Dan Lyons was always an over talker: His wife considered chatting with him not a conversation but a one-sided “Danalogue.” His constant blabbering once cost Dan a mountain of cash. He’d been hired at a Silicon Valley IT company and could’ve been awarded stock options, but Lyons was fired before hitting his second anniversary because he couldn’t stop himself from critiquing the CEO.
“If I had lasted four years and held my shares, they would now [be] worth $8,000,000,” Lyons writes in “STFU: The Power of Keeping Your Mouth Shut in an Endlessly Noisy World” (Henry Holt).
Heeding that lesson, Lyons tried to learn to stop himself from too much yadda, yadda, yadda. Now he believes his book can help others “shut the f–k up,” too.
“My non-patented STFU Method … can help you become a little happier… healthier … more successful,” he writes.
Over talkers are unpopular around the world, called “gasbags,” “windbags,” “motor mouths” or purveyors of “verbal diarrhea.” In the UK and Ireland, they’re describes as “gobshites” — a combination of “mouth” and “s–t” — which is at least less crass than the Russian “pizdaboly,” which merges the verb “to flap” with a dirty description of lady parts.
But keeping things to oneself can lead to health and happiness. A Bavarian study revealed “Monks, those masters of silence, live five years longer on average than men in the general population.” In 2022, Finland was named the happiest country in the world for the 5th straight year, with its taciturn residents believing “Silence is gold, talking is silver.”
Andy Warhol said very little in interviews, which only increased interest in him. “I learned you have more power when you shut up,” he said.
Lyons agreed, offering among other things 5 tried and true rules to STFU: 1) When possible, say nothing (“Be Dirty Harry, not Jim Carrey”); 2) Master the power of the pause; 3) Quit social media; 4) Seek out silence; and 5) Learn how to Listen.
Lyons writes Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address was only 272 words, so does anyone need more words than that to share a message certainly less important? Nope!