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00:02:54 Author Nick Morgan describes in his book Power Cues

00:08:34 How to Master Nonverbal Communication

00:12:08 Body Language Basics

00:14:37 Look for Clusters of Behavior

00:15:26 Don’t Be Afraid to Trust Your Instincts

00:16:16 What to Look At

00:18:50 The Art of Cold Reading

00:19:50 Four Important Cold Reading Principles

00:21:36 Redirection

00:22:32 Collaboration

00:23:19 Conversation

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• Be mindful of your meta-language and make sure that your verbal and nonverbal signals are aligned. Nonverbal communication can repeat, substitute, complement, or accent our verbal communication. If it doesn’t, we risk sending mixed messages or lowering trust. Pay attention to messages sent using facial expressions, body posture, gestures, eye contact, touch, use of space, and voice characteristics.

• To build mindful awareness of your nonverbal communication, try to eliminate in-the-moment stress (by breathing, pausing, and connecting with your five senses) and cultivate emotional awareness (including the ability to tolerate and accept emotions as they are).

• When reading body language, think holistically, dynamically, relatively, and in context. Don’t rely on single data points, but look for clusters of behavior, inconsistencies with context, and a shift from baseline.

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Appreciate your efforts today, along with all our lumberjack friends, we'll write them all a little note on Love Note Day, and let's hope for total elimination of nuclear weapons. That's another international effort for today. Our menu is loaded up. Today more than just lunch can handle because it's better Breakfast day, which is going to include pancakes, of course. Later on we're going to have to have a chimichanga with some dumpling and maybe key lime pie for dessert. And then for you adventurous ones, it's also Alpaca day. And Shemu the whale day. Shemu used to be called Shemu the Killer whale.

Now he's just the whale. Another victory for tolerance and inclusion. Wow. So with all that, let's get to it today from Patrick King's book The Power of EQ Social Intelligence, Reading People, and how to Navigate Any Situation, we take a look at mindful non verbal communication. Patrick King reminds us that many of us, while we are fascinated with the art of reading body language and gauging people's feelings by looking at their feet or their left eyebrow, we can only become adept at reading other people's non verbal or hidden communication until we thoroughly understand our own. If what we are saying verbally doesn’t align with what we are saying nonverbally, we are likely to send a garbled or confused message. Even if the mismatch is slight, our listeners will unconsciously feel the disconnect, and this may result in: •Our message being “lost in translation” •People thinking that we are insincere, hard to understand, or concealing something •Full-on misunderstandings as people respond to one message and not the other (“I thought you meant ... ”) Imagine that there are always these two conversations—verbal and nonverbal—running parallel to one another in every conversation. Author Nick Morgan describes in his book Power Cues how we can deliberately bring the second, nonverbal level out of the shadows and into conscious awareness.

When we are mindful of the way we are moving our bodies, using our voices, placing our eye contact, and so on, then we can ensure that the two channels of communication are in sync. Then, we will come across as clear, strong, trustworthy, friendly, and solid. To dig deeper, let’s consider the way that nonverbal communication actually functions in the world. Typically, according to Morgan, it has five distinct roles: Repetition: By confirming and repeating the verbal message, your nonverbal communication confirms your overall message and makes it appear stronger. Contradict yourself, however, and it’s as though you are splitting up the force of your message and making it weak. An easy example: you say no to enforce a boundary, but you say it while cowering and with a slight fearful expression, your voice making the statement into more of a question, more of a request for permission to say no. Your verbal communication says one thing (no), and your nonverbal communication says another (I don’t know? Maybe?

What do you think?). If you say no in a firm voice paired with firm, assertive body language, that no becomes stronger. Substitution: You can say something nonverbally instead of verbally. You see someone walk down the road in a ridiculous outfit, and you turn to your friend and quickly raise a single eyebrow. That single gesture stands in for a whole world of verbal communication! Complementing: Related to but a little different from repetition, this is where we send a nonverbal message that adds a little something extra to our verbal communication. For example, we may be breaking bad news in a professional setting, but near the end of the meeting, we give the other person a quick, friendly squeeze on the arm. The verbal message may be, “I regret to inform you ... ” but the nonverbal message adds a little extra: It may not even be possible to put it into words, but the person is saying that beyond the professional setting, they care and are showing some tactile human warmth and encouragement for the situation.

Accenting: This is a little like putting some of your words in a written paragraph in bold or italics—it tells the reader to pay special attention to these details in particular. Accenting body language does the same thing, just with nonverbal communication. Let’s say you’re really angry about something, and you bash your fist on the table at precisely the word you want to emphasize most. Or maybe you are expressing your gratitude and wonder at something, and you pause and give a little “chef’s kiss” at just the point in your narrative that you want to highlight. It’s like using nonverbal punctuation! Drawing on any or all of the above roles of nonverbal communication will help clarify and strengthen your message, so long as it is connected in a real and honest way with what you’re saying verbally. We can use any of the above modes of communication on any of these “channels”: •Facial expressions •Body posture •Gestures •Eye contact (or lack of!) •Touch •Use of space •Voice—volume, pitch, articulation, accent, etc.

Think of the example of a woman in a management position who is finding that people seem not to like her and are resistant to her leadership. Why? There could be many reasons, but one of them could be that her verbal and nonverbal messages are in contradiction. She might have genuine authority and a particular rank in the workplace, and her verbal expression is authoritative when making requests and giving feedback. But her nonverbal expression might be weaker and sending a different message. So, she comes across as false, manipulative, or insincere. Many female bosses and executives find themselves in this position and wonder why people don’t take them seriously. One possibility is that they are unconsciously communicating to others “please don’t take me too seriously”! Such a woman might find that the solution is to better align her verbal and nonverbal expressions.

So, when she is issuing instructions, disciplining others, or setting hard limits, she needs to make sure all parts of her nonverbal expression match this tone. She may mistakenly think that coy smiling, submissive gestures and body language, “uptalk,” apologies, and a soft, high-pitched voice will make her seem nice and non-threatening. However, it will only create resistance since it doesn’t match what she ultimately wants to convey: “I’m in charge. Listen to me." How to Master Nonverbal Communication There are two golden rules for becoming a more in-tune, mindful nonverbal communicator: 1. Get on top of in-the-moment stress 2. Cultivate emotional awareness First, a big impediment to being conscious and aware of nonverbal communication—yours and other people’s—is anxiety. If you are stressed, worried, unhappy, or in any way uncomfortable, your focus immediately shrinks and goes inward. In other words, you automatically stop paying attention to what is going on around you. Even worse, your anxiety may create a filter through which you misinterpret certain stimuli, so what you think you see in others is really a reflection of your own anxiety.

Stress and good communication don’t exist together. Anxiety means you may misread others, send mixed messages, or get confused about what other people are communicating to you. One of the best things you can do is learn to better regulate stress (and indeed, all the emotions) in real-time, as you are talking to someone. Awareness starts with self-awareness. Are you speaking rapidly and not breathing? Consciously pause, take a breath, and slow down. Are you feeling overwhelmed and can see your mind racing to give a response, or getting carried away with wondering what the other person is thinking? Stop and reconnect to the moment.

Get out of your head. •What can you see, taste, hear, smell? •Turn outward and become curious about the other person. •Take a deep breath, consciously open your body language, and pause. Learning to regulate stress goes hand in hand with emotional awareness—after all, you have to recognize that you are stressed in the first place if you hope to get on top of it! The great thing is that the more you develop awareness of your own emotional expression, the better you will be able to see it in other people. The sad truth is that many of us (especially those who spend more time alone or online than we do with real people in the real world) are quite disconnected from our emotions. One of the hidden benefits of social interaction is that we learn to not only better understand others, but ourselves.

Try to remember that you can only ever engage with another person’s emotional reality to the extent that you can engage with your own. So, if you find strong emotions or awkward feelings difficult to deal with, you will not be able to engage with them (or even notice them!) in other people. This is why it’s often said that our relationships with others are a reflection of the relationship we have with ourselves. Improve the one and you cannot help but improve the other. So, make the commitment to yourself now that you will take charge of noticing and reducing stress when it pops up, and also that you will take an attitude of nonjudgmental curiosity at emotions, whether they are yours or other peoples’. Body Language Basics You might have seen “body language experts” who read photographs of celebrities or politicians and confidently tell you things like, “See the way he’s touching her arm? That’s a clear sign they hate each other!" The truth is, reading body language is not like verbal language, where one sign or symbol “means” one thing, so if you only know what each thing means, you can peer into the secret world of others.

Rather, body language must be thought of holistically, dynamically, relatively, and in context. Holistically: What is the whole body saying? How does the verbal combine with the nonverbal? Dynamically: We read not just a single moment or an isolated gesture, but an expression as it actively unfolds over time. Relatively: What does XYZ mean for this person? How does it compare to others? Communication is idiosyncratic, and we need to measure our observations not against an absolute, but against a baseline. In context: What is the environment in which this communication is happening?

Where in the world? What time period? What is the background circumstance, and what came before? So, we don’t just make a single, time-limited observation in a vacuum and interpret it with no regard to who we are observing, and where, when, how, and why they are communicating that way. Rather, we take a broad view. Forget about looking for this or that nonverbal “clue." Instead: Look for Inconsistencies Again, notice any mismatch between verbal and nonverbal expressions. Also notice whether the communication is at odds with prior behavior or somehow doesn’t fit with the situation or the general context.

Why? Notice changes and transitions. Become curious about why someone suddenly alters their tone of voice or shifts in their seat. Look for Clusters of Behavior A single gesture means nothing. Instead, look for patterns and clusters that point in the same direction. Try to characterize things broadly in terms of open or closed, and in terms of advancing or retreating. Is the overall body language expansive, taking up a lot of room, and open? Or are most of the gestures about retreating, closing the body, protecting, cowering?

Is the body characterized by lots of movement and energy, or is there a stillness? Each observation is like a pixel, but try to zoom out and see the bigger picture that these pixels are forming. Don’t Be Afraid to Trust Your Instincts Long before the human species evolved verbal communication, they knew one another nonverbally. There are powerful, primitive, and pre-verbal ways that bodies communicate with one another in space, and some of these are instantaneous and completely unconscious to the higher brain. If you get an immediate impression of someone in a conversation, don’t dismiss this feeling, even if you can’t quite find a more rational explanation for it. Could you be mistaken or just plain old prejudiced? Yes—that’s why you consider gut feelings, but you don’t make assessments based on them alone. What to Look At Eye contact—Where are the eyes going?

Is the gaze direct and confident, evasive, quick, or focused elsewhere? Facial expression—What do you see? How does it change over time? Is it tight or relaxed, masklike, fluid, downcast, or aggressive? Tone of voice—Think about pitch (how high the voice is), volume (how loud, but also how much speech there is), variability (is it monotone or varied and dynamic?), accent, articulation (smooth and flowing, or filled with fluff and um and uh), speed, pacing (is it even or jerking around unpredictably), or strained (are they breathing or is the voice constricted or choked?). Try to think of the voice as a part of the body—how is the person using this “limb”? What does it tell you about them and what they’re trying to communicate? Posture and gesture—Is their body relaxed or stiff and unmoving?

Is the body leaden and deflated or light and quick? Imagine that bodily tension is the same thing as psychological tension, only manifested physiologically. What does the location of the tension tell you? Touch—Is there any physical contact? When and how does it happen, and how does it fit with the situation? How do you feel about it? Intensity—Everything you observe will also fall on a scale. Are they ecstatic or merely pleased/content?

What are their interest levels—cool and detached or keenly focused on you? Are their reactions over the top or strangely muted for the situation? It’s important not to overthink it—the good news is that you are already a body-language-reading expert; the only challenge is to make sure that you are relaxed and paying enough attention to be aware of what you know! The Art of Cold Reading You may be familiar with the term “cold reading” from those who claim to have supernatural or psychic powers, like mediums, clairvoyants, and magicians. The reader is really just using a combination of visual observations, leading questions, and certain conversation techniques to make it seem like they have a special, almost miraculous insight into the person in front of them. This may seem like an odd topic for a book about emotional intelligence, but it turns out that making others feel like you know more about them than you do is a rather useful trick for everyday conversation! If you can understand the basic principles of cold reading, then you can create rapport and connection with other people very quickly, not to mention “read” their subtle and nonverbal expressions to rapidly gain insight into their personalities. Four Important Cold Reading Principles The phony medium notices someone in the audience who is extremely overweight and a little disheveled, with a near-empty pack of cigarettes in his pocket. She says, “The spirits are telling me that they want someone present to take better care of themselves."

She watches to see any flicker of reaction. When nobody bites, she quickly changes tack, saying, “the spirits also want me to know that someone here needs to love themselves more and accept themselves for who they are." The overweight person very slightly sits up and pays closer attention, and the medium, noticing that it’s a man, immediately says, “they’re telling me it’s a man ... around mid-thirties, maybe his name begins with a J ... or a D?" Later, the overweight man leaves the session thinking, “Wow, I felt like that message was specifically just for me! How spooky." But really, nothing supernatural has happened. These four elements, however, were all present to give him the feeling that it had: Observation The cold reader begins by noticing all those little things that, taken together, paint a picture of the person. She sees an overweight man who hasn’t taken much effort with his appearance, who also looks to be a smoker.

She puts all these observations together and makes a guess that this is someone who isn’t great on self-care. Redirection As it happens, the cold reader is actually wrong in her appraisal, and she gets no response to this observation. But that doesn’t matter! She quickly moves on to give the impression that she hasn’t made a mistake at all. She says the spirits have “also” told her an additional piece of information, which is cleverly worded to conceal the fact that it’s quite different from her first assertion. She switches tack and starts talking about self-love. Notice how the medium suggests the man’s name begins with a J or a D—very common letters for male names. Notice also that by presenting both options as one “guess,” if his name really does begin with one or the other, she conceals the fact that the other letter was still wrong.

Collaboration The cold reader deliberately chooses to call on the person in the audience who is actually showing signs of responding to her. Skeptics and deliberately uncooperative people are going to be harder to work with, but someone who believes, someone who unconsciously wants the cold reader to be accurate, is going to enter into an unspoken arrangement with them to help them be right. The man in our example may be very invested in being told by others that he needs to love himself more, and is willing to go along with this narrative—even forgiving or ignoring any obvious mistakes the cold reader may make! Conversation If the cold reader had to simply sit down and make an immediate claim, she’d probably be very, very wrong. Instead, she draws out the back-and-forth conversation, knowing that it’s this closely intertwined involvement between reader and subject that gives her something to work with. The more responses/reactions she gets, the more data she gathers and the more accurate her pronouncements seem. Of course, the audience members don’t know (or pretend not to know) that they are feeding this information to the reader throughout. How can the above four principles be applied to ordinary conversations?

These techniques work amazingly well when you’re meeting someone new or don’t know them very well. The trick is to create rapport and connection. If you can do this with someone you’ve just met, you can create a sense of real warmth and liking within five minutes—and that’s a very useful skill to have! Whether you’re networking, dating, or trying to survive a big party, getting others to like you is invaluable. Good cold readers: 1. Keep their focus constantly on the other person 2. Pay close attention to everything—verbal and nonverbal data 3. Look at the bigger picture to piece this data together and make “predictions” 4. Constantly update and move this picture according to feedback they receive 5. Maintain warmth and rapport at all costs These are all skills that good conversationalists also possess! Take a look at the following conversation and see if you can spot the redirection, the back-and-forth, the clue-gathering, and so on. Person A notices that Person B has a tattoo with several initials and dates next to them, and guesses that these are the birthdates of the person’s children. They assume that getting a tattoo of such a thing means this person takes their parenting role very seriously.

They also notice something else—taking into account the oldest date on the tattoo and looking at how old the person is, they conclude they must have had their first child very young. A: “You know, I bet you’re a very ride-or-die kind of person. I’m the same; if I’m loyal to someone, that’s it—they can depend on me for life, you know?" B: “Yeah? That’s really cool. So few people are like that these days, though." A: “Tell me about it. But you can always rely on family."

B: “Exactly! I always say that." A: “Families are funny sometimes—they have this way of teaching you the lessons you never knew you needed to learn." B: “Totally!" A: “Like, sometimes things happen and they seem like the biggest disasters in the world, and they turn out to be the biggest blessings. And sometimes the people you’d least expect can step up to the challenge and prove everyone wrong." B: “Wow, that’s ... that’s uncanny. It’s like you can read my mind!"

Person A starts by making observations and putting them together. They see tattoos, love for one’s kids, etc., and start to piece things together. People get tattoos for many reasons—why did Person B do it? To mark a special occasion? Why choose tattoos specifically, which are so permanent and publicly visible? Is this a person who wants other people to know how important family is to them? Why would they want that? These questions need never be formulated so precisely, but they will be swirling around Person A’s mind.

Person A says things like “Families have a way of teaching you the lessons you never knew you needed to learn” and “Sometimes the people you’d least expect can step up to the challenge and prove everyone wrong” because they have a working hypothesis: that Person B had an unexpected child when very young, but went ahead and did their best, and now loves their family more than anything in the world. Also, the fact that they broadcast this love might speak to a desire to let everyone know that although the child may have been an accident initially, they are proud of them and proud of themselves. Within a few minutes of conversation, Person B not only feels completely seen and understood, but Person A has also positioned themselves as broadly in agreement with them, creating a strong sense of understanding and rapport. Even if Person A was completely wrong, however, their statements are also general enough that they can just move on if they notice that Person B doesn’t quite respond to them. This is what “cold reading” used for good looks like! This episode of Social skills Coaching was brought to you by Newton Media Group and Patrick King Consulting. Thanks for tuning in. If you enjoyed today's show, head on over to Pkconsulting to gain access to his free resources.

Albert Einstein tells us imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited, and imagination encircles the world.