Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Body Language

I participated in an AMAZING training this morning on body language and thought I'd share some of it with you today. I couldn't add a stick figure in this post but think about these things.

"Reading body language is a skill to find answers and solutions. To begin reading body language I must remove judgement and see movements as indicators. When I see indicators, the next step is to ask better/more questions."

"While you are speaking, the brain prepares and organizes 450 words per minute to say. At the last moment, our consciousness filters this down to 150 words. As a person speaks, there are an average of 300 words that are held back. These hidden words show up in body language.

57% of our commuication is gestures-36% is tone-7% is what we say.

Our left brain is analytical, uses numbers, logical, contains our past history.

Our right brain is artistic, thinks about the future and our vision of us.

Shifting eyes side to side indicates that I'm listening to my inner voices and not to the person I'm speaking with. It can also mean that I don't believe what you're saying or I am thinking about ending my life.

Looking up means we are seeking inspiration from our higher power.

Looking down means we are looking into our soul and emotions or deciding how much we want to share. No pun intended but my eyes were opened on this one.

When children are asked to make a choice, they look down because they are using their emotions to make a choice. Do I want a popcicle or do I want an ice cream sandwich, for example. Oftentimes as parents, we interpret them looking down as shame, or deceit or not listening so we tell them to look at us when we're talking to them. We have interrupted their choice making and should not be surprised that they make a snap decision under such pressure and half way through their choice they insist that they wanted the other thing. Give the child the opportunity to look down as long as needed. When they bring their head up you should be looking at them in an open and pleasant manner.  They will instantly feel your acceptance of them and readily tell you their choice because they've had sufficient time to think about it. (OH HOW I WISH I'D KNOWN THIS! WHAT A KEY TOOL!!)

Your hands indicated capacity. Open or closed. Don't hide your hands.

Closed lips means you may want to say something.

Buckled knees may mean I can't handle this.

Feet or other parts of body pointing toward the door mean I'm done or I need to leave.

This was VERY interesting!

I also won a CD about body language and when the woman called my name I realized I need to practice my penmanship because she called me Barbara Rambson!!  It was very humorous!





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