A widespread phenomena in our conversational life with others is the introduction of irrelevancy to the chat. It happens all the time, you’re talking about attending the upcoming conference and then she mentions that she’s doesn’t like the new dean of students. Then the conversation goes back to the conference and you wonder why that was brought up and what it has to do with the upcoming conference.
In the movie, 12 Angry Men, we are allowed into the deliberations of a jury on a case of homicide. It’s a story about the bar of reasonable doubt and how certain prejudices affect how we view that. In the beginning all but one juror votes for the “guilty” verdict and we begin to view how that hung-jury situation is handled. In the penultimate scene of the movie the last holdout to the “not guilty” verdict (remember the movie recounts the ebb and flow of their deliberations) vehemently begins to defend his position. (By the way, vehemence is a classic sign of non-rational issues.) As he speaks he takes out his wallet and while fumbling though it as he speaks, accidentally a picture of his son fall out on to the table.
He continues his tirade against the defendant until we see the picture catch his eye. Then he explodes about how you simply can’t trust the young people...he picks up the picture of his son and begins a tirade about him tearing the picture to pieces. Why? What does that mean?
There were at least two indicators of non-rational objections in that scenario. One indicator was his vehemence...and the other was the irrelevant and apparently happenstance tirade against his son.
And then suddenly he realizes the whole room has seen his display and that what was really going on was that he was angry with his son and in some non-rational (and I might add unjust) way he was transferring that anger toward the defendant who was in some sense similar.
The point being is that in our conversations about spiritual things and life’s journeys, don’t be surprised that in the middle of the discussion you’ll see your colleague go off for a moment or two on a tangent. Many times that tangent will be an important clue as to what really is bothering him.
Our suggestion is to diplomatically explore that tangent with your colleague so that he may himself, like the actor in the movie mentioned above who eventually saw his own non-rational behavior for what it was, see her issues for what they are. Don’t be surprised that deep down you will occasionally find the visceral reason your colleague doesn’t like Christianity and Christians is that she grew up in a fundamentalist home that practiced their faith in alarming and unhealthy ways. Usually that sort of thing is buried, but if a turn in the conversation reveals that sort of thing and you don’t discuss it, you may leave the most important objection she has to spiritual things buried.
We’re not suggesting you play junior psychologist and try to heal these sorts of things, but rather were suggesting good conversations involve an interplay of rational and non-rational things and if you want to be effective in persuasion sometimes you need to know how to handle non-rational barriers. In some cases it might be a good thing to neutrally explore those experiences, to help them let off some steam. That may help them in their timing come to their senses about interpreting things like that. In other cases, exploring these things sets off higher and higher non-rational responses and that’s the time to back off. Don’t try to match vehemence with vehemence either. Remember we’re more interested in the person than in persuasion. Sometimes people just need others to understand their predicament in an non-judgmental way. And, frankly, we want to avoid becoming like Job’s friends