 and people are talking about it for weeks, that those exceptions, they're burnt into our minds and they haunt us in our own conversations. But it's important to remember that there's so much more going on than what we're seeing when it comes out on the news. What's up everybody and welcome to the show today. We drop great content each and every week and we wanna make sure that you guys get notified and in order to do that, you're gonna have to smash that subscribe button and hit that notification bell. And if you've gotten a lot of value out of this, make sure you give us a like and share our videos with your friends. So in training and teaching small talk and conversation skills, many of us don't realize how we are fully perceived, the body language signals that we're sending and how it can change the tone of a conversation. And we just finished a bootcamp in Las Vegas this weekend and our clients had to go through the video work exercise. And when you first go through it, it's a little nerve wracking because now you're like, oh, I'm gonna see all the things that I'm doing wrong. In actuality, when we play the video back, they see all the things that they were doing right in ways that they were having great body language and impacting the conversation a meaningful way. Seeing the other person light up and react to those gestures, the smile, the eye contact, all the signals that we clue in on. And what's fun is once you have a better representation of who you are and how you show up in the world, a lot of that worry that concerned that anxiety wanes and you can actually just focus on being in the moment, present, becoming a better listener. Yeah, I just love that so much. And it also kind of works with this idea I like to get across, which is that we have an idea of what influence is. It's like standing up on the pulpit and making this grand speech and like trying to really convince someone of something. But influence is all these little things like the facial expressions you make, the little offhand comments, you know, a laugh or a smile in the way that you interact with people in these very subtle and formal ways. Those also impact people sometimes even more than those moments when you're really trying to influence them. And so actually showing people video like that to show like, look at all these little things you're doing that are impacting people. I just, I love that. By to do whatever they can to keep from the spotlight being turned on them. So maybe make themselves smaller. Their tone out, it gets quieter. They're trying not to be seen. But that has the direct opposite effect because that is influencing that room. And another direction is pushing people away rather than attracting people. And for us, it's to get our clients and our listeners to understand that just because you're not the loudest person in the room doesn't mean that you're not affecting how others are thinking and feeling in those moments. And if you want to be somebody who is adding value, then you have to take time to put out actions and behaviors that influence people in the proper way. Because being the quiet person or the person who's hiding, as I said, it has that opposite effect. It makes people uncomfortable. I couldn't agree more. And I mean, that's, it's interesting because I often talk about the fact that even if you don't say anything, even if you're just sitting there in the audience, you are impacting the room. Think about when you're talking and you're kind of out of the corner where I keep looking at this person who's like looking down or not paying attention or like you said, like curling up into a ball. Like that is impacting the things that the people around you are discussing and the way they're discussing them. And so in some ways that's empowering because it means that simply showing up to a discussion means that you actually can make a difference just being there, representing yourself or groups that you want to represent, even if you don't want to speak up, even if you're super introverted, just showing up matters. But I love this other part as well, right? That you could also be unintentionally influencing this discussion in ways you'd rather not be. And you mentioned in the book that you are an introvert and part of what you do in speaking at colleges and on stages is there's the stage moment, which as an introvert myself, I've rehearsed it. I know exactly what I'm gonna say. I know what works and doesn't work with my material from the laboratory. So I feel really confident in that moment. But there is that before and after where we're in the one-on-one moments where it is a little tense, it can be a little anxiety inducing. So what have you done personally to put yourself in a better position to feel confident and comfortable in those environments when you know going in as an introvert, it's gonna be a little uncomfortable for you. And that's exactly how I feel as well. It's funny because people think if you're an introvert that you are really scared of getting up on stage or performing or doing a talk. And it's true, you wind up practicing that so much, especially if you're an introvert. I mean, for me, I over-practice it so that it's actually not that scary. It becomes like very sort of rehearsed and okay, and I have my props, you know? But it's those little informal interactions where you don't know what someone's gonna say and you're worried that you're gonna say something stupid or talk too much or not talk enough or ask a weird question or not have the answer. And I really, you know, the biggest thing that has helped me is really to remind myself of this research that does show that we come across better than we think, right? Because I am the kind of person who will leave a meeting and obsess about that stupid thing I said. And I now know, based on Erica Boothby's research in the Liking Gap, that I'm not alone, that most of us do this, and introverts do it even more, it turns out, where we focus on that thing that we feel really self-conscious about, that no one else noticed and no one else is paying attention to. And in fact, the other person just has this holistic view of that conversation and sort of the warmth that was conveyed. You know, it's not about saying the perfect thing or talking the perfect amount of time. It's like, were you warm and friendly? That's really what people take away from a conversation. And that's why we focus on body language signals in the work that we do so much. Nice warm eye contact, a nod like you're doing on video, smile back, lets the person that you're speaking to know that you are engaged, you are interested, even if you may have a faux pas here or there. And what I find so interesting is we all have the Liking Gap, which means when two introverts are interacting, they're more likely to focus on their own fallibles, the own things that they did wrong in the situation so they can't possibly be paying attention to the other person's issues. And we see this time and time again, we'll play back the video and our client will be like, really dwelling on, oh, I didn't say this properly or this joke didn't really land. And then you watch the interaction in totality and there was no response. It was completely invisible to the other person because they were also a bit in their head, also worried about that Liking Gap. What's also a very freeing feeling to be focused on the things that actually matter and detach and un-chaining yourself from the thoughts that have nothing to do with how the other person felt about you. And when you're lying awake in bed because here's another date that you went on that didn't work out so well and you couldn't figure out what did you say wrong this time. When in actuality had nothing to do with what you were saying, it was your presence. It was how you allow the other person to feel in that date. And if you're continuously in your head thinking about what to say next and what's the joke, you're not present. That is making the other person feel awkward. They're mirroring your behaviors and actions that are not present. And here we have people focus on the wrong thing. We drop great content each and every week and we wanna make sure that you guys get notified. And in order to do that, you're gonna have to smash that subscribe button and hit that notification bell. And if you've gotten a lot of value out of this, make sure you give us a like and share our videos with your friends. Absolutely. And one thing I talk about is we get so hung up on, oh, I used this one wrong word or I stumbled over my words or whatever it is. When people just don't care about that stuff, they care about the gist. Were you generally friendly? Did you talk about sort of in general some topics I was interested in or the topics that I was bringing up, did you respond to that? So it really is just not about these little tiny things that we think are super important. And then, you know, what's interesting it's not even just about these individual interactions, but the things that you're talking about, nodding, showing that you're listening, sometimes these are called micro affirmations. And so they're even great for sort of helping with inequality issues, right? Because the more that we can show other people micro affirmations and kind of show people that we're listening to them and include them in conversations, the better not just for us and for those individual interactions but also for inclusiveness. You talk about saying the wrong things and obviously now with the rise of cancel culture and people feeling like if they say the wrong thing they could lose their career, they could lose their livelihood and they could essentially lose their social networks because of it. Yet, you argue in the book, a lot of this is misplaced concern because we all are making mistakes, we're all human. So how can we get a little bit more comfortable being genuine and expressing ourselves when we're seeing this backlash in the media and this pressure more than ever to say the perfect thing at the perfect moment? Yeah, and I do, you know, I'd like to sort of have the caveat that it's not that words don't matter. Words matter, of course. But at the same time, it's not always the words we think, right? It's more, a lot of it is the intent and how we're talking about something and our willingness to engage in a conversation. And at the end of the day, people just aren't gonna jump down your throat as much as we tend to think. That's particularly true in person. It turns out there are huge social barriers to actually calling somebody out in person. And in fact, there is this default that we all have where if someone says something, we assume that they're coming at this thing with genuine good intent that whatever they're saying is probably factual for the most part. Most of the things we talk about are not hardcore political conversations, right? The kinds of things you think about when you think of canceled culture. You know, you're not gonna have a conversation with someone and bring up like the five most sort of difficult things to talk about. For the most part, even if you talk about things in a clumsy way, people are willing to give you the benefit of the doubt. And I think keeping in that in mind and coming to a conversation genuinely is one of the best sort of pieces of advice. Yeah, well, there's also, when it comes to institutions, there's a lot more politics involved. There's people fighting for hierarchical positions. And there's so much more behind the scenes by the time that we see it on Twitter or on the news, it's been so sensationalized and people are talking about it for weeks that those exceptions are, they're burnt into our minds and they haunt us in our own conversations. But it's important to remember that there's so much more going on than what we're seeing when it comes out on the news. And actions matter. So it's not just about words with cancel culture, it's the actions. It's the behavior over time that may be represented with a gotcha moment or a misspoken word, but the behaviors and actions behind it are often what lead people to distrust us, to not want to work with us. So what you talked about brings the next caveat, right? So I feel like it almost lays the groundwork for sociopaths to get ahead because we come into situations feeling like, oh, this person's definitely has the best intentions. Why would I not trust this person? They mean well. And it does give people who could wield their influence in negative ways an advantage. So how do we counter the bullshitters, the people who do want to use their power and influence against us if we're going into situations being more trusting, more often than not. It does have that caveat for sure. And I think one domain where you see that really clearly is this domain of social engineering. So we often think of hackers who are going to hack into your account as people who are typing it their keyboard, trying to hack into your password with all this complex coding. But in fact, a lot of hackers practice social engineering, which is basically getting you to just reveal the information to get into your account because they convince you that they are someone that they're not. And all the same things we've been talking about as you noted, this tendency to trust other people, to not want to call someone out and call them a liar, right? All that keeps us from sort of questioning when someone says, I need to get into your account for this legitimate sounding reason. Can you just give me your password and your date of birth and your social security number or whatever it is? And so there are these spectacular cases. Kevin Mitnick is one where he basically would call up people and come up with these elaborate excuses. Like he checked the weather and there'd be a snowstorm and he'd say, okay, I'm working from home. He'd call someone up at Motorola and say, I'm working from home because of the snowstorm. I don't have my password. Could you just give me yours essentially through a whole rigmarole of additional points in that story? And people would eventually just give it to him or send him this confidential data that is not supposed to be sent to people outside of the company. And so I mean, part of it is that there is training in those kinds of cases, right? Against this kind of social engineering approach, but being prepared for it and recognizing that it's hard for us to call people out on this is helpful. I wanna add to that. And it's not just other people who are gonna ask us these questions and hope to get the information that they're looking for. You see it on social media all the time. I mean, they're programming their own software to work better, but they're also learning about us. There's a new phenomenon on Facebook that I've been seeing repeated lately, which is post your favorite artist's name in the comments below and see if they return and message you. I'm like, and it's all of these ANON accounts that aren't really going to anything, but yet people feel the need to post their favorite artist because, well, who doesn't want the attention of their favorite artist who's looking at this thread? But you're giving them the information that helps their machines, but also understand what you like so they can give you more of it so you engage even more. Totally. I have a friend who posted, and I don't know if this is a meme going around if it was just his thing, but it was like, okay, new game. What was your pet's name growing up? What number would you choose if you could pick any number and what non-numerical symbol would you choose if you could pick any? It's basically like, you know, everybody's password in the world. Thanks for the password, yeah. Yeah.