The Power of Communication and Body Language
as a child growing up
i used to enjoy watching cartoons and
tv shows that had a number of
superheroes
from icons like superman
and spiderman and a host of others
i was always fascinated by the different
powers
and abilities that each one of them
possessed
but one thing that i found very
interesting was their backstory
of how they acquired their superpowers
because initially many of them did not
know how to use them to help others
but with time patience
and practice they were able to master
those newfound skills and abilities and
began saving lives
all over the world
and as i look around i can only imagine
that many of you
also had childhood superheroes and wish
that you had
superpowers and abilities as well
but as adults today i’d like for you to
imagine
what if you had the ability to read
human emotions
with great accuracy while reducing or
minimizing the risk
of misjudging others based off our own
opinions
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and wouldn’t it be great to be able to
read someone’s body language
to be able to help them get through
tough times or personal crisis
and get to a better state in life well
i’m here to let you know
that each one of these things are
possible and i’d like to share with you
some
how to recognize tips
that have helped me as a police officer
and a polygraph examiner
now early in my career i was a pretty
decent communicator
but i wasn’t a great communicator
but just like other superheroes i knew
that i wanted to help other people
so in order to do this i had to get out
of my comfort zone and start learning
more about myself while also learning
about others
and once i started investigating
criminal cases
i realized that i had to step up my game
you see i discovered that i had been
missing small subtleties
such as microexpressions and body
language gestures and cues
that were right in front of my face but
unfortunately
i wasn’t picking up what others were
laying down
but with time patience and practice
i was able to master these newfound
skills and abilities
and because of this i’ve been able to
help a number of people
get through some tough times and crisis
in their life
on personal and professional levels
and so i’d like to share with you some
of the
abcs of effective communication
these are active listening
body language and congruency
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now when we talk about communication one
of the first things we need to
understand
is communication is the act of imparting
or exchanging ideas
or information now this can be verbal or
non-verbal
typically we start with a messenger and
a receiver the messenger will send
information to the receiver and the
receiver provides feedback to the
messenger
and this will continue and go on and on
and on throughout the conversation
this is very important to establish
effective communication when meeting
someone because it helps
build trust and rapport
active listening active listening is the
verbal component of communication
and this helps us with the channels of
how people
think learn and communicate with each
other with each other
and they are auditory
visual and kinesthetic or tactile
now our auditory learners typically
think
learn and communicate in terms that
involve
hearing and they’ll often speak in terms
like
i hear you hey listen to this
or that sounds good to me
our visual learners will think learn and
communicate
in ways that involve seeing and they’ll
often speak in terms like
i see what you’re saying picture this
or that looks good to me
and our last kinesthetic or tactile
these learners will
typically think learn and communicate in
ways that
that involve touching or feeling
they like to get hands on and write into
the thick of things
and often they will speak in terms like
something doesn’t feel right or let me
hold it
or you need to get a grip
so for example a package comes in the
mail that requires assembly
now the auditory learner will take that
item out of the box and they would
prefer to have some type of audible
instructions to accompany them if that’s
not available then they will maybe ask
someone to help
read those instructions out loud and if
that’s not available that they may read
the instructions themselves
and say it out loud so they can process
what they hear
our visual learner they’re going to look
for pictures
illustrations or diagrams to help them
piece the items together
and if that’s not available then they’ll
read the instructions step by step
so that they can process what they see
now
on the other hand the kinesthetic and
tactile learner they’re going to take
that
item right out of the box they’re going
to discard the instructions all together
and they’re going to go straight
hands-on
and they’re going to start to assemble
that item unless they run into a snag
and if they run into a snag then they’ll
go to one of the other learning channels
so you may be saying well i do each one
of these
and while that may be true we’re
typically stronger in one area
and not as strong in some of the others
now you may be asking yourself well how
is this going to help me help
anyone well you see when we understand
how individuals think
learn and communicate
we’re better able to assign tasks in
our homes in schools in the workplace
or even in everyday general society
because we learned to speak the same
language
because if it feels good to you it feels
good to me
if it sounds good to you it sounds good
to me
and if it looks good to you then it
looks good to me
so we continually continue to build
rapport
with others to show that we’re
understanding
body language body language is the
non-verbal component of communication
now contrary to popular belief
there is no one definitive body language
gesture or cue that indicates deception
some of you may have heard the classic
saying
well i’ve heard if a person crosses
their arms they’re being deceptive well
that in itself is not absolutely true
as some of you may be viewing this
presentation right now
you may be seated with your arms crossed
simply because
you’re cold or chilly or maybe that’s
just how you relax so we have to look at
everything in its overall context
for example if i cross my arms
and tilt my head as though i’m lending
an
ear and i give an eyebrow flash
and nod my head it may show that i’m
engaged or interested
but on the other hand if i cross my arms
and keep them in an uptight position and
show a sign of anger
and inhale deeply and keep my shoulders
upright
it may show that i’m frustrated
irritated
uninterested or being guarded so we have
to look at everything in its overall
context
and when we talk about body language
micro expressions are a great
tool to help us establish emotion
now for those of you who do do not know
micro expressions are a brief
involuntary facial movement that usually
lasts about a half a second or less
and they’re based off the emotion felt
at the time of their display
now for the past 50 plus years
scientists and researchers have studied
these micro expressions
and they’ve determined that we all have
seven universal traits in common
happiness sadness
anger disgust
fear surprise and contempt
and because of time purposes i’m only
going to be able to share a handful of
those with you
so as we look in the first diagram here
in the photo you see we’re focusing on
the area here
in between the eyebrows as we look at
the muscles
we see a furrowing in the eyebrows which
show a
downward and an inward movement
which is indicative of anger
now this should not be confused with
concentration as concentration number
one would last
longer than a micro expression
and other than that it would show
sometimes a squinting of the eyes as the
lower eyelids increase
and it would show more of an intense
focus
now in the second photo we see the exact
opposite whereas in anger
we saw a down and inward movement we see
an
up and an inward movement here
in the muscles just in between the
eyebrows
and these are indicative of sadness
and often associated with sadness as we
see in the eyes
there’s a softening of the eyes
and in our last photo
we’re used to seeing the lips outside
the mouth in a relaxed state however in
this photo we see
that the lips are pulled inward
which we call lip tucking and this lip
tucking shows that some type of emotion
is being
repressed that emotion is being held in
inside as some type of tension and
oftentimes we’ll see this when someone
is
biting their tongue or holding their
words back so that they don’t say
something that they’ll regret
later and so i like to say when the lips
begin to hide
there’s tension building inside
and in our last group of photos here we
see different sets of hands
and these hands appear to be
self-soothing
as they’re massaging each other or you
see people pull on their fingers
or play with jewelry on their fingers as
well
these are very strong signs of stress
nervousness or anxiety
and often affiliated with this the hands
may begin to sweat
and this is why we’ll see athletes such
as
baseball players they’ll pick up dirt
off the ground and dry their hands
or gymnasts they’ll use chalk to dry
their hands before they perform
or just everyday people in society when
they get nervous
we dry their hands on their pants
congruency congruency is the ability
to analyze the verbal and the non-verbal
components of communication
and what we’re looking for are matches
and mismatches
because these help indicate truth and
deception
so for example as we typically affiliate
the word yes as something being positive
and in the affirmative
the head normally moves up and down
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and opposite of this we affiliate the
word no
with something being negative or on the
contrary
so if i say hey
that shirt you’re wearing
i i really love it it it looks great on
you
you have to ask yourself are my verbal
and non-verbal components matching or
mismatching
or when you ask someone how they’re
doing
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and they display a sign of sadness
briefly and say
i i’m okay
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you have to ask yourself are they really
okay or are they just saying they’re
okay
because sometimes we have to dig a
little bit deeper
and so i would charge you to take
your active listening skills and your
body language skills
and look for those matches and
mismatches because
when you ask the right questions
you will get the right answers
and remember when someone has something
to say and they’re willing to talk to
you
they just want to be heard it’s just our
job
to listen to them
and so as i close i’d like for you for
you to imagine once again
being able to help that person that’s
angry or nervous
by helping them calm down and relax
or maybe that person is going through
sadness and depression
by helping them get to a better state in
life before it’s potentially too late
and so i’d like to end with a quote from
jonathan swift
vision is the art of seeing
what is invisible to others
in other words start using your new
found skills and abilities
and if you’re willing to take the time
to learn and practice
then maybe we can all be superheroes
to help build and improve relationships
between others one person
one step at a time
thank you
you