582 Build Your Confidence with Jordan Harbinger

"Our first impressions are always made non-verbally” One of my favorite guests I’ve had on this show is Jordan Harbinger, from The Art of Charm. Previously, he gave great advice on how to leave the right first impression, and most importantly it’s not made through what we say. So little of the impression we give off is through our words. Our body language, says so much more than anything that comes out of our mouths. This 5 Minute Friday will give you tips to build your confidence and create the impression you want, on Episode 582. In this episode you will learn: When first impressions are really made (00:50) How to test the way we make perceptions (1:54) Ways to create a good first impression (3:12) The doorway drill (4:27) Plus much more... Get more from Lewis! Get my New York Times Bestselling book, Make Money Easy! Get The Greatness Mindset audiobook on SpotifyText Lewis AIYouTubeInstagramWebsiteTiktokFacebookX

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Lewis Howes?

  This is Five Minute Friday.

• 0:10Lewis Howes?

  You know, a lot of times I get people reaching out to me and saying that they're struggling with their life or their business. They tell me different things that are holding them back. Challenges to make more money, challenges in their relationships, challenges with their family. And so today, we're covering about how to build self-confidence with Jordan Harbinger.

• 0:35Speaker 01

  One of the sort of common misconceptions is that our first impressions that we make on other people are the first thing that we say or the first interaction that we have. And that sounds reasonable when you're thinking about making a good first impression with people in general. However, what we know from science and what we know, and I'll back up and prove this real quick, is that our first impression is not made when we open our mouth. It's made when we become a blip on the other person's radar. And so what I mean by that is our perception of other people, and this is evolutionary psychology 101 here, is that we do snap judgments of people based on what we see. And we have to do that. It's a safety thing. Women are 10,000 times better at this than men.

• 1:19Speaker 01

  That's not a scientific measurement because they have a, they have a safety question that that is just the elephant in the room every single time.

• 1:26Lewis Howes?

  Is this person safe?

• 1:27Speaker 01

  Is this person safe? Right. Whereas you and I, I don't, I only think about that when it's like face tattoos and serious like dark alley type stuff.

• 1:35Lewis Howes?

  Dude.

• 1:36Speaker 01

  Yeah. And other, even then, if I'm in a, if I'm in a movie theater and there's a guy who's 6'6" and has face tattoos, I'm like, hey, man.

• 1:42Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:43Speaker 01

  Pass the popcorn. I don't care. Right. But if I'm outside at night in Hollywood or something like that, then it's a different story. But for those perceptions that we make, they're made completely non-verbally. And you can test that just by going out for a walk right now and then, or maybe after the show. Go out for a walk and see when you make a judgment of the next people that you see. And it's going to be before you talk to them, unless they sneak up on you, in which case you've got other issues.

• 2:07Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 2:08Speaker 01

  The reason this is important is because since we're making those judgments the second we see people and it's happening at a subconscious level in our brain, that means that our first impressions are always made non-verbally. And so this is really, really important because people who spend a lot of time thinking, "What do I say? How do I start this conversation? What do I do to approach this person and get them to like me?" That all becomes far less relevant.

• 2:30Speaker 02

  It's not as much important about what you say or even how you're saying it. It's more about who you're being and the way you're saying it beforehand.

• 2:37Speaker 01

  Exactly. Yeah, it becomes far less relevant to the actual connection that you have with that person. And so what we try to do is create positive first impressions that we now know have to be non-verbal, and they have to be positive, they have to be open, and they have to make sense, and they have to portray the intent that we have, which is hopefully positive, friendly, open, loving, whatever sort of positive adjective we want to throw in here.

• 3:03Speaker 02

  Right. So what's the drill then?

• 3:05Speaker 01

  So the drill, I call this a doorway drill. It's this kind of an artichoke charm staple. And what this is, is when you're confident, you naturally are upright. Like, you basically just did this. Upright, open body language, smile on your face, chin up ideally, chest back, or chest forward, shoulders back. You don't have to be like Superman pose or anything. Those power posing things have kind of been, those studies are hard to replicate, I'll put it that way. But if we remember what we look like in this position, and we're doing this socially, and this is how we feel positive, open, loving, open-hearted, I think is the word that you used. If we do that every time we walk through a doorway, we no longer have to do this manually. Because what a lot of people do is they go, "Oh, good, right. Open, tall, positive body language. Put a smile on my face. That's going to work next time

• 3:50Speaker 01

  I go into a place and start a conversation." But the problems crop up when you're trying to do what we just talked about, what you just talked about, and you're trying to remember to do that at all times. Not going to happen. It's kind of like telling yourself, "Remember to notice things." It's an impossible task, right?

• 4:07Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 4:07Speaker 01

  You can't do it. You can't be mindful of your verbal and non-verbal communication and stay present in a conversation. It's too many things for your brain to concentrate on with different parts at the same time. It's very difficult. I don't know anybody who's good at it and still looks natural doing it. So we have to relegate the positive, open, friendly, nonverbal communication to the level of habit. And the way that we do that is with the doorway drill. Doing that upright, shoulders back, chest up, chin up, smile on your face every time you walk through a doorway, even in your own house. When we have that, when you have that posture going, I don't know, I should count how many times I walk through a doorway. And I'll tell you, to illustrate my earlier point, I've tried to count in a day how many times I walk through a doorway.

• 4:50Speaker 01

  But you can't because you just can't remember to count every time you walk through a doorway. Just like you can't remember to straighten up, put your shoulders back every time you have a conversation. It's impossible. You're not going to do it. You need to make it a habit. If you do it every time you walk through a doorway, let's say you walk through a doorway 100 times in an average day in your office or house, you will eventually have the habit of having upright, positive, nonverbal communication. And you gotta do it every day because I just got off a plane. I've been sitting like this for, you know, two hours. You gotta reset. And you have to constantly reset every time you sit up, stand up, whatever. This is great because if you do this and you relegate this and you create this habit over time, when you walk downstairs to Starbucks, or when you go to that networking event, or when you go to that next meeting, It's automatic.

• 5:33Speaker 01

  It's automatic. And then you can focus on your verbal communication, which is so much more difficult for us to stay present in the conversation. Think about, alright, what am I trying to do with this conversation? Where do I want this to go? What am I going to say next? That's a whole different set of, I would say, skills slash problems of self-management and self-actualization and authoring that get us past that. However, to not then worry about your nonverbal communication is so powerful.