January 22, 2013

How to Play Hard To Get

In the realm of courtship, knowing how to play hard to get matters. A lot. I’ve heard many people tell me that when they have to work in order to get the attention or sexual availability of a member of the opposite sex, they enjoy it considerably more when they get it.

Like or not, we tend to subjectively perceive something more valuable if it was challenging to acquire than if it was just handed to us on a silver platter. And this pertains to male-female interactions as well.

Finding the Middle Ground

The problem concerning how to play hard to get is that many men and women go to an extreme and they do one of two things.

A) They do not play hard to get at all and they make themselves very easily available.

Now, to be clear, this doesn’t mean that members of the opposite sex still won’t like them. There are many traits beyond being a challenge that can make you attractive. However, learning how to play hard to get and doing this would really make them visibly more exciting.

B) They play hard to get too much, up to the point where they seem completely uninterested in the other person or totally inaccessible to them.

Thus, the other person will simply give up and stop pursuing them. Keep in mind that after all, this is called playing hard to get, not being hard to get. It’s all a fun little courtship game.

So, the trick is to find that middle ground. To behave in a way that makes you a challenge, but a surmountable one. That’s when you’re playing hard to get effectively.

It Starts With Your Attitude

The most important determinant by far of how well you can play hard to get is your attitude.

Guy and girlAs a confidence and communication coach, I’ve noticed that people who are very good at playing hard to get all have something in common regarding their attitude: they have a solid dose of social confidence.

This social confidence consists of several elements. First of all, they have a good self-image. They see themselves as likeable, attractive and worthy of the attention of men/women.

Second of all, they are willing to accept rejection and to risk the possibility that a person might sometimes be discouraged by the fact they pose a challenge. And last but not least, they’re not afraid to show their interest in somebody and they can also stop playing games when it’s fitting.

These forms of social confidence lead them to naturally behave in a way that makes getting them a fun challenge. They do it brilliantly well and they don’t even think about it.

Of course, you can try to just copy their behavior, and you will succeed to some extent, but it doesn’t work that well if you lack the inner social confidence.

Many times, you’ll miscalibrate those behaviors, or you’ll miss the subtleties in them and they’ll come off wrong when you use them. Plus, without the inner confidence, you’ll never internalize them and they won’t ever feel natural to you.

This is why I often say that the best way to learn how to play hard to get is to build your social confidence. Develop the attitude of people who are good at playing hard to get, and you’ll naturally become good as well.

With this in mind, I invite you to check out my special presentation on building social confidence. In it I will show you exactly where social confidence comes from, and what are the two simple, scientifically supported steps for improving it. Go here and watch it.

5 Ways to Play Hard To Get

Beyond working on the attitude part, there are some specific behaviors you can practice when dealing with persons of the opposite sex in order to successfully play hard to get. Here are the top 5 such behaviors that I’ve indentified as creating the very best results.

1) Giving double-sided compliments. A double-sided compliment is a positive remark about the other person, but which also contains an implicit joke or negative remark about them. For example: “You’re pretty cute for a short girl”.

In this case, calling the girl cute is a compliment, but the overall remark also implies that in general you don’t find short girls (which she is) cute. Double-sided compliments are a great way to convey interest, but in a cocky, non-needy way.

2) Taking rain checks. When somebody you like asks you out or to do something with them at a certain date and time, politely say to them that you can’t at that suggested moment because you have others plans, but that you’ll gladly do it some other time.

The key is to decline the invitation, but only for the proposed date and time. If you just decline it, they might think you’re simply not interested in them. You want to show availability and lack of availability at the same time.

3) Dividing your attention. When you’re in a group setting and there is a person you like in that group, pay attention to them, talk to them, but pay attention to the other members of the group as well, especially the ones of the opposite gender.

Do give this person attention but don’t give them your whole attention. Give them some attention, then take it away and refocus it, then give them some more, then take it away again.

4) Not showing too much interest too early. It’s rarely a good idea to convey to a member of the opposite sex, verbally or non-verbally, that you’re totally enthralled with them the very first moment you lay eyes on them.

A person with a good self-image and a lot of options in their life is not impressed that easily. Don’t try to hide that they caught your eye and you want to get to know them better. But don’t convey a ton of interest right off the bat either.

5) Not being in a hurry to get into a relationship. For a person who is confident and independent, there is nothing more off putting then to simply make out with some girl/guy at a party and have them immediately start treating you as if you’re their boyfriend/girlfriend: calling you non-stop, wanting to hang out all the time, visiting you and not leaving anymore, etc.

Take your time. Don’t be in a rush to make somebody your significant other and don’t suffocate them with your attention. Get to know them better, experiment, have fun, and let the relationship build up gradually.

As you employ these behaviors, bear in mind that in learning how to play hard to get, you’ll make much more progress from changing your attitude along with your behavior than by changing your behavior alone.

Again, I encourage you to watch this presentation on becoming socially confident.

Your behavior will always be inclined to reflect your inner attitude. And there is only so much that you can play hard to get if it doesn’t come from within. But if it does come from within (and you can make it so), it will change the way others react to you entirely.

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Filed Under: People Skills, Relationships Tagged With: , , , , , Leave a Comment
December 6, 2012

Shy Guys: Their Psychology and Their Recovery

Most statistics state than shyness is somewhat more common for girls than for guys. Nevertheless, make no mistake about it, there are heaps of shy guys out there, and many of them are in fact extremely inhibited.

These guys feel anxious in social situations and they feel particularly anxious around girls, especially the ones they find attractive. They have trouble engaging in conversations and keeping them going, they hide their sexual side, they are often invisible to the girls they like, and if they’re not they often get friend-zoned by these girls.

Unsurprisingly, their social life in general and their dating life in particular look pretty gloomy. And taking care of this issue is one of the most valuable actions they can accomplish.

As a social confidence coach, I work with shy guys on daily basis. Over time, this allowed me to see certain recurring patterns regarding why they are shy and how they can fix this. So, in this article, I’d like to share with you my most important findings.

The Making of Shy Guys

Generally speaking, shyness is the result of an overestimation of the risks social situations pose for you. But what these perceived risks are exactly, why they are perceived and what they signify varies from one person to another, and it varies based on gender as well.

I discovered that shy guys have two limiting beliefs in particular, which feed their timidity.

Firstly, shy guys perceive themselves as losers.

Success and status are very important for men. On average, they are significantly more important for them than they are for women. Men are especially competitive, achievement-seeking and results-oriented.

If a guy doesn’t see himself as successful and as having a good status, if he thinks other guys are better than him, he will tend to feel inferior and insecure.

Of course, success and status are very relative and the problem is that shy guys distort the reality in their heads and make themselves seem much, much worse than they are. And this generates unreasonable coyness.

Secondly, shy guys perceive themselves as sexually unattractive.

Even if they may seem themselves as successful, they still don’t see themselves as sexy. Deep down, they believe that a woman could never be sexually interested in them.

This is why they regularly try to compensate for their alleged lack of sexual attractiveness by being extremely nice with girls they like, paying a lot of attention to them or buying them expensive gifts.

Yet again, this lack of sexual attractiveness is merely a figment of their imagination, a result of some very faulty stereotypes used to understand human sexuality. It has little to do with the objective reality.

Now that you have a better understanding of the problem shy guys have, let’s talk about the solution.

From Shy Guy to Social Guy

A lot of shy guys appear to deem that their lack of social confidence is the result of their shortages in terms of success, status, looks, charisma or sexual experience.

Although these shortages may be to some degree real and they can be contributing factors to shyness, their role is only secondary. As I already alluded to, as a shy guy, the primary source of your shyness is your faulty thinking, not the way you are as a person.

Whatever your condition may be, trust me, I know several guys in the exact same condition who are very confident socially and have no problems making friends or enticing members of the opposite sex.

But your thinking amplifies your flaws, even invents false ones, and embellishes their meaning. This takes places automatically when you’re in social situations, and generates your feelings of anxiety and hesitancy to just be social.

Obviously, the solution is weeding out these automatic thinking patterns and replacing them with more accurate ones. It’s a step by step process which entails:

  • Indentifying unrealistic thoughts you have in social settings;
  • Challenging and correcting these thoughts;
  • Gradually developing a more social behavior;
  • And being persistent with this process.

This is a just a gross outline of the process. I’d like to show you in more detail how to implement it effectively. For this purpose I have created a special video presentation for you.

Go here now to check out the presentation and learn how the psychological process of changing your thinking and eliminating limiting beliefs works. You’ll get a lot of value out of it.

Unfortunately, shy guys miss out on a lot on life. I should know: I used to be one. You notice other guys making friends, having girlfriends and enjoying social interactions, while you’re just being an observer, waiting for something to simply fall in your lap. But it almost never does, and if it does, you’re not able to leverage it.

The good news is that you can change all of this. You can take charge your thinking, eradicate your limiting beliefs and gain the social confidence you want. All you need is the right guidance and the wiliness to apply it consistently. The improvements will follow naturally.

Image courtesy of Ed Yourdon

Filed Under: People Skills, Psychology, Success Tagged With: , , , , 6 Comments
November 6, 2012

How to Be Friendly

If you study the people who bond the easiest with others and have the richest social lives, it doesn’t take long to realize that much of their social success resides in the fact they are very friendly and gregarious, with both girls and guys. Luckily, you can learn how to be friendly as well, and join their ranks.

As a communication and confidence coach, one of my core activities is teaching others how to be friendly and confident socially, and helping them create the fulfilling interpersonal relationships they yearn for.

The thing is, friendliness is just a set of behaviors and a certain frame of mind. If you understand them, you know how to be friendly. And if you employ them effectively, you become more friendly and social.

With this in mind, here are the 4 essential behavioral and mental changes to make in order to be more friendly.

1. Use Social Initiative Exercises

The biggest component of friendliness is social initiative. Having social initiative means that you proactively generate social interactions or certain phases of social interactions. You don’t wait for others to be social with you before you’re social with them.

There are very specific actions that compose social initiative. You can take these actions, one or more at a time, and practice them deliberately, sort of like exercises. I’m talking about actions like:

  • Attending events that are social in nature: parties, classes, networking events, etc.
  • Walking up to new people or people you know and starting conversations.
  • Introducing yourself to people you don’t know when they join your conversation.
  • Asking the other person questions about themselves during a chat.
  • Talking about yourself and sharing your own ideas and experiences.
  • Asking another person for their contact details.
  • Calling or emailing another person and inviting them to go out with you.

And the list could go on. Pick a couple of these activities today and start doing them more. There is no point in waiting.

2. Develop a Mindset of Likability

Something I’ve noticed early on at individuals that want to learn how to be friendly because they struggle with this is that, at some level, they see themselves as unlikeable.

They don’t think they’re good enough or interesting enough for others to want to interact with them or be friends with them. Thus, they are act cold and unfriendly with others. But this is just a facade, to protect themselves from the rejection they expect to happen.

If this is true for you too (and in almost surely is), then implement the 1st change I mentioned may prove to be quite challenging. You may have trouble even asking a few questions or making a bit of small talk with others, because you keep second-guessing yourself.

This is why it’s crucial to work on your mentality as well and develop a mindset according to which you are a likeable person; you are good enough. Which, trust me, you are. You just don’t fully realize it yet.

Since this is an extensive topic, I discuss it separately in this cutting-edge presentation. Make sure to watch it and you’ll learn the exact steps you have to take to change your mindset and become at ease in social interactions.

3. Choose the Right People for You

A genuinely friendly person can make conversation with just about anybody and enjoy the experience. Nevertheless, there will always be people they find it much easier to chat with, for longer periods of time, they’ll take more pleasure in it and they’ll be much more outspoken.

These are the people they are very compatible with: the people they have a lot in common with in terms of ideas, values, lifestyle, interests and so on.

It’s much easier to be friendly if you’re interacting with a person you match well with. If you usually hang out with people who only talk about marriage, kids and TV shows while you care about personal development, entrepreneurship and travelling, there is a definite mismatch there.

Think about the kinds of people you connect with the best, and then seek the types of activities, places and events where these kinds of people spend their time. Meet the right people for you and you’ll naturally find yourself being friendlier.

4. Socialize On a Regular Basis

It’s hard to become friendly and social if you only go out once every two weeks and you spend the rest of your time at home by yourself.

In order to eventually be friendly without effort, you mind needs to become acclimatized with social interactions. It needs to recognize them as a standard component of your life, which you go through regularly. And this requires regularity in your social interactions.

So, go out more, meet new people and interact with them periodically. Make going out the rule, not the exception. This is how to be friendly on a constant basis: by acclimatization with social contact.

Again, this presentation will provide you practical advice for achieving this and making the process of becoming more friendly as smooth as possible.

Your social life is under your control. Make the right adjustments in your behavior as well as your mindset, and you’ll surprisingly find yourself opening up more with all kinds of people and having lots of fun interacting with others.

That’s when you know that your life can be all that you want it to be.

Image courtesy of NicoleAbalde

Filed Under: Attitude, Inspirational, People Skills Tagged With: , , , , 1 Comment
October 11, 2012

The Socially Inept: Symptoms and Solutions

Are you pondering the possibility that you’re socially inept? Many people are that way, so you’re definitely not alone. Nevertheless, you shouldn’t take consolation in this and not do anything about it.

I’ve been working as a social confidence coach since 2007. And I can assure you that, no matter who you are, you can turn yourself from socially inept to socially skilled. You have the intrinsic ability to change how you are, and the tools to do it successfully are out there.

The first important step is to gauge if you indeed are socially inept and to what degree. A good change process always starts with a good understanding of your starting point.

The 10 Sign that you’re Socially Inept

Here are the most important indicators of social ineptitude to take into consideration. Read them attentively and try to recognize how much each one of them pertains to your case.

  1. You feel nervous when you’re in a social setting or you’re making conversation with someone.
  2. You’re particularly anxious around people you just met, attractive members of the opposite sex or people you perceive as being very cool.
  3. You don’t know how to properly start a conversation with another person, so you either not do it or do it clumsily.
  4. You have problems keeping a conversation going and those awkward silences frequently creep in.
  5. You feel that you’re not good at expressing yourself and when you say something it doesn’t come out the way it was intended.
  6. You don’t go out very much, you don’t talk very much and, in group conversations, you barely talk at all.
  7. When you do talk or interact with others, you often end up saying or doing silly things and embarrassing yourself.
  8. You don’t know how to react when you do or say something inappropriate and recover from the situation.
  9. You believe others find you weird or boring and they’re generally not interested in interacting with you.
  10. You have few friends, if any, maybe you see yourself as a loner, and your dating life isn’t looking too well either.

That’s it; these are the 10 key signs.

So, what’s the conclusion? How socially inept are you?

Once you’ve done an evaluation of your social aptitude, whatever level you’re at, it’s time to start thinking about some effective ways to improve your social skills, confidence and life.

The Formula for Social Success

Here are the 4 actions I encourage you to take in order to stop being socially inept and become socially savvy. In my experience, these actions will create the best results, in the shortest amount of time.

1. Get More Social Experience

I know that you may want to find a way to not be socially inept anymore and afterwards go out and socialize, but unfortunately, it doesn’t really work that way. It works the other way around.

Social skills come with social experience. As you interact with others, you try various styles of behavior and you notice how others react, this creates reference points for your brain and it improves your social prowess.

So, begin by going out more, interacting with people more and being more talkative, even if it’s challenging. It’s by challenging yourself that you make genuine progress.

2. Build Your Social Confidence

Most problems related to being socially inept will take care of themselves if you become more confident. You’ll feel more at ease in social settings, find it easier to know what to say in a discussion and be a lot smoother.

In fact, social confidence is so important that usually when I coach a person who is socially inept, we focus 80% of the time and energy on developing this trait. And without exception, with social confidence come slick social skills as well.

Building your social confidence is a process in itself, and this article is not intended to describe it thoroughly.

However, I have a special presentation for you which does just that. Go here to check it out and learn the step by step process for becoming confident socially.

3. Hang Out With Socially Savvy Individuals and Study Them

A lot of my understanding of social dynamics, I formed by interacting with people (especially guys, since I’m a guy) who were very good at social interactions. And I studied they’re mannerisms: how they start a conversation, how they keep it going, how they talk, etc.

Soon enough, I began to see patterns. Then I deliberately incorporated several of the patterns into my own behavior. Some of these new behaviors felt weird at first, but as I got used to them, they eventually felt very natural. Model individuals who are very social and you’ll see positive results in your social life.

4. Be Persistent

You won’t put an end to being socially inept overnight. Nevertheless, if you follow smart advice and you apply it consistently, you can make incredible progress fast.

In just a couple of months you will be much more relaxed, active and smooth in social settings than ever before, and you’ll enjoy yourself like crazy. The trick is to have some patience, invest in yourself and be persistent.

By the way, for more free advice from me for overcoming social ineptitude and achieving social success, I invite you to join my social confidence newsletter.  You’ll learn a lot from it.

As your social skills and confidence grow, your social life grows with it. And your fulfillment with yourself and your happiness in life reach a whole new level.

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Filed Under: Attitude, People Skills, Psychology Tagged With: , , , 6 Comments
July 6, 2012

Jobs for Shy People: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

If you’re shy and interested in finding a job, you may be wondering: What are some good jobs for shy people?

The traditional advice concerning jobs for shy people goes something like this: since you are shy, you will feel uncomfortable dealing with people. Therefore, you should pick work where you don’t interact a lot with others.

Based on this line of thinking, several career fields and jobs with minimal human interaction are recommended for shy people, such as:

  • IT. Good jobs include: computer programmer, software developer, computer systems analyst and web designer.
  • Finance. Possible jobs are: accountant, financial analyst, credit analyst and actuary.
  • Writing. Good jobs include: author, photographer, article writer and content translator.
  • Health Care. Some nice jobs are: lab technician, researcher, equipment preparer and medical transcriptionist.
  • Blue Collar. Possible jobs are: janitor, maid, gardener, repairman, factory worker or truck driver.

While it is true that the jobs above won’t involve too much social contact so you won’t find them stressful from this perspective, there is a potentially huge problem with pursuing such a job.

In order to comprehend this, consider a few important ideas which, as a social confidence coach, I’ve discovered to be very accurate.

1. Deep down, you may actually love jobs that involve social interaction.

Many shy people I’ve coached were deep down very sociable and they loved interaction with people. But on top of that was a layer of insecurities that made them feel nervous in social situations.

However, once they managed to remove that layer, the love for social interaction became obvious. Many of them work in fields where they regularly deal with people, such as sales, recruitment, training or management, and it’s deeply fulfilling for them.

If they would have just avoided jobs that entailed social contact, they never would have ended up doing what they truly love.

2. Shy people don’t necessarily have bad social skills and good technical skills.

Many of the shy people I know are in fact very intelligent socially. They have an intuitive understanding of people and intrinsically, they have sharp social skills. It’s just that the nervousness they feel when dealing with others can inhibit these skills from manifesting.

I also know shy people who work in jobs like computer programmer or accountant and they suck at them. Because that’s not where their natural skills are; it’s just where they don’t have to face the discomfort of dealing with others.

So, it’s a big mistake to assume that if you’re shy, you automatically have an inclination towards technical jobs and lack an inclination towards working with people. You never know what’s beyond the shyness.

3. A big part of overcoming shyness is exposure to social situations.

Yes, shyness can be defeated. And right now there is an overwhelming amount of empirical evidence confirming this.

However, a very important step in defeating shyness is engaging in social interactions reputedly instead of avoiding them.

This exposure to social situations will help your brain get accustomed to them, and change your beliefs about yourself and others, thus making you more confident socially. This leads me to my next point…

4. Avoiding jobs that entail social contact just perpetuates the problem.

Shy people avoid social contact. And it’s perfectly understandable, because it’s scary. Nevertheless, considering the role of exposure to social situations in overcoming shyness, this only keeps their problem alive.

With respect to their career, shy people avoid social contact by looking for jobs that imply very little of it, it any. And they are quick to believe these are the best jobs for shy people.

I often hear shy individuals saying: “I don’t want to have to deal with others in my job. It’s demanding!”

Well, the fact dealing with others is demanding is the very reason why you should consider a job that entails dealing with others.

You can’t stay away from what scares you forever.

At one point or another, if you want to truly live your life, you need to face your fears. And a major way to do this is avoiding the “traditional” jobs for shy people and instead choosing a job that gets you interacting with people.

I’ve had coaching clients who worked, at least for a while, in jobs like door-to-door sales person or customer service representative, precisely because they were intimidating for them.

And these jobs provided a good amount of social exposure, which helped them build their social confidence.

By the way: if you want to learn how you can gain social exposure as effectively as possible and build rock-solid social confidence in literally just a few weeks, check out this presentation right now.

So: What are the best jobs for shy people?

They’re the same jobs that are best for anyone else: the jobs they have a natural inclination and passion for.

Look deep into your heart and ask yourself: “What would I really like to do if I wouldn’t be shy?”

It could be a technical job; it could be an extremely social job. Either way, that’s the path to pursue in your career.

And even if deep down, you truly want to work in a job that requires little social contact and you do have natural skills for it, you may still want for a few months to give a try to a job that requires lots of social contact. Simply because the experience in itself will be extremely useful in developing your social confidence.

Remember: the most valuable experiences in life are often the ones that you’re afraid of.

Inage courtesy of Ed Yourdon

Filed Under: Attitude, Inspirational, People Skills Tagged With: , , , , , 12 Comments
February 24, 2012

How to Be More Talkative

Many shy and socially anxious people are interested in learning how to be more talkative. Some people seem to naturally be talkative and connect easy with others. They on the other hand struggle with this.

The good news is that you don’t have to struggle. Equipped with some savvy advice on how to be more talkative, you can get out of your shell and participate more in conversations with other people.

As a social confidence coach, one of my biggest delights is to see my clients speedily become more talkative under my guidance. I want to reveal to you the top four pieces of advice regarding how to be more talkative that they apply to achieve this.

Step 1: Manage Your Expectations

People who are quiet go into social settings with flawed expectations that make it almost impossible for them to be social and talkative.

For example, the may expect that everybody should like them, or they should never say something off beam, or they should never upset others.

With these kinds of expectations, you’re bound to be shy in social situations. Because almost anything you could say risks not meeting one or more of them. This is why an important step in learning how to be more talkative is to manage your expectations.

Managing your expectations means to identify what you, consciously or subconsciously, demand of yourself and others in social interactions. And then, to correct these demands: to make them less perfectionist and more down to earth.

This will allow you to feel more at ease in social settings, open up more and enjoy conversation more.

For a step by step explanation of how to manage your expectations and take the pressure off yourself, watch this exclusive presentation I created.

Step 2: Practice Being More Spontaneous

Another pattern in the behavior of quiet people is that they think too much before they say something.

They wanna be sure they always say the smart, funny or right thing and they never say the silly, weird or wrong thing, which is also related to the unreasonable expectations they have.

Consequently, they tend to over-think every sentence they could utter. And when you think too much about something, you always find fault in it and you often end up not saying it.

An excellent exercise for overcoming this is to practice being more impulsive during conversations. What you do is you say what pops into your head before getting a change to evaluate it thoroughly. You think less and you talk more.

As a result, not only that you’re more involved in conversations, but in the long run, you also build confidence in yourself and become comfortable with being more talkative. This is what makes the exercise cool.

Step 3: Remove Your Limiting Beliefs

Having unreasonable expectations, thinking too much and being quiet in social settings are ultimately mere symptoms of certain beliefs you posses.

Most shy or socially anxious people I’ve met or coached don’t hold themselves in high regard, they think they must be perfect or they think others are better than they are. This is the root of their problem.

If you want to permanently eliminate your nervousness in social settings and become more talkative, you need to get to the root of the problem and fix it from there. You need to change a precise cluster of beliefs you hold.

This is not only a helpful insight regarding how to become more talkative, but also a helpful insight to transform your relationships with others completely. And from there, your whole life.

I have a special free guide for you in which I’ll show you how to remove your limiting beliefs and blast away your anxiety in social settings. Go here to check it out.

Step 4: Treat This as a Process

Today you can become a bit more talkative than yesterday. And tomorrow you can become a bit more talkative than today. And in a few weeks, you’ll have accomplished one mind-blowing transformation.

However, you won’t turn from shy to talkative overnight. Don’t expect this, because you’re just adding to those unrealistic expectations that work against you.

The truth is that human psychology doesn’t work that way. It takes some time and practice to change. Not a lot if you do it the right way, but it does take some.

Treat this as a process, not as a quick fix. Work on becoming more talkative day by day, optimize the process, persist, and focus on making steady progress. This is the attitude that individuals who win at this game have.

I can vouch from experience that learning how to be more talkative and effectively applying this knowledge will open a lot of doors for you. You’ll be able to meet more people, make more friends, get more dates and get ahead in your career.

When you’re comfortable with expressing yourself and letting the world know you as you are, you can do great things with your life.

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Filed Under: Attitude, People Skills, Psychology Tagged With: , , , 14 Comments
February 2, 2012

How to Be Witty

So, you want to learn how to be witty? I understand you perfectly. The witty person in a social setting is the person who gets all the attention, makes everyone laugh, is liked by everybody and has no problems connecting with others.

As a social confidence coach, I work on a regular basis with guys and girls who want to learn how to be witty and charming. I’ve discovered there is a set of precise steps that if any person takes, it can make them considerably wittier. Here they are, taken and explained one by one.

Step 1: Practice Thinking Outside the Box  

Essentially, what makes a person witty and funny in conversations is the fact they say things that are unexpected and creative. And they’re able to say such things because their thinking is outside the box.

Therefore, developing your ability to think this way is a must step in learning how to be witty and funny. And the only true way to develop it is through practice, which can take place while in social settings but also outside of them.

Let’s say somebody asks you: “Hey, are you gonna run to the market, because I’d like to ask you to get something for me?”

Instead of answering in a basic manner “Yes, I am”, think for just a second and see if you can find a more creative way to answer. For example, you may come up with: “Well, I’m not gonna run, I’m just gonna walk to the market. But yes, that’s the gist of it.”

Now that’s a much more clever and amusing way to respond. It’s guaranteed to get at least a giggle. There is another thing though that you have to do to be able to come up with such snappy comebacks, which is the next step.

Step 2: Really, Truly Listen

Studying how to be witty and charming is to a large extent a study in being a good listener. It’s important to really pay attention to the words and messages others convey, in order to find clever and funny ways to respond to them.

The problem is that most people don’t truly listen. They’re stuck in their heads, thinking what to say next or what’s a smart line they can use, instead of paying attention to what the other person is saying.

In a conversation, listening always comes before thinking out of the box. It’s only once you received the full message and its meaning that you may start to think how you can respond to it. Otherwise your comeback will just seem unnatural and odd.

Step 3: Focus on Having the Right Emotional State

I’ll tell you a little secret few people know: the bulk of your ability to be witty and funny has to do with your emotional state. This is why, when a person asks me how to be witty and funny, I usually tell them that the main way is to manage their emotional state.

When you’re in a conversation and you feel confident and relaxed, trust me, you will naturally find all sorts of clever things to say.

The problem is that most persons who want to be wittier feel quite shy and nervous in most social settings. And when you feel like that, you tend to fumble, stumble, act awkward and not be able to think straight. It all goes down the drain from there.

This is why one of the best things you can do is to focus on changing your emotional state in social settings. Don’t concentrate too much on what you say; concentrate more on how you feel. If you’re in the right emotional state, you’ll also be witty and charming.

To find out precisely how you can achieve this emotional state, check out this presentation I created.

Step 4: Stop Putting Pressure on Yourself

In discovering how to be witty, it’s crucial to realize that you can’t pressure yourself to become this way. Well, you can, but it’s simply not going to work. It’s not gonna get you anywhere.

Paradoxically, it’s only when you let go and stop demanding of yourself to be witty and charm everybody that you start to loosen up, feel more confident and then your witty, charming side comes out with ease.

The fact of the matter is that you’re probably putting needless pressure on yourself to impress in social settings. You need to start seeing social interactions as a casual thing and to stop taking them too seriously. And this is a mindset that you can develop with practice.

I have created a special presentation in which I discuss the exact steps you must take in order to develop this mindset and become confident in conversation. Go here to watch it.

Learning how to be witty and funny is a process. It’s a journey of habit-changing, self-discovery and self-empowerment.

You’ll start seeing results as soon as you begin applying the steps I’ve discussed here, but it is consistent application that creates the overall best results.

The more confident and witty you become, the more satisfying your social life becomes, and the more this whole self-growth journey feel like a worthwhile thing.

Image courtesy of  sebastien barre

Filed Under: People Skills, Success Tagged With: , , , ,
January 14, 2012

Things to Talk About

A conversation is basically an exchange of information on various topics between two or more people. When the content and form of the conversation are appropriate, people connect with each other. Having good things to talk about plays a big role here.

When you have good things to talk about with somebody, either a guy or a girl, it’s easier to keep the conversation going, make it interesting and create a positive connection.

As a social confidence coach, I often work with people who struggle with identifying the best things to talk about, which feeds their anxiety about making conversation.

So I want to share with you the best things to talk about that I know.

Good Things to Talk About With Anybody

There are some conversation topics that cannot fail. Almost every person will have something to say on these topics and they are suitable for many situations: a first date, a party, a coffee with friends, a business networking event, etc.

These topics form the acronym F.O.R.D., which is an excellent way to remember them so you can bring them up in a conversation. Here’s what it means:

F stands for Family. Ask the other person about their family: if they’re married (not on a date though), if they have kids, or how are things at home for them if you know them for a while. Talk about your family situation as well.

O stands for Occupation. This is one of my favorite things to talk about. You can ask the other person what they do for a living, how they got in their particular field or what they like about it. You can also disclose your own career situation.

R stands for Recreation. This is a very big topic, which offers many possibilities. Ask the other person what they do for fun, or what hobbies they have. Bring up your recreational activities as well, and discover your common interests if they exist.

D stands for Dreams. This is where you talk about future plans or goals. Anything from “Where do you see your career going in the future?” to “What do you want to do in your next vacation?” goes.

These topics can go hand in hand and it’s easy to jump from one to another; like from occupation to dreams and from dreams to recreation. This dynamic is what helps the conversation be fluid and engaging.

For more practical advice on making a conversation engaging, watch this presentation I have designed.

When In Rome…

You know that old adage: when in Rome do as the Romans do? It applies a lot to conversation and finding the best things to talk about with somebody.

The context you meet a person in leaves clues about their interests. And their interests give you interesting things to talk about.

For instance, if you meet a person at an art gallery, they probably like art. So it’s a good idea to ask them what exhibits they like the most at that gallery, or what kind of art they like the most.

It’s pretty straightforward for a person to get pleasure from a conversation when they talk about the things they love to talk about.

Plus, the more you converse with a person, the better an idea you get about their specific interests, and then you can navigate the conversation towards the topics related to those interests.

The key is to first be curious about how a person’s overall life looks life, and to ask questions using the F.O.R.D. model. Then, as you have a clearer picture of their lifestyle, you can infer the specific conversation topics that person enjoys the most.

Remove the Obstacles

There is one thing that all people who frequently don’t know what to talk about with others have in common.

It’s not that they’re not intelligent enough to figure out what to talk about, it’s that they have a flawed mindset.

They may think that they always need to find the perfect things to talk about, that they must always impress or that others won’t enjoy conversing with them if they just talk about the things that naturally pop into their head.

They are often shy and anxious in social settings, and struggling with finding things to talk about is merely a symptom of that.

For this reason, it’s imperative to remove these internal blocks. Work on identifying and eliminating your limiting beliefs, as well as boosting your social confidence.

I have created a special presentation that will show you the exact steps you need to take in order to overcome your limiting beliefs and develop your social confidence. Make sure you check it out.

Once you get these obstacles out of the way, you will always have subjects to talk about and naturally make conversation fun. Confidence is the propeller that will make banter run effortlessly, make you astonish others, and make your social life thrive.

Equipped with the essential knowledge I just gave concerning the right things to talk about, plus a solid dose of social confidence, you can enjoy meaningful interactions with others in any situation.

Image courtesy of Ktoine 

Filed Under: Communication Skills, People Skills Tagged With: , , , 4 Comments
December 15, 2011

6 Signs That You’re Socially Awkward and How to Fix This

If social interactions don’t go for you as well as you would like and you sometimes tend to put your foot in your mouth during conversations, you may be asking yourself: “Am I socially awkward?”

Drawing from my experience as a social confidence coach, I want to explain the characteristics of socially awkward people and help you comprehend if you are socially awkward or not, as well as show you what to do about it.

The Profile of Socially Awkward People

Socially awkward persons possess a set of distinctive traits. The more of these traits you have and the larger their degree, the higher on the social awkwardness scale you’re likely to be. Here they are:

1. Feeling nervous in social settings. The typical socially awkward person doesn’t feel comfortable in social situations. They are anxiety producing.

This is one of the main factors that often make them behave in weird ways around other people. Nervousness leads to a creepy demeanor, and realizing that your demeanor is creepy creates even more nervousness, so we have an ongoing negative cycle.

2. Not understanding social norms. Often when I talk with a socially awkward person, they tell me they often don’t know what’s appropriate for them to do and what’s not in a social situation.

They don’t know how is it OK to start a conversation, what conversation topics is it best to talk about and when, or what is it suited to joke about and what is it not. Obviously, this lack of understanding can lead to either weird or shy behavior.

3. Often having a different impact than intended. It’s common for socially awkward people to joke about something and others to find the joke uncalled for, or to try and give a compliment, only for it to come off in a distasteful way.

In other words, they intend to generate one result, and they end up generating a totally different one. This mismatch is a sign of a deficiency of social calibration.

4. The lack of conversation flow. Everybody has conversations that don’t flow, have awkward silences or end abruptly. But for socially awkward people, this is the rule, not the exception.

Their conversations are habitually like a rough wagon ride on a bumpy country road.

5. Frequently being avoided or ridiculed by others. If others actively try to dodge interactions with you, or they often mock you during them, they probably see you as the weird person in the group.

And if they see you this way, it can be a sign that your social behavior is awkward and makes it easy to attract the derision of others.

6. The lack of meaningful connections with others. Since they struggle with making conversation, feeling at ease around others and expressing themselves effectively, socially awkward people typically lack strong connections with others.

They generally have few friends, if any, and a very small social circle. They spend a lot of time alone and to say their social life is less than fulfilling is an understatement.

OK. These are the 6 distinctive traits of socially awkward individuals. Taking them into consideration, this is a good moment to ask yourself again “Am I socially awkward?”

If The Conclusion Is “I Am Socially Awkward”

If the conclusion of this self-assessment is that you are socially awkward, this is likely an issue with a visible negative impact on your life. You could have much better relationships and be a lot happier if you deal with this effectively. I have three essential pieces of advice I can offer you.

The first and most important is to develop your social confidence. To a very large extent, social awkwardness is produced by shyness and anxiety in social settings.

When you’re anxious, you can’t think straight, you stumble, bumble and fumble around, and thus you embarrass yourself. Work on improving your social confidence, and I promise you that most of this will take care of itself.

Check out this free presentation I’ve created to learn how to eliminate anxiety and boost your social confidence.

The second advice is to learn the basic social norms. The basic principles of social interactions can be learned from books, courses or socially savvy people. Knowing them and applying them will aid you adjust your social behavior to the situation.

However, beyond the basic principles, everything else can only be learned through experience. No other person can tell you exactly what to do and say during a social interaction.

This is why the third advice is to gain lots of experience interacting with others. Meet new people, make conversation, experiment, notice the results and fine-tune your behavior accordingly.

In time, this real-life social experience will transform you from socially awkward to socially intelligent. And of course, a huge part of the nerve to do all this socializing comes, again, from developing your social confidence.

If you want to discover exactly how you can do this, make sure you watch my social confidence presentation.

Fortunately, overcoming social awkwardness is absolutely possible, no matter who you are. You can become a socially calibrated person who makes conversation effortlessly, has awesome friends and enjoys a great social life.

The key is to use focus on achieving this with determination, seek the best advice available and implement it.

Image courtesy of DaveAustria.com

Filed Under: Communication Skills, People Skills Tagged With: , , , , 189 Comments