Some communicators, like Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan, just seem to have the "natural ability" to communicate well with anybody, anywhere, anytime. They didn't have to learn how to communicate from a book or a course--they just picked it up along the way in life, or it was wired into them at birth. The vast majority of us, on the other hand, are unconscious about how to communicate, and when it comes to effective communication, we're babes in the wood.
Our lack of training leaves us vulnerable to professional message makers like Frank Luntz and Newt Gingrich, who have been working for decades to convince average working Americans that their interests correspond with those of the mega-wealthy and multinational corporations. To a large degree since 1980, they've succeeded. But Americans everywhere are starting to see that the policies put into place supposedly on behalf of working people are actually harming working people-not to mention the planet and the prospect of our handing over to our children a world at peace with a bright and positive future.
Luntz, Gingrich, and the manipulators of Madison Avenue and Wall Street didn't intuit the path to persuasive messaging or find it under a rock. They learned these techniques, from the ground up, and their efforts to apply what they know to political debate are conscious, intentional, and systematic. You can do the same-and help your fellow Americans take our country back for the people.
Cracking the Code shows how. It breaks down the science and technology of effective communication and helps you apply it to your own efforts to build a better world. Hartmann shows you, tells you, and hands you the tools to become conscious about how people think, sort, understand the world, and how you communicate with others. Throughout the book, Hartmann shares exercises and steps you can practice to master this technology, and he shows how hypnotic language actually "installs" learning without requiring practice.
As you read deeply into this book, you'll find yourself seeing things you hadn't realized were there-in everything from advertising to political rants, seizing the power to be an agent of change in your own life and in the world. You'll discover resources and personal abilities you didn't even realize you had. You'll become an agent of change, in the finest tradition of those brilliant communications geniuses Paine, Jefferson, and the cousins Roosevelt.
And whether you're a politician, an activist, a volunteer, or a voting and concerned citizen, you'll reach into that part of the collective human psyche where we truly do have the power to create a new world.
Thom Hartmann is the host of a nationally syndicated Air America radio program. A four-time Project Censored award winner, he is the bestselling author of more than nineteen books, including Screwed: The Undeclared War Against the Middle Class-and What We Can Do About It, The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight, and Unequal Protection: The Rise of Corporate Dominance and the Theft of Human Rights.
Introduction Talking the Talk
Part I Telling Your Story
Chapter 1 Cracking the Worldview Code
Chapter 2 Cracking the Story Code
Part II Feeling Comes First
Chapter 3 Cracking the Sensory Code
Chapter 4 The Body's Secret Language
Chapter 5 How Feelings Are Anchored
Chapter 6 The "Negative" Code
Part III The Meaning of a Communication Is the Response You Get
Chapter 7 The Code of the Core Story
Chapter 8 Mastering the Learning Trance
Chapter 9 Future Pacing
Chapter 10 Framing
Part IV The Map Is Not the Territory
Chapter 11 Learning the Legend
Chapter 12 Th e Motivation Code
Chapter 13 Chunking the Code
Chapter 14 The Identity Code
Conclusion Reclaiming the Liberal Story
Some communicators, like Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan, just seem to have the "natural ability" to communicate well with anybody, anywhere, anytime. They didn't have to learn how to communicate from a book or a course--they just picked it up along the way in life, or it was wired into them at birth. The vast majority of us, on the other hand, are unconscious about how to communicate, and when it comes to effective communication, we're babes in the wood.
Our lack of training leaves us vulnerable to professional message makers like Frank Luntz and Newt Gingrich, who have been working for decades to convince average working Americans that their interests correspond with those of the mega-wealthy and multinational corporations. To a large degree since 1980, they've succeeded. But Americans everywhere are starting to see that the policies put into place supposedly on behalf of working people are actually harming working people-not to mention the planet and the prospect of our handing over to our children a world at peace with a bright and positive future.
Luntz, Gingrich, and the manipulators of Madison Avenue and Wall Street didn't intuit the path to persuasive messaging or find it under a rock. They learned these techniques, from the ground up, and their efforts to apply what they know to political debate are conscious, intentional, and systematic. You can do the same-and help your fellow Americans take our country back for the people.
Cracking the Code shows how. It breaks down the science and technology of effective communication and helps you apply it to your own efforts to build a better world. Hartmann shows you, tells you, and hands you the tools to become conscious about how people think, sort, understand the world, and how you communicate with others. Throughout the book, Hartmann shares exercises and steps you can practice to master this technology, and he shows how hypnotic language actually "installs" learning without requiring practice.
As you read deeply into this book, you'll find yourself seeing things you hadn't realized were there-in everything from advertising to political rants, seizing the power to be an agent of change in your own life and in the world. You'll discover resources and personal abilities you didn't even realize you had. You'll become an agent of change, in the finest tradition of those brilliant communications geniuses Paine, Jefferson, and the cousins Roosevelt.
And whether you're a politician, an activist, a volunteer, or a voting and concerned citizen, you'll reach into that part of the collective human psyche where we truly do have the power to create a new world.
Thom Hartmann is the host of a nationally syndicated Air America radio program. A four-time Project Censored award winner, he is the bestselling author of more than nineteen books, including Screwed: The Undeclared War Against the Middle Class-and What We Can Do About It, The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight, and Unequal Protection: The Rise of Corporate Dominance and the Theft of Human Rights.
Introduction Talking the Talk
Part I Telling Your Story
Chapter 1 Cracking the Worldview Code
Chapter 2 Cracking the Story Code
Part II Feeling Comes First
Chapter 3 Cracking the Sensory Code
Chapter 4 The Body's Secret Language
Chapter 5 How Feelings Are Anchored
Chapter 6 The "Negative" Code
Part III The Meaning of a Communication Is the Response You Get
Chapter 7 The Code of the Core Story
Chapter 8 Mastering the Learning Trance
Chapter 9 Future Pacing
Chapter 10 Framing
Part IV The Map Is Not the Territory
Chapter 11 Learning the Legend
Chapter 12 Th e Motivation Code
Chapter 13 Chunking the Code
Chapter 14 The Identity Code
Conclusion Reclaiming the Liberal Story
Introduction Talking the Talk
Part I Telling Your Story
Chapter 1 Cracking the Worldview Code
Chapter 2 Cracking the Story Code
Part II Feeling Comes First
Chapter 3 Cracking the Sensory Code
Chapter 4 The Body’s Secret Language
Chapter 5 How Feelings Are Anchored
Chapter 6 The “Negative” Code
Part III The Meaning of a Communication Is the Response You
Get
Chapter 7 The Code of the Core Story
Chapter 8 Mastering the Learning Trance
Chapter 9 Future Pacing
Chapter 10 Framing
Part IV The Map Is Not the Territory
Chapter 11 Learning the Legend
Chapter 12 Th e Motivation Code
Chapter 13 Chunking the Code
Chapter 14 The Identity Code
Conclusion Reclaiming the Liberal Story
Thom Hartmann is the host of a nationally syndicated Air America radio program. A four-time Project Censored award winner, he is the bestselling author of more than nineteen books, including Screwed- The Undeclared War Against the Middle Class-and What We Can Do About It, The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight, and Unequal Protection- The Rise of Corporate Dominance and the Theft of Human Rights.
“No one communicates more thoughtfully or effectively on the radio
airwaves than Thom Hartmann. He gets inside the arguments and helps
people to think them through—to understand how to respond when
they’re talking about public issues with coworkers, neighbors, and
friends. This book explores some of the key perspectives behind his
approach, teaching us not just how to find the facts,
but to talk about what they mean in a way that people will
hear.”
—Paul Loeb, author of Soul of a Citizen
“Thom Hartmann’s book is an excellent primer in communication
techniques. But unlike other message makers, Hartmann has genuine
substance. He is restoring the radical populist tradition to the
mainstream of our culture. Much of what we revere as Americans,
Hartmann believes, was created by radicals who simply were ahead of
their time.”
— Tom Hayden
"Thom Hartmann ought to be bronzed. His new book sets off from the
same high plane as the last and offers explicit tools and how-to
advice that will allow you to see, hear, and feel propaganda when
it's directed at you and use the same techniques to refute it. His
book would make a deaf-mute a better communicator. I want him on my
reading table every day, and if you try one of his books, so will
you."
—Peter Coyote, actor and author of Sleeping Where I Fall
“In Cracking the Code, Thom Hartmann, America’s most popular,
informed, and articulate progressive talk show host and political
analyst, tells us what makes humans vulnerable to unscrupulous
propagandists and what we can do about it. It is essential reading
for all Americans who are fed up with right-wing extremists
manipulating our minds and politics to promote agendas contrary to
our core values and interests.”
—David C. Korten, author of The Great Turning: From Empire to Earth
Community and When Corporations Rule the World and board chair of
YES! magazine
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