How to Be Interesting Without Saying a Word

Have you ever looked at someone and instantly felt they were an interesting person? I think we all have sensed an interesting person. These people didn’t open their mouthes to spark this tickle of curiosity. There is a list of characteristics about these people that I have learned to cultivate in myself that I’m going to share with you in this article – so you can be more interesting without having to say a word.

There are two aspects to communication: verbal and nonverbal communication. Because these interesting people do not say a word to make you curious about them, their interesting characteristics come from good nonverbal communication, narrowly known as body language. Nonverbal communication gives you the power to be interesting among many other benefits.

A lot of lies and misleading information has been made about body language’s impact on communication. One such example comes from Albert Mehrabian, a psychologist at the University of California in Los Angeles, who created the “7%-38%-55% Rule” – a communication rule that defines what factors give our words meaning. The rule says 7% of meaning is in the spoken words, 38% of meaning is in how we say the words, and 55% of meaning is in facial expressions. As I’ve revealed in the 15 greatest communication myths, this communication rule cannot be applied to all situations, as Mehrabian specifically says this rule applies only when someone discusses their likes and dislikes. Mehrabian does, however, emphasize that body language is a strong influence in communication.

Want to look attractive? Your body language has the power to communicate attractiveness. If you want to appear lazy, boring, or unattractive, adjust your body language accordingly and others will immediately judge you as lazy, boring, or unattractive. Your body language has the power to influence and communicate what you want – in our case, how to be interesting.

I’ve learned three body language tricks to make myself appear more interesting. These techniques are simple and powerful, but may require a bit of practice until you become unconsciously competent with them. Eventually, people will see you as interesting and charismatic once you practice the tricks. Here are the three most powerful nonverbal skills you can put on yourself that will instantly make you more interesting, rapidly improve your attractiveness, make you more approachable, and quickly explode your confidence like never before with ease:

Gooey Eyes

As I type this, it’s ironic that I’m listening to a song called “Open Your Eyes” by Snow Patrol while the next song to be played is “Iris” by Goo Goo Dolls (normally, I don’t listen to lyrical music because it steals my point of focus). Eyes have always been important to humans. Without eyes, human communication relies on sounds. Without good eye contact, communication can be destroyed.

Most people’s understanding of good eye contact is to ensure you keep looking at the person, but there are eye contact techniques, like the gooey eyes trick, you can use to make yourself more interesting without having to say a word. The other person will see your great eye contact and instantly infer from your body language that you are no ordinary person. Excellent eye contact gives the message that you are an interesting person.

Gooey eyes has you momentarily increase eye contact with the person you want to be perceived by as being more interesting. It is a slow, deliberate movement to make people like you. The imagery you want to have – and where it gets its name from – is visualizing your eye contact with the person like a sticky toffee being peeled off a surface. Look at the person as per normal, but keep the eye contact going a little longer than normal. Right before you turn your head down, to the side, or to someone else’s eyes to break the eye contact, maintain eye contact a little longer by peeling your gooey eyes off the person as you turn your head. Peel your eyes off the person like a sticky toffee lifted from the surface it’s stuck on.

Gooey eyes makes you interesting because your head shifts somewhere else, but your eyes momentarily focus on the person. It shows the person you’re confident enough to make strong contact, a dominant trait, as you continue whatever you do. The technique also communicates that you see a trait in the person that other people overlook. You go to break eye contact yet continue to visually absorb them because they interest you.

Gooey eyes contain several different levels of intensity depending on the person and the situation. Women to women and men to women can generally have strong eye contact. When someone makes strong eye contact with a woman in a conversation, their conversational intimacy heightens. The woman instantly feels more interested in the person.

Women interact with others to feel intimacy and strong eye contact is associated with intimacy. Take a look at the time women spend on the phone. They can talk for hours about what happened in one day. Now think how long a man-to-man phone call takes. We punch in the numbers and are off the phone within one minute. I’ve had so many man-to-man calls that have lasted less than 30 seconds. We are objective based. I cannot imagine us guys asking each other, “Oh, so what are your feelings about…?”

If you are a guy and want to appear attractive to a lady, make an effort to never look away from her until she loses eye contact with you. This technique displays explosive amounts of confidence – a very attractive quality to the lady. When you and a woman see one another, make strong eye contact in addition to applying the gooey eyes technique as you look away. Women love slow, meaningful body language. You will catch her attention, show confidence, and be more interesting to her than if you avoided the technique. When using these techniques, please do not eye her down without talking to her at sometime otherwise you’ll be seen as a creepy stalker.

Be careful in some cultures and situations with strong eye contact because it can be interpreted as threatening and aggressive. You can make strong eye contact without appearing aggressive in most cultures. You can be dominant without being domineering. If you’re a guy, aim to make eye contact about 70% of the time with another guy – and when you look away, visualize your eyes peeling off the guy like a sticky toffee. You won’t come off as aggressive or shy, but you will find a median that shows you are an interesting “someone”.

One last point I would like to make about gooey eyes is to avoid overusing the technique with a person. If you keep peeling your eyes off the person like a sticky toffee, you risk being seen as weird.

Illuminating Smile

Dale Carnegie in How to Win Friends and Influence People says smiling is necessary to make friends, but how do we do it? Most of us know the influence of a good smile, yet many people don’t know how to smile well. You need to learn the “how” and not just the “what”.

A good smile is contagious because it makes the smiling person and witnesses feel good. Research has isolated a smile from other influencing variables to discover that seeing only a smile makes you feel better. Likewise, seeing a person frown makes you feel worse. It is a magical brain-to-brain connection that links humans in an almost mystical way. You can make people feel good, make yourself feel good, and make yourself look good by cultivating an illuminating smile.

Why do some people have a cold turkey smile that freezes a room’s emotional temperature? On the other hand, some people ignite your heart with a beautiful smile. How can you achieve an illuminating smile that lights up the room?

You don’t have to be born with a great smile. You also don’t need a beautiful face to carve a great smile. The face is comprised of muscles you simply control to develop an illuminating smile.

A cold turkey smile begins with the smiling person not feeling happy or excited – the incongruence shows in the facial muscles. An authentic smile shows when you feel positive emotions. Make yourself feel great to smile. It also helps to fabricate a smile by just smiling as research proves you feel better even when your smile is fake.

A cold turkey smile is simply an on and off switch, while an illuminating smile slowly increases in intensity until it’s fully illuminated. I call this the “illuminating smile” because your smile is like a volume switch gradually turned to full power.

To use the technique, “turn up” your smile after one second of good eye contact. Increase the dimming switch to gradually brighten your smile. Begin with a little smile, slowly increasing it over two seconds until it becomes a big smile. The initial eye contact to your largest smile totals approximately three seconds.

Practice smiling in front of a mirror. Make the initial eye contact and wait a second, then gradually increase your smile to illuminate the room. You will see how genuine and interesting your smile can become. (Note: Lock the door to the room in case someone sees you practicing your smile. It’s weird to see, but wonderful to do.)

An illuminating smile will appear genuine because you don’t instantly flick on your smile upon eye contact. Rather, you wait a second or two, begin smiling, then you increase the size of your smile over two further seconds. (If you want more smiling techniques and further secrets based on facial muscles and psychological secrets to build a great smile, see my Big Talk program.)

Capitalizing Posture

An excellent posture rings a giant bell to everyone that you’re an interesting “someone”. It tells everyone you’re not an average person. In the man-to-woman context, a woman instantly sees the guys she is interested in by observing how a man walks. A guy with an excellent posture switches all her right buttons and makes her interested. Similarly, a woman with a good posture becomes more attractive to men.

I have called this third technique a “capitalizing posture” for several reasons. Firstly, successful people use their assets better than an unsuccessful person. You can capitalize one of your greatest assets – your posture.

Secondly, a good posture is associated with being tall, high status, confidence, and power. A capitalizing posture is like buildings in a capital city. This does not mean you need to be an over-sized human to have good posture (like yours truly). A capitalizing posture has you focus on maintaining an upright position the best you can with ease.

It’s time to put an end to a posture that is like The Leaning Tower of Pisa and reconstruct it into a strong, “Tower of Power” structure! There are several techniques you can use to grow your greatest body language asset. I’ve heard so many complex techniques to adjust your posture, but recently I discovered one amazingly simple technique that I wanted to kept secret.

Here it is: all you need to do is lift your chest. That’s it! Your head will rise, your neck will straighten, your shoulders will drop back, and your back will straighten – all by lifting your chest! This is a capitalizing posture.

If you ever feel compressed in the day (like you might be now as you sit at the computer reading this article) lift your chest like Tarzan. Take on the capitalizing posture. While I recommend you breathe through your stomach (technically you can’t because your lungs aren’t there, but your stomach should expand), I want you to take a deep breath into the top of your lungs to lift your chest and stretch your posture into a taller position.

Try the capitalizing posture technique right now. You can do it on your computer chair. It only takes one second to do. You’ll feel more special and confident just by practicing the technique.

Practice the gooey eyes, illuminating smile, and capitalizing posture techniques in front of a mirror or in a conversation the next time you socialize to see for yourself how these three body language adjustments instantly transform you into a more interesting person without having to say a word.

(You can discover further simple adjustments in your body language that make men and women attracted to you by checking out the nonverbal communication chapter in my Big Talk program.)

About the Author

Joshua Uebergang, aka "Tower of Power", is a communication skills coach, author, and owner of Australian company Tower of Power. Visit his blog and sign-up free to get communication techniques, relationship-boosting strategies, and life-building tips by email, along with blog updates, and more! Go now to http://www.towerofpower.com.au/free

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