Can you change an arrogant person?

9 replies
Turns out,
you can!!!



Yes, you can change someone.

Seems I disagree with most people. A refreshing change where most people believe it is morally wrong to want to get someone to be a better person. Can you get an arrogant person to change?

Yes, you can change people. Yep, I said it. You can change people. And people are changing people all the time. It is called leverage, pressure, finding their current motivation, etc. etc.

Sales people use it all the time. The media does it as well. Everyone is changing things all the time. People discuss, learn, grow, adapt constantly.

How many times have you changed your mind today? What influenced you - just you? Or were there any external motivations used by others? Was the media involved in any way online or offline?

Did you turn on the radio and instantly like the song playing and felt better? There are trillions of dollars spent every year, millions of jobs where people spend all day - every day - planning in exquisite detail about how to change things to their own advantage. They are called politicians, lawyers, corporations, and even Reddit, Quora, and others.

This also applies to motivation. Can you motivate someone? Yes, see above.

Everybody begins the desire to change once the proper form of benefit is shown to them. Everybody begins to desire to change once they see a better way of getting what they really want. An arrogant person (generically speaking) wants to be right and known for being right. But what is wrong with being admired, appreciated, respected, and revered if the person keeps their ego in check about it. People love compliments. Once an arrogant person sees this better way of getting admiration and appreciation they want to change.

People often say change yourself first. I agree and add this - Change yourself first so you can change others for the better. Or rather, learn the skills of leadership, self improvement, and how to offer a better way to people.

But can people really change? Most think no. I disagree again (respectfully). I have just given an example about how sales, marketing, and motivation combined with psychology and personal development can produce the desire to change.

After all, isn't that what this very site is all about? Marketing to change people?
#arrogant #change #person
  • Profile picture of the author Jeff Schuman
    We can all be influenced for good or bad. My wife has that effect on me, usually in a positive way.
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  • Profile picture of the author Coach Comeback
    I do agree...

    yet, the mind has to be open to change. You ever seen people who are FORCED to go to rehab? Usually disastrous results and no more than minutes after they are out... they are right back where they started.

    The people who VOLUNTEER or turn themselves in for rehab almost always recover.

    Same kind of applies here. The mind must be open to it and welcoming
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  • Profile picture of the author C G
    You can't change someone if he does not want to.

    Cheers,

    C.G.
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  • Profile picture of the author Odahh
    human beings respond to incentives..

    with the right incentives you can change someone ..

    but isn't it rather arrogent to think it is your role to change people and make them conform to your ideal of better ..

    it might be a far more effective use of effort to change the person..for someone already conforming to your ideal of better ..unless your married or close family .

    we have the tendency to ingnor working on a bunch of places where are messed up..and pour our efforts into trying to fix other people ..
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  • Profile picture of the author tdanz
    IMO learning anything to perfection is only possible with a humbled attitude. Accepting that someone is an expert in the very thing you are trying to learn makes people less arrogant.
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  • Profile picture of the author Cali16
    Originally Posted by tobyjensen View Post

    Yes, you can change someone.

    But can people really change?
    There's a vast difference between claiming that you have the power to change someone, and saying that people can change.

    Marketers, politicians, etc. influence people. That's not the same as "changing" them, per se. Changing someone's opinion or mind is not remotely the same thing as changing a deeply ingrained personality trait such as arrogance.

    You can't change someone's personality. You can only influence the person and do your best to show him or her the benefits of making particular changes. That kind of change comes from within the person - not from you.
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    If you don't face your fears, the only thing you'll ever see is what's in your comfort zone. ~Anne McClain, astronaut
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    • Profile picture of the author maximindpower
      Originally Posted by Cali16 View Post

      There's a vast difference between claiming that you have the power to change someone, and saying that people can change.

      Marketers, politicians, etc. influence people. That's not the same as "changing" them, per se. Changing someone's opinion or mind is not remotely the same thing as changing a deeply ingrained personality trait such as arrogance.

      You can't change someone's personality. You can only influence the person and do your best to show him or her the benefits of making particular changes. That kind of change comes from within the person - not from you.
      I wholeheartedly agree. The only person you can change is yourself. But this doesn't mean you're totally powerless over others. We often have a greater power over others than we realize. You can change how you respond to someone, and in so doing change their response to you. A great book on this very concept is "How To Change Your Life and Everyone In It" by Michele Weiner Davis.
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  • Profile picture of the author tobyjensen
    This thinking of, “You can’t touch me” seems to stem from kindergarten. Also probably from our upbringing that we have certain rights, boundaries, and privileges about who we will let close to us as well. We seem to have this ideology that nothing will happen in our lives unless we want it too. While this seems doable the problem is that other people have choice too. They can choose to cross the line with us and step into our personal space and often do.

    The negative side of changing people is incredibly easy to see first. For example, how one person can make another mad against their will. People piss each other off all the time. And people usually don’t ask for that. In fact, we see people quite often here on the Warrior forum pissing each other off. I just did it last month (that I know of). This is the easy way to show, “you can change someone against their will.” Because it is negative.

    We can chop down a forest in a matter of minutes but to grow one back takes years.

    But I think I was implying more of the positive side to this question when I was asking, “Can you change an arrogant person (against their will, for the better)?” seems to be what this question has morphed into.

    And I am stunned that a site dedicated to marketing (which is all about getting people to change to buy your product, take action, or move) seems in the majority against changing people against their will. Even at the very least this whole site and the multi-billion dollar industry of marketing/sales is about getting people to change their minds. Because what people want is your product for free and we talk them out of that. We change them – against their will.

    Is marketing then arrogant and should be illegal? (Hey, I’m not even talking about the dark side of marketing yet either!) If we really followed these rules then nothing would get done. The non-interference would rule just does not seem to work. It is not just change, it is about progress. Progress would be the enemy since it is a form of change.

    I once heard about a married couple in the middle east whose little child fell out of the boat on the river and drowned. They did nothing to help him. When asked why they allowed their child to do at their very feet they simply said it was arrogant to interfere with the will of their God.

    You can’t force people to change. Or at least it is morally wrong to do that. It is arrogant to think you can.

    Nah, there is a consensus with the general moral code we all “pretty much” abide by. A generally accepted healthy perspective and context allows us to change people against their will. Stay within that and you are fine. Let me give an example with nutrition. Since nutrition usually doesn’t set everybody on fire like morality, politics, money, or religion. Everybody pretty much agrees that eating carrots works out a lot better than eating a Big Mac. Tons of people are still arguing over which kind of salad though so I won’t get into salads today. Or another note, smoking cigarettes is pretty much out of the picture now. See how it is not arrogant to stay within generally accepted guidelines? Getting people to eat more carrots and not smoke cigarettes is generally accepted as an ok thing to do (in the USA of course, the rest of the world still smokes like chimneys). But, yes, which kind of salad do we have to eat? That can be arrogant in some cases (in my opinion, not a nutritionist here).

    And yes, if you go to Europe and start trying to get people to stop smoking you are seen as arrogant. But the real question is, “should we not do it anyway?” Getting people to stop smoking (Hey, I’m not talking about a fine Cuban cigar once every few years. I’m talking about Lucky Strikes being done every day.) Seems to be the vast majority of doctors and neighbors agree that to stop smoking is a very good idea.

    Are we not truly working to change incarcerated criminals against their will as well? Will that not make for a better society?

    I will take this a bit deeper by saying to be careful about changing someone. Yep, turns out we can change people against their will for the better or for the worse.

    To say we can’t change someone is to also say – nature vs nurture is only nature – no nurture. It means no outside influence person or thing can be a part of the development of the individual. Now, how arrogant is that?

    But the real question is, “Can you force someone to change?”. It is one thing if the person opens up to an influence but can we persuade someone to open up? Of course. Sales, marketing, debate. But can we also force someone? Of course, even though I do not like or recommend it being done negatively. Just look at the results of Japanese war camps, WWII German camps, or other means of torture. But what about our own current enlightened society? Can we force someone to change under these conditions? How about the influence your boss has over their employees? Are you telling me that an incredibly good job for an individual has no influence whatsoever getting a person to become what they want so (s)he can keep their job? Keeping your job for most people is a positive thing.

    Leveraging (which still blows my mind of the responses here on this marketing forum that we can’t or shouldn’t change people against their will) is what marketing/sales/persuasion/debate are all about. Debates happen every day all across this country where two people enter into it absolutely sure they have the better position with the complete desire to force the other person to capitulate to their opinion/theory/fact and sometimes a person’s mind gets changed against their will. They did NOT want to change their position but they did – against their will as a result of the debate.

    We change people every day by leveraging what they want to give us money for our marketing to help them achieve their goals. It is what I do as a master life coach. It is what you do in marketing/sales as well. An even more powerful way to put it is that salespeople that don’t touch the pain of the client simply don’t close more sales. Would anyone like to elaborate on this dark reality?


    Which brings us to the big question, “How do I make changes in my own life for the better that I simply don’t want to but kinda realize I need to too stop being so arrogant against myself and shape up?” That is one of the single greatest questions in psychology and personal development that I spent over twenty five years getting the answer too. Yep, (speaking of arrogant) I figured out one of the greatest question in the world right now. (Now I need help in getting it out to more people. A lot of help.)

    Who is “arrogant” enough to reach out and offer me some help to change the world? Or is everyone here too scared to take on real issues to help me turn this into a huge empire to change the world?

    Are we arrogant or confident? Where is the line? And what are you going to do about it?


    Am I being arrogant or have I really discovered this incredible secret? This goes a bit beyond the initial question to the even bigger question, “Can people even change?”. Oh, I’m not talking about changing the route you drive to work, or changing your pants, or changing where you sit at the table to eat dinner – I’m talking about the grand daddy, gut level, knee jerk reaction to something that is based on false programming that needs to change. I’m talking about changing our very programming all the way to the core. I’m talking about changing ANY limiting beliefs we have to free ourselves and become healthy.

    Yep, people can change. And it is easier than ever since I developed Gutap to do it. Well, easier than the gut wrenching, brutality of inner work with no direct system to achieve it that left us with intention, push through it, or suck it up to be able to go in a different direction in our lives. Change is still brutal work. But at least there is a system to achieve it now.

    So, bring it on. I have been down this path many times before. What am I missing here? Where is my thinking errant (<hey, see what I did there?) What else do I need to do?

    Please, let me know. I’m building an empire, after all.
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    Toby Jensen - Invest in what works this time

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