Every Conversation Needs a Strategy

Our goal with effective activism is to influence people’s mindset and decision-making. We want people to actually change how they think about animals, the environment, the food industry, and ultimately, themselves. And then to translate those changes in thinking into changes in their actions.

This type of influence requires a high level of strategy. Every conversation is almost like a game of chess.

If you’ve ever played chess, you know that it’s a highly strategic game that requires advance planning as well as the ability to improvise and respond intelligently to the moves of your opponent. In order to be successful in chess, you need to understand general strategic concepts, like it’s always advantageous to control the center of the board. And once you grasp those general concepts, you need to be able to improvise strategic plans in the moment. The art of improvisation stems from the mastery of the individual pieces and how they interact with each other.

For instance, pawns can only move forward (unless they’re attacking, in which case they can only move diagonally) and they can only move one square at a time, except for their very first move, when they can move two squares forward. It’s not a very powerful piece on its own. But when a pawn is used in combination with the queen, who can move in all directions and an unlimited number of squares, the pawn can become quite powerful. It can even deliver a checkmate. 

Conversations work the same way. There are general principles that apply to every conversation; we will detail three general systems of thinking in Part I of our upcoming book, Plant Powered Persuasion. But it is also important to master each individual topic (or chess piece) so that you can use them in combination with one another; we will detail all of these individual topics in Part II of Plant Powered Persuasion. 

For instance, one of the most common topics people bring up when talking about veganism is protein. “Where do you get your protein from?” is a question that probably every vegan on earth has been asked.

It’s easily answered by the fact that all protein originally comes from plants, all plants have all nine essential amino acids in varying proportions, so as long as you eat enough calories, you’ll get all the protein you need. That answers the question. But it becomes even more powerful when you combine it with the additional argument that humans evolved as frugivores, that we have no special adaptations to eating meat, dairy, or eggs, and in fact we have all the physiological characteristics of plant eaters (we’ll discuss this more in depth in Part II).

When you combine those two arguments, it becomes clear that it’s not just possible to get your protein from plants, but that humans even evolved to get our protein exclusively from plants. We’re actually designed by evolution to get our protein from plants. When you combine the protein (pawn) and the evolution (queen) arguments, you checkmate your conversational opponent.

When you have each topic mastered in this way, you can creatively combine them to craft compelling arguments. And when you wield this power in combination with the general principles of conversation, which ensure you communicate effectively, you drastically increase the chances of inspiring someone to take steps toward a vegan lifestyle. 

From my experience as an activist, I’ve created three general systems of effective communication strategies that all have a unique purpose and work in synchronicity with each other to deliver arguments in the most impactful manner. 

The Effective Communication Mindset guides your general attitude and demeanor. It affects the energy you present. The Principles of Effective Communication guide your overarching conversational strategy. The big picture. And The Effective Communication Filter guides your words. It’s a sentence-level tool to ensure your arguments are well-received. 

In our upcoming book, Plant Powered Persuasion, we teach you these three systems of effective communication, how to effectively inspire your community to embrace a vegan lifestyle, cover all the most common arguments against veganism and how to respond, and we detail exactly how your activism will culminate in the transformation of the global food chain. 

Vegans are so powerful. You are so powerful. 

You are a force for good in this world. And this book is here to help you magnify your own impact. 
You can preorder the Kindle Version here. Paperback and Hardcover versions will be available for purchase June 30th, 2024!