Next to love, sympathy is the divinest passion of the human heart. – Edmund Burke
sympathy
We all need love and understanding. When we don’t get it we feel hurt. When we do receive sympathy we feel better almost immediately. To genuinely make the other person feel better is the key to winning them over. When our life is more about others than self, we are happy and so are they!
life principles
18th Dale Carnegie Principle: Be sympathetic with the other person’s ideas and desires.
Here’s a story from the book:
Jay Mangum represented an elevator-escalator maintenance company in Tulsa, Oklahoma, which had the maintenance contract for the escalators in one of Tulsa’s leading hotels. The hotel manager did not want to shut down the escalator for more than two hours at a time because he did not want to inconvenience the hotel’s guests. The repair that had to be made would take at least eight hours, and his company did not always have a specially qualified mechanic available at the convenience of the hotel.
When Mr. Mangum was able to schedule a top-flight mechanic for this job, he telephoned the hotel manager and instead of arguing with him to give him the necessary time, he said:
"Rick, I know your hotel is quite busy and you would like to keep the escalator shutdown time to a minimum. I understand your concern
about this, and we want to do everything possible to accommodate you. However, our diagnosis of the situation shows that if we do not do a complete job now, your escalator may suffer more serious damage and that would cause a much longer shutdown. I know you would not want to inconvenience your guests for several days."
The manager had to agree that an eight-hour shut down was more desirable than several days’. By sympathizing with the manager’s desire to keep his patrons happy, Mr. Mangum was able to win the hotel manager to his way of thinking easily and without rancor.
Daily Affirmation: Today I understand the hurt others feel…
Recommendation: How To Win Friends And Influence People by Dale Carnegie
