@thesotiris 1 September 2025 more from that month

Own the Frame: Be mindful of interrogative questions that set you up for submission

Strangers often initiate an unsolicited interaction with you, talking vaguely without stating intent, or asking questions that aren’t clear as to what they want from you. You assume that, if you obediently keep responding to them, politely answering their line of questioning, you will get to the bottom of what they want from you. You aren’t suspicious about why they avoid revealing upfront what they want… So, you keep obliging them, setting yourself up for a disastrous interaction. As I keep saying, **every single human interaction is a negotiation**. If you keep following a stranger’s frame of an interaction between the two of you, without breaking that frame to assert your own, **you negotiate down**. You put yourself in **an implied frame where you are the inferior — the one who has to supplicate, justify, and explain yourself, forced to respond to their initiation of questioning that feels like an inquisition from someone with authority over you**. You begin to feel like you did something wrong, and you assume an apologetic, obliging mindset that will be inevitably exploited. ***It’s a supplicating frame, as if you are being interrogated, as if you are guilty of a crime you didn’t know you committed, and you now have to justify your existence to them.*** If you passively keep satisfying their questions, meekly catering to their demands, you help them set the frame of an interaction that you didn’t even choose. This is important: if *they* are the ones initiating an interaction, then *they* are obliged to be upfront and respectful to you by stating their intent beforehand. If anything, *you* should be the one interrogating them because you never chose to talk to them — *they* chose to disturb you and intrude on your stillness with their enquiries. Your supplication to their questioning puts them, subconsciously, in a state of perceived superiority to you, which then makes them **entitled** to whatever they want from you. **Each time you keep submit to a question, they lose more and more respect for you**. Here are some everyday examples of interrogative questions from strangers who seemingly want something from you — instead of politely stating what they want, they beat around the bush, interrogating you to make you feel like you are in the wrong, thus setting you up to yield to them: *“How many sets have you got left? Are you gonna park there long? When are you going to get back? Are you staying here? How long as you staying? Can I help you?”* Yes, even “*Can I help you?*”, when asked in a condescending tone, is meant to frame you as a pariah doing something wrong in the wrong place. The framing of these questions is such that it puts you in the spotlight, having to explain yourself, instead of them having to explain themselves to you about what they want from you. It’s subtle, and in most cases, it’s done subconsciously, but this is the frame: you are in the wrong for minding your own business, and you thus need to atone by supplicating to their whims. The audacity here is that they want something from you, but you want nothing from them. And instead of them being apologetic to you for initiating an unsolicited interaction, their performance implies that you’re bothering them for minding your own business. If you just submit to their framing — the frame of them interrogating you and you obediently complying — you give them a mindset that is entitled to your submission, robbing them of the humility to negotiate respectfully with you. You also give yourself a guilty and obliging state of mind by which you feel the need to please them, as if you did something wrong. We all feel like we did something wrong when we’re interrogated by strangers, without any warning or explanation as to why. Whenever you feel like you’re interrogated, take it as a violation of your individuality, and an effort by others to manipulate you, even if they’re doing it subconsciously. Instead, answer their interrogative questioning with a question delivered in a polite tone: “Excuse me. What do you want? What would you like from me?” If they evade your question, this should ring alarm bells. Tell them you can’t help them unless they clearly tell you what they want from you. Otherwise, they can leave you alone. Any escalation would be deemed as harassment. When *you* ask the question, when *you* demand to know what they want, you create a clear frame of them wanting something from you, especially when you never asked anything from them. This takes away their leverage, and it puts them in the spotlight instead. Now, *they* are the ones being interrogated, not you. *They* have to answer. *They* have to submit to your frame, since *they* are the ones who initiated contact. Another way is to direct the conversation by making a statement instead of directly answering their question. For example, the annoying gym question “*How many sets have you got left?*” puts you in a position where you have to commit to a number of sets, when perhaps you don’t have a number of sets in mind. Instead, since you know they want to use the equipment you’re using (they could just say so), you could suggest that you use it in turns between sets. And that’s it. You don’t have to answer how many sets you got left. You don’t have to know, and you don’t have to declare it to them. What next — your PIN number? If they resist your frame and keep asking their questions like a broken record, explain that *they* are the ones talking to you, so they need to state what they want because you don’t see the point of their questions. This implies that you don’t have to answer them, and if they want something from you, *they* have to adapt to *you*, not *you* to *them*. You never wanted anything from them, so you hold the advantage in this interaction. **Key takeaway** Be mindful of the frame of each interaction. Avoid staying in someone’s spotlight. Turn the spotlight towards them instead. Focus on their negotiating disadvantages: *they* want something from *you*, when you want nothing from them. They need, you don’t — you’re just minding your own business… they aren’t. This makes them vulnerable. Expose this, and continue the conversation with this frame in mind: that they are at a negotiating disadvantage against you.