Normally if you hear me talking about Perspective with regard to hoozyu, I am talking about three of the Grid symbols - Usual, Needs and Stress. Those are, respectively, a measure of:

  • how I see myself;
  • how I see everyone else; and
  • how I start to misperceive everyone and everything when the people around me don’t match my expectations.

But today I want to pick up on the great post Claire wrote, back in May, called Highs and Lows.

You see, those Areas of Interest scores are primarily about Motivation and passion; but very high and very low scores actually start to leak across into perception as well.

Understanding how that works for you, could be pretty useful.

My favourite example is Persuasive. In workshops I often ask very Low Persuasive people what they mean, when they say “no” to something. They look at me for a moment and then say “…no?” Which is exactly right: low Persuasive people see (perceive) interpersonal verbal transactions as just that: discrete packets of one question and one answer, end of story. Keep it simple, keep it short, and if I don’t want to do whatever it is you asked me, then you can be sure I don’t want to keep talking about it.

So then I go and ask the very High Persuasive people what they hear when someone says “no” to them. No one has ever said to me, “they mean no”. Instead I get:

  • “we are just getting started here”
  • “I just need to find a different way of framing the question”
  • “that’s okay, we’ve got time”
  • “I wonder why they said that”

As you can see, there is a rather different perspective at play here. High Persuasive people see interpersonal verbal transactions as fluid, complex, multi-dimensional interactions, where it is never ‘over’ until we have all arrived at a happy outcome. You can shout ‘No!’ until you are hoarse, but that isn’t what they are going to hear.

It can be an eyeopener for Low Persuasives to learn that High Persuasives aren’t trying to be difficult, but rather are doing everything they can to help the conversation along. And it can be equally surprising to High Persuasives, to learn that Low Persuasives are communicating a decision, not a bargaining chip.

So here is a very simple, possibly even simplistic, chart that gives you a flavour of what is going on with all the Areas of Interest. Look at your very high and very low scores (assuming you have them) and see - well, see what you may be seeing and not seeing!


Interest Very High Very Low
Artistic It’s not right until it looks right Does it work?
Clerical First tidy desk, then focus Just move the mess to one side
Literary Word selection matters You know what I’m trying to say
Mechanical How does this work? Spare me details, just fix it
Musical I sense disharmony Let’s get on with it
Numerical The numbers say… It seems to me…
Outdoor Let’s get out of here Let’s stay in the office
Persuasive Your ‘no’ means ‘probably’ My ‘no’ means ‘no’
Scientific I need to understand I did what you said
Soc. Service I’m making a difference Why are people so needy?