Ask anyone what they want, and they’ll eventually tell you:
I want to have my beliefs challenged.
I want to stretch my comfort zone.
I want to question everything.
I value critical thinking.
I want hard truths.
Most people say all this for one simple reason. It makes them feel smart. It makes them feel good about themselves. But when you actually try to stretch their comfort zone or share hard truths, how do they respond?
You already know.
These days, when you tell someone something they don’t want to hear, the first thing they want to do isn’t to thank you for voicing an idea that challenges them to see the world through a different pair of glasses.
The first thing they’ll do is tell you why you’re wrong, and why they’re right. They’ll cite their own hunches as evidence. They’ll turn to the same handful of experts who’ve been wrong about everything so far.
In reality, people want one thing most of all:
To preserve their self-image.
This one aspect of human nature explains almost everything that’s been going wrong with the world for decades now. It explains why people continue to consume news media that lie to them. It explains why they support political parties and candidates that can’t be trusted. It explains why societies make the same mistake over and over again, until they run out of chances. It explains why they ignore warning after warning, then throw their hands up and say:
"Nobody saw this coming.”
People don’t just want to be right. They want to be right with a bullhorn. When they’re wrong, they never admit it. Instead, they erase every last trace anyone ever tried to tell them otherwise.