Learn Body Language
When talking to people; they give you an evil non verbal communication?
And they try to be nice verbally; that ticks me off to the wall; what would you think about it and how would you handle such situation?
Public Comments
- You can tell a lot about a person by what they DON'T say. when that happens I usually stop talking to them, even in mid sentence, I will just stop, talking... and find, that THEY are the ones who respond first, because they KNOW that their non verbal rudeness got through, and they feel uncomfortable, because they know I understood what they were doing.
- I have been in this situation. When I moved to my new neighborhood (Sugar Hill, Harlem), I was super-friendly to my neighbors and to my building superintendent. My building super, esp., would literally flinch when I would smile at him and say hello or good morning. I freaked him out. His reaction freaked me out. Some of the neighbors would look at me as if were from another planet. In a way I am. Where I come from you talk to your neighbors. Here in NYC it's dicey. How I handled it was by googling it and finding out that in big cities a lot people do not trust, and will even attack, people who are too friendly. I also talked to my students, many of whom come from really rough neighborhoods. Many of my students agreed. They admitted that they, too, are freaked out by people who are too friendly. It ticked me off at first. I didn't want to change who I am or my personality to suit the paranoia of my big city neighborhood. Eventually, I found a good compromise. Instead of the big hello or good morning, with my big, toothy grin, now I just smile gently and subtly. I might nod or wink and keep walking. But I save the big hello's for the neighbors who say hello to me. Now my super is "super-nice" to me, and my neighbors seem comfortable with me. What a world. I have to move. If people are giving you evil, non-verbal body language, it might be good to find out why, but it might also mean that you will have decide how much of your own behavior or conversation needs to change or who you want to spend your time with. With my neighbors, for ex., some are actually friendly now, some are relaxed, and some are so hostile and defensive that I have had to stop talking to them atogether. The choice is yours, but see if you can find out what's going on.
