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"I'm planting these little seeds, telling you I'm in control. I'm not telling you, but I'm doing it subtly." - Evy Poumpouras

Evy Poumpouras spent years mastering the psychology of influence and control as a Secret Service agent and interrogator. In this conversation, she speaks of techniques that sound almost too simple to work, but they do. When she walks you through how to greet someone with subtle commands instead of questions, how to give someone autonomy in small ways so you can push them on bigger things later, how to plant seeds that say "I'm in charge here" without ever speaking those words directly, you realize these aren't manipulation tactics. They're protection strategies. She talks about dating after abuse with the kind of honesty that cuts through all the self-help noise. If you've been a doormat, if someone walked all over your boundaries, the instinct is to either shut down completely or come out swinging. Evy offers a third path, one where you rebuild authority without taking your trauma out on innocent people.

The conversation shifts into something even more valuable when she explains the difference between conditional and unconditional trust. Most of us hand out trust like candy because it's easier, because it means we can turn our brains off and just believe people. But that's exactly why betrayal destroys us. Evy explains that law enforcement officers assume everyone is lying because they deal with liars all day, while average people assume everyone is honest. Neither extreme works. What does work is conditional trust, where you protect yourself by trusting someone in stages, in pieces, watching how they handle small things before you give them access to bigger things. It's more work, yes. It requires staying alert, keeping that more complex part of your brain engaged. But it's the difference between building something real and getting shattered when someone you trusted completely shows you who they really are. This is practical psychology you can use today, whether you're sitting across from someone in a job interview, on a first date, or trying to figure out if someone in your life deserves more access to your heart.

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