How to Persuade and Influence People: Powerful techniques to get your own way more often

Chapter 24. SOCIAL PRESSURE

I learned to play the guitar because I had a girlfriend when I was seventeen who could play very well and, indeed, performed in folk clubs in the area regularly. She was called Stasia Cwenar. Frankly, my burgeoning ego struggled with people buying me free drinks simply because I was attached to her and I resolved to play the guitar myself.

I went out the morning after one particularly embarrassing session while she was playing and bought Bert Weedon's Play With Yourself in a Day (or at least that's what I think it was called) and taught myself 'The Boxer' by Paul Simon. It was pretty soon after that I latched on to Ralph McTell's music and it became a burning passion. I still have the holes in my pockets to prove it. ...