Advertise on podcast: Inner Propaganda with Owen Fitzpatrick

When was the last time you sat down with someone who sees the world very differently and listened to understand them? I believe the biggest problem in the world today is that we are not disagreeing effectively enough. Too often, we decide it is pointless even to try. Polarization, echo chambers, and media that amplify the most extreme voices have convinced many of us that the gap between "us" and "them" is too wide to cross. Research shows we consistently overestimate how extreme the other side is, and when we respond with shame and moral outrage, we often push people further away. In this episode of Inner Propaganda, I explore why shaming backfires, what the rise of the Nazis teaches us about ignoring people's grievances, and why identity-protective cognition makes us reject views that challenge who we are. I also share a conversation with my guide in Afghanistan that tested my ability to disagree well, along with research on deep canvassing and what it reveals about how people change their minds. What you will discover: Why we overestimate how extreme the other side really is How shaming and moral outrage can create the very thing they oppose What identity-protective cognition means for every difficult conversation How the illusion of explanatory depth opens the door to more flexible thinking Why curiosity and respect give us the best chance of changing minds If you enjoyed this episode, check out my new book, Inner Propaganda. It explores how the stories we are sold by leaders, by the media, and by our own minds shape what we believe, and what it really takes to change hearts and minds in a polarized world.  Visit my website: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/ Join my newsletter: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/newsletter/ Order my book, Inner Propaganda: https://www.amazon.com/Inner-Propaganda-Leading-Through-Turbulent/dp/1646872444/

What if your competitors are wrestling with the same dilemma you are, and nobody is brave enough to ask? My friend Jess Pettitt, a Hall of Fame speaker and crisis advisor, believes this fear is keeping good organizations from doing better. In her new book, Doing Good Better, Jess adapts Maslow's hierarchy of needs for organizations. At the top sits outlasting the cycle: surviving recession, disruption, and crisis while staying true to your values. She argues that every mistake you have made prepares you to recognize the next one faster. In this episode of Inner Propaganda, I explore with Jess why leaders fear admitting mistakes, the internal and external pressures behind that fear, and the two questions she asks leadership teams that reveal where they really stand. We also discuss the shareholder-versus-stakeholder debate, a protein loophole in the food industry, an oil refinery racing its competitors, and what it would take for AI leaders to agree on a shared off button. What you will discover: How organizations can climb their own version of Maslow's hierarchy Why past mistakes are preparation for recognizing new ones How internal and external pressure shape the decisions leaders make Why collaboration with competitors can create collective decisions that do good How to take back control of your own sense of urgency Jess' new book, Doing Good Better, is out now! I highly recommend it. Spread the word, and you can order it here: https://jesspettitt.com/doing-good-better-2/. Take Jess Pettitt's advisory survey: https://jesspettitt.com/advisory-survey Learn more about Jess: https://jesspettitt.com/ Exciting news: my brand new book, Inner Propaganda, is now available to buy in Ireland and the UK. In the book, I explore how our beliefs form, why they resist change, and how leaders can align what they do with who they are. You can now find it on https://www.amazon.ie/ and https://www.amazon.co.uk/. Visit my website: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/ Join my newsletter: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/newsletter/

Whenever I feel anxious or down, a voice in my head speaks with complete authority. It tells me I'm a fraud, that I'm broken, that nothing I do matters. I call it the inner dictator, and I have named him Dick. Inner propaganda is how we convince ourselves of the ideas we hold. The stories we sell to ourselves become the beliefs we buy into, and the inner dictator is the voice that sells the darkest of them with total certainty. In this episode of Inner Propaganda, I explore why recognizing the inner dictator weakens its hold, drawing on the persuasion knowledge model and my own experiences of propaganda in North Korea. I then go through the most common lines Dick uses on me, from "You're a freak" to "The world is so full of pain," and share how I talk back to each one. What you will discover: Why naming the inner dictator makes its messages less convincing How the change of meaning principle works inside your own mind Why your mood decides which evidence feels like proof Simple questions that expose the vague claims behind self-doubt How to judge a thought by its usefulness rather than its accuracy If you enjoyed this episode, check out my brand-new book, Inner Propaganda, where I explore how the stories we are sold by leaders, the media, and our own minds shape what we believe. Drawing on field research and stories from across history, it offers practical ways to take back control of your own narrative.  Visit my website: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/ Join my newsletter: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/newsletter/ Order my book, Inner Propaganda: https://www.amazon.com/Inner-Propaganda-Leading-Through-Turbulent/dp/1646872444/

If you have ever felt like you are not a good enough parent, partner, friend, or professional, you have met the inner dictator. It is a voice of absolute certainty that tells you the limits of your potential, and it can sabotage your chances of success. The belief "I am not good enough" is so vague and abstract that it is hard to pin down and easy to accept. It is a form of inner propaganda, a story your mind tells you to keep things simple and stable. In this episode of Inner Propaganda, I explore how to tackle this belief from every angle, drawing on my book, cognitive behavioral therapy, neurolinguistic programming, and mindfulness. I share the belief audit, a way to define what "good" and "enough" actually mean, and questions that test how much evidence sits behind the belief. What you will discover: Why "I am not good enough" is inner propaganda from the inner dictator The four questions of the belief audit How to define "good" and "enough" so the belief becomes specific and testable How to build an antifragile identity that turns mistakes into growth Questions that test how certain you really are, including rating your certainty from one to ten If you enjoyed this episode, check out my brand new book, Inner Propaganda, where I show how the stories your mind tells you take hold and share the tools you can use to challenge them. It draws on stories from history, the latest research, and everyday life to explain what leads us to believe what we do.  Visit my website: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/ Join my newsletter: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/newsletter/ Order my book, Inner Propaganda: https://www.amazon.com/Inner-Propaganda-Leading-Through-Turbulent/dp/1646872444/

Most people chasing followers are playing the wrong game entirely. In this episode, Howie Chan, founder of the Behavioring Company and LinkedIn's number one branding creator, explains why the visible metrics of likes and reposts often hide the real currency of influence. Howie built his career by switching tribes, moving from stem cell science into brand strategy and eventually into entrepreneurship after being laid off from the agency he helped grow to over 2,000 people. That experience shaped his belief that behavior change, not belief change, is usually the fastest and most reliable path to real influence. In this episode of Inner Propaganda, we explore why LinkedIn behaves more like a risk management exercise than a true social platform, why belief often follows behavior rather than the other way around, and why the smartest people online are usually optimizing for authority rather than applause. Howie also breaks down his six-part framework for building influence and his CARE method for earning trust quickly. What you will discover: Why the mechanics of a platform matter less than the psychology of its audience Why LinkedIn users protect their reputation more than they chase engagement How changing default settings can shift behavior faster than changing beliefs The six-part framework for moving someone from noticing you to recommending you The CARE method for building trust: competence, authenticity, repeatability, and empathy If you enjoyed this episode, check out my brand new book, Inner Propaganda. It explores the same mechanics of belief and influence that Howie and I discuss, applied to how we lead, communicate, and change minds.  Connect with Howie Chan: https://howiechan.com/ Take his free quiz at https://influencestylequiz.com/ Connect with Howie on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/howiechaniam Visit my website: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/ Join my newsletter: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/newsletter/ Order my book, Inner Propaganda: https://www.amazon.com/Inner-Propaganda-Leading-Through-Turbulent/dp/1646872444/

A few weeks ago, I posted photos of myself signing books at Barnes & Noble on Fifth Avenue and at my local bookstore. It looked like a win. What I didn't share was how some stores I visited hadn't stocked the book at all, or had a single copy on order from a friend of mine who had put in the order. There is a story I heard years ago from my friend Philippe about Grigory Potemkin, who supposedly built fake, beautiful villages along a riverbank just so Catherine the Great would believe everything was thriving. That image has stuck with me, because most of what we see on social media works the same way. In this episode of Inner Propaganda, I pull back the curtain on the last six months of launching my book. I talk about landing incredible endorsements from people like Tony Robbins and Robert Cialdini, and about the far larger pile of rejections that never make it onto Instagram. I talk about hitting USA Today's bestseller list and missing the New York Times list I wanted. And I break down what I call the story war, the way our minds can take the same fact and spin it into two completely different realities depending on which internal narrative wins that day. What you will discover: The Potemkin village metaphor and why so much of what we present publicly is a curated version of reality How the same piece of news can trigger either a confidence-boosting story or a self-defeating one Why "am I good enough" is a question with no useful answer, and what to ask instead The four core themes of my book and why mental health and polarization matter most to me Why the meaning we assign to an experience shapes our next move more than the experience itself   Visit my website: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/ Join my newsletter: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/newsletter/ Order my book, Inner Propaganda: https://www.amazon.com/Inner-Propaganda-Leading-Through-Turbulent/dp/1646872444/

Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness spent decades as sworn enemies in one of the bloodiest conflicts in modern history. Then they became genuine friends, so close the press nicknamed them the Chuckle Brothers. If they could bridge that gap, the divide behind your last political argument may not be as permanent as it feels. In this episode of Inner Propaganda, I explore why disagreement now so often feels like disrespect, and what is actually driving us apart. Not just human nature, but a set of forces, from the way our brains sort people into us and them in milliseconds, to feeds engineered to keep us certain and furious, that are pulling us further apart than we would ever go on our own. I also explore the research behind polarization and share the four moves I use to bridge even the deepest divides. I draw on my own experience sitting down with people in North Korea, Afghanistan, and Iran whose beliefs seemed completely alien to me, and I walk through the deep canvassing research showing that a single honest conversation, built on real curiosity rather than argument, can shift a belief and make it last for months. What you will discover: Why we overestimate how extreme the other side actually is How social media turns an ancient psychological effect into a machine for manufacturing outrage Why shaming someone out of a belief almost always backfires The four moves that actually bridge deep divides Why the goal is never to win, but to find the common ground underneath Visit my website: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/ Join my newsletter: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/newsletter/ Order my book, Inner Propaganda: https://www.amazon.com/Inner-Propaganda-Leading-Through-Turbulent/dp/1646872444/

In the early 1980s, Steve Jobs asked an engineer to save 10 seconds off the Macintosh boot-up time. The engineer found 28. His skills never changed. The story he was working inside of did. This episode brings together everything I have taught this summer on logic and story into one complete system I call DELP: Demos, Ethos, Logos, Pathos. It is built on Aristotle's original framework, with the one piece he never had to think about added back in: knowing your audience before anything else. In this episode of Inner Propaganda, I explore what real, ethical influence looks like in practice. I walk through Sophia Jex-Blake's fight to study medicine, the unsettling truth behind Milgram's obedience experiments, why a mint on a restaurant bill can raise tips by 23 percent, and the single three-word question that gets other people to argue your case for you. What you will discover: Why influence, done right, is something you do for someone rather than to someone The four elements of the DELP framework and why order matters How the same fact can produce completely different decisions depending on how it is framed Why conceding a point first builds more trust than any amount of extra evidence A three-word question that gets people to talk themselves into a decision Visit my website: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/ Join my newsletter: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/newsletter/ Get my new book, Inner Propaganda: https://www.amazon.com/Inner-Propaganda-Leading-Through-Turbulent/dp/1646872444/

I almost said "pick up the phone" was the wrong call for Stanislav Petrov to make. His training said launch. The screen said launch. He said wait, and that pause is the reason the world is still standing. Most of our decisions will never carry those stakes, but the machinery behind them is identical. Your mind was built to keep you alive, not to get things right, and that single fact explains why brilliant people make reckless calls and why the rest of us default to whatever is easiest. In this episode of Inner Propaganda, I explore why even Isaac Newton, a man who mapped gravity, lost a fortune chasing a stock bubble he knew was irrational. I walk through the four-part toolkit I use to make better decisions: Defusion, Debiasing, Decision Modeling, and Discernment, and I share why grading your decisions by their outcome instead of their soundness teaches you exactly the wrong lessons. Before we get into it, I have AMAZING news to share. Last week, Inner Propaganda was listed at No. 8 on the USA Today national bestseller list, No. 2 in nonfiction, No. 1 in psychology, and No. 1 in business on the same list!! It also made the LA Times bestseller list and the Independent Press Top 40 for nonfiction. This result far exceeds my expectations. I am still over the moon!  Thank you for your support and feedback. If you have already picked up a copy, thank you, and I would love it if you took a moment to leave a review on Amazon. If you have not grabbed it yet, you can find it at innerpropaganda.com, on Amazon, or at your favorite bookstore. In this podcast episode, you will discover: Why Stanislav Petrov's doubt in a Soviet bunker prevented nuclear war How Isaac Newton's own envy overpowered his intelligence Why defaults, not choices, run far more of your life than you think The four-part toolkit for sharper decisions under pressure Why the conviction paradox is the key to leading with both doubt and confidence Visit my website: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/ Join my newsletter: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/newsletter/ Get my book, Inner Propaganda: https://www.amazon.com/Inner-Propaganda-Leading-Through-Turbulent/dp/1646872444/

In 2006, I sat on a hillside above Quito and drank ayahuasca with a shaman. For a few hours, my entire reality came apart: dragons, monsters, grudges dissolving into nothing. Not one fact of my life changed that night. My whole experience of it did. That gap between the facts and the story we run on top of them is the idea underneath everything I want to share this week. Your mind works like a news channel, selecting a handful of moments out of billions and spinning a narrative around them. The editor making those calls is your mood. In this episode of Inner Propaganda, I explore the four Ms I use to manage my own mental health: mood modulation, metacognition, mindset, and meaning. I share a UCLA brain scan study on naming your feelings precisely, walk through the cognitive distortions most of us fall into daily, and unpack the mindsets that decide how every difficult moment gets covered before it even happens.  What you will discover: Why a negative belief feels like fact while a negative thought can be argued with The precise skill of affect labeling and why vague words like "stressed" do not work The most common cognitive distortions and the questions that dismantle them Four mindsets- agency, growth, antifragility, and solution focus- that reshape how you handle pressure Why the meaning behind your hardest moments is a story you can choose to rewrite In other news, I also want to say a huge thank you for the incredible response to the book since launch. If you have picked up a copy, a quick Amazon review would mean a great deal to me. If you have not yet, you will find it at innerpropaganda.com. Get your copy of Inner Propaganda: https://www.amazon.com/-/he/Owen-Fitzpatrick/dp/1646872444 Visit my website: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/

For years, a voice in my head told me I was worthless, and it never once sounded like an opinion. It sounded like the truth. It took thirty years and trips to some of the most propaganda-heavy places on earth to understand what that voice actually was. This week my new book, Inner Propaganda, is finally out, and it is built entirely around that discovery. The most convincing propaganda you will ever hear speaks in your own voice. In this episode of Inner Propaganda, I explore the three biggest insights behind the book. I walk through the Asch conformity experiment and what it reveals about how easily we abandon what we can plainly see, the five types of truth we mistake for objective fact, and why you are allowed to change a belief without it meaning you were weak or wrong. I also break down the three gates every belief has to pass through: feeling, identity, and logic, and why logic rarely gets there first. What you will discover: Why believing something with total conviction tells you nothing about whether it is true The five kinds of truth, and which ones we usually mistake for fact Why changing your mind can be the strongest thing you do, not the weakest The three gates a belief must pass before it sticks: feeling, identity, and logic Why hearts change before minds ever do My brand new book, Inner Propaganda, is out on 4th August: https://www.amazon.com/Inner-Propaganda-Leading-Through-Turbulent/dp/1646872444/

Picture the most wrong person you know. Now consider that somewhere out there, someone is just as certain about you. In this episode, I explain why we all feel like the last sane person on Earth, and why that feeling itself might be the actual delusion. Psychologists call it naive realism, the belief that we see reality as it is and anyone who disagrees is misinformed or brainwashed. I wanted to build an episode that gives you the manual nobody ever handed us for how our own minds work, especially in a world that feels louder and more polarized by the day. In this episode of Inner Propaganda, I explore 12 ideas that sit at the heart of my new book, Inner Propaganda, each one designed to stand on its own. I cover why a single word can plant a false memory, why a failed doomsday prophecy made a cult more certain rather than less, why AI bots outperformed human debaters on Reddit by studying people rather than facts, and why intelligence often just makes us better at defending the wrong conclusion. I also share a personal story from coaching a university football team the night before the biggest game of their lives, and what I learned about the difference between statements and prompts. What you will discover: Why certainty is a feeling your brain produces rather than proof you are correct How the words used to describe an event can rewrite your memory of it Why AI works as an amplifier of whatever you already believe, not a filter for truth Why overwhelm, not deception, is the most common form of manipulation Why nuance, not certainty, is the closest thing we have to seeing the world clearly If you enjoyed this episode, check out my brand new book, Inner Propaganda, launching August 4th and just named an August must-read by the Next Big Idea Club.  Pre-order now and you will get a free masterclass, a workbook, and behind-the-scenes interviews. Pre-order Inner Propaganda: https://innerpropaganda.com/ Free masterclasses: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/summer

During the Second World War, up to forty percent of the German army tuned in nightly to a radio host they trusted completely. He never existed. He was invented by a British propagandist, and his death on air was staged theater. That story is the doorway into something I think about constantly: we don't experience reality and then tell a story about it. We feel something first, and our mind writes the story afterward to explain it. The voice that does the writing rarely announces itself as fiction. It sounds like your own voice, stating facts. In this episode of Inner Propaganda, I explore the research behind why stories are so much more persuasive than facts, including a Princeton study on how a good story literally syncs listeners' brain activity with the speaker's, and an experiment showing that an emotional story can spike oxytocin and change how much money people give to charity. I also share the six stories I believe most of us default to without noticing, and a two-word phrase I use with clients to catch themselves dramatizing an ordinary moment into a disaster. What you will discover: Why you feel first and invent the explanation second How a compelling story can sync your brain with someone else's Why the tidiest explanation is often the least trustworthy one The six stories almost everyone lives inside, and what each one costs A simple way to catch yourself turning a tough moment into a trauma Pre-order Inner Propaganda: https://innerpropaganda.com/ Visit my website: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/ Join my newsletter: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/newsletter/

Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes and one of the sharpest minds of his era, spent years publicly defending photographs of fairies made from paper cutouts. He wasn't fooled because he was naive, but because he was brilliant, and he desperately wanted it to be true. We are not rational animals. We are rationalizing ones. The smarter we are, the better we are at building a convincing case for whatever we already wanted to believe. Logic, when we trust it blindly, doesn't lead us to the truth. It defends the conclusion we'd already fallen in love with. In this episode of Inner Propaganda, I explore how logic actually works, where it comes from, and where it quietly breaks down. Drawing on Aristotle's three types of reasoning, the psychological concept of dysrationalia, the Allied deception at D-Day, Isaac Newton's financial ruin, and the deep canvassing research by Broockman and Kalla, I walk through two ways to use logic well: building a genuinely strong argument using the Toulmin framework, and, more powerfully, asking the investigative questions that let someone else change their own mind. I also explore why wrapping logic in credibility and story is the difference between a point that gets made and a point that actually lands. What you will discover: Why high intelligence often increases susceptibility to motivated reasoning rather than protecting against it The three types of reasoning Aristotle identified, and a practical way to stress-test each one before you trust your conclusions What dysrationalia is, and how it explains everything from wartime intelligence failures to market losses among the most sophisticated investors Why Adam Grant's concept of logic bullying describes the most common and least effective way people try to change minds How the deep canvassing research demonstrates that non-judgmental questions shift beliefs more durably than any amount of evidence-throwing Pre-order my new book, Inner Propaganda: https://innerpropaganda.com/ Visit my website: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/ Join my newsletter: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/newsletter/

When people give, they're not just transferring money. They're rehearsing a version of themselves. That insight, shared by my guest Cherian Koshy, cuts to the heart of why logical fundraising pitches so often fail, and why identity-driven communication changes everything. Cherian is the author of Neurogiving, a behavioral scientist, and one of the most original thinkers I've encountered on the question of generosity. His work applies neuroscience and behavioral science to the act of giving, and what he's uncovered reaches far beyond fundraising into every area where we try to move people. In this episode of Inner Propaganda, I sit down with Cherian to unpack the science behind why people give, how identity drives every donation decision, and what organizations consistently get wrong when they treat the giving brain like a buying brain. Cherian introduces the concept of generosity decay, based on research by Dr. Katy Milkman at the Wharton School, which shows that a donor's generous impulse drops by roughly 50% within 30 to 45 days if not reinforced. He also explores how pairing identity reaffirmation with the identifiable victim effect can dramatically increase the likelihood of a second gift, and why the most important thing you can tell a donor is not "thank you for your donation" but rather "you are a generous person." What you will discover: Why the giving brain operates on fundamentally different principles than the buying brain, and how to communicate accordingly How generosity decay works, what causes it, and what to do in the critical window before it sets in Why thanking a donor for the transaction is the least effective thing you can say, and what to say instead to reaffirm their identity How compassion fatigue and psychological reactance work in the nervous system, and how to strike the balance between reality and hope in your messaging Why generosity is not just an act of giving but, as Cherian puts it, agency in action, a way humans reclaim a sense of control and meaning in uncertain times Learn more about Cherian Koshy: https://cheriankoshy.com/ Get Cherian's book, Neurogiving: https://neurogivingbook.com/ Order my new book, Inner Propaganda: https://innerpropaganda.com/ Visit my website: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/ Join my newsletter: https://owenfitzpatrick.com/newsletter/