Listen well and ask questions to better understand other people’s views and enable them to rethink them

Identify someone whose opinion you would like to influence
Your partner, child, family member, colleague

Engage them in conversation and listen with openness and curiosity
Resist the temptation to try to ‘fix’ them – you will accomplish more by listening than by talking.

When it’s your turn to respond, ask questions that help facilitate the clear expression of the other person’s thoughts
Show an interest in helping people crystallize their views. Refrain from statements or questions which have a hidden agenda of advising, convincing or correcting.

Ask them to consider if they would have developed the same opinion if they were someone else
Many of our opinions have developed without rigorous data or deep reflection. Prompt them to consider how they’d believe different things if they’d been born at a different time or in a different place.