The Art of Reading Minds

by Henrik Fexeus

  It’s time to change that. And I really mean it. My goal is to give you this knowledge in as easy, straightforward, and practical a way as possible.

  I just bought a new bunk bed for my children. From IKEA. If it had come with an eleven-page instruction manual that spent the first ten pages explaining why beds are great to have, and then concluded with, “You already have all the tools you need to make your own bed! Just get to work! Make sure you have a solid frame! And don’t forget a comfortable mattress!” I would have been pretty angry and poked the first IKEA employee I came across in the eye with an Allen key. But I’ve noticed that there are a lot of books that do just that. They spend the whole book promising to explain how to achieve something or other, but you’re none the wiser after you’ve finished reading them. You still have no idea of what to do in purely practical terms in order to become a better person (this is often the point). Or how to join the stinking headpiece to the joist, for that matter. I hope this book isn’t one of those books.

  I want this book to be as clear and straightforward as an IKEA instruction sheet. Once you’ve read the book, you’ll understand what I’ve been talking about, in concrete and practical terms. You will begin practicing different methods of mind reading and ways of influencing other people’s thoughts while you read it. You’ll know where the headpiece goes. And you won’t even need an Allen key.

  * * *

  One last thing: nothing in this book was discovered by me. Everything you’re going to read is based on and collated from works by the true masters of the various fields discussed. The real work was done by people like Milton H. Erickson, Richard Bandler and John Grinder, Desmond Morris, Paul Ekman, Ernest Dichter, Antonio Damasio, Erika Rosenberg, William Sargant, Philip Zimbardo, William James, Denise Winn … to mention only a few. Without them, this book would have been a very quick read.

  I hope you are sitting comfortably. Let’s get started.

  2

  Rapport

  WHAT IT IS AND WHY YOU WANT IT

  In which we discuss cycling and how to

  establish a good relationship with anybody you like

  without uttering a word.

  There is a very good reason why we want to know what somebody else is thinking: it helps us establish rapport. It’s an internationally acknowledged term, used in the realm of wordless communication, and that is why I will be using it here. Rapport is something we always try to establish with the people we meet, whether it is in a business context, where we want people to understand our presentation of an idea, or simply in a case of wanting the attention of the hottie in the checkout line at the supermarket we were fantasizing about just a few pages ago. In both of those cases, we can only succeed by establishing rapport.

  The word “rapport” comes from the French term le rapport, which means to have a relationship with, or connection to, someone or something. By establishing good rapport, we are creating a relationship of mutual trust, consent, cooperativeness, and openness to each other’s ideas. Sounds useful, huh?

  Rapport is the basis for all meaningful communication, at least when you want the person in question to listen to and care about the things you have to say. When you’re trying to deliver a message, even if it’s simply an attempt to get your kids to empty the dishwasher, if you haven’t ensured that you’re in good rapport with the person you’re talking to, you might as well not bother. The person won’t listen to you anyway. Rapport is also a prerequisite for people liking each other on a more personal level. How personal is up to you, but without rapport there’s no point even trying.

  We are always establishing good and bad rapport with the people around us. By learning how it’s actually done, you can learn how to always make good rapport, even with people you wouldn’t ordinarily get along with. Funnily enough, you often come across these people holding positions in which their decisions or attitudes concerning your opinions and ideas can greatly influence your future. Wouldn’t it be nice if he or she understood what you mean for once?

  I understand if you can’t see how rapport has anything to do with mind reading, but I have to insist that it does. What you will learn to observe in others, in order to establish rapport, will also tell you where they are mentally, how they understand the world, what they’re thinking, and how they feel. Mind reading begins at that early stage, as a condition for creating good relationships.

  The Basic Rule of Rapport

  The basic rule for establishing rapport is really very simple, but it’s based on a deep insight into how people work. The basic rule of good rapport is to adapt to how the other person prefers to communicate. (If you’ve studied marketing, you have been taught to always communicate on the level of the target demographic. Same thing.) You do this in a variety of ways, which we shall soon go through. They are, almost without exception, wordless methods that the person you are communicating with will only pick up unconsciously.

  By adapting to someone else, you achieve two different things. It makes it easier for the other person to understand what you’re saying, since you are expressing yourself (wordlessly) just like she would have done. The recipient no longer has to “translate” your wordless communication into something she better understands, as you are now communicating in the way that she prefers (and understands the best). When the person you are talking to no longer has to “filter” your information to understand it, that means that the danger of misunderstanding has been minimized. To be able to adapt to another person, you first have to make sure you understand how she prefers to communicate. In other words, by learning to observe how other people communicate, you’re also learning to understand what they are actually trying to say. The other thing you accomplish is making her like you better. The reason for this is simple: by adapting to the other’s way of communicating, and becoming the same, you show that you are like him or her, since your expressions resemble that person’s. And people like people who remind them of themselves. Who do we like the best of all people? Ourselves. This only makes sense, after all, as we are the only living beings we can ever know from the inside. (This is also the reason for the so-called “spotlight effect,” a concept proposed by psychologists Thomas Gilovich and Kenneth Savitsky, which states that we tend to believe that others notice us more than they actually do.) The rest of the world is only accessible to us by observation, which creates an emotional distance. By the same logic, then, the answer to the question of who we like second best seems obvious: we like people who are like us. We like to spend time with people who are like us, who see the world the same way we do and who like and dislike the same things we do. Research has shown that we also prefer to hire people who are like us. A recent study by the Gallup organization found that one of the most important things for a new employee is “good rapport and trust between the immediate supervisor and the employee.”

  We choose our closest friends based on who makes us feel comfortable being the way we are. And who better for that than people who are already like us?

  * * *

  At this point I feel a brief comment is in order. The idea of adapting to somebody else is, naturally, not for you to completely erase your own personality. Establishing rapport in this way is something you do initially, when you’ve just met somebody. In any relationship or encounter, we adapt to each other, back and forth, once good rapport is established. You can help this procedure along by establishing rapport consciously, by selflessly offering to be the one to adapt, as you are likely to be more aware of the procedure than the person you’re meeting with. It’s not really any stranger than offering to speak a few words in a foreign language to somebody who understands it better than English. You adapt to the way the other person prefers to communicate. By adapting to somebody else, by beginning to speak his language, even if not fluently, you’re telling the unconscious mind, “I’m like you. You’re safe with me. You can trust me.”

  * * *

  After rapport is established, you can start changing your own behavior to a
chieve the same changes in the other. Once you’re in rapport, you don’t need to keep following the other person’s lead or adapting to her; she’ll gladly follow you. That’s just how rapport normally works. We take turns following each other’s leads, all the time.

  I promise you, somebody who speaks his own language better than English will both have an easier time understanding you and like you better if you don’t insist on speaking English exclusively. But as soon as this person has decided he likes you, he won’t mind giving his own broken English a try.

  If you’re in good rapport, the person you’re in it with will have an easier time accepting your ideas and suggestions, too. When somebody likes you, she tends to want to agree with you. This means that if you adapt to a person and show her that you are like her, she will feel an urge to agree with you. The things you say are the kinds of things she could have thought of herself (since you are so alike). Disagreeing with you would be a little like disagreeing with herself.

  Once you’re in rapport, you can also take the lead and bring the person you’re with to a positive mental state, one better suited for clearly understanding your message or ideas and the value of them. This is a case of influence without control. We’re not trying to manipulate anybody in any sinister sense of the word. If your idea isn’t actually any good, it won’t convince anybody, no matter how good your rapport is. What we want to do is to create a relationship in which you can creatively and constructively discuss any issue with respect and understanding. We don’t “control” or deceive other people to give them opinions they don’t really hold. We just make sure that they are in an optimal state to understand the actual advantages of whatever we are presenting, using only simple means, such as moving our bodies or adjusting our voices according to certain principles.

  If I am the same as you, you will understand and like me. If you like me, you will want to agree with me.

  Situations in Which You Need Rapport

  It’s never too late to start establishing rapport with somebody. Perhaps you have a very bad relationship with someone and want to change that. Start establishing rapport the next time you meet. You probably won’t manage to turn things around in one go, but if you keep trying to establish rapport every time you meet, you’ll notice a big difference in how the other person acts toward you fairly soon. Then, of course, there are always a few people that it would simply seem impossible for you to create good rapport with. Usually, you don’t really want to, anyway, so that’s OK. I’m not saying you have to be in good rapport with everybody you meet. I’m simply saying it can be done.

  When is rapport useful? Pretty much always. I mentioned some situations earlier. Communications expert Elaina Zuker lists some other everyday situations:

  When you want to finally understand what the person you’ve been living with all these years is trying to tell you.

  When you’re trying to regain some of the respect your teenage kids have lost for you.

  When you’re dealing with bosses, teachers, government agencies, or any other type of authority.

  When you come across people whose service you need but who can cause you problems, such as an ill-tempered bank clerk or a stressed-out restaurant waiter.

  When you receive a sales call (in this case, you might prefer to be going for bad rapport).1

  In any type of situation where you are being assessed or judged, such as a job interview.

  Zuker also offers the following examples from professional life:

  You often need to achieve more, with fewer resources. Often, you’ll find yourself competing with your colleagues, and your work might depend on your ability to establish rapport with important people—like the person in charge of the resources.

  To be a successful executive today, you need expert-level people skills. If you “go your own way,” you might risk alienating both your higher-ups and the people who work under you.

  If you want to convince people of your innovative idea, you need a well-developed set of communication skills. Your amazing idea won’t be going anywhere unless you can convince the right people.

  When you’re in the middle of an organization, you have people above you that you report to, and others that you are expected to lead. To get the results you want, you need to be able to create good relationships both above and below you.

  In flat organizations, you often end up with more responsibility than actual power. You have to work through other people to get things done, which can only be achieved by establishing rapport and working together.

  All of the things your years of work experience have taught you don’t mean as much as your ability to establish rapport. No matter how skilled you are, nobody wants an expert who is impossible to talk to.

  Perfecting What You Already Know

  Remember, you already use most of the mind-reading techniques I will touch on here. You just don’t know it. Also, you probably don’t use them to their maximum effect. What we’re going to do is take a look at these techniques, sharpen them up to make them effective, and then put them right back into your unconscious. And since you already know all this stuff in some sense, there’s no reason to feel daunted by the amount of information and number of techniques in the pages that follow. The fact is, you’ll have an easier time learning this than a lot of other skills. Here’s a model of how the learning process works:

  Step 1: Unconscious Ignorance The classic example is riding a bike. In step 1, that means you don’t know how to ride a bike, but you also don’t know there is any such thing as cycling.

  Step 2: Conscious Ignorance You don’t know how to cycle, but you are aware of cycling and that it is something you are ignorant of.

  Step 3: Conscious Knowledge You can ride a bike, but only when you concentrate and focus on what you are doing.

  Step 4: Unconscious Knowledge. You can ride a bike, and you don’t even have to think about it to do it.

  Real learning only happens at step 4, and you’re already there. However, we’re going to return to step 3 to polish your skills, and maybe we’ll add a thing or two to them. Getting back to step 4 will be your job, and you have all the time in the world to do it. After you’ve done the exercises in this book, start using the methods one at a time until you notice yourself doing each of them automatically (i.e., you’ve reached step 4). Only at that point should you begin using another method. Don’t try to do everything at once; you’ll only get confused. Take your time, and remember to enjoy yourself! It really is a lot of fun, especially once you begin to realize how easy it is and how well it works.

  3

  Rapport in Practice

  USING UNCONSCIOUS COMMUNICATION CONSCIOUSLY

  In which you learn how to use body language and other

  wordless methods to achieve your ends, in a completely

  different way than you might expect.

  Now, take a deep breath. In the next few pages, I will be bombarding you with facts, methods, and techniques that can be used to establish rapport. You’ll learn about everything from body language and tone of voice to energy levels and personal opinions. Of course, the whole idea is for you to use these ideas in real life, and the sooner you begin practicing, the better. However, you must remember not to rush through them. Take your time to learn to master the different methods.

  You won’t have to worry about “getting caught” while you’re practicing establishing rapport with people. I promise you, nobody will complain about how you’ve become easier to understand and more pleasant to converse with, or even that you suddenly seem to be able to read their minds. Although, for a time, you will be very aware of everything you do, the same doesn’t go for the people around you.

  Shake That Booty!

  How to Use Body Language

  As I mentioned earlier, we establish rapport by adapting to our recipient in a number of different areas. The first of these is body language. I am actually not particularly fond of that term. “Language” makes it sound as though there’s a voc
abulary list somewhere that you can just learn. Of course, books like that do exist. They teach you that when someone’s little finger is held in a certain way it means one thing, and when her left foot does a particular thing, it means something else. But things aren’t quite as simple as that. Our gestures don’t always mean the same thing in every situation or for every person. To write an entry in a dictionary of body language that says that crossed arms mean “keeping one’s distance / dissociation / doubt”—which I know a lot of people would happily write—is wrong, on the one hand because it ignores the considerably more multileveled and dynamic expressions our bodies can make, and on the other hand because it seems to require you to believe that body language exists in isolation, independent of all other things. You must have crossed your arms at some point and been struck by the thought, “Right! This is what people do when they’re angry or keeping their distance. But I’m not angry!?” Exactly. There may have been some other reason: perhaps it was cold and you crossed your arms to stay warm. Or it was just a convenient way for you to rest your arms for a minute. To make sure if someone is really keeping his or her distance or being doubtful, we have to look for other visible physical signs and consider the context in which these gestures are being carried out. How does the rest of the body look? Are the arms tense or relaxed? What about the face? Has your discussion been heated? Is the room cold? And so on.

  I would prefer to replace the term “body language” with something else, like “bodily communication.” But that sounds pretty dry, too. And since I don’t want to cause confusion by adding yet another new term to an area that is already overburdened with terms and definitions, I’m going to stick with “body language”—which, as you’ve come to understand, is a term for something considerably more varied and dynamic than a lot of people think.