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🏋️♀️ Use your body to your advantage
In 1967, researchers at UCLA wrote about the importance of nonverbal communication and how our body language and tone of voice can influence our message. Over the following decades, the research was misinterpreted and led to a popular yet false concept named 7/38/55, which indicates that:
Of course, this isn’t always true. When you listen to a technical speech, the words will account for more than 7% of the message. Plus, cultural norms, personal biases, past experiences, and the relationship between the communicators can also have a massive influence on how messages are perceived. And yet, there’s a point to the misinterpreted research: Nonverbal cues matter. If you tell me you’re happy, but your body language communicates the opposite, I’ll struggle to believe you. If you look furious, saying “Everything’s fine” won’t help. Body language matters because we intuitively sense when something doesn’t feel right. If you want to seem confident during conversations, stand up straight, pull your shoulders back, keep eye contact, and rotate your body to face the person you’re talking to. Ideally, your toes will point to your conversation partner, and your arms won’t cover your upper body. You can also use your body to build rapport by mimicking your conversation partner. We subconsciously like people who are like us. That’s true for common interests and preferences but also applies to body language. By imitating someone’s gestures, mimic, and tone, you can build rapport and connect on a subconscious level. Oftentimes, that’s what we naturally do anyway: When someone smiles at you, you smile back. When someone raises their voice, you do the same. It’s an instinct, but you can train yourself to consciously use rapport to better connect with your communication partner.
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