Words are a very powerful thing. We often don’t realize just how powerful words are in how they shape us and change our perception of the word, and we more consequently underestimate how much on an influence we have on the word with just our own words. In the podcast “The Influence you have” the narrator talks about many instances where this underestimation of our own persuasion is shown, for example in the Milgrim Experiments, that we are all familiar with, the experimenter was able to convince the teacher even though he was showing concern for the student in the next room, to continue giving the student larger and larger doses of electricity volts simply by saying, “Please continue with the experiment”. Or when Vhennsa Barns Prof at Cornell University, did her own experiments in where she went around 34st Pen Stations asking random people to do a survey, she found that she was able to get a lot more surveys then she initially thought. This trend continued with her students when she had an experiment for them to conduct and before the expirenmnt started she asked the students to tell her how much people she thinks they would be able to convince in partaking the experiment. And of course, each time they were able to convince more people then they thought. What the Prof Barns found with these experiments was that you as an individual have much more weight on a person’s actions then you may realize.

 

In the Poem “Enemies by, Wendell Berry the author speakers about how we can influence people without even using words. I believe what the author means by this is that is to not hold grudges, because those very grudges will turn you into a “monster” which will make you act a certain way and the person you have a grudge on will then turn into a monster and hate you. This another way a person has an impact on another person. Simply by holding a grudge against a person it will make that person act a certain way to hurt or even inconvenience the other person will make the other person have a grudge on you. It’s only through love and forgiveness of a person that will make the other person love you.

 

I remember a younger me back in middle school, I had just came to America and I was fascinated with the sport of basketball. I was a fresh player who just started playing basketball competing with players who had been playing since they first started walking. One day it was tryouts day and of course, I went to go try out. During the tryouts the coach had us playing a 3on3 game to see how well we played. On my team was this older player who was in a grade above me who I looked up to Joshua. He, unfortunately, got double-teamed because he was one of the better players on the team, and they could afford to leave me open because I couldn’t make a shot or lay up to save my life. After the game, Joshua had a few words for me. He called me trash amongst other things, and that I should never touch a basketball again. I’m sure Joshua was just mad at the moment at our 3on3 lost and wanted to impress the coach he didn’t want me to stop playing ball (well I hope), but that stuck with me I didn’t want to play basketball anymore after that. I didn’t play basketball or every dare try out in middle school again. It wasn’t really until after I graduated middle school and got to high school, where I garnered more confidence in myself that I took to playing basketball again more serious.