21 observations from people watching
Importance: 2 | # | writing, psychology
Painting weddings for a few years now, I have spent a fair bit of time observing strangers move through a room. Seeing someone new, I always have a feeling of noticing their internal architecture. I did not realize that some people do not feel this way, at least not as intensely.
I can hear how receptive they are to other people’s worlds. This is often encoded in the pace of their back and forth; the brief pause after someone says something, or the absence of any breathing room. The pause is usually sinking into a feeling, allowing themselves to process and respond in real time.
A fun read. It's certainly true that you can read a LOT from cues other than the literal words people say. But beware confirmation bias and fundamental attribuiton error. I do, however, think that most people can drive tremendous results from paying a little more attention to the people around and their actions - deliberately. You keep at it for a while, get signals (were you right or wrong) and you improve your model for predictive accuracy.