Attract Your Perfect Relationship

You can’t be a great communicator without being a great people reader.

Attractive communicators are super-detectives of human signals. They’re alert to every little shift.

So, how open are you to what’s going on?

Many of us have developed a kind of protective bubble that keeps the world out. If you live in a busy city you will know the unnerving feeling of scurrying down a quiet street at dusk or being stuck in the middle of a crowd of drunks on a Saturday night. It’s not surprising we shut down. There are times when we don’t want to notice things and we don’t want to be noticed.

This is a protective mechanism and it works well when you use it selectively. What sometimes happens, though, is that we filter out the world. And it is not a good way to be if you need to pick up signals. Tune back into the world with the following exercise.

An Exercise to Sharpen Up your Senses

Take five days and every day make up your mind to use one sense more consciously.

Day 1: Look out for things. Notice what you see.
Day 2: Listen for sounds going on around you.
Day 3: Pay attention to bodily sensations.
Day 4: Sniff things out – what smells do you notice?
Day 5: Get a taste for life. What tastes do you come into contact with? What tastes do you get in your mouth?

Also, practise the body awareness exercises (see page 000), notice when you’re not paying attention and spend more time being present.

In communication, people often ask me what signals they should look out for and I say with a smile, ‘Anything that changes!’ Here are some useful types of change to look out for and some very general ideas as to what they could mean. Remember, it’s important to be open to interpretation.

There’s a great advert on British TV which shows a dishevelled guy wearing pretty scruffy clothing running crazily towards a man and starting to push him. Our first thought is likely to be that he’s going to attack that person. And then the camera angle switches and you see him pushing the man out of the way of falling bricks. Things aren’t always as they seem.

Forwards Movement

This could be a sign that a person is paying more attention or that they are on the alert for action. It could also mean that they can’t hear well or even that they are trying to get a closer whiff of your perfume.

Backwards Movement

Sometimes people move back when they want to think about something. It’s as if they need to give themselves more distance. This may be because it’s too much to contemplate all at once or because they sense a threat (real or imagined). .

Crossing Limbs

Sometimes people cross their limbs when they’ve received information that makes them uncomfortable or warns them they need more time to think. It may be a stalling tactic. When you cross your limbs, you are making it more difficult for the energy to flow. If you are trying to figure out a problem or to come unstuck from something, crossing your limbs could hinder you.

Rhythmical Movement

Notice any rhythmical movements people make when they’re talking. If they have a jagged rhythm or are very frenetic, that’s generally a hint that they’re having some thoughts that aren’t that useful. If their rhythm is paced and even, such as a gentle but slight nodding of the head or moving up and down of a foot, this generally indicates they’re enjoying something pleasant. When people talk about how they are at their best, they often fall into a rhythm as they experience it.

Hand Movement

Pay particular attention to the hands. They are one of the most expressive parts of our body, as anyone who has seen Italians talk will agree!
As we feel the urge to speak our hands often move. Sometimes when someone is about to speak but loses the opportunity you will see a hand somewhere up around their face. Look out for hands being moved upwards or outwards.

Sometimes people make a little gesture like this and then pull them back. This might be a sign that someone wants to say something. Or they might be thinking something and then stopped themselves for some reason.
People also use their hands to mark out things in the space around them. They’ll put their hands in a particular location when they’re describing something. A common example of this is when someone talks about ‘putting something behind them’ and moves their hands in a backwards movement.

A skilled communicator will be asking questions that get people into all sorts of states and will watch as they mark them all out in the space around them. When Sandy talked about a ‘fantastic opportunity’, for example, he lifted his left hand with the palm up and curled his fingers inwards and he moved his arm back and then forwards and stopped with a jolt. He was mapping out his representation of ‘fantastic opportunity’ in the space around him. That space is anchored to ‘fantastic opportunity.  If you want him to think of something as a fantastic opportunity you can point or look to the space as you tell him what you want.

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