662 Mastering Body Language and Confidence

There are two things that can make or break you when it comes to achieving greatness: your body language and your confidence. If you don’t have confidence, you’ll never be able to put yourself out there to the world. You need the confidence to try, and it’s confidence that will help you get back up after your failures. Once you have the confidence to get out there, your next obstacle is your first impression. Your body language tells someone a lot about you. Sometimes, it may not be what you intended it to say. Having proper posture, giving people a big smile, and treating everyone like an old friend will go a long way. These are really important lessons, which is why I wanted to bring you a mashup from Chen Lizra, Jordan Harbinger and Vanessa Van Edwards. I’ve received such an overwhelming response on the past mashups I wanted to bring you another one. I really suggest you go back and listen to the episode multiple times. There’s so much great advice from all three of these guests, you can’t absorb it all in one sitting. Take a new nugget of information each day and apply it to your life. You’ll quickly learn how not only your life can change, but these tips will also affect the people around you. So learn how you can master your body language and improve your confidence, on Episode 662. In This Episode You Will Learn: How Cuban culture heals the body (6:48) Where we should put our energy to become happy (8:05) The role tempo plays in your body (14:55) What men are commonly missing (18:00) Common misconceptions we have about first impressions (19:53) How your smile affects others (23:10) What makes popular kids popular (28:55) The biggest killer of relationships (30:52) What an ambivert is (32:07) What matters more than IQ (33:13) How you can make your interactions count (35:53) Plus much, 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 episode number 662, Mastering Body Language and Confidence.

• 0:07Lewis Howes?

  Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week, we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin.

• 0:32Lewis Howes?

  Theodore Roosevelt said, "Each time we face our fear, we gain strength, courage, and confidence in the doing." This episode is all about how do we master our own body language, understand body language, be able to read it from other people, and also increase and improve our confidence in the process of that. This is a series that we've been doing based on your feedback. We've had 660-plus episodes, some incredible individuals on lots of different topics in the world. And we wanted to do a series where we brought the best ideas from some of them for specific episodes. We've done some on sex and relationships. We've done some on spirituality, leadership, business.

• 1:17Lewis Howes?

  This one's on confidence and body language. We've got Hen Lysra, Vanessa Van Edwards, Jordan Harbinger. This is a powerful one. Some of these episodes have all done incredible individually on their own, have crushed it on the downloads. So we wanted to bring some of the best moments from each one of those and bring them together so you can have this incredible standalone episode as well. If you enjoy this, share it with your friends, lewishowes.com/662, all about mastering body language and confidence. And before we dive in, a quick shout out to the Fan of the Week. Again, we've got over 3,100 5-star reviews over on iTunes. If you haven't left a review yet,

• 2:00Lewis Howes?

  go leave one right now for your chance to be a Fan of the Week. This is from... Limitless Heart Life Coaching says, "I'm a life coach and college counselor for teenagers. And after listening to the School of Greatness podcast for a few weeks, I purchased two copies of the School of Greatness, one for me and one for a male 16-year-old client. We recently read this book together and let me tell you, it was a huge game changer for not only connecting with my client, but also helping him truly transform his life. He's a football player who wants to play Division One football, whose grades were less than stellar last year. Well, after reading School of Greatness with me and listening to Lewis's podcast every

• 2:41Lewis Howes?

  morning, this kid is now rocking a 3.7 GPA and is a starting defensive back for a very competitive high school varsity team. Scouts will be looking at him for sure next year. But more importantly, as he listened to the podcast and read the book, he was able to identify where in his life he was holding back, making excuses and lacking integrity with his academic work ethic. I can't wait to use this book and podcast with other clients. Thanks, Lewis." So that moved me. I really appreciate that one because as a football player in the past who struggled with grades, I could have used this book myself to improve everything in my grades in school.

• 3:25Lewis Howes?

  So, you know, I create the podcast, the book, the events that I would want to read, listen to, or attend. So I'm so grateful that the book has made an impact on you and on your student, and I appreciate that. If you haven't got a book yet, School of Greatness or The Mask of Masculinity, you guys can get it at Barnes & Noble or on our website, LewisHowes.com as well. All right, guys, I'm excited about this one. Master your body language and increase your confidence.

• 3:58Speaker 01

  I gotta find a way to heal the body.

• 4:01Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 4:02Speaker 01

  Looking back, it wasn't really the seduction. I thought it was the seduction. It was what Cubans had in their culture that caused my body over time to heal from the trauma. Like, I'm pretty sure I'm down to about 2%, like, the very elusive 2%, but I cleaned my body from the trauma.

• 4:20Lewis Howes?

  What did they have in the culture that allowed you to free yourself?

• 4:24Speaker 01

  One of them is the sabrosura. Sabrosura is the sensuality that's inside each and every one of us. It sits on physical self-love. So, think about it as a society that doesn't have material things for that many years. Like, you're talking about a country that got locked because of communism and socialism, where there's no advertising on the streets or anywhere, not on TV, not on the radio, no advertising. You're in a sterile place. And then, you don't have internet on your phones, and you don't have the crazy technology that we have, and everybody's still in the streets connecting, like, in the 50s and the 60s, old school.

• 5:00Lewis Howes?

  Talking to each other, in person.

• 5:02Speaker 01

  Yeah. Knocking on the door when you need somebody, rather than texting and WhatsApping. And they didn't have material things, but everybody didn't have material things together. So, there was that solidarity. And then, what happens when we don't have material things? Where do we put that energy to become happy? What do you think?

• 5:22Lewis Howes?

  With each other. With ourselves, with each other, yeah.

• 5:25Speaker 01

  In human connections. And, exactly the point, right? Like, if you can't be out there, then you go in. So, they found ways that create a natural high through body movements that release dopamine and endorphin.

• 5:40Lewis Howes?

  And it's constant, right?

• 5:42Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 5:42Lewis Howes?

  It's all the time?

• 5:43Speaker 01

  It's all the time.

• 5:44Lewis Howes?

  Just like it's all the time for us on our phones, it's all the time, but it's real, in real life?

• 5:48Speaker 01

  Yes. So, this is one of the things. So, and on top of that, when they're moving with the sabrosura, and there's sabrosura for women and sabrosura for men, it actually sits on physical self-love that gets released in the body, and you feel that warmth, and you feel good sounding about yourself.

• 6:04Lewis Howes?

  You feel confident.

• 6:06Speaker 01

  Also confident, but also love. Like, you feel the love. Like, you feel good about yourself. Like, people that I get to experience the sabrosura, well, I'll say, "Do you feel it in your body right now?" And they'll say, "Yes." I go, "Like, where?" Stomach, chest, what are you feeling? Heat. That's self-love.

• 6:23Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 6:23Speaker 01

  Physical self-love. So, really, what brought me to Cuba, if we really look at it in a deeper way, was that they had the knowledge to heal my body and seduce me on the way.

• 6:36Lewis Howes?

  Exactly, yeah.

• 6:36Speaker 01

  At the same time.

• 6:37Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, exactly. When do you think we started to lose the connection with our body? And why do we lose the connection, in general?

• 6:45Speaker 01

  Oh, that's a really good question. The really interesting thing is, going to Cuba, this is what fascinates me about Cuba. It's like taking a time machine back.

• 6:53Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 6:54Speaker 01

  So, I take a time machine back and I experience the way things were. And then I take it back here and I see the way we live. And in that, you understand many things. So, what happened to us gradually is that we wanted to become more effective. We wanted to be more productive. We wanted to produce more. We wanted to achieve more. We wanted to have more, right? We wanted to sell more. We wanted to market more. Capitalism. That's what happened to us. So, as that happened, we had to start giving up things. So, we gave up romance. We don't have time for romance. People don't have time for romance, mostly. They're too busy running fast. You know, some people don't have times for their kids. We want to achieve.

• 7:38Speaker 01

  We want to fulfill ourselves. We want, and it's not a bad thing. It's all about balance. If you notice, more and more people are thinking too much and not feeling enough. And that's where you start people, to see people also get sick. Because the body signals when we're out of balance. But then they don't listen to the signals. They shove caffeine. They shove medication and they keep going. But the body tells you to stop. And you're not listening. So what is the body going to do? Make you sicker.

• 8:06Lewis Howes?

  Get shut down, make you sick, depressed, anxious.

• 8:09Speaker 01

  Right, which is what we're seeing today.

• 8:10Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, wow. And what happens when we rediscover our natural sensuality? Or our bodies?

• 8:19Speaker 01

  Well, it's not just the sensuality, right? It's basically this. So we've got the five elements of somatic intelligence. And it's really about coming back to our true nature. So when we're in true nature, everything's balanced and we're at our optimal place.

• 8:34Lewis Howes?

  Okay.

• 8:35Speaker 01

  And we have to keep the elements balanced. And we got to also think about the fact that we need to balance between material and social. If one takes over the other, something comes out of balance.

• 8:46Lewis Howes?

  Got it. So what's our true?

• 8:48Speaker 01

  Nature.

• 8:48Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 8:49Speaker 01

  So we've got five elements.

• 8:51Lewis Howes?

  And then you call this somatic intelligence.

• 8:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, the five elements of somatic intelligence. So one is elegance. I'm not talking about clothing. I'm talking about our being. So elegance is the possession of ourselves. The quietness of being ourselves. It's that when you've got that, you know, the past generations, the way they were and the way they behaved? They had elegance in their being. Obama is very elegant.

• 9:13Lewis Howes?

  Very elegant.

• 9:14Speaker 01

  In how he behaves, right? And we admire him for that.

• 9:16Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 9:17Speaker 01

  He's like a role model for how in the being. I'm not just talking about, you can just mute him and look. There's something about his being that says elegance. The same with Michelle Obama. Right?

• 9:29Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 9:29Speaker 01

  So that's the element of confidence. Intention is the one that is connected to meaning and drive. So I always get up at the end. When we think intention, if I'm, let's say, standing right now like this, what does my body say?

• 9:49Lewis Howes?

  Hmm, maybe unsure, or quiet, or reserved, or shy, or?

• 9:55Speaker 01

  Exactly, right? Or avoiding, or, but I'm not in the situation. And now, what am I saying? I'm gonna shift it. So now what am I saying?

• 10:04Lewis Howes?

  Hmm, more confident, I guess, more interested, more elegant.

• 10:11Speaker 01

  So what I did is I went from avoiding the situation into

• 10:16Lewis Howes?

  Back to the forward.

• 10:16Speaker 01

  Being in the situation. The intention is always forward going. And it's the element of doing, right? It's like we're right there and it's the goal and it's the thing. The energy goes there. So when the body is towards there, it's like, ah, right? Now, somatically, if your body isn't in that position, then you're really already like getting yourself to be there because it changes the chemistry in our bodies. So you know how Amy Cuddy talks about the power pose, right? So if I put people into elegance, which is the being. And I put them into two minutes of elegance. And I will ask them at the beginning, "How do you feel right now for your confidence?" Before we do that. If they're feeling really bad, they will describe it between zero and four. If they're having a really bad day.

• 10:59Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 11:00Speaker 01

  By the end of it, they'll say probably six to eight. Because the chemistry in the body changes in two minutes, which changes the behavior, which changes the results. So this is the being that quiets the noise and the turmoil, right? And this is the doing. So it's like, "I'm going and I'm doing." They have to balance each other. If I'm just too much intention,

• 11:20Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 11:20Speaker 01

  I'm not really...

• 11:21Lewis Howes?

  You're off balance.

• 11:22Speaker 01

  Right. If I'm just really elegant, what's missing right now?

• 11:25Lewis Howes?

  The doing.

• 11:26Speaker 01

  The doing.

• 11:26Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 11:27Speaker 01

  Right. But if I've got both,

• 11:28Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 11:29Speaker 01

  Then I'm with the intention and I've got that thing that calms down the nerves and all these things.

• 11:34Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm. So having that slight doing elegance calms nerves? Is that what you said?

• 11:41Speaker 01

  No, the elegance calms nerves. The doing doesn't calm the nerves. You get the nerves because you're doing and you're taking risks and stuff. But when we have the elegance in there, it balances the doing and it creates... If I go into meetings and I'm really nervous, I'll put tons of elegance in. And it quiets the system.

• 12:00Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 12:00Speaker 01

  Right? Then I come in more balanced. Now...

• 12:04Lewis Howes?

  So that's intention.

• 12:05Speaker 01

  Intention.

• 12:06Lewis Howes?

  Yep.

• 12:06Speaker 01

  The next one is tempo, which is the element of enjoyment. So tempo, let's say that this is the tempo that we take. And it doesn't matter if it's slow or fast. It works for both, right? Most people now, their tempo of their body is addiction. Addiction to the race of the pace. So I'll give them a thing and they're like, they get there and they're already thinking of the next thing. And they haven't even gotten there. They're already like, you know when they get da, da, da, da, da, da, da, right? But if I take enjoyment, I'm enjoying myself. I'm enjoying the journey, right? Versus got there. It's the same tempo. One, there's no enjoyment. And then the one... I'm like, I'm taking

• 12:48Lewis Howes?

  You're feeling it, yeah, yeah.

• 12:49Speaker 01

  I'm taking the juice of life.

• 12:50Lewis Howes?

  Of course.

• 12:51Speaker 01

  Which is all about, I'm not just about getting to the end goal. I'm gonna enjoy also the journey.

• 12:56Lewis Howes?

  Experiencing the journey, yeah.

• 12:56Speaker 01

  Which is what happens to us with stress and anxiety and depression is that we get so about

• 13:01Lewis Howes?

  The next step.

• 13:02Speaker 01

  Right, that we're not there.

• 13:04Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 13:05Speaker 01

  We're not present anymore. So this is the tempo. When I change your tempo.

• 13:09Lewis Howes?

  Enjoyment, yeah.

• 13:09Speaker 01

  I can change your tempo. And that would release endorphins and dopamine. And in like, in the session, you sort of just feel good.

• 13:16Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 13:16Speaker 01

  Because you're high now.

• 13:18Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 13:19Speaker 01

  Because I slow you down a little bit. We're running faster than the natural tempo.

• 13:22Lewis Howes?

  And I break that down into just celebrating the small wins of your day. Like, what are you grateful for in the morning? Every little win, like acknowledge it as opposed to waiting for the end journey of like the big goal at the end. Like, what's the, you know, smiling at someone down the street, like appreciating that moment.

• 13:39Speaker 01

  That's enjoyment.

• 13:40Lewis Howes?

  It's enjoyment, yeah.

• 13:40Speaker 01

  That's when you're really enjoying your life.

• 13:42Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 13:43Speaker 01

  And you're not trying to get to the end goal where you're gonna die anyway.

• 13:46Lewis Howes?

  Exactly, exactly. You can't take anything with you anyways.

• 13:48Speaker 01

  No, and people live life like it's a trial life.

• 13:51Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 13:52Speaker 01

  But what about the years you're going through? Those are the ones that count.

• 13:55Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 13:56Speaker 01

  Right? So then you have the sabrosura. And the sabrosura that is, like I said, it's the sensuality that sits on self-love. So it's connected to love. And the sabrosura, as you can see, it's not just any sensuality. Because, like, I can just move with sensuality, okay? That's sensuality. But if I'm moving with the sabrosura, there's something extra, right? And I'm doing the female one right now. And what is that? It's because when I'm looking at my hands, I'm looking at them as if they're the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. And that's where self-love is. I'm not going like, my fingers look like, really fat.

• 14:32Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 14:32Speaker 01

  And I hate them, and I don't like my nails, and that, whatever we think translates into how we also move. Because if I look at the flaws, I'm missing the beauty of it, then I'm missing the love. And that also affects...

• 14:47Lewis Howes?

  So it's how we look at ourselves. It's how we think about our self-talk and our...

• 14:52Speaker 01

  Negative self-talk or positive. But that's one aspect of it. The other aspect of it is also when we talk about containing other people. And you know when people get, let's say, aggressive?

• 15:04Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 15:05Speaker 01

  Right, when we talk about men who are taking things away. So what do they have really strong? Which element right now?

• 15:12Lewis Howes?

  Their intention.

• 15:13Speaker 01

  Exactly. Right, so they have a really strong intention. They know what they want. What's missing?

• 15:20Lewis Howes?

  Elegance.

• 15:21Speaker 01

  One, right? That place of respect, of honor, of being a gentleman. What else is missing?

• 15:29Lewis Howes?

  Well, they're not playful, I guess, if they're being aggressive, but...

• 15:32Speaker 01

  Well, Sabr of Sura, love.

• 15:33Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 15:34Speaker 01

  Right, love is about bettering off the other person.

• 15:37Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 15:37Speaker 01

  It's not about taking something. So it's not really the elements that we need to tone down. If you see there's a minus and a plus. It's which ones are missing that balance it. Right, so if we look, and I'll explain to you, Mr. in a minute. If we look, for example, at, and let's look at the culture now, not a person. If we look at the US, which element is super strong right now?

• 15:59Lewis Howes?

  We look at the US, I mean, the attention, right?

• 16:02Speaker 01

  Right.

• 16:04Speaker 01

  What's missing? What got turned down lately?

• 16:07Lewis Howes?

  The love, the elegance.

• 16:09Speaker 01

  Exactly. Those, if we think Obama to Trump, those got turned down. And this is why it's not working. You have to keep them in balance to be in true nature. And mystery, that's the trickiest one. Because this is where not just the playfulness is, but that's where the seduction is. And that's where there's that energy of like, mmm-hmm, right?

• 16:30Lewis Howes?

  Right, yeah.

• 16:31Speaker 01

  And that's where people get scared. Because there's a gray area there. You can't really box it, because it's a life energy.

• 16:45Speaker 02

  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.

• 17:29Speaker 02

  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.

• 17:36Lewis Howes?

  Is this person safe?

• 17:37Speaker 02

  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.

• 17:45Lewis Howes?

  Huge dude.

• 17:46Speaker 02

  Yeah. And other, even then, if I'm in a civil, 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, 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 gonna be before you talk to them, unless they sneak up on you, in which case you got other issues.

• 18:17Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 18:18Speaker 02

  But 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.

• 18:40Lewis Howes?

  It's not as much important about what you say or...

• 18:42Speaker 02

  Right.

• 18:43Lewis Howes?

  Even how you're saying it, it's more about who you're being.

• 18:45Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 18:46Lewis Howes?

  And the way you're saying it beforehand.

• 18:47Speaker 02

  Exactly. Yeah, it becomes far less relevant to the, the actual connection that you have with that person.

• 18:55Lewis Howes?

  And before you get into the drill, I'll back that up by giving, you know, as a positive example of this. There's so many times, like when I was single... Years ago even, like, not even the last time I was single, but years ago, like in my early twenties, when I was just like, you know, trying to like, say hi to every girl, right?

• 19:11Speaker 02

  Sure, yeah.

• 19:12Lewis Howes?

  I always, yeah, I always felt like, I never knew what to say. I always felt like this dumb kid, it was like, I don't have anything clever to say, I'm not like this smart kid. But I was like, you know what, let me just practice using the gifts that I do have, which is I can smile. I can smile and come up to someone with like, positive energy, like be open hearted, and just like, smile and look them in the eyes. And not like staring into their soul or whatever, but just like-

• 19:34Speaker 02

  Creepy style?

• 19:35Lewis Howes?

  Kind of make them like, a little bit like, uncomfortable, but like, oh, that's interesting that the person has the confidence to look at me for like, two seconds. And smile. And then just kind of like, keep walking or whatever, or say hello. And when I would do that, I would always feel like, if I came with a big smile, like genuine, almost a hundred percent of the time, the girl would talk to me, or whoever I wanted to talk to would talk back, and it'd be like this friendly conversation. Just like that one little cue of, big heart, big smile.

• 20:02Speaker 02

  And there's a lot of switches being flipped in the subconscious mind when that happens, which is the safety switch, go, oh, okay, dangerous people often don't smile. Which isn't true, by the way. But it is, is, that's why dangerous people do overemphasize the smile, is because they're often overly charming because they are dangerous and they're predators. It's another, that's another thing for, I did a show with Gavin DeBecker, The Gift of Fear, we talked a lot about that. But yeah, you're right, you're flipping a lot of the right switches, which is, look, this person is friendly, this person is maybe safer, this person isn't judging me right now, or has judged me in a positive way, which is great, so there's approval there. That's very welcoming for a lot of people. And then of course,

• 20:42Speaker 02

  you having other friends in the same room is also very helpful, any situation like that that comes about can be, add to a positive first impression. And so-

• 20:52Lewis Howes?

  But I never said anything like, unique or clever, it's just like, oh, we can have conversation by just being positive.

• 20:57Speaker 02

  Exactly, yeah, exactly. And I think a lot of guys, I think when they're dating especially, if they don't know how to start conversations, or even if you're going up to your favorite speaker at an event or something like that, often people are like, oh, I don't know what to say. And it's like, well, it doesn't really matter, because here's what's happening. If you're not saying anything, I'm getting a weird vibe from the creepy, quiet person who's just staring at me trying to figure out what to say, because your body does weird stuff when your mind is otherwise engaged. So it's better to just turn that off. Cause if you're thinking, hmm, what do I say? What am I gonna do? Then you just look like, you, you looks, you look strange and you look unapproachable and you're, the gears are turning.

• 21:39Speaker 02

  And we don't think, and, and you guys can probably back this up. If a guy walks up to a fe- a female and he is nervous, a lot of times, if he looks like the type of guy who shouldn't be nervous, like if it's Louis and he walks up and he's like nervous and fidgety, you're not thinking, oh, how cute, he's nervous. You're thinking, okay, what is going on here? This is creepy. I don't get it. Why is this person creeping me out? And, and we mirror people naturally, like I will mirror your emotions. Women will mirror our emotions. They'll mirror each other's emotions. That's a human thing. So if I'm nervous and anxious, other people are gonna start to become that way in the interaction and they're not gonna go, oh, well, you know, he probably just has a little bit of anxiety because he's not used to being in a room full. No, that's not what's happening.

• 22:25Speaker 02

  What's happening is they're going, he's nervous. What's he gonna do? Cause I'm nervous now and I don't know why. And since I don't know why, I'm just gonna leave because that's gonna make me feel not nervous, which is where I wanna be. That's my comfort zone. So you end up making other people feel strange, whether through eye contact that doesn't match the rest of your body. Eye contact that seems like there's an intent behind what you're doing. That's not the, the words that you're saying. So all of these things goes back to the body can't lie, that first takeaway. The body can lie, it's just very hard, but the body certainly will give away and betray your intentions. It just might be that the other person's perception of your intentions is incorrect. Does that make sense?

• 23:05Lewis Howes?

  Of course, yeah.

• 23:06Speaker 02

  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 wanna throw in here.

• 23:24Lewis Howes?

  Right. So what's the drill then?

• 23:26Speaker 02

  So the drill, I call this a doorway drill, is this kind of an art of charm staple. And what this is, is you know, when you're confident, you naturally are upright, like you, you basically just did this. Upright, open body language, smile on your face, chin up ideally, chest forward, shoulders back. You don't have to be like, you know, Superman pose or anything. Uh, those power posing things have kind of been, they're, those studies are hard to replicate, I'll put it that way. But if we, 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,

• 24:08Speaker 02

  put a smile on my face, that's gonna work next time 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 gonna happen. No. It's kind of like telling yourself, "Remember to notice things." It's an impossible task, right? Yeah. You can't do it. You can't be mindful of your verbal and nonverbal communication and stay present in a conversation. It's, 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.

• 24:51Speaker 02

  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. Mm-hmm. When we have that, when you have that posture going, I don't know, I, 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, 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.

• 25:36Speaker 02

  I've been sitting like this for Yeah, yeah. two hours. You gotta reset. And you have to constantly reset every time you sit up, stand up.

• 25:48Vanessa Van Edwards?

  I have always been fascinated by the popular kids, right? Like, these magnetic sort of like, what makes a kid cool or popular, whatever that is? And Van Sloon did a really interesting research experiment with teenagers. Can you guess what makes the most popular kids popular? Like, what is it? It could be anything from attractiveness, to clothing, to the way they talk. If you had to guess. Listeners, guess too.

• 26:12Lewis Howes?

  What makes a popular person popular?

• 26:14Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Yes.

• 26:15Lewis Howes?

  Their confidence? I don't know, their outgoing?

• 26:18Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Okay, I would have guessed outgoing. That's exactly what I would have guessed. Like, extroverted, talkative, which was like, I was like, oh, please don't let it be that. So first of all, it wasn't attractiveness, which I think is very important for people to keep in mind. It wasn't the most beautiful girls or the hottest guys. What it was is the most popular kids also liked the most people.

• 26:38Lewis Howes?

  Hmm, that makes sense.

• 26:40Vanessa Van Edwards?

  And like, now that I heard that, which is exactly what you just said.

• 26:43Lewis Howes?

  I suppose just five people, they're like, you know, everyone.

• 26:46Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Right, so, yes, exactly. It's like, what he found was, is that the most popular kids, when they were asked, "Who do you like?", they had the longest list. And that also meant that they were liked by the most people. And this was measured by, typically, they smiled more in the hallways. So they would do the, you tell me if this is right. So, men, when they know, see someone they know, they give the upward, "Hey, nice to see you", like, it's like acknowledgement, versus if you don't know someone, but you want to acknowledge them, you give them the downward nod.

• 27:13Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 27:14Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Is that right?

• 27:15Lewis Howes?

  Probably, yes. If you're conditioned that way. I try to just smile at everyone.

• 27:19Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Okay, so that's what the cool kids said.

• 27:21Lewis Howes?

  No, because you like, you train yourself to this. I just started smiling at everyone in the hallways, too. Just like, "Hey, how are you?", like, "Good to see you", just like, a compliment or something.

• 27:29Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Without realizing it, and that's what I kind of wrote about in your chapter, was like, without realizing it, you were actually activating a scientific principle that we like people who like us.

• 27:38Lewis Howes?

  Makes sense.

• 27:39Vanessa Van Edwards?

  The biggest-

• 27:40Lewis Howes?

  You're not gonna like people that hate you.

• 27:41Vanessa Van Edwards?

  No.

• 27:41Lewis Howes?

  Or ignore you.

• 27:43Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Or, and this is the real killer of relationships, people do not think of. We talk a lot about toxic people, right? Difficult people, toxic people. But actually, the killer is ambivalence.

• 27:54Lewis Howes?

  You're not sure.

• 27:55Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Yeah, you're not sure. Do they like me? Do I like them?

• 27:59Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 27:59Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Were we friendly? That actually takes up more mental energy than the toxic people. And they did a study with police officers where they found that police officers who have more ambivalent relationships versus police officers who had a lot of toxic relationships. The ambivalent ones actually had less efficiency. They had less happiness and career satisfaction. And they skipped more days of work. That's because if you, if someone's toxic, you know. You don't want to sit with them at lunch.

• 28:25Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 28:26Vanessa Van Edwards?

  You don't want to stop by their desk. It's clear. Ambivalent, you're like, should I, should I invite them to lunch?

• 28:31Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 28:32Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Or no?

• 28:33Lewis Howes?

  It's not safe. You're like, I'm sure.

• 28:34Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Right. And I think that that's the key word is safety. And so ambivalence, when you like someone, you clearly are like smiling, nodding. Hey, what's up? Good to see you. The person's like,

• 28:44Vanessa Van Edwards?

  I'm liked. And like, that is the greatest feeling of safety in the world. And so if you go to a conference, you have a big conference coming up, you're really nervous. I don't want you to think about being extroverted, especially if you're an introvert or ambivert. No, like, don't pretend.

• 28:58Lewis Howes?

  Ambivert?

• 28:59Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Ambivert.

• 29:00Lewis Howes?

  Ambivert.

• 29:01Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Yeah. It's, it's, I'm an ambivert. An ambivert is if introvert or extrovert never felt right to you, it's when you can flip into extroversion if you need to or in the right situation. So like, for me right now, I'm not that nervous, right? I'm a little bit nervous. You make me a little bit nervous, but like, not terribly.

• 29:18Lewis Howes?

  Sure.

• 29:18Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Like, learning one-on-one situations, conferences, I'm okay. Nightclubs, bars, those kinds of things, no. So if you are in those situations, going to a conference, don't think about, how can I be more extroverted? How can I be more outgoing? It's actually, how can I just like more people? When I'm at a conference and I do this, you were at WDS. So I go every year. And all of my trainers, my science people trainers come with me. And I say like, our one thing is, we're inviting everyone to sit with us. We are inviting everyone to come to lunch with us. If you see someone standing alone, we say hello. We invite them to come over. Like, that is our number one goal. And so that's an easier way, I think, to tackle like big groups or conferences. It's just, how can you like more people?

• 30:01Lewis Howes?

  That's cool.

• 30:01Vanessa Van Edwards?

  I was very focused on IQ, right? Like, growing up, like, book smarts, technical skills. I never heard about PQ. I never heard about social or emotional intelligence. So there's all these IQ tests and things like that. But I found that what a really good way to start is like, where are, where is your smarts? Right, like socially, what are your social strengths? Like, we even have like StrengthsFinder 2.0. I'm working on something right now where I want to do like Social Strengths 2.0. Like, what are our social strengths, which are just as important as some of our capabilities? And so the quiz is sort of like, okay, where are you at right now? Right, like, how good are you decoding? So we're talking about social intelligence. There's really two things we're talking about. Decoding, so spotting cues, spotting hidden emotions, decoding lies. And encoding.

• 30:46Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Encoding are the signals that you send out to others. So we're kind of testing both sides of that.

• 30:50Lewis Howes?

  Got it, got it. And I read that people with a higher EQ or PQ also make more than people.

• 30:58Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Twenty-nine thousand dollars more per year, according to this research.

• 31:00Lewis Howes?

  Than someone with a high IQ or a lower?

• 31:04Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Lower, lower EQ.

• 31:06Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, lower EQ. So higher EQ, you're gonna make more.

• 31:08Vanessa Van Edwards?

  That's right.

• 31:09Lewis Howes?

  Ninety percent of the time.

• 31:09Vanessa Van Edwards?

  That's right. And that's because we are interacting with people in ways that we don't even quantify or realize. Right, like, every time you send an email, like, that email has to be received, processed. There's a difference between having someone respond to it right away and having it sit in their inbox for five days.

• 31:22Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 31:23Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Right, negotiating, interviewing, around the water cooler. People still have water coolers in their office.

• 31:29Lewis Howes?

  Sure, sure.

• 31:30Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Right, like, I, and my team is all virtual, and I still am using that PQ every day, all day. One exercise that sometimes I think about, you can do this if you're listening, is, in the course of a day, make a note of every single interpersonal reaction that you have. It will shock you how many of those there are and how big of an impact they have. Right? Like, even if it's just like a casual coffee, all the possibilities that could come out of that interaction and then so you make one column where you mark out all the interactions you have. The second column is, if that interaction went as good as it could possibly go, what magic could happen for you?

• 32:07Lewis Howes?

  So much.

• 32:08Vanessa Van Edwards?

  So much.

• 32:09Lewis Howes?

  So much.

• 32:10Vanessa Van Edwards?

  But instead, a lot of our interactions are like, meh.

• 32:12Lewis Howes?

  Average. So you get average results.

• 32:14Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Exactly.

• 32:15Lewis Howes?

  And when you, you know, I'm thinking about it, I'm probably like, I have hundreds of these interactions a day potentially.

• 32:19Vanessa Van Edwards?

  You do.

• 32:20Lewis Howes?

  Especially with social media and emails and in person and if you're at events like, yesterday I was at Oprah's event, Super Soul Sessions.

• 32:26Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Cool.

• 32:27Lewis Howes?

  And there was like thousands of people, but I met a lot of people.

• 32:29Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Yeah.

• 32:30Lewis Howes?

  Even for like 10 seconds, I met people.

• 32:32Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Yeah.

• 32:33Lewis Howes?

  And I remember there were a number of people, even I just met and gave them a hug, like they always left a comment like, man, you give really good hugs.

• 32:40Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Yes.

• 32:41Lewis Howes?

  As opposed to just like, oh, nice to meet you, off. Like, they always said something.

• 32:44Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Yeah.

• 32:45Lewis Howes?

  That was like a positive reinforcement. And for me, it's like, maybe the next time, and maybe months when I see them, but they'll remember I gave them a good hug.

• 32:51Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Absolutely. So that was, you took something in the interaction, even in 10 seconds.

• 32:55Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 32:56Vanessa Van Edwards?

  And you made it above average.

• 32:57Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 32:58Vanessa Van Edwards?

  So Michael-

• 32:59Lewis Howes?

  I have awkward long hugs. I try not to make them awkward, but I try to make them like, not like super awkward, like get off me, but like just a little extra, like an extra second.

• 33:06Vanessa Van Edwards?

  An extra second.

• 33:07Lewis Howes?

  Like, right when they start to pull away, I squeeze.

• 33:09Vanessa Van Edwards?

  You're like, no, want a little bit more.

• 33:10Lewis Howes?

  I squeeze a little bit more, and they're like, oh, okay.

• 33:12Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Yes.

• 33:13Lewis Howes?

  I always do that.

• 33:14Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Yes, yes.

• 33:15Lewis Howes?

  Sometimes it goes bad, but most of the time it works.

• 33:16Vanessa Van Edwards?

  I mean, I have a theory that you should greet everyone like they're an old friend.

• 33:19Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm. That's good. Yes. That's what I do.

• 33:23Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Hand hug. Yes.

• 33:24Lewis Howes?

  That's what I do.

• 33:25Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Because if you have that mentality, same with an email, you give so much more, like excitement, whatever. It's like, oh my gosh, you haven't seen this friend in three years? How would you greet them? That is the way that I think you should greet most people.

• 33:35Lewis Howes?

  Maybe not screaming after that.

• 33:37Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Right? Like, that's the girl scream, right?

• 33:38Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 33:39Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Two girls get together and like, immediately, I told you, Blake, the volume would go up on me once I got excited.

• 33:44Lewis Howes?

  No, you're good.

• 33:45Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Yeah, because like, we scream, we go up. What I was gonna say also about that, which is really very smart, is it doesn't need to be a five-minute interaction, it can be 10 seconds. A lot of the time, we focus on productivity. We focus on efficiency. We focus on maximizing our business revenue. All those things are great, but like if we focus on some of the social aspects of that, it makes it so much easier. Like, let's not just optimize our IQ, our business acumen. Let's also optimize our social acumen because you make that list of every interaction you have and all the good things that could happen if it went really well. It's magic in every other area.

• 34:19Lewis Howes?

  Magic.

• 34:20Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Yeah.

• 34:20Lewis Howes?

  And, oh gosh, that's why I love this stuff. Because I feel like this has really been kind of the key to my results.

• 34:27Vanessa Van Edwards?

  I would agree.

• 34:27Lewis Howes?

  In my business life. Because I would probably have, if I took an IQ test, I probably wouldn't even, you know, I don't know, I don't even know what the rankings are. I don't even know what the lowest is. I'd probably be at the bottom. And so for me, it's like, I just feel like I stack and stack and stack so much good PQ. Is that right?

• 34:44Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Yeah.

• 34:44Lewis Howes?

  EQ, PQ.

• 34:44Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Exactly right.

• 34:45Lewis Howes?

  SQ, whatever you're calling it, social, yeah. And I feel like people care more about how you make them feel, you know, as opposed to how smart you are or whatever.

• 34:53Vanessa Van Edwards?

  And that quote, that famous quote, I think it's by Maya Angelou.

• 34:56Lewis Howes?

  People don't care how much you know until they know what you care is one quote.

• 34:59Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Yes, and then people remember.

• 35:01Lewis Howes?

  They remember what you say, but they remember the way you made them feel.

• 35:04Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Oh, God, quote, quote.

• 35:06Lewis Howes?

  Those are my two favorite quotes.

• 35:07Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Yes. So I saw that quote, that second quote, what I just explained with the skydivers, that is the scientific reason behind that quote. So in the book, I talk about these quotes we share all the time, like the Dale Carnegie, how to, you know, be interested to be interesting. Like, what is the science behind that?

• 35:24Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, not just like, oh, that's a cool philosophy.

• 35:27Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Because now that Maya Angelou quote, you actually could think to yourself, what emotion do I want to infect today? Right? Like, is it gratitude? Is it excitement? Is it fulfillment? And like, by the way, this doesn't mean that you cannot be vulnerable. This doesn't mean you can't have a bad day. This doesn't mean that you can't go into a meeting and be like, I'm so sorry, like, I am feeling really down. In fact, I have those days, we all do. I regularly do not cancel meetings on those days. I feel that I would rather go in and say, listen, like, I am just overwhelmed.

• 36:01Lewis Howes?

  I'm off today.

• 36:02Vanessa Van Edwards?

  Yeah, like, I'm off, I'm overwhelmed, I'm sorry for that. Because I also want to catch theirs. Right? It's not just a one-way street. We don't just infect. I also like to be infected by others.

• 36:17Lewis Howes?

  Oh, do you feel more confident after this already? Do you feel like you know how to command a room and how to optimize your body language in any setting? If so, let me know. LewisHowes.com/662 is the link to share with your friends, to get all the show notes, and to get the links for each of the individual episodes that we talked about in this episode as well. Share with me over on Instagram @LewisHowes. Again, share with your friends, tell them to click on the link, swipe up, all the good stuff. If you think it'll help them be a resource and a tool for mastering their own body language and increasing their confidence as well. Again, big thank you to everyone that we featured on these episodes. You can check them out on our show notes. I am so pumped, guys.

• 37:02Lewis Howes?

  We've got some big episodes coming up, some huge names coming up. If you haven't subscribed to the podcast yet, click the subscribe button. And as Theodore Roosevelt said, "Each time we face our fear, we gain strength, courage, and confidence in the doing." Continue to face your fears every single day. I love you so very much, and you know what time it is. It's time to go out there and do something great.