#18 The Hidden Science of First Impressions

Welcome to episode number 18. And the crazy thing about this is. So I wanted to give an update because we're halfway through the year, and I have read 16 out of 24 books this year. About half of those, or a little more than half, I've actually listened to, and the other half have been sitting down and just reading hardcover or print printed books and actually sitting down and reading those. And those are the books I go through on the podcast. And. And I've read a lot of those. And the thing is, what I want to start doing is introducing lessons that I learn from my Audible books. And so this will be like a little mini series within the podcast that studies the short lessons from the audible version of these books. I've listened to probably, you know, five to 10 of these, and these will be short, impactful summaries of these books. And these episodes won't be too long, but long enough to where you get enough out of it. So before we get into this, I just want to mention this because I thought this was really interesting. I was meeting with someone today, and I was talking with them, and I asked him, just out of curiosity, how many books do you read in a year? And I think I found one in a million or one in a hundred million people in that one person. Like a. One of one, truly. And they said, oh, man, that's a good question. I've. I probably read two to 300 books a year. You know, I was just thinking, oh, my goodness, that's a lot. And I, I, ultimately, the reason why I'm sharing that is I want to build up to that. I mean, I think that would be awesome to be able to read like, five books a week. But he was saying, yeah, I, I read like four books a week. That's on the lower side. I'll read more than that. I'll keep, like, a retainer of seven books that I'm constantly reading all at the same time. And so ultimately, I would love to get to that point or even read just a hundred books in a year. And that, that's just something I wanted to bring to your guys's attention because I think it's really, you know, inspiring. And, you know, that's what, like, incredible. And so if you are out there and you're like that, please feel free to contact me, whoever you are. I'd love to get in touch with you and just find out what you've learned and what you read. And that's one of my favorite things to do. And anyways, that was just something you Know, I was thinking, oh, I've read, you know, my goal was 24 books this year and I'm talking to someone that has probably read like, you know, a hundred books so far. And so, yeah, it was just something that was inspiring to me and can be inspiring to you as well. And you know, reading, you know, reading comes naturally to some people and, you know, not as naturally to others, but I think it's still really impressive and I wanted to share that cuz that's what this whole podcast is about. So let's get into this episode, but before we do that, I want to go through this app or this idea that has been really helping me. But first I got to set it up. So imagine this. You've just finished reading a book that blew your mind. You're hiding it, you're highlighting it like crazy. You're underline, underlining every other sentence. And you, you really just think, all right, this is the book, right? But then a week later, and this happens to me a lot, you forget everything. I've done this with the Audible books. You know, I, I take some notes, but not a lot. And then all of a sudden, you can't remember most of the things. And the thing is, that's why readwise comes in handy. That's the problem it solves. Readwise isn't just an app. It's a system. A system that takes the best ideas you've ever read and makes sure they stick. They actually use this scientific way of learning, and it's like having a personal assistant for your brain. And here's how it works. Every time you highlight something, whether it's in a Kindle book, a physical book, or even an article online, Readwise saves it. But it doesn't stop there. It brings those highlights back to you day and night after day in perfectly timed doses. So you can have like five highlights of books a day. It's like compound interest for your knowledge. This is what I'm talking about all the time on my podcast and why it works. David Ogilvy once said, it takes a big idea to attract the attention of consumers. Well, readwise is built on a big idea. Retention is the key to mastery. And Steve Jobs, he believed in simplicity. He said, if you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough. That's exactly what readwise does. It simply, it simplifies the overwhelming process of learning and turns it into something effortless. So again, Read Wise is amazing. Go sign up using my link below. It's you get two months for Free. One of the best, best uses of my time or uses of my money, I would like to say. And again, one of the best things that you can do today to start optimizing the YouTube, your journey of learning. And now let's get into the episode. So Vanessa Van Edwards wrote this book called Captivate, and she's a behavioral investigator who's spent years decoding social dynamics. So in her book Captivate, she breaks down exactly how these first impressions work, and she uses, like, these first impressions, and she tells you how to use them to build deeper, more genuine connections. And so I put. I have put together this outline, this podcast outline that I want to go through, and it talks about first impressions, conversations, and then it goes to confidence and networking. And then it also lie detection, which is actually really fascinating. Lie detection was really interesting. This whole, just everything that I'm going to be talking about in this episode was really interesting. And I made sure to have the best notes on this one, on this podcast episode, especially just as possible, because it was one of my favorite books that I've actually listened to probably this year. And I think it will tremendously interest you guys. But not only interest, you guys will really help you guys. So let's go through first impressions. There's this thing called snap judgment. So when we actually, we form impressions almost instantly, studies actually show that people form a lasting opinion in two seconds. First impressions are remarkably accurate. It's about accurate. It's accurate 76% of the time. So make those first moments count. And this is just one little thing that, you know, can be, you know, understood where those first impressions actually make a big difference. And so how do you. How do you work on these first impressions? Right, so there's something called the triple threat, and it's called. Or what it's known as is hands, posture, and eyes. So use open body language. What is open body language? All right, well, hands. You want to keep your hands. You want to keep them visible. So if you're sitting down on a table, keep your hands on top of the table. If you're standing, don't keep your hands right in front of you. You want to, you know, lower them a little bit, but you want to gesture naturally. You want raised. You want to have raised palms that signal honesty. In terms of posture, you want to stand tall with your shoulders back, which is also known as a power pose to look confident. So you. You stand tall and you use open body language. So actually, there. There was something I was telling someone I know about your feet. If your feet are standing a little bit outwards, right? If you have your feet pointed a little bit outwards, you're, and you're straight up tall and you have like a good posture, you're actually signaling that power pose or that posture of winning, which is actually really interesting. It when you start drooping and you, your, your earlobe. So Vanessa Van Edwards said that the greatest measurement in your body is from your earlobes to your, your shoulders. And the interesting thing about that is, is why it is is because the earlobes to your shoulders means that when, when you're like hunching or your, your, your shoulders are going up. The reason why I'm hesitating or you know, stuttering so much is because I'm actually doing the movements while I'm talking. So when you have your shoulders go up to your ears, you're signaling like defeat. But when you have your shoulders go down to your, you know, all the way back, you have a good posture. You're signaling that power pose. And then in terms of your eyes, you want to maintain eye contact, which is around 2 to 5 seconds to show that you care. And it also signals that you want to build trust and you're building trust with that person. The interesting thing is that this is the next thing. Handshake and touch always offer a firm handshake, even for brief meetings. The interesting thing about skin to skin contact, which is that handshake touching, all that stuff, skin to skin contact actually floods both people that the person like when you shake hands or you touch them on the arm slightly, all that it was something called oxytocin and it's basically a trust hormone, but it also gives you some dopamine. So you actually, you like that. And so a solid handshake and a friendly touch instantly convey confidence and warmth. The interesting thing about what Vanessa Van and Wertz talked about is when you actually shake someone's hand, you can tell if they're extroverted or introverted. Introverted by the way they shake your hand. I, I'm forgetting all the things and the science behind it and I don't want to get it wrong. But there is a whole thing but between extroversion and introversion based off of how they shake your hand. So it's really interesting. I definitely go recommend listening to the Diary of a CEO podcast with Vanessa Van Edwards on, on that podcast, both episodes, both were amazing and just incredible. So I'll link to any resources that I have down in the links below or in the description below. But it's one of the best. The next thing is smile. Genuinely use a warm, genuine smile. So a true smile engages the eyes. So what she was talking about is you want to. Don't fake your smile, but have a smile to where when you're smiling, you're activating your upper cheek muscles. So I'm doing it right now. You can't see it. I wish I had video. But you want to. You want to activate your upper cheek muscles to where you're actually. It's signaling sincerity, and it actually makes you more memorable. And these are just, you know, first impressions. You want to smile with those cheek muscles. A funny thing is when you actually start doing what I'm going to go into with these emotions and all this stuff, when you start doing it, you actually start to feel that emotion. So if you actually try this, you'll start to feel it after like a couple of seconds or 10, 20 seconds if you do it long enough. The next thing is dress like the. The way you dress, so appear well groomed and appropriately attired. So clean, neat clothes. Your appearance sets the stage. Polished attire and good posture reinforce confidence even before you speak. So this is all about, you know, first impressions, but now we move into conversations. So how do you have a good conversation with someone? Well, the thing is, what she was saying is ask sparkling questions. So avoid that flat small talk like, how was your day? Or all this stuff, right? Instead, post curious or quirky sparker questions. And for example, one guest simply asked, do you like soup? This was actually in her book. She wanted to talk to someone that she really looked up to. She was on the show and one of the guests asked. So there was three of them. It was her, Vanessa Man Edwards, and two other people. One person she looked up to, and then another person she didn't really know. That one person asked, do you like soup? To both of them. And it led to an enthusiastic discussion about favorite recipes, what their, you know, their grandparents did, and just, you know, all this stuff. But the key point about that is novel or unexpected questions boost that dopamine, and they also boost memory memorability, so being memorable in their mind. The next conversation tip is push hot buttons. Look for topics that light people up, whether that's a hobby, passion, or a recent project. Clues include nodding, animated gestures, or exclamations like, wow, tell me more. Um, there. There's so many different things. So when you nod, you have those animated gestures or just like, exclamations like, it really signals that you're listening to them. And that's Actually a trait of founders or or really good or certain types of founders is actually or a leader. I I want to say. I should say leader. A good leader. Jocker Willinks talks about this. A good leader is being one to listen a lot. But a manager is someone that talks a lot. So when you see these cues you you should dig in. So when you look for these hot buttons and when you see those cues, dig in. So example like I noticed you volunteer with X or have you always done that? There's so there's certain specific interest questions that get much higher engagement and you can just try these out with certain people. You know, she really recommends that like start doing these with you know, certain things with certain people and you'll actually start to learn more like that. Um, the next thing is thread theory. Find common ground. Begin by spotting any connection ask for ask about mutual contacts, context or shared interests. For example, how do you know the host or have you been to this conference before? Finding even just one thread creates instant rapport and just a natural topic to talk about. The next tip is use the name game. So when you hear someone's name, repeat it aloud. So nice to meet you Eliza or nice to meet you. You know, whatever their name is, mentally spell it and link it to someone familiar. So like you know, I know this person from this place. Oh, you remind me of that because that's your name. Um, this is actually a three step trick. So repeat spell in your mind and then associate. It cements the names and memory. If you're pretty bad at remembering names and people love hearing their own name, it actually present actually produces that oxytocin and it also creates that instant trust. The next thing is genuine praise. So she talks about high highlighting or being a highlighter. So give sincere specific compliments about the person. Highlight what you truly admire, whether that's this, their skills, ideas or style. This highlighter approach is more meaningful than generic flattery. Yeah, it's really interesting and for example this is something you would say I noticed how attentive you are with guests. That's impressive to make them feel seen and respected. So you want to offer them genuine praise. And you can also do this in businesses where you offer genuine praise to someone and that produces confidence. The next thing is tell an invite story. So she says to keep even if it's not your own story, keep a memory or even just like put a note tab in your phone of all these stories that you really think are interesting that you could share with people that would make them that Would capture their attention. So she says, share a brief personal story or ask them for one. So stories capture attention and they create emotional peaks. For instance, that reminds me of when I did this. Or what's the story behind your name? Slash, picture, or just anything. So storytelling makes the conversations richer and more memorable. Again, I really emphasize storytelling or just telling stories or inviting those stories in and saying, hey, what? Like, you know, do you have any stories? Or, like, there's certain ways of asking that, but in ways, yeah, that. That's a really interesting thing. The next thing is confidence. So use a winning stance. So, yeah, this is the next tip. So we've gone through. We've gone through the conversations. We've gone through the first impressions, but now we get into confidence. And confidence is. Again, it's using that winning stance. So believe and act like a winner. It's. It's actually. So you can do this right now. You can either stand or sit, you know, upright. And what you want to do is you want to have your chest open, your shoulders down and back and your chin up. This is called the power pose, or. Well, this is the winning stance. But the power pose is actually the arms raised or on your hips. It is actually a universal. It's like. It's like the. The superhero you. You see, like their shadow and their, you know, their hands on their hips. That's why they call it the power pose. It's a universal confidence signal to anyone in any culture, any society. It actually makes you feel stronger and others perceive you as more capable when you do this. So it's just another tip. It's really interesting. The next thing is a firm greeting. So a confident hello. So that's the smile, handshake, and eye contact. The. The triple nod that really sets the tone. And studies show that perceived confidence outweighs expertise when earning trust. So again, you have that confidence. When you have that confidence, it earns trust. The next one is approach people with a friendly. Well, this is actually part of the same one. But approach people with a friendly but assured demeanor. People are drawn to winners. The next. The official next one is be authentic and play to your strength. Your. To your strength. So don't force extroversion. So before we get into this, the interesting thing is there's actually three types of people. There's extroverted people. So the people that thrive off of being in social environments. Then there's introverted people. The introverted people are people that go. And they like to be with themselves. They like just reading. They like. They. It's really hard for them to go out and do things with other people. Then there's a type of people called ambiverts. And ambiverts can go out, it takes a little bit, but they can go out to these social gatherings. But they also have like a meditation time. They also have time for themselves. And I mean, I would say I'm an ambivert, but that an ambivert is someone in the middle. And you could have, you could lean a little bit more one way than the other. But it is really interesting. I never knew that. And that's something I found out from this book that I. Or just her interviews with Stephen Bartlett on the Diary of a CEO podcast. I thought that was really interesting. So the interesting thing, when she says be authentic and play to your strengths, she says, don't force extroversion. Plan social events that fit your style. If big parties drain you, focus on smaller meetings or invite a friendly colleague along. I just did this where there was a big party that I didn't go to, but the next day I went to a one on one with someone I knew. I, you know, some people really thrive the one on ones more or some people thrive off the parties more. It really depends on who you are. And Vanessa advises only interact in places where you don't have to fake it. So saying no to draining events preserves your energy and your confidence. So again, you don't want to go into environments. You want to play to your strengths and be authentic. The next thing is energy breaks. It's okay to step away and regroup. For example, take short breaks at like the buffet or the restroom, you know, it's called the Grazer strategy. It's in order to recharge. This helps you stay enthusiastic and prevents social fatigue. The next tip is project positivity. Fake smiles fall flat, just like what we were talking about earlier. Genuine enthusiasm is actually infectious. Focus on your successes in what you enjoy. Confidence is contagious. When you relax and actually enjoy yourself, others pick up on your ease. It's that whole idea of like feeling the room in, in a way where you go into this and when you feel the room, you can feel if the, the vibe is off, if something's not okay between you and someone else or it just feels off. But you can also project your positivity by acting upbeat or just, you know, having that confidence or being genuinely enthusiastic. The next whole thing. So we went through confidence, all that stuff. The next thing is networking. This is really interesting. I found this really interesting. But she says work the Room by quote sweet spot. So what she means is when you enter a social space, you want to enter it strategically. So avoid the doorway and edges at first. So when you walk into a social gathering, don't stand by the doorway and don't go to the edges. Instead move to the high traffic zones like the bar or the bar ends or near the host. So these areas actually they naturally gather people. So example opener at the bar, how do you like the wine tonight? Or simply raise your glass and say cheers. I'm like, this is my name. Or the next tip for a social networking environment is host introductions. So make a point to greet the host or organizer and say, thanks for having me. This looks like a great group. Then ask them for introductions like anyone you think I should meet. So staying visible to the host can prompt them to connect you with others. This is a really good tactic. The next tactic is approach small groups gently. So spot someone standing or sitting alone with like a food or a drink and join them with a smile and say, mind if I join you? Or that looks delicious. May I share this table? Casual invitation in like casual invites, break the ice naturally. The next tip is avoid the start zone traps. So don't like, you don't want to start bothering people the moment they arrive. And so early on, what is called the start zone, attendees are distracted. They're focused on their coats, putting away their coats, their phones, the nerves of actually being at the party. So wait until they've kind of settled down and they've had a drink before approaching. Like until, yeah, they, they've had a drink before approaching. And this is the social zone. So instead of being at the start zone, go to the social zone. The next thing is don't hide with your friends. A quick wave or a hun, a hug to friends is fine, but then you, you should branch out because staying, staying with, staying only with known colleagues means that you'll miss these new connections at a, at a networking party. And ultimately you want to go do that. So use your initial energy to circulate and revisit friends later if you want to. The next thing is grace. For energy, circulate by grazing. Take small portions of food or drinks multiple times. This gives you social breaks to refill your plate or drink in natural transitions to new conversations. Now this is one of my favorite parts that we're going to get into. It's lightest lie detection. So we went through networking, confidence, all this stuff, but the next thing is lie detection. This is interesting because it really helps you spot lies. So Watch for incongruence. So this is the first step or just the first tip with lies. So watch for incongruence. So tune into facial cues. A facial cue is what we're going to get to in a second. But tune into facial cues versus their words. If someone says I'm fine, but then flashes a quick look of anger or contempt, trust the face. So micro expressions last less than a second and can't be faked. So they reveal true emotions. So if you tell them, hey, are you fine? And they have a look of surprise or they have a look of fear, and I'll tell you how you know that in a second because it's called key micro expressions. They will show their true emotions. So if someone says, yeah, I'm doing fine, and they're shaking their head no, that means they're not fine. Trust the face or their head, not their, the words they're saying. The next thing is learn the key micro expression. So there's seven for some reason. I have six on this list, I think, but I'll just go through what I have right now. So anger. So anger has pinched eyebrows. So if you do this right now, this is actually kind of a fun experiment. I do. I'm not joking. I really like this book. You should definitely listen to it. I'll definitely link to it. But what you do. So just do this with me, for example. So anger shows pinched eyebrows. So pinch your eyebrows and have tight lips. All right? Now once you do that, that's the anger expression. So these are universal expressions. And there's seven of them. Then the next is contempt. And contempt is a one sided sneer. So think about it as kind of like a smile, but it's not. So just have one side of your lip raised. So yeah, I, I just did it. It's a little bit weird. It's a weird thing. If you're not used to that. Then the next one is the genuine happiness. So that's the, you know, that's the really happy, you know, like, like squint your eyes. Actually, if you squint your eyes, it makes you look like you really care about someone, which just do it anyways because you know, you, you probably do. But like squint your eyes a little bit and like raise those upper cheek muscles like, you know, above your jaw and that will signal genuine happiness. Surprise is really funny. So surprise causes raised eyebrows and a drop draw. So you, you raise your eyebrows and then you drop your jaw. Then fear looks like wide eyes and a slightly open mouth. So you're so fear. So the difference between fear and surprise is surprise is just the raised eyebrows, but fear is. You can see the upper whites of their eyes. So the upper whites is really interesting. The upper ites, the, sorry, the upper whites are right above your pupil. And so if you can see that, that actually shows true fear. And then they have an open mouth. Surprise is just raised eyebrows with the drop draw. Then the next one which I. That's six. The seventh one is sadness and that's when you frown. Just really sad. Like a puppy dog. Right. I feel like I'm, I feel like I'm going through like a, a teaching lesson. This is really funny and I really like this. But you, you, you like kind of frown down like. You should definitely watch Vanessa Van Edwards because she goes through this and she's like natural and on video. She's amazing. And I'm just doing a review and like giving you the quick rundown of this book. Man, this is amazing. So yeah, sadness is where you like, you have that frown and you go a little bit down. I wish you could see me right now. But it's, it's. Yeah, I won't explain anymore. It's, it's pretty self explanatory. You just watch your video, it's amazing and buy the book because it's amazing. But those are the seven universal across every single like culture. Like everyone will recognize those. And so that's something you can easily learn that can apply to any culture. So the next thing is use surprise as a litmus test. So when you're asking, when asking unexpected questions and honor. An honest person often shows surprise. So eyebrows up, mouth open. If you see a fear micro expression instead the eyes wide, tense, lower eyeballs during a reveal, it may mean they anticipated it. That's really interesting. The next one is focus on brief flashes. So pay attention to expressions that flash briefly. This is what we were first talking about when going through the lie. The lie detection with the incongruencies. Anything held them longer than one second is usually controlled or polite. So the instinctive flash, anxiety, anger, relief is actually the more honest signal. The next is observe voice and pauses. So in conversation, the oh man, I wish I could do this because it's amazing. But there's like this dry voice. So in conversation, sudden pitch changes, long hesitations or overly defensive answers can also hint at dishonesty. Um, and the really interesting is there's this thing called vocal fry. So when you get like, I don't know how you do it, I don't really know the science behind it. But vocal fry is when either you're really nervous or something happens. And so your. Your voice sounds, you know, kind of like this. And it's weird, but, like, it's so interesting. You should go watch the video with Vanessa Van Edwards. It's incredible. Um, but she talks about all this and the vocal fry. It's kind of when you, like, shrivel up a little bit and you're kind of hunched, and it's like. It's really weird, but it's super cool. It's like, studying people is incredible and one of the coolest things ever, because you can kind of get these hints and all these stories and everything. Just do, like, little things like this. And so just to wrap up this episode, because it's, you know, 30 minutes. Like, this was 30 minutes. But I hope you guys learned so much. And this week, I just want you to try one of these things. Just try looking for one of these things or try actually using one of these. See? One of these things. So practice either the smile or, you know, nod a couple of times in your conversation. When you actually nod three times in your conversation, you actually are showing that you really agree. So don't nod, you know, more than that or, like, less than that. If you nod, like, three times, you actually are showing you really agree and you're really listening to someone. And then you should ask someone a question that invites them to light up about what they're doing or what they talk about, and then pay attention to what changes, not just in how people respond to you, but how you feel. Showing up with intention. And, yeah, it's truly amazing. This is like, you should go check out all the resources. I'll try to link to everything in the description, but this is one of the most amazing books on people I have ever read, especially this year, and it's one of the only books I've read on people. But I was truly impressed by how well Vanessa Van Edwards does this and just kind of her full job around this. And again, go read the book. Go listen to the. The episodes with the Diary of a CEO when you get a chance. And so, again, thank you for listening to this episode. It. It was a little bit longer than it's supposed to, but I hope you learned so much. It's one of my favorite things, actually, to talk about. It's really fun just to learn about people, how to study them, how to. Also, just a quick note, when people cross their arms, that's. That means that they're closed off. Like, they don't they don't want to talk as much. I would just notice that. Or, you know, she says don't have your hands anywhere near like your face or just in your upper body and just keep them like down below or just use or, or just use hand gestures. She so she actually, like, she'll wave at people when she says hi, so she'll say, hey, how are you doing? And she'll wave her hand while she does it. It's, it's crazy. But definitely watch her videos. Go check out her book. Go definitely watch some videos probably before you read the book just because you can see all this play out, see how she does it. And again, thank you for listening to this. I hope you learned a ton in this short podcast episode. And again, thank you for listening to this and I'll talk to you guys again soon.