Okay, audience participation time. Hands up those of you that have been awake late at night and found yourself voluntarily ‘trapped’ by an infomercial?

You know what I’m talking about, those professional actors, all on high octane energy pills, pitching products, interviewing the over the top owners or creators of these products that will literally change your life!

Yes, their presentations are well rehearsed. Yes, they are definitely polished. Yes, they follow all the rules. Yes, their story is well scripted and they even toss in a few psychological triggers just for the fun of it… you know… a limited time offer with a digital clock ticking over on the screen… tick-tock-tick-tock. Or scarcity… “once these are gone, that’s it… they will never be at this price again!

Yeah, all the tricks, bells and whistles. But almost all of them are fake! Something is missing. Sure… it’s all so very well-choreographed… but still, something is missing. Yes, I know, they all look sincere… but something is missing.

After watching a particular fitness infomercial, I determined to find out why I felt manipulated instead of motivated. Instead of being ‘inspired to move’ – which is the definition of motivation.

Manipulation, on the other hand, is an effort to be coerced or forced into a certain course of action or outcome that is not necessarily in your best interest. Or put another way, manipulators will use tactics like fear, guilt or shame to bend you, coerce you, control you into acting their desired outcome, no matter how needed or required it is for you.

Anyway, after watching this one particular fitness infomercial I was not feeling inspired to move, to take action, I was feeling coerced so I decided to examine, from a professional, objective point of view, what the presentation elements were. It had all the elements I mentioned before, It was well scripted, well performed, had the big name celebrity and the inventor of the product… it was all there but still, it was missing something that cannot be manufactured or faked.

It was missing that ingredient that cuts right through the layers of hype and settles next to the primal, instinctive motivator for action. It was missing passion. Oh it had excitement… but not passion. Yes, it had high octane energy in the voice and graphics galore… but not passion.

Without passion it didn’t feel genuine. It didn’t feel authentic. Passion is what would have connected it to my first brain motivation… I’ll explain more about soon.

Passion is what would have transformed me from being a couch spectator into an inspired participator. I can hear you ask me, “But Eugene, the owner of the product was there. Surely he had passion?” Yes I thought of that, so I examined it more closely and what I saw was someone trying to make a sale using someone else’s tactics and words. Now, if that owner had been left to engage me with their authentic self, it may have been a completely different outcome.

Not even the inventor of that product could fake passion. No one can fake passion. Well, maybe some people can.

Take for example Meryl Streep… I’m pretty sure she could pull it off. After all she’s made at least 55 movies, has 19 Oscar nominations, and has won 3 of Oscars! She leads the pack for nominations by the way. Or maybe Jack Nicholson with 12 Oscar nominations and 3 wins could pull it off.

But do you really think you could fake it? Would you put your hand on your heart and say you are multi Oscar kind of good? 

I’ve been standing in front of audiences for over 40 years… and I know from first-hand experience, it is exceptionally hard to fake passion. The few times I’ve tried to ‘fake it’ the result was like famous line from Top Gun… “It wasn’t very pretty. I crashed and burned”.