For the past 2 weeks, I've been using Claude as my weightlifting coach.
I told her (he, it? I dunno) my goals, my constraints—like I can't drop weights in a certain gym—my target, and what I already know how to do. Then it spit out a recommended program, which I've followed religiously for 2 sessions. After each session, I tell her what went wrong, what I think should change, and it gives me new updated programs.
AMAZING. I must say, I enjoy my workouts way more than when I just go in blind and do what I think I'm supposed to do.
Does it mean I've been wasting my time in the gym all this while?
I sure did 😹
Because all this while, I've been going to the gym and training based on what I felt like doing, or what I thought I was weak at. There was zero thought or planning that went into the workout session.
No wonder I felt more productive with Claude's plan rather than my own "on the whim" routine.
The reason is simple: a plan gives structure. And structure is how we feel safe.
We might not know or even admit this, but our brains crave structure. Structure gives our brains a sequence to latch on to, so we know exactly what to expect.
Think about the emails, ads, or landing page copy you see or write every day. Same thing applies. We use Problem-Agitate-Solution. The Hero's Journey. Hook-Story-Lesson all the time.
This is where it gets interesting for marketers: too predictable a structure also makes our brains switch off and go, "Oh, I know how this is going to happen."
Being predictable means people gloss over your text. They scroll past your email. They forget your ad the second they see it. You become the credits rolling at the end of a Marvel movie that everyone skips just to see the post-credit scenes.
Structure is what gives clarity, but structure with a twist is what makes readers stay.
Let me show you what I mean with a movie you've probably seen: Shrek.
The expected ending is when they live happily ever after, right? We've all seen a hundred fairy tales where the princess gets saved and boom, happily ever after. Your brain's already writing the ending before the movie does.
But instead of Fiona being saved and staying human, she chooses to stay an ogre. That's 1 way to end on a happily ever after note that audiences like, but with just enough twist to keep it special.
My point is this:
A twist creates a pattern interrupt. It's contrast. And we as humans are wired to pay attention to contrast.
It's like driving the same route to work every day for a year, then one morning there's a massive hot air balloon landed in the middle of the road. You HAVE to stop. You HAVE to look. That's what a twist does. It hijacks attention right when people are about to switch to autopilot.
It's how you get people to read and remember your stuff. The structure gives them the safe path to follow. The twist wakes them up right when they're about to zone out.
In other words, when you tell stories in ads or emails, the story should follow a structure, but add a twist if you can to make it interesting.
But back to Coach Claude.
Yes, she did give me a structure. But there’s also small adjustments each session to align with how I felt or how I did in the last session. Familiar enough to feel safe, unexpected enough to stay interested.
Having structure, giving it a twist, bookending your stories or copy are techniques I knew about, but got reminded just a few days ago after watching Joanna Wiebe's video on storytelling.
In it, she gave 8 ways to go about telling stories that aren't often shared elsewhere.
If you're interested in watching that, head over here:
