Licking Purple & Expecting it to have a Taste
ER…
hahaha - that is gold!
Recently I travelled interstate to visit one of my closest friends.
It’s approximately 1 hours drive away.
As I began my trek I decided to listen to an audio book that my brother had recommended called “Happiness” by Derren Brown.
I have to admit I am a huge fan of his work.
As I was driving along I found myself listening intently to the audio book, as it delved deeply into mentalism and NLP.
He began to speak about the confirmation biased - This sparked my interest so much that I decided to run a training webinar on it (feel free to pop in, in Feb 2021 - REGISTER HERE).
The confirmation biased talked about how people make up their minds on a decision and then make all decisions based on confirming this information - It’s not a bad thing! but it can lead to living a limited life.
Even when new evidence is presented they will still seek out evidence to confirm their previous decision and make it true (sound familiar - raise your hand if your a guilty party - Trish slowly raises her hand)
We all do confirmation bias thinking - I personally do not like avocado so therefore as soon as someone presents to me something new to try that has avocado in it I will immediately confirm with myself that I do not like avocado so therefor I will not like this new thing. Shutting down any prospects of a new experience.
I arrived at my destination and ordered some cake with my girlfriend Danielle. As we ate and discussed all the issues with the world and how to solve them she presented to me a statement that made me laugh out loud so hard the whole restaurant stopped and stared.
She began telling me about a young man that idolises his father and whatever his father said is gospel.
The young man had said that the father enjoys drinking kraken whiskey.
Danielle knows my favourite drink is kraken and that it is a rum - not a whiskey - She piped up and said “You mean kraken rum”. The young man stood in defiance as he defended his father and said “No its Kraken whiskey!”.
Danielle had decided she wasn’t taking this conversation any further as she knew no matter what evidence she had this young man was not open to any reason.
She then told another person about the conversation about the kraken and finished by saying “It’s like licking the colour purple and expecting it to have a flavour” To which the other person responded “Grape!”
Shocked by the response Danielle wondered if this person had even listened, she explained that the colour purple only has that flavour if you were taught it, that grapes also come in green. But no! This lady wasn’t listening to this known evidence and had already decided that the colour purple had a taste of grape and that was the only conclusion to a rhetorical question.
Which leads me back to the confirmation biased the Derren Brown had previously spoken about -
First we have the son that defended the father and no matter what it was Kraken Whiskey and nothing is going to change that till one day he receives evidence that it is rum.
Secondly we have the lady that whole hearted believe that if you lick purple you will taste grape.
I begin to wonder how many confirmation biased are going on inside our minds that we defend as truth due to our quick reactions.
When did asking questions become a game of family feud where you must whack the buzzer and answer as quickly as we can? Why not take a few small moments to ponder … open up thoughtful mind and perhaps experience something new. Who knows - Perhaps you may like this recipe that has avocado?
I thank Danielle for the belly laugh and will definitely be using her saying in the future. Even writing this I can see in my minds eye Danielle pulling her face and saying “It’s like licking purple and expecting a taste”.
If the take away answer is what we believe, then who are we to judge?
Enjoy the video below of family feud fails with Steve Harvey - IT’S HYSTERICAL!
Keep smiling my friend! It’s way easier then arguing with grapes xox
