Inception, the original.

I was part of a very interesting discussion today, at work.

It turns out that women invented inception.
Forget Leonardo DiCaprio's take on the concept - clever women have been using this technique for generations.

The concept of inception is planting an idea into someone else's mind, making them think it was their idea.


Allow me to illustrate:

The girl I sit next to at work is currently engaged to be married. She is busy considering and making plans for a rather large engagement bash this year and the actual wedding next year.
She also happens to be someone obsessed with birds. She even has a pet bird who she considers her child, and hopes to somehow involve him in the wedding ceremony. Ring bearer?

Anyway, here is the illustration: She saw a picture of a beautiful wedding cake with small birds on top, which she loved. It was the cake she wanted. But of course no guy is going to choose such a cake when presented with the options.
So what is a girl to do?

Easy. She decided to start showing him pictures of really extravagant bird cakes, ones that were really over the top, ones that even she wouldn't choose. Ugly ones. After a few pictures, she would lessen the impact and finally show him the original choice .. which by this point, doesn't seem so bad.
He thinks it's a much better choice, she gets the cake she actually wanted. Winner.

It turns out that all us women do this. Our conversation at work brought out the best stories from other girls.
One had creatively convinced her partner to agree to staying at a beautiful resort on an exclusive island by discussing it with him while watching television. Men have selective hearing while watching television, you see.
(Some even have this typically-male amount of hearing at all times.)
Later, when he spotted the island in the itinerary, she could honestly say "but we talked about it, and you agreed!"

Then we started talking about how we convince our partners that something is his idea .. we do know best, after all .. but that's for another day.