USING EXPECTATIONS AND CONTRAST
“lower the bar first. then step over it.”
The Lesson
Larry David's 'Curb Your Enthusiasm' title isn't just clever. It's strategic. Coming off Seinfeld (biggest TV hit ever), he needed to prevent comparison. 'Curb your enthusiasm' means 'don't expect too much.' Now he can exceed that lowered bar. Scott Adams did the same with Dilbert. He presented himself as an employee drawing subversive graffiti from a prison cell, not as a professional cartoonist. People were generous with his amateur art because he never claimed to be an artist. Same with live streaming: sniffling, bad lighting, cat walking across, forgetting what he's saying. By lowering expectations, every decent moment becomes a pleasant surprise.
Real-World Example
A first-time founder pitching investors. Wrong approach: 'We're going to be the next Stripe.' (Now you're compared to Stripe.) Right approach: 'We're three engineers who noticed something weird in payments. We might be wrong, but here's what we're seeing.' Expectations: lowered. Now when you show 100 customers and $10K MRR, it's impressive. You exceeded the bar you set. Expectation management is persuasion architecture.
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