persuasion isn’t working, doubling down won’t magically work. In fact, it pushes people away.

The reason: the more you try to persuade when someone doesn’t want to be persuaded, the more you trigger their resistance. In psychology this is known as reactance — a mechanism that seeks to preserve one’s sense of autonomy in the face of potential manipulation.

So, just stop.

2. Communicate the distance already travelled

Instead of persuading, try celebrating. Communicate to the person (which may be yourself) how far you have come so far.

For myself, this is reminding myself that I enjoy posting on LinkedIn, never regret it, have done it consistently for years, and enjoy the conversations that follow.

3. Do LESS than the least

The win for me right now isn’t even to post on LinkedIn. It’s simply to open the page and type “Hello, this is a post.”

By the time I’ve done that, the enthusiasm of years gone by silently nudges forward and decides to write something more.

For those who have kids, you know very well about using these techniques. They are how we get our children from refusing to eat, to being willing to at least have a bowl of porridge put before them.