My First Lesson in Body Language
Body language… the universal language we all speak incredibly well, but barely know how to read. We’re taught some of the basics, such as a firm hand shake, making eye contact during presentations and keeping good posture, but beyond that, there is no real education in reading body language.
Body language is the natural language of flirting. What your body does, says more about you than words. We can all fake interest in a conversation, but our body cannot. If you try to pick up a girl at a bar by approaching her from behind and she only turns her head to address you, what’s that say about her interest in you?*
Boys, in our teens read the generalized cliff notes on body language… We learn from movies or magazines (Maxim) that if she plays with her hair, she’s interested in you. If she leans in, that’s a sign of interest. If she smiles a lot, she’s interested.
The problem with these is that they are broad generalizations that have been pushed for years. A girl smiling doesn’t mean she’s interested, she could just be friendly. All girls play with their hair. If she leans in, she might not have heard you because you’re talking too quietly. But, men have said they are true, and we are only boys (and they seem to work on the girls in our class), so they MUST be true!
My first year of college, with my cliff note knowledge, I went to the first pub night determined to pick up a girl… My target, this blonde with a one shouldered red shirt(is there a name for this?) that she was wearing as a dress. She had on these red high heels that are burned into my head. God she was sexy!
But she was talking to this another guy, but looked like she wanted out. Didn’t see any hair twirling, no leaning in really close. I knew I had to save her!
In an act of Alpha-ness, I put my one arm in between him and her, and the other around the back of her chair. I said in my smoothest voice “Hey, looked like you needed a save. I’m Zach.” She turned her chair the opposite way and walked away without saying a word. Boom! In that instant I questioned if I’d ever have the courage to talk to another girl again! I had just been blown out of the sky.
What had I done wrong? Wasn’t I suave enough? Did I not seem confident in what I was doing? I took control of the situation like a man, why didn’t she respond? It turns out, I knew nothing about body language.
I sat down in her chair, and tried to establish who the hell I was. As I sat there, a brunette who’d been sitting on the other side of the gorgeous sniper who killed my confidence with a single shot, turned to me and said
“You didn’t do a very good job there did you?” I turned to her and said
“No not really.” She replied,
“You didn’t see that she was into that guy?” I turned my chair to face her.
“No! I thought she wanted to be saved!”
“You didn’t notice her punch him in the arm playfully? The way she was looking at his eyes and then his lips? The ‘accidental’ touches of her swinging foot?”
I hadn’t noticed any of these things… She was hitting him, how is that an indication she was interested in him? How was looking at his lips a indication? Maybe he just had something in his teeth, and maybe those ‘accidental’ foot touches really were accidental!
“Everything she was doing screamed interest! And you just looked like a stupid player asshole trying to pick her up.” She said. (This girl had just kicked me when I was down, but she was giving me advice, so I didn’t blow her off.)
“Then you come up behind her, put your arms in front and behind her… you trapped her like an animal. She had to escape the prison you instantly put her in.”
I didn’t say anything. She read my body language. Could tell I felt pretty lame and she wasn’t helping in that moment.. So she stopped. Put her hand out and said
“Hi, I’m Tiffany.”
In that 3 minutes, I realized I knew nothing about body language. I realized that body language actually meant something now. But where would I start? Then I stopped. Turned to Tiffany and said “Hi, I’m Zach.” I quickly replayed what she had just said to me while I was contemplating my existence. I realized… I had just gotten my first lesson in body language!
*It says she’s not interested. Never approach a girl from behind.
