Inspiration VS Manipulation: and the Idea of Influencing People.

Inspiration, Manipulation, and the Catalysts behind them.

---

Ahnaf Anjish | January 9, 2021

Hi guys! I hope you all are doing great. As usual, back to my blog after a week. In the past week, I've started reading a book of one of my favorite podcaster and YouTuber, Simon Sinek. The book is called "Start with Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action". I haven't finished the book yet, and I am looking forward to write an full-fledged review on this book soon after I finish it. But today I am going to talk about one of the topics introduced early in this book: Inspiration VS Manipulation. Hope you enjoy the post, as well as my other posts on this blog; and feel free to comment or share your opinions. So, without further ado, let's begin.

At first, we have to learn about what Inspiration is, and what Manipulation is. These two are the approaches a man or a company can take to achieve certain goals and to influence people. Another buggy term comes in, damn! What is Influence, and WHY is it often necessary? Influence is a term that we use to explain impact. It is the impact of something, or the consequence to something; where something mostly indicates to an event or an occurance. Influence is the power that makes you to go for lunch with your friends, or to a nightout, or makes you buy a shoe, or makes you study more or to take alcohols. As you may have noticed that you do not do all of those happily, rather sometimes you do these reluctantly or you feel like your life depends on it. Yup, you got it right! You are either inspired or manipulated to do so.

Let's talk about Manipulation first. Manipulation is the skillful handling, controlling or using of something or someone. But what does that mean? It means companies cutting down the price or giving cashbacks, or installing fear among the customers or making them believe that they "MUST" need to buy these products to achieve their goals. It means a man convincing his friend to listen to podcasts without mentioning why they should, or taking someone to dinner via blackmailimg. These are the commonly-known aspects of manipulation as well. Manipulation is not a good practice at all, and doesn't help an entrepreneur or a CEO to run his business for long.

Now let's check on the second-most important part of todays blog: Inspiration. Inspiration is some type of feeling, that enables you do creative stuff as well as to buy products naturally without being forced. The idea of "Inspiration" is like standing for something and voting for it to be the best. If you look at the tech-giant Apple, or a sportswear manufacturer Adidas - you can see that these companies stand for their product, so they don't need to manipulate you to buy their products. It has a beautiful thing:

People do not buy your product based on how or when or where do you make it or market it, rather they buy your product based on WHY (or on which purpose) you have created it.

So, you can't actually inspire anyone for anything unless YOU START WITH WHY.

Now we come to an extra part of our discussion, and I am including it because this part is super-confusing. So, what is it? Simple! Here, I would love to talk to about the differences between Inspiration and Motivation. Well; Inspiration is all about you, and your questions of WHY. On the other hand, Motivation is mostly about giving examples; examples of successful & productive men and women. Motivation goes like, "If I/he/she can do this, then why you can't?" But it often gives a negative thought on the listeners' mind. So, at the end of the day; Inspiration, if implemented perfectly, lasts forever.

The post is lengthy already, and I won't extend it any longer. I will just end the post with a simple, yet inspirational message by Simon Sinek,

“You can easily judge the character of a man by how he treats those who can do nothing for him.”

Thank you for reading this lengthy post with patience. Stay happy, stay safe.

- Ahnaf Anjish