The Unspoken For Win Language: A Universal Approach to Winning any Conversation: The Growth Project

By LaDarrell Hopkins

From the mind of a child whispering, "drug selling", pageant winning, wedding singing, sales training, beer chugging, conservatively liberal communicator, who loves God, balancing chakras, trap, country, and classical music, comes a not so far left perspective of how to really win the conversation every time.

The Unspoken For Win Language offers an engaging perspective from a diverse value seller. The book discusses real life data, and then puts some flavor on it through real world stories, creative analogies, and powerful lessons to help us all grow together. You will learn when to talk, but more importantly, you will learn when you need to talk to yourself. You will learn simple methods that will help you communicate more effectively with almost anyone in the world. Develop persuasion and communication skills all while being entertained and engaged by someone that has created value from the streets to the C-suites. 

• Language: English
• Publisher: LaDarrell Hopkins
• Release date: Jul 21, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393780878

LaDarrell Hopkins

With over 15 years of experience, LaDarrell has led over 3,000 talks on sales, marketing, and business development. His ability to identify and create valuable and diverse relationships fast helped him become a top seller in the pharmaceutical industry; winning awards for sales and multi brand selling. This is just a fancy way to say that he creates value with a variety of products in a very efficient way. His out-of-the-box methods gained him access to offices that were known throughout the industry as hard access or no access offices. His time as an Area Account Manager in laboratory sales created opportunities to collaborate within and across several departments, all while consulting physicians on growing their practice, and managing investment opportunities.    As President and CEO of The Green Thumb Consultant LLC, he partners with clients to help with business development, personal development, and sales trainings. He thoroughly understands the challenges that both the employee and employer face. His consulting projects have included companies such as The Texas Center for Lifestyle Medicine, St. John’s United Methodist Church, and Bread of Life Inc. His strategic planning with Bread of Life helped develop a much needed distribution center during the devastating aftermath of Hurricane Harvey. Partnerships and contributions from organizations and people like the Houston Food Bank, Tina Lawson, Beyoncé Knowles-Carter, and Tyler Perry have helped Bread of Life serve over 100,000 people.   He is a former Director of Membership and VP of Business Development for The National Sales Network Houston Chapter and led the first ever sales training in collaboration with the NBA Houston Rockets at the Toyota Center. LaDarrell is affectionately known as “The Closer”, because he effectively sells the value of membership at every event through creative story telling. He is a co-host of the relationship podcast HOP INTO HEALTHY RELATIONSHIPS, where he and his wife dive into spicy issues like blended families, conflict resolution, current events, and more. He’s a Power Member of the Association of Talent Development, and an International Coach Federation Affiliate, which is the leading global organization for coaching professions. He’s a husband, father, speaker, seed-grower, achiever, believer, and one of your biggest allies for your personal growth

Book preview

CONTENTS

Dedication

Introduction

Chapter One

ALRIGHT STOP. COMMUNICATE AND LISTEN.

Chapter Two

REPEAT OFFENDER. OFFENDER. OFFENDER: BAD HABITS OFFEND.

Chapter Three

TALK TO ME, TALK TO YOU, TALK TO YOUR BABY, AND TALK TO YOUR EGO.

Chapter Four

WHO’S THE MASTER? MASTER OF RESPONSE.

Chapter Five

I AM Beyoncé ALWAYS.

Chapter Six

FATHERS BE GOOD TO YOUR DAUGHTERS.

Chapter Seven

THE SILENT TREATMENT: DISTRACT THE DISTRACTIONS.

Chapter Eight

THE NEVER ENDING STORY.

Unspoken (adjective):

not expressed in speech; tacit: an unspoken assumption

Win (verb):

1 be successful or victorious in (a contest or conflict)

2 acquire or secure as a result of a contest, conflict, bet, or other endeavor

Gain (a person’s attention, support, or love) typically gradually or by effort: you will find it difficult to win back their attention.

(win someone over) gain the support or favor of someone by action or persuasion: her sense of humor had won him over at once.

{no object} (win out) manage to succeed or achieve something by effort: talent won out over bureaucracy.

Archaic manage to reach (a place) by effort: many lived to win the great cave

Language (noun):

1 the method of human communication, either spoken or written, consisting of the use of words in a structured and conventional way: a study of the way children learn language {as modifier}: language development

any nonverbal method of expression or communication: a language of gesture and facial expression

2 the system of communication used by a particular community or country: the book was translated into twenty-five languages.

Computing a system of symbols and rules for writing programs or algorithms: a new programming language

3 the manner or style of a piece of writing or speech: he explained the procedure in simple, everyday language.

the phraseology and vocabulary of a certain profession, domain, or group of people: legal language

(usually as bad/strong language) coarse, crude, or offensive language: strong language.

Introduction

Why me? Why you? Why us?

––––––––

Expression is not always what it seems, and freedom of speech could cost you more than you are willing to pay. I have had my fair share of run-ins with people that don’t always respond kindly to what I express and the words I choose to use in speech. The question that has always intrigued me in all of my encounters was always How do the things I say and do affect the way others respond to me? I became a student of this question at a very early age. I was one of those kids that wanted to make everyone feel positive around me; even if it sacrificed some of my positive feelings. An expressive, energetic, and creative class clown, with extremely strict parents was hard to pull off. Depending on the era you grew up in, you may relate to getting grounded for a week for coming in the house 15 minutes past your curfew. Some of you may be wondering what’s 15 minutes? Apparently, it was the equivalent to a week of being grounded in my parent’s household. I could not be too expressive or passionate about a subject. Even if my intention was not to be disrespectful, it could come across like I was being disrespectful. Most parents did not differentiate passion and aggression much in those days. If they felt you were being disrespectful, you would have to face the consequences of their perspective.

I had encyclopedias in my bedroom. Yes. In my bedroom. My stepfather would have me write a two page book report on something from one of those encyclopedias every day that I was grounded. He would pick a letter, and I would pick the subject. I was a student of research and development before I even knew what it was. I am not sure what being grounded in your household growing up was, but being grounded for me was a great learning experience. I am pretty sure I did not see it that way as a child, but most kids do not see the lessons in the middle of something that makes them uncomfortable. This statement seems true for most adults as well. That was a lesson in commonality. I know I hated the penalty of my actions at the time, but it definitely helped mold me into the man I have become. I learned a lot of information from the book reports, but the real lessons came in the form of how I communicated with others for optimal success. I indirectly became a student of response. It started with my parents. I studied the things that they would react poorly to when it came to my communication methods. I learned the habits of myself and my parents that were causing me to get grounded, and I corrected those habits. I became a keen and swift influencer at an early age. I was becoming an effective communicator quickly, and I had not even realized it. I started studying how others responded to certain situations. I noticed cause and effect scenarios with adult conversations. I kept notes of all of this in my head. Always remember that the kids are watching us. I became a sponge; absorbing knowledge from every interaction that I would see and hear. If I communicated poorly, I would strive to communicate better next time. If I saw someone else communicating poorly, I would think of optimal ways that I would have communicated if I were in their shoes. I did not realize then what I was actually doing. I was forming habits that would ultimately form systems to build on my personality and communication skills. I initially did this with the only goal of being able to express myself more without getting grounded. Little did I know that these habits would allow me to communicate in ways that would keep me above ground.

As a child, we moved around a lot. It seemed like we moved to a different city almost every few years when I was in grade school, up until I entered the 5th grade. The 5th grade will come back up in the book for different reasons. We started in the great city of Houston, TX, where I was born. We moved to the state of Colorado when I was five years old. We remained in Denver and Aurora for about 6 years, came back to Houston for little less than a year, and then moved to the Chicago suburbs. If you know anything about any of these places, you know that they are very different in weather, environment, and the personalities of the people who live there. Could you imagine having a big personality as a child, having to adapt to new environments and personalities quickly, only to have to say goodbye to them within a few years? There I was. A kid with a big personality without a real city to claim.

Nothing made me realize how important belonging to a team, group, or community was to people more than my time in the Chicago Suburbs. I say the Chicago Suburbs, because we lived in a few of them. Chicago sports fans are hardcore fans. From the high schools to the professional teams, fans love representing their teams. Da Bears, Da Bulls, Da Cubbies, Da Hawks, and Da Sox all have their own sort of cult following. For the most part, the places we lived were fairly nice, but one thing was always consistent no matter where we lived. Gangs were everywhere. The gang culture, even back then was pretty aggressive in the city, but not all of the gang members lived in the city. A good amount of people in gangs had actually moved to the suburbs. This was probably my most memorable introduction to what most people today would call a tribe, a team, a group, a fraternity, a sorority, or even an extended family. I never joined a gang. My fear of how my parents would respond to me being in a gang was greater than my fear of gangs. I did not want to be writing two page book reports for the rest of my life. Even though I never joined a gang, I was definitely associated to several groups. When I said groups, what did that make you think of? Did you assume gangs? I was associated to so many other groups, that most of the people I knew in gangs thought I was too lame to be a member of their gang. I was associated to groups like choir and the chess club. Most people don’t associate gang members to those groups.

There started to be more overlap with gang affiliations when I started playing organized sports in 6th grade. I was so intrigued by the culture. It was not the violence. I was not seeing much violence in the 6th grade. It was the feeling of belonging to something bigger than myself. Some of my friends in 6th grade had older brothers that were heavily involved in gangs, but they never bothered me. They never picked on me or tried to lure me in. They knew I was a good kid with very strict parents. I was able to be around the culture and not be a part of it. That next year taught me a valuable lesson. Being guilty by association is a real thing.

While in 7th grade, one of my friends that I played basketball with got into a fight with an 8th grader. It was at this time I realized that middle school was a lot different than elementary. That friend was like a brother to me. We had a few associations. We were the same race, we were both athletic, and we both liked a lot of the same things. I was willing to fight for my brother. That’s the energy you should have for someone you consider a part of your team, group, tribe, or family. There was a group that he and this 8th grader was associated to that I was not. They were both in gangs. To make matters worse, they were both in rival gangs. I offered to walk him home that day after school. He initially declined, but then he agreed. He implied that there may be a group of them wanting to fight him, but he was not worried about them. Full disclosure, I did get a little nervous when he said group, but I was still ready to ride for my friend. We proceeded to walk the long way home to avoid running into the 8th grader and other members of his gang. My head was on a swivel. I was ready for whatever happened. At least that is what I told myself in my head.

We got to a point on our journey where we were about a quarter of a mile from splitting up and going our separate ways. I remember this so vividly, because we had just passed the house of an older girl that I had a crush on. The coast was clear, and we were both heading home. There is one more reason I remember it so vividly. Her house was at the bottom of this hill we had to walk up. Just as we passed her house I noticed two figures on top of the hill walking towards us. I did not think anything of it at first. We were all slowly walking towards each other. As we got closer, we realized that it was the 8th grader and one of his friends. His friend was also in the gang with him, while I was just guilty by association. I wanted to pass peacefully, but I knew that this could potentially turn into a fight. As we walked closer to them, we sized them up. It was two against two, and we felt we were the stronger of the two. Our mini tribe was stronger. We got about 25 feet away from them. I was ready for a fight. What I was not ready for was what happened next. The 8th grader lifted up his shirt and showed a silver plated gun. This was the first time I had ever had a gun pulled on me. Here I was. A 7th grader that was associated to most of the right groups faced with a not so 7th grade choice. Should I run or should I