We may have mastered advanced language techniques, but just as some animals have different body language for different occasions – Jackdaws glare, a cat’s fur stands up in a ridge along the spine, beavers slap their tail on water, the rattlesnake shakes his tail, and peacocks puts on an impressive visual display – our bodies continually impart information to indicate our diverse intentions. Many of our body reflexes are difficult and even impossible to control.
Do you know why?
Non-verbal communication is fast. Many of our body reflexes are involuntary and instantaneous. The brain receives information from several senses and sends out non-verbal communication signals to other parts of the body. The body reacts on an impulse before we are fully aware of what we are thinking or how we feel. These involuntary cues happen so naturally and quickly, they are impossible to stifle which means they are honest gestures that reveal oour thoughts, mood, and true intent.
All, absolutely all the emotions we feel, we communicate through our bodies. That means our body language can contradict what we say or how we think we want to react or what body language we contrive to hide our true feelings.
Take for example the face. We have several reliable muscles that we cannot voluntarily control, especially in the face. One is the “fear muscle”. It is a small twitch of the muscles between the eyes, that forces the eyebrows together to make a grin-like gesture that is impossible to stifle. This muscle reveals true emotion. Another very reliable indicator is the involuntary impulse of a person’s pupils; they dilate when they see something that excites them. Nobody can control that part of the eyes. You cannot stop your heart from beating or your face from flushing. That is why poker players wear sunglasses to mask their eyes or hoodies to cloak pulsations in their neck and the perspiration on their brow. No matter how hard we try to have it not happen, some aspect of our body language always gives away what is going on in the mind. It is extremely difficult to hide our pattern of thoughts because they ooze from body naturally.
We spend so much time focusing on the face. For that reason, people learn to control many of their facial expressions in order to hide their true intentions or emotions. Similar to donning a mask, they try to control their facial expressions in the presence of other people. A person may be able to disguise a part of the body or distract us from noticing fleeting, spontaneous, and contradictory body reactions. However, they simply cannot control or hide all the parts of their bodies that reveal true feelings or intent. They cannot hide the micro expressions that leak out from behind the mask. Eventually, some part of the person’s body will always reveal negative and contradictory tell-tale signs that expose the real meaning.
Our bodies are powerfully expressive tools. They speak a language of their own saying much more than we realize, both when we want them to and when we’re oblivious to it. The involuntary and unintentional cues are the most sensitive. You send out a continuous stream of insightful information. Others perceive these flashes of insight and can instantly sense your feelings, attitudes and moods. They consciously and unconsciously react to this information and their bodies in turn communicate their emotions that you consciously or intuitively interpret. This exchange is instantaneous and unremitting.
Essentially, through these sensitivities, we connect with other people.
These cues may be barely visible to the naked eye. Both unintentional micro expressions and involuntary cues (an eyebrow lift, a corner of a twitch, pupils contracting, a small tightness of the mouth, etc) can appear and disappear so quickly (some can be 1/30 of a second) that we can easily miss seeing important data that adds layers of genuine meaning to the words. The cues may be barely discernible if your view of the person is obscured. Yet, if you are alert enough, you often catch the signs early. If not, sooner or later, your instincts kick in and you know.
The interpretation of what the cues mean may not always be accurate if we miss important signals. Still, non-verbal body language can be used as a positive tool to help us understand how people really feel. Take the medical profession as an example. Nurses and doctors are astute at reading our non-verbal cues so they can probe a little deeper to treat our illnesses. Whether we are in the workplace or romantic encounter insight prepares us to respond appropriately and honestly. In an emotionally charged situation, another person’s body language primes us to be in a position to act.
For example: When experiencing shame or embarrassment, a person automatically touches the side of the forehead and partially block the eyes, or if the emotion is extreme the person will go from a forehead touch to completely covering the forehead as a visor over the eyes. We see that body language and recognize that we should refrain from whatever we might have done to put that person in such a situation and we know it is time to back off.
Think of non-verbal communication cues this way: View a person’s entire body as their personal animated billboard. You observe 100% of the billboard to gather all bits of information. Without this information you can misinterpret a person’s meaning or true intent. The more you observe, the more you see, and the more you will understand and appreciate the person or message.
In our society, people are expected to act positively, even when they are at odds with being in that frame of mind. We quickly learn how to display positive body language, especially in our faces, to disguise our feelings of being scared, sad, displeased, disappointed, bored, contradictory, or overwrought. When things are difficult we present ourselves so we do not appear rude, insensitive, weak, nervous or perplexed.
No matter how hard the person may try to make the conscious image more dominant, the subconscious finds its way to the surface. It must tell the truth! The subconscious releasing the truth through involuntary cues that appear some aspect of the person’s body language. Think of the times you get a sense when someone is not trustworthy? Think about times you have been able to tell if a person seems emotionally aloof, cool, or disinterested. How long does it take you to determine when a person is calm or low-key versus melodramatic or panicky? Actually subconsciously you can detect some miniscule micro expressions that send you honest meaning.
Involuntary cues can complement as well as contradict the spoken words. You discern this variance when you catch the non-verbal cues. If you only pay attention to obvious gestures and miss the involuntary cues, you can be fooled by another person’s overt body language.
In any communication, non-verbal involuntary cues are the most significant because they are natural and genuine. In fact, if you ever find verbal language confusing, the non-verbal communication cues will unravel the words so you can decipher better meaning. These cues are a reliable indication of what lies beneath the surface of a person’s behaviour pattern
Research from Princeton showed that humans make initial judgments about a person’s attractiveness, likeability, trustworthiness, competence and aggressiveness within 100 milliseconds or one tenth of one second of meeting someone. These initial judgments are based on exposure to a person’s non-verbal communication signals. Furthermore, their studies showed that people can make accurate inferences about new people they meet with very little information. Many of us subconsciously develop first impression interpretation skills early in life.
It is astounding how fast our brains can decode expressions of body language and giving them adequate meaning.
We stated earlier that most of us know many of the non-verbal communication signals intuitively. That is true. Any innate skills that you may have stifled may just need to be reawakened which will happen with awareness, keen observation, and practice. Of course, the language of non-verbal communication is immense and none of us can ever learn or know enough. Yet, whatever seems daunting now, will become more intuitive as you hone your abilities. These are valuable skills that anyone can learn and hone.
