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Unlock the Power of Nonverbal Communication with Joe Navarro

Hey everybody, What's up? It's Chase Welcome to another episode of the Chase Travis live show here on Creativelive. This is a show where I sit down with amazing humans, I unpack their brain with the goal of helping you live your dreams and career hobby in life. Today's guest is former FBI special agent joe Navarro For 25 years, Joe worked for the FBI and specifically studied the things that set exceptional people apart, verbal nonverbal cues and all of the other things that go into that personal genesis. In this particular episode, we talked about his previous book, one that I found very valuable, called what everybody is saying and specifically his new book called How to be exceptional and master the five traits that set extraordinary people apart. Now things like self mastery, things like how to apply the same human observation techniques that the FBI uses things like how to harness the power of verbal and nonverbal communication. These are useful in every area of your life. I love t...

his episode. I've been paying attention to joe for gosh, probably years now you're gonna love this episode and tell you what he also, he analyzes my own ability to interview people and my interpersonal skills. So if you want to learn anything that we just talked about and you want to see him, judge me. This episode is for you. I'm gonna get out of the way yours truly with joe Navarro. Yeah, we love you, joe. Welcome to the show. Thank you for being here. Chase great to be with you. It's been a long time coming I think. Well it hasn't uh I'll confess I've been attuned to your work for a long time and now you've written something some 14 odd books. But I really became familiar with your work uh with a book that you put out. I think it was and eight or something around that time. It's called what everybody is saying the subhead was an ex FBI agents guide to speed reading people. So if I used that little nugget too orient people in time and space a little bit about who you are and uh what you what you work on, what you think about. But most importantly what your new book is about. I'm interested in if you could for people who may not be familiar with your work, give a little background uh orient us around sort of your time in the FBI and what you've transitioned to your primary focus now and why you're on the show. Yeah. Happy to. And and really thanks for having me. I've I've been looking forward to this for for a long time. Um you know, I served 25 years in the FBI. I came on board at a very young age. I can't believe they gave me a gun and a badge at the age of 23. I still shake my head at that. Um and I spend most of my career as a spy catcher in the intelligence division. And and I developed an expertise um which I talked about in the new book about reading people, understanding people realizing that as an FBI agent, mostly what I did was observe human behavior and cataloged. And that's really what an FBI agent does, whether you call it criminal behavior or uh, espionage tradecraft. It's just behavior. And so that was my specialty. And then when I retired or shortly before I retired, um, some of the people in the bureau said, hey, you're leaving, you're taking a lot of knowledge with you. Um, how about leaving some behind for the younger agents? And so I began to write And never intending to, uh, to, to be an author or a writer. And, and as you said, My, what everybody is saying came out in 2008 and uh, remains the number one body language book in the world. It's in Incredibly, it's in languages. And um, and then just last year I came out with, um, the book be Exceptional, Which I wanted to write about something that was a little different. And that was to take advantage of all those observations that I had made over the over 50 years really of writing down observations and uh, and sharing that with with with the readers. And uh, and I really appreciate you being a big fan. So I thank you. Well, this show is about helping people be exceptional, be the best versions of themselves and I'm not dissimilar to you. I know you've conducted more than 10,000 field interviews with um you know, suspects and just all of your all of your research and time in the FBI. Uh and one of the common threads that I recognize about exceptional people, people who are the best in the world at what they do is they often one of the, one of the sort of through threads is they have an incredible um knack for connecting with other people. And when I, you know, was became aware of your work, especially in some of those earlier books, this idea of connecting with people, you know, through the use of words and connection, but as you said, in a couple different places in your work, it's way less about the face and way more about so many other cues that we are subtly either accepting or rejecting or making an effort to connect with people. So maybe we can start there, let's talk a little bit about this. Um and I think it may be fair to say we're going back in your in your body work a little bit to the body. And what are some of the things, some of the consistent things that you saw with, you know, in your field research about people who um maybe we're exceptional at their craft and whether they use that for good or evil. Um you can you can comment accordingly, but what are some of the traits that you saw of sort of interesting, powerful uh successful. Um or maybe people who use their their their skills for for evil? What are some of the traits that may be set aside those folks? Yeah. Well you you nailed it on the head when you started the question and that is that uh you know fundamentally the people that are exceptional Have this one trait that sets them apart. And I tell people that um who who make queries of me and I and I say this is something we can all work on and exceptional people have this ability to observe the needs, the wants, the failings, the fears, the concerns of others and what really makes them stand out. And this has nothing to do with how much you earn, what kind of car you drive. But it has to do with how they make you feel. In the social sciences, we call that valance that you come away and you know these folks because you interview them, you walk away from them and you feel so much better. There's just something about it. And what you don't realize is that it all began because these individuals are so focused on you. They're hyper attentive. They are in tune with you because they are observing you. We cannot think for a minute. We talk about empathy and and the power of empathy, but you really can't be empathetic unless you are able to observe the condition of another person and see how they're doing today. How are they feeling? Did they just experience something that was unplanned? And that's one of the characteristics that I talked about in the book that these exceptional people have And that we're not just talking about skilled because you know of the of the 13,000 or so interviews that I did. You know, most of them, fortunately were were with people that were innocent but they had to be interviewed regardless because they had witnessed crimes were present but didn't actually witness it and so forth. But you still have to you know, spend the time establish rapport Do the interview. And some of these interviews were you know, relatively short and bureau and and FBI turns which would have been maybe a 40 minute interview because a good effective interview. You know, takes takes a while and it's a it's about establishing report the same thing that you do. The the welcoming of someone, the creating of psychological comfort to get them to open up. You know, you were talking earlier about the body language. You don't realize yourself chase the body language that you use your eyes light up you smile, you use your hands to to be expressive and these things register positively and thus your uh your guests feel like talking and relaxing around you and you know, yes, I think it makes sense to go back to that very first book on body language? Because body language still is the primary means by which we communicate and people I talk to people all the time and they said, well that can't be right. You know, I'm texting emailing and I and I said when somebody knocks on your door, what do you just listen to what they say? Hi, I'm the mailman. Can I come in? No, we we look at them right when you're at an A. T. M. Machine and you're making a withdrawal at 10 o'clock at night and you're looking over your shoulder, you don't say to the people uh you know, coming up behind you or are you up to No good. We're assessing the world. Nonverbally babies are born incapable of of of of talking when it comes to courtship and dating and mate selection. We do that non verbally. I mean we don't we don't we don't date someone because wow, you scored what? On your college exam? I mean we we made that might be interesting, but that's not why we that's not why we decide to um to to date them. And so we begin to realize that we we demonstrate care. We demonstrate empathy. We demonstrate the emphasis of how important something is by our body language. It's not just words, let's let's put this into our context here in the time and time and space. What what what do you think has transformed the most in this world where you sort of you made the comparison of the mailman at the front door. That is a real life interaction and here we are as an example, recording this. We used to do all the shows in person now we do a lot of them virtually. And so many of our interactions are uh is it the same via video as it is in real life? And how much of that is translated how much of that is contributing to us either feeling psychologically comfortable or is that contributing to our disconnection? And are the struggles that so many are having with mental health? And just in this, in this weird time that we're in right now, how does that, you know? How do you look at that through your your lens of experience? You ask a profound question and it's a question that needs to be examined because there is more depth here. There's more gravitas here than than meets the eye. We, you know, we had to go from being in the same room to all of a sudden now we're looking at a little spot which represents a camera that now if we're doing it right, we're looking at the camera and we're actually avoiding looking at each other the way we normally do and that causes the brain a lot of stress. Uh we're not used to that, we're not used to being able to see ourselves as we speak. And a lot of people uh started looking at themselves and saying, wow, I I didn't know I had that habit or boy I scratch a lot or you know, I need to trim my my facial hairs and and and different things. We laugh at these things. And yet um this is a significant change in behavior From the last 200,000 years where we communicated principally very quietly, very close to each other. Work with me here For the last 200,000 years. We we now think that um our species, homo sapiens have been around somewhere between 350 to 200,000 years. We were certainly uh not only alive but we were also surrounded by other archaic humans, neanderthals, uh Denisov Ian's and so forth. But for most of that time period we had to communicate quietly and in small groups because we were surrounded by predators at all times. We moved around quietly, We rejoiced quietly. Most of our communication was non verbal. And uh we learned to use fire to to protect ourselves and so forth. We use caves uh and and and and and and so forth. But everything was at arm's length at arm's length. This this was how we established um harmony with within these small groups. And we know this because when we look at those people that still remain in very small um encampments that are pre industrial, that's how they are. They communicate like this. And now in the space of Two years and overnight, literally in March, I remember march of 2020 all of a sudden we had to now talk to each other by looking at a little dot on a little piece of plastic and and everything that we were used to the color of the skin, the smell of the other person, the subtle facial movement That we can just now begin to appreciate if we have a 4K camera. But if you have a 1080 camera or or a 750 or whatever those numbers are, you're missing the nuance. If you don't have enough light, you're missing the nuance. We were we've been using microphones. Uh for instance, the microphones that come with our phones make our voices actually go higher. All of these things changed the perceptions that our brain was accustomed to. And so when we talk about fatigue, zoom fatigue. When we talk about, you know, the meetings and our eyes are dry and we don't get to see the hands. And I've had, I've had Corporate Chiefs tell me, Joe, we do 89 interviews of people before we bring them on board. And we used to do it live. And now we do it virtually. And I don't get the same field. No, we don't get the same feel our species evolved two in a way, communicate very intimately. And and that's been the biggest change that this is very novel, but also very challenging to a brain that has been accustomed uh, to to communicate much differently this that we are in exceptional times, I think translates nicely over to the title of your book. Again, be exceptional. Master the five traits that set extraordinary people apart. That is a mission of this show, is to study extraordinary people, have them on the show, deconstruct their thoughts and habits. Um there there there the way that they make their way in the world And learn things and across these now, 13,000. So I had the number wrong at 10,000 read that somewhere. But now that 13,000, is a good a good enough for rounded up a number. It's it's more than one. Let's just use you're an abundance of research and data that you have witnessed a lot of extraordinary people and extraordinary in, you know, the true sense of the word and maybe a broader sense than just, you know, high, high achievers, for example. So, you have extrapolated if I'm using that word the way I think it fits here. Five traits that set people apart. What is your, you know, if you were to name the most important cause I would love for people, first of all, highly recommend the book. Um, and you know, I don't want to trot out every one of them here, although there's it's well documented online. But what are some of the let's just say, let's take on the top two most important traits that you believe of the five. What are those and how can people come to know them? Yeah, but well, I mean there's there's five traits and we don't need to explore them all either because we've already talked about, you know, being a good observer. I I think one of the the important traits that exceptional people have is no matter what life has presented them, they have mastered themselves. They have created for themselves, a the necessary architecture and scaffolding to allow them to do whatever they chose to do or whatever they were um Mhm. Maybe it wasn't what they chose to do, but it was something that at least they could do and do well for themselves. You know, I that's the one thing that stands out that it doesn't matter where you were born, what condition or whatever. I I remember as you know, I travel all over the world and I we were setting up the legal attache program in brazil, I I speak Portuguese. So I was I was down there attached to the embassy when we were opening it up and I remember being out there in in in in in brazil. Uh and these kids who are so poor that they are making soccer balls out of garbage bags by tightly binding them together and then putting a rubber band around them. And and I'm thinking to to myself there there's there's there's an example of uh you know, not weeping and crying because they don't have the perfect ball to play football as they call it. They go out and, and, and, and they create it, they do what, what they can um, the farmer that I met in Yuma Arizona who understands, um, through this perfect mastery that they have created, he didn't get to go to college because his father was killed in Vietnam, but he learned from, from talking to others and from study how to, you know, animal husbandry. He learned about agriculture, he learned, um, as good as any vet, how to assess what the, you know what the cattle's, what the cattle needs, the animals and so forth. And you, you realize that the, the scaffolding that they have created, nobody can take that from them. It's self organized, they put energy into it and it has given them in the case of the boys pleasure in that they can play or an occupation in the case of, of this gentleman that I interviewed. And um, and you know, it's like, well, what, why did you do that? And it's like, it's what needed to be done. And I think that's what sets exceptional people apart. It's get out of my way. I will find a way to do it. I will master myself. I'm not going to wait till some entity or someone else comes along and, and creates that mastery for me. I'm going to do it myself. And I think everybody that's been on your show, you know obviously I haven't listened to to to to all of them. I I think this is one of the things that really stands out well sure this goes back to Socrates right know thyself as a foundational principle for success achievement and and also I would say not just you know, not just using that measurement, the cultural measurement, but also fulfillment, personal connection, like you have to be aware of yourself and you know so much of your work is used for leadership and you know, it's it seems obvious that in order to lead others or master the art of leadership, you can't really get you have to go through yourself in order to get there right, if you are, if you aren't able to to lead others uh if you are unable to lead yourself, how can you, you lead other people and I think that's part of you speak, spoke about observation and that's one of the things that I believe we observe in people that inspire us, that we observe in uh in the leaders that we either choose or elect or um decided to work with with inside a company, this you know, we we our ability to observe that they have mastered themselves And then I'll just try it out the other three here, communication is one of the five action is another and then the last one which is really where I want to spend some time uh is this idea of psychological comfort. You mentioned it early on in our conversation that that that was that was something that I was doing again unknowingly. Or maybe it's it's um Um I think it's an eight and you well I think it's in and I don't know if it's a habit with you. Chase. I think it's innate in you. I think you've been like this, you know, for a very long time. I would say that psychological comfort is singularly the most important trait for us to master. Because if that becomes your priority, then you know that to achieve psychological comfort for yourself and to others that you have to have mastery that you have to observe the needs of others that you have to communicate effectively. And by the way, most of that communication is nonverbal, you know, who needs a hug? Who needs more space? Who needs a kind word, Who needs that word right now, but not a minute ago. When do we take action? How do we take action? What what action do we take? We take action. That creates psychological comfort. Any organization That sets this as a priority is going to be to borrow from Shakespeare the soonest winner. Why? Because in all my studies in my 50 years of looking at human behavior, You know, and people think that, you know, I only look at nonverbals that would be a mistake because I've spent 50 years looking at what anthropology teaches us. I've looked at neurobiology. I've looked at how the brain, all the components of the brain interact to make us humans. And in the end, what's interesting is humans don't seek perfection Right? A baby, a toddler doesn't care if they have a $ dollar teddy bear or a rag to hang onto. All they seek is psychological comfort. And our speed and and so we don't seek perfection. What we seek is psychological comfort. And everyone that understands that will soon be the winner. Because if you can orchestrate events with you can create situations where you can create psychological comfort for others. They will gravitate towards you, I'll give you an example. You have to gas stations across from each other. You raise the price of gas in one but increase the lights, what we call security or there's more lights creates psychological comfort. So people will go there even though they pay more, right? We you know when stores began to allow us to actually handle products, we forget that when we used to go to a store there would be somebody there and you'd say could I see that sweater or could could you hand me that? And we'd look at it those those days are gone. But when we began to be able to handle things and say, wow this is that created psychological comfort. I remember when Volvo came out and put airbags In cars and Oh my gosh and airbags, $750. Who, who would want that? My car has six of them. Why? I always say, well it's for safety, not for safety, it's for psychological comfort, right? If you want safety, put me in a tank, put me in a tank surrounded by rubber. So, but, but psychological comfort, that's that's one of the great motivators and that's what exceptional people have is that um they make us feel good. You know, you can think of the idea of like it's not about what someone says, it's how they make you feel or you know, we're in a world where brands, you know, dominate the landscape and we associate positively brands that make us feel good that make us feel like we're connected with ourselves or our parents. You know, what's the latest apple commercial where your face timing with your, you know, the grandparents is face timing with the grandchild. You know, these are all sort of emotional psychological comfort that you're talking about. What what how do we reconcile this idea? I'll just give you a personal example. I, you know, two hours ago was up to my neck in 43° water because I choose to in the mornings for a number of reasons, health benefits, you know, to um um psychological strength, my my, I choose to get uncomfortable. I choose to put myself in discomfort in icy cold water every morning because I have experienced the euphoria that it fills and most importantly my willingness to be uncomfortable and it said often that that's where growth happens, all the growth that you seek in the world is on the other side of comfort. So how do you reconcile this idea that muscles need tension and sort of pain in order to grow and my cold water? How do you reconcile that with this idea of psychological comfort that successful people cultivate in others? Is there a relationship at all? There are they totally disconnect? Well, I don't think they're disconnected. I mean, one you're talking about uh you know, as they say, not all analogies are analogous. Um because for instance, the fact that you're going into cold water causes vaso constriction. If you dive in, it will probably cause you to your vagus nerves kick in and you know, now you have the the diving reflex kicks in and these physiological changes wake up in essence your anatomy. That's in essence what you're doing. You're waking up the anatomy and you're saying to the to the brain and Hegang um there's severe temperature change. All sorts of of things happen. That powerful change causes, you know, all these chemicals serotonin endorphins, all these things to be released, right? Mhm. When it's over. Do you feel better? Yeah, I feel a sense of well being. I feel like I have attempted to strengthen a muscle that is overcoming discomfort. My mental willingness to so I feel Yeah, I do I feel I feel like I did something positive for myself. So maybe this is leans more into self mastery or just tell me where you're going here. Well, know what I think you asked a very good question. Why do we, you know, I used to run 14 miles on the weekends. I still swim, I can't run anymore. I swim 1600 m a day, you know? And while I'm dealing with it, um it's not always pleasant, but somehow I always uh feel better afterwards. The body has its own um chemical reward system for when we do something extraneous then there are benefits from it, physiological benefits, I would argue. Um are are different than the things that maintain us in a state of homeostasis. So we avoid the loud sounds we avoid, we, for instance, for business people, we hate slides that are too complicated. What did steve jobs say, put one word in it or one picture, but please no more than that. And and we gravitate towards anything which keeps us in in this this this position that is referred to as leaky, poised, perfectly balanced, too much of this and we get away from that. And so we seek psychological comfort because our brain performs best when there is right if I if I asked you as I often ask when I give speeches around the world and I and I've asked this question in in in Taiwan, I've I've asked it in in in Switzerland, have you ever been in an act in a argument and then an hour later when it's over you remember all the clever lines you should have said and everybody says yeah why didn't I think of them? And in because you were in a state of psychological discomfort and in a state of disarray psychological discomfort we don't think as well and our physiology is off because we're releasing cortisol, we're we're getting ready for the freeze flight fight um situation and we're not in a in a thinking mode. And yet when we achieve psychological comfort then we have higher cognition then we are in a healthier uh state. So I don't think there's a disconnect. I think we're looking at two disparate things that make for us uh make make us human that we intentionally seek to do these things. You know I I was watching a tv show the other day this young man who climbed up this uh solid stone mountain without any ropes and I you know I was the rappel master for the FBI on the swat team and I just cannot imagine being off rope and I'm thinking he's doing this voluntarily and you talk about a state what we think is psychological discomfort. And yet I heard him say when I'm climbing I'm in a zone, I'm in that zone and I can never experience that because I'm not that kind of a of a climber, I don't know what the reward system is is for him, but it keeps bringing him back. So I I think because we're humans because the brain is I honestly believe the most complex thing in the universe. I don't think there's anything more complex in our than our than our brains. I think because of that, than the the variety of experiences that can create psychological comfort are actually um quite broad. And then it ends up coming back to like, what is it for you? Right, know thyself, what are the things that that for yourself and for others? So It seems like a very simple following question. But this has been, you know, 50 years of your work. So if we're all seeking psychological comfort, what are the most common things that people omit in their own lives? What's the distance between most people? What are some of the things that that we omit between where we are and psychological comfort when we look at mental health issues? When we look at why this generation, now I get emails from all over the world and I'm asked why is there so much anxiety? Why is there so much tension? Why, you know so much? And I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that we don't take time to do nothing, nothing but just be appreciative of of ourselves, You know, some people enjoy yoga, some people meditate um maybe sitting in cold water And I've I've heard about this this this practice both from Russians and Ukrainians and east Europeans that they really enjoy this. And I have no doubt that it that it has benefits. But we don't take enough time to to just establish a a state where nothing's going on, where we're not thinking about, oh I gotta go pick her up because schools out at 2 15 or oh shoot that light bulb burnt out. We've got a, there's so much activity. Our devices are constantly going on. Well, you know, we have the ability now to look at a brain as it exists today. And brains that have been pickled since the civil war. And what's interesting is those little parts of the brain, the amygdala, the hippocampus, the hypothalamus, all those things that help us to regulate our bodies and and deal with our environment chase. They haven't changed in size. We're trying to deal with the most complex society that has ever existed on this planet with the same structures that we have had For the last 200,000 years. And uh this infusion of activity is overwhelming our systems. And so probably more than ever. We really need to take a step back and create these small moments. Um I uh the the the dutch have a word for us. It's called Nixon, which is doing nothing, doing nothing so you can heal doing nothing. So you can think doing nothing so that you can recuperate doing nothing to then allow thoughts to, to to come in. Um and I think, I think that's the importance of creating these moments where we can do that. And you can certainly, I some of the best ideas I've ever had have taken place when I'm swimming and I'm in that zone or times when I've taken time out. I think we we we we need it. Um and I think especially for busy executives, busy parents, I think that needs to be programmed into your, your daily life. It's not optional. I think it's necessary. There's a lot of wisdom in there that matches up with my experience here on the show over 12 years, you know, hundreds and hundreds of interviews here. That is one of the common, the most common threads and all the guests is there's some awareness of and or practice where calming the mind and that's meditation, mindfulness awareness, practice prayer, some spiritual time out that allows us to reconnect with ourselves. Uh the, the environment around us simplify what you just described as the most complex society that you know, that the world has ever known by accelerating. Yeah, we've never had uh so much going on at uh just I, you know, I, I knew a lady who was born in the 18 nineties and uh and and she died in uh in uh in the year 97, believe, and I'm thinking of everything that she had seen Horses on the street pulling people to 747. Think about that for a minute. And uh and and that's that's a lot. That's uh that's a lot. But I think I think, you know, the the the other thing that, I mean the the big thing that exceptional people do think about is not just their own psychological comfort, but more importantly, the psychological comfort of others. Yeah. And and I think, you know, when I talked to leaders and they asked me, joe, how do I differentiate myself? I mean, my counterpart also went to Harvard or went to Yale or went to Princeton. How do I differentiate myself? Okay. And there's there's only very few ways to differentiate yourself because we all have excel. We all have the same access to information and that is when we set as a priority. The creation of psychological comfort. What do they need, when do they need it? What could make things better for them? What can we anticipate to get things out of their way? I think, I think that's what differentiates um great leaders. Um I I think that's what really makes for for for someone who people want to be around. Um I love the idea. Yeah. I love the sorry to interrupt you there for sex job, but I love the idea of um awareness and and in your work, this comes about largely after you've mastered yourself through observation and what, you know, what are some of the specific techniques that you learned in, you know, your time with the FBI and that you've written about at length that help us, you know, these are skills, this is what people don't understand right now. They're like, oh man, we're, you know, I have trouble holding attention if I'm speaking to a small group of people or I'm, you know right now that the listeners of the show or whether on the treadmill or commuting on the subway, they're thinking, hmm, you know how I want to get better at this. And so let's give them, you know, some tools because observation, the ability to observe the needs, what someone needs in a moment, the ability to attune to them, that is a skill, a skill for example, that you mastered through decades with the FBI, but give folks a place to start, you know, they need to get the book to, to do all the work to, to get the details. Um, but give us a place to start, a great place to start is start at home beat, be sensitive to the people around, you begin to read their body language, you know, when, when, when a child comes home from school and their chin is down, their shoulders are slumped. Um, you know, don't dismiss that this is nonverbally, I'm there saying I had a tough day. Now it may not be the smartest thing to confront them immediately, but um, one of the things that you may want to do is then later on in the day just say, hey, how was how was school today and not even mentioned the body language. But let's see if, if they communicate the something else that I've learned is that when you sit in front, when you stand in front of Children, you know with your hands on your hips, arms of kimbo elbows out and you say, so what happened today? That is one of the worst ways to talk to people is you know, sit down next to them, look in the same direction, don't, don't be in and you know, don't make it it into, into an inquisition. You're on the same side as they are. Use your voice to, to to create warmth. The second thing is has to do with verbals and and that is that humans want to be validated. If if I tell you man getting to your office, traffic was terrible, parking was horrible. And getting through your security people yuck validate that this is these are things that create negative emotions And in for humans we need to deal with emotions first, we always put transactions first and that's wrong because again, you know why is it that we forget where we left the keys when we're stressed emotional hijacking. We deal with emotions first. That's why we validate right? When we look at the olympic athletes, the women's gymnastics, it was the failure to validate that these girls were being abused. That's pretty big. They will tell you that was bad enough to be abused. But to not be validated was even a worse offense. And that's one of the things that leaders can do is validate. It doesn't mean that you agree with them totally. It doesn't mean that you buy everything. It just means that you validate by listening to them and understanding what they're saying. We can, you know, as as leaders and communicators. And we're all communicators. Remember that simple things like even over the internet by how we greet each other by arching our eyebrows by saying, hey how are you? Uh my my writing partner, Abby murano in in in in England reminds me that you know when we have a neutral face, the brain doesn't recognize it is neutral. The brain recognizes happiness and and sadness but not neutral. And so a neutral face is perceived as negative. So you know when we're talking to people, nod with them, uh use your nonverbals to communicate that. Oh that's interesting. Uh go along with them. That when we tilt our face or tilt our stories tilt our heads that the mere tilting of the head that we do with with little Children or while we're dating helps to establish rapport and it increases facetime. This is this is powerful. You know, people ask me how did you get these spies to talk to you for 89 10 11 time I talked to one for 12 hours. I finally had to send them home enough. And I said because I never sat across from them, I would sit on the couch and when they were talking I would tilt my head and I would nod, he said, and that's it. No that's not all of it, but it's certainly contributed to it. What do you think? I was gonna sit there with a stiff neck? I am Mr FBI and you must tell me everything. You know, they're not going to tell you that they're going to defend against it. But if you're sitting with him, it's pretty tough to fight somebody off. We're on the same side. And if they're tilting their heads well, he used to do that. Your mother, as soon as she grabbed you, she tilted her head. These are the things, you know, we we study nonverbals not to detect deception. There isn't, By the way, There is no single behavior indicative of deception. We've known that since 1986. It's this is there's just no truth to that. Now, humans do reflect our sentiments, stress anxiety, but not the deception, but we use non verbals so we can communicate more effectively. And and that's why we study this. But knowing that is not enough is how do we implement it? And for what purpose so that we can create psychological um comfort. There's uh undoubtedly referring to a piece of the book. Again, we are um with joe Navarro talking about his book, be exceptional. And there's a page that I'm looking at. I had dog eared here. Page 1 61. 10 Ways to speak with more than words, small gestures being prompt, letting people vent. Uh considered the seating as an example, sitting on the same side as a couch rather than across from them. Mining your head, mirroring behaviors, Mirroring language. These are this is part of what I found so fascinating about your most recent book and your work in general is that these are Skills. These are things that you can practice for in day to day life and get better at. And clearly with 25 years of practice, we are one of the reasons you're on the show is because you're a world class at this. But can you tell, can you remind us that these are skills that we can learn and we can improve on and then we can apply in our lives to create the results in the the the outcomes that we seek. Yeah, absolutely. Um let's let's take, for instance, um the use of our hands. Right. So, you know, for years, I've worked with leaders. I've I've taught people who later became Prime Ministers and Heads of State and I said a leader when they speak, they use broad gestures, but they're smooth. The difference if you look at a corporal and a general from the back, right. And they have a battle dress uniform, you can't tell the difference except for their gestures except for their gestures. And you can tell the difference because one will have jittery gestures and the other one will be broad and smooth. Now let's come to the virtual environment. That's all great. You know, and the great general Colin Powell, you know, he was just so very smooth cary Grant, very smooth with his gestures. But here's the problem now in a virtual environment, you know, smooth and broad is out here. Where are my hands? So you're talking about a skill set? We now have two. I have I last year I worked with 67 executives on getting their skill set so that their hand gestures were now here but smooth because as every actor knows and learns in in, in, even if you're fighting on camera, you have to slow it down because the camera can't pick it up or it's too fast. So your gestures have to be up here, but they have to be really small and tiny. Not the broad gestures. We used to do. This is a skill you say, Well, is that like acting in many ways, life is acting. You know, the first time I put on before I came into the FBI, I was a police officer. The first time you put on a police uniform and you go to a call and you're scared scared. Yeah. You're acting, I'm pretending not to be scared. There's a lot of things that that that that we have to develop, for instance, how to assess for each other for how much space do you need? Right. Because if you're in a big city, you probably will be okay with somebody standing next to you at less than three or four ft. But not if they're from the midwest because if you violate that spatial zone and everybody's is different, how do we assess for that so that we don't violate space? Because when you create psychological comfort by honoring your spatial needs, you increase the amount of time you're together or how about how we talk? Did you ever stop to think that when people machine gun information that the brain starts to shut him down? Why? Because that's not how we evolved to communicate. Why did why did martin Luther king speak in cadence? I have a dream that one day. Why is he so mesmerizing? Because your best speakers Churchill you pick a person, you'll notice that they speak in cadence. You yourself chase speaking cadence and why ba gives it. It gives us the listener the amplitude to listen and process and appreciate before we go on to the next thing. How do we, you know, what do you hear all the time? I was listening to a show last night and and uh we use fillers. So we say, well yeah and it was like I you know, I went there and like there were a bunch of people there and like, uh, and it's terrible. You're machine gunning this stuff and interjecting this word that you don't need. What if you had said. Yeah. And I went there and when I got there, I found there were a lot of people and you now you've changed and I deal with a lot of young executives who quite frankly, especially the ones that are in Silicon Valley that I deal with. They're very successful. But their skill set at communications Is probably at the 7th grade level and you have to, and you have to say, guys, ladies, we need to stop that. Well, you need to stop using. Like you have to use cadence because people will take you serious people will listen to you when you use cadence. Now, obviously some descriptive things need to be, uh, be together. So, you know, my, this is what I try to do in in the book. Be exceptional. What are the skills that will set you apart? But you have to practice them? You have to devote time. Now the thing is, it won't, other than purchasing the book, it's not gonna cost you any money to increase your skill set and your likability and your influence. That doesn't cost a thing, but you have to do the right behaviors. Well, that is again, what this show is all about is learning from folks like yourself, four the paths that we can put ourselves on to make ourselves the highest version of ourselves to um to get better. And I was absolutely struck with this. You know, again I just listed on that page that I had dog eared 61 just very simple things like agree and add yes and for example whether that's an improvisational setting or in order to build report the concept of taking notes, listening for phrases that people use in repeating them. It ought not be thought that this is some sort of a manipulation but it ought to be thought that this is the very basis whether it's neurochemical or otherwise. The basis for human connection which again is a characterization is a characteristic rather of the most successful, happy and fulfilled people uh that have certainly been on this show and I have a debt of gratitude to express to you thank you for doing the work that you've done, bringing these. There's also some really good stories and spy twister um stuff in your work that I really appreciate. But thank you so much. Again, the book that I recommend is be exceptional, master the five traits that set extraordinary people apart. I also have to give a nod again to your earlier work. What everybody is saying, An ex FBI agents guide to speed reading people. Um thank you so much for being such a generous guest and sharing with us during your your work. and it's really, really appreciated. Is there anywhere else that you would like to steer folks? You mentioned that you're coaching executives and You know, you've got 14 books. Is there anywhere else you would steer our listeners other than we've already suggested? They check out the books? Yeah. Well, you know, please visit my, my website joe Navarro dot net and um all my books, all eventually your podcast will be will be there um all my books, the numerous videos that are out there. But I, you know, I want to also thank you because you do a great service. Um you know, I've followed you for a long time and the fact that you want to educate others that you want them to share. Um the things that you know, the things that you're interested in. Um we're not all as fortunate and uh to to be able to have a place where you can experience these things and listen to great speakers at length is a tribute to you and and your producers and your directors and everybody that works with you. So I'm very grateful and as soon as this covid thing is over, we're going to meet some something, we are going to meet in person. We will make it happen again, joe Navarro, thank you so much for your time and all you all out there in the world, highly recommend his books. These are skills that are not only valuable but transferable to other areas of your life. To transcend just executive leadership at work. They come into, you know, the relationship with your spouse is your parents, your friends, your Children, your parents, thank you, joe, appreciate having you. We will uh, by the book and until next time to joe and everybody else out there in the world. I bid you all, mm hmm. Right. Yeah.