A year or so ago, one of our HPS Forum participants introduced a word that perfectly describes a common challenge in selling. He called it Hopium.
Hopium is an odorless, colorless, tasteless gas that tends to affect salespeople more than most. Its symptoms are subtle. Its impact is predictable.
Hopium is what keeps us pursuing prospects who ghost us.
It leads us to “add value” excessively in the hope that someone will buy.
It convinces us that because someone needs what we offer, they must therefore want it — and will eventually do business.
Under the influence of Hopium, we:
- Set appointments with people who have shown no intention of keeping them.
- Refer to prospects as “clients” or “customers” before they have ever bought.
- Continue conversations long after intention has failed to appear.
Hopium replaces clarity with optimism.
You arrive at an appointment. The prospect says, “You’ve got 10 minutes to pitch me,” even though they previously agreed to 30 minutes of uninterrupted time.
Instead of disqualifying, Hopium whispers: Maybe I can still make this work.
So we compress, persuade, and perform — abandoning process in favor of possibility.
Hopiumitis often goes undiagnosed.
Some label it “attachment” and attempt to appear detached.
Some fill their calendars with low-probability appointments under the belief that more activity will produce more results.
Others experience it intermittently — especially when pipeline anxiety rises.
A colleague once described regularly driving up to two hours for appointments without first asking the Conditional Commitment Question. The outcome was predictable: four-hour round trips and no business. Nothing unethical. Nothing aggressive. Just an unexamined assumption that interest might convert to intention.
That is Hopiumitis.
The challenge with Hopiumitis is that it feels productive. It feels positive. It feels like perseverance.
But in High Probability Selling, clarity replaces hope.
Intention replaces assumption.
Commitment replaces optimism.
The remedy for Hopiumitis is not force or effort. It is awareness — and adherence to principle.
The symptoms may appear externally, but the cure is internal.
Every moment presents the choice:
Proceed on hope — or proceed on probability.
We discussed the ghosting problem and how it is related to Hopiumitis in a HPS Community Forum conversation on Zoom. The video recording of that meeting will be available starting 6 Mar 2026 on our online store for $25 USD.
