8 Body Language Traps to Avoid

Happy Sunday!

I came across a great article today about career body language mistakes that go from handshakes (which I've already covered in detail) to nodding too much. Check it out for a great summary of body gestures that we often overlook that speak volumes about us to others.

My favourite tip was how women often tend to "over condense" their bodies by crossing their legs and keeping their elbows on their sides. High status men tend to do the opposite, and as a result women subconsciously communicate low confidence and status in professional environments.

Happy D-coding,
Darya

What’s In a Handshake?

How many handshakes do you give in day? A month? A year? A handshake can say a lot more about you than you think. Ever wonder where the saying “having the upper hand” comes from? This month I’ve been looking into what kind of “power” messages various handshakes communicate.

Most people tend to forget how important it is to make the right impression with a handshake. A handshake can guide someone in making a conclusion about your personality, what kind of status you hold or how much power you have.

Some of the best examples of how important a handshake is when demonstrating power can be drawn from politicians. Here is an amazing four-minute video clip that shows several politicians adjusting their body language in order to have the “upper hand” in a handshake and to demonstrate their power. My favourite one is Hilary Clinton’s “not-so-subtle” photo preparation manoeuvre.

The Basic Power Rules of a Handshake:

1.       The hand that is on top usually has the power.

2.       Tapping the person on the back while you shake their hand re-establishes your power once again.

3.       The last person through a door usually has the power (often seen in politics).

4.       If taking a photo of you shaking hands with someone, you need to be on their right side to “have the upper hand”.

How To Shift the Power of a Handshake:

If you see someone else having “the upper hand” while shaking hands with you, there are several things you can do to change the situation.

1.       If you see someone reaching out for a handshake with their palm facing down, use the “step-to-the-right” technique. Step forward with your left foot (this might feel unnatural and needs practice, since 90% of people step with their right foot first), then step forward with your right foot, then bring your left foot to where your right foot is. As you are doing this, you will be able to turn the handshake vertically and establish power through being closer to the other person’s personal space.

2.       If this is someone that you are closer with, you can put your second palm on top of their palm to re-establish power.

3.       If you are being dominated in a handshake and don’t want to, you can try to create equality by turning the other persons hand vertically so that their hand is no longer on top of yours. (You need to judge the situation because it might come off as too aggressive).

Handshake Mistakes:

People don’t usually think all that much about what their handshake says about them. I hope you don’t recognize your own handshake in this list. If you do, now you know how to fix it.

1.       The “wet fish” – a handshake without any grip that can be associated with weak character

2.       The “bone crasher” – a handshake so firm it imprints marks in your finger bones. Negatively associated with a dominant personality.

3.       The “Finger- Tip Grab” – if someone accidentally shakes hands this way with you, casually say something like “let’s do that again” and give them a full handshake. This shows the person that you respect them enough to give them a proper handshake.

It’s amazing how much can be communicated in just a couple of seconds. May yours handshake always say about you exactly what you want it to.

Happy D-coding,

Darya

Source: Pease, Allan and Barbara. The Definitive Book of Body Language. Bantam Dell, New York, New York. 2004

Don't Be Fooled by a Fake Review

With the increase of companies paying people to give them positive reviews in social media, I thought this would be quite handy. This example is helpful in determining whether or not a review is authentic.

How to Win Your Crush Over: The Body Language of Attraction

In celebration of Valentine’s Day I thought I’d do a post about attraction. What is it that makes certain people more likeable than others?

Through some research I was able to compile a list of things that naturally attract us to other people. Even if you already have a significant other, these tips are sure to reduce awkwardness in social situations:

1.   The Power of Touch: studies show that people become more comfortable around those that they come into body contact with. It could be as simple as brushing them with your left hand while shaking  their right hand, or by brushing hands with them while passing them an object.(Don't abuse this if you don't want to be seen as a creeper)
2. Open Body Language: this includes avoiding crossing your arms and facing the person you are communicating with.
3.  Don’t use objects to block your body: To appear more open and welcoming during a conversation avoid clutching your purse in front of you or keeping a coffee cup in front of you at a coffee date. Try keeping it on the side so that your torso is open toward the person you are speaking to.
4. Get your crush to do a favour for you: You know from yourself that when you do something nice for someone it makes you feel good. Psychologically, it makes you like the person you are doing the favour for (within limits of course) because you think “wow, this someone must be really special to me because I am spending time helping them”. Make your crush feel the same way.
5. Laugh and smile: Studies show that women laugh more with men they’re attracted to and men are attracted to women who laugh at their jokes. Men are more attracted to women who smile.
6.  Mirror the body language: When people get to know each other better, they tend to start mimicking each other’s body language. You can create that feeling of bonding by slightly adjusting to your crush’s body language. For example if one of you is sitting with a laid back posture, you can gradually start to mimic it as you talk.
7. Move together: People who move together, such as dancing or walking, develop stronger bonds with each other.
8. Speaking into someone’s left ear or touching their forearm will make a person more willing to do something for you.

And the last and most important trick of all is to be yourself. You can certainly adjust your body language to help ease the tension in a social situation, but if your love interest isn’t responding to your attempts...move on. If it were as simple as following a few steps then no one would be hating or whining about having a crappy valentine’s day. The single people get sad that they aren’t dating and those in relationships wake up thinking the day will be magical and their unrealistic expectations end up setting them up for disappointment.

Regardless of how you spend February 14th, just remember to focus on giving as much love as possible to those around you and you’ll never be disappointed.

Happy loving and d-coding,

Darya 

P.S. you can now follow me on twitter for more tips @DaryaDen

Social Etiquette: What People Secretly Like

Grade 12 was a year in my life when I was “coming out of my shell”. All the university applications were due and in order to have something useful to add to them, I’ve had to get out of my comfort zone and actually take risks – such as run for  president of a charity club I was part of and do some public speaking.

Since I’m a big book nerd, during that time period I have read more self-help books than any sane person would admit to. But as they say “In order to become wise you only need to read 10 books, but to find those 10 you need to read hundreds”. And so one particular self help book I read 6 years ago, is still definitely in my top 10 books list.

“How To Talk to Anyone” is basically a list of things we can do to please people and avoid awkward social situations. I don’t know how the author does it but somehow many of those tricks stuck with me right away. To save you all some time, I’ve compiled a list of some of my favourite ones here. I bet you will be nodding that you would really appreciate it if someone showed this type of social etiquette while interacting with you.

1. Pretend that every new person that you meet is an old friend of yours (your body language will naturally change as you greet them) – who doesn’t love a warm greeting?
2. After a compliment, thank them back with another compliment: "That was insightful, you are very kind"
3. Sound like a boss when trying to get an admin to connect you with someone."Hi, Darya here. Is she in?" refer to person you are calling as he/she, him/her. This will create the illusion that you are close with whoever you are trying to reach, maybe increasing the chances of you getting through.
4.  Overlook their bloopers – if someone spills their wine, don’t draw attention to it ..just silently pass them a napkin and continue the conversation without interruptions
5. Whenever someone’s story interrupted, let the interruption take over, but then go back to their story. – I can always relate to that awkward feeling of whether or not I should finish my story. If it happens to someone else, make sure you let them finish
6.  Let them savor the favor – people feel good about doing nice things, repay them, but not right away “tit for-wait-wait-tat”
7. Before speaking, let them empty their tanks first – if you want someone’s full attention, make sure you hear everything they have to say first and then go into your story.
8. Lead the listeners (be the first to applaud or encore etc) – make the presenter feel more confident by supporting them first
9.  Limit the fidget – it will make whatever you say sound more sincere.
10. Have a good posture (this is my forever-failing new year’s resolution L)

The actual book has many more tips, you can find it here.

Happy D-coding,

Darya

Article Review: What Shamu Taught Me About a Happy Marriage

Since I’m very much into the art of communicating without using words (although I get it’s really hard..since we suck at communicating with words too...I’ll blog about that later) this article was a neat read. It’s written by a woman who observed animals being trained and then used the same techniques on her husband...and they worked!

Here are some quick pointers:

• My Favorite: if your partner does something that you like, PRAISE THEM! We don’t do this enough in our relationships. Humans are all about silently being happy and voicing when we are annoyed. In the English dictionary, we have more negative verbs than positive ones. Just like an animal trainer gives treats for performing a trick...so should we praise people when they do something nice for us. If someone isn’t calling you as often as you’d like, why not tell them you appreciate it when they do call next time you are on the phone with them instead of saying “you don’t care enough about me” or something along those lines.

•          If your partner does something negative, ignore it...(this means don’t even say it annoys you) Eventually the negative behaviour stops if it doesn't get acknowledged

 DISCLAIMER: this works for naggy little annoyances...if this is a bigger issue, you better communicate it (respectfully) with words

Read the full article here.

Happy D-Coding,

Darya

My Body Language Fails & Disclaimers

The other day I was looking through some holiday photos that a friend of mine posted on Facebook. She attended a party with her boyfriend. The the last time I spoke with her, they were having some issues and constant fighting. I thought I’d use the photos of the two of them as a way to try and read into whether or not they got past their issues and went back to being a happy couple. As I was clicking through the album I spotted some group shots where they weren’t standing beside each other. In others, his arm wasn’t around her and vice versa. There was even a photo where her torso seemed to be facing away from his as the two of them were posing for a picture. Body language jackpot! I was convinced they didn’t resolve their issue.

A few days later I saw my dear friend and to my big surprise I found out that they had overcome their fight and actually felt a lot closer to each other before and during the party. So what went wrong? I thought I was following the books!

I became my own example of observer bias.  Since I have a personal relationship with my friend and had a background story of the fight she had with her boyfriend, I was unconsciously looking at the photos with a negative mindset.

Just as people hearing what they want to hear...so do we see what we want to see.

If there was no observation bias, most of us would be body language experts. However we are all subject to it. And unfortunately we hold the most observation bias with the people we are closest to and they happen to be the same ones whom we want to better understand through non-verbal communication.  If I was a neutral party observing the holiday photos I’d probably notice how the couple actually had quite a few photos of them together, both of them were smiling  and other positive indicators.

So here are some disclaimers when trying to read people:

•  Always try and have an open mind. Beware of any pre-conceived notions you have about that person

• Compare it to their general behaviour. If someone has a habit of crossing their arms, if you are having an argument them crossing their arms might actually not be an indicator of something defensive going 

• It's hard to analyze the body language of a stranger because you don’t have a base of mannerisms to compare it against (aka someone shy might actually not make a lot of eye contact...but that doesn’t mean they are a liar)

• Always try and find a combination of non-verbal signs that are not contradictory before making a conclusion of what that person is secretly communicating.

• Don’t isolate a single body movement to make a decision. Look at the whole picture. Is my friend having a bad today? Or is she actually mad that I didn’t reply to her text fast enough?

And here is a photo of me in Montreal covering my face from the strong cold wind. But if you didn’t know that, maybe you’d think I’m covering my face in shame after becoming victim of observation bias.

Happy D-coding,

Darya