Cold Reading

On August 1, 2011 by Shark

Haven’t had time to respond to comments because of work and writing the book. I decided to post a few pages from the book to answer the comments about cold reading. This section is specifically referring to reading body language.

 

Researchers estimate that the impact of any message is only about 7% verbal. 38% of what you say depends on vocal aesthetics (tone of voice, rhythm) and the other 55% is allotted to body language (posture, presence, physical movements). In the same tragic fashion governing most of our ironic debacles, men in game focus all their attention on mastering that scanty 7%. What you say to a girl is comparatively insignificant to how you say it. Our discussion over body language will be split into two parts; understanding body language and displaying proper body language, in that order. More emphasis should be placed on understanding body language because humans are self-obsessed creatures by nature; you will have less trouble with the latter segment.

A persons body language will perfectly mirror their emotional state. People who use their hands to express themselves will use gestures to signify how important they think a topic is or betray emotional subtleties. Wider hand movements correlate with issues of higher significance. If someone is consistently using hand movements throughout an entire conversation, you can gauge how important each topic is to the person relative to each other. If a girl uses conservative gestures while talking about her interest in sports and then bursts into a masterful display of metacarpus fluidity while talking about the latest gossip, you know you’ve got yourself a swindler. You can tell which of her past relationships she was most invested in, the things that make her tick, what motivates her, and whether she actually cares about politics and the environment or if she’s just pretending to do so to seem impressive.

Whether a girl’s hands are in an open or closed position will tell you how interested she is in you or the topic of conversation. If her palms are open and facing you, she insists on kino, or her arms are in in an open position, she’s likely interested. If her arms are crossed, folded, slapping you across the face, or in a closed position, you’re probably going to be masturbating tonight. I say “maybe” in both scenarios because body language must be read holistically (if she has closed body language during winter while you’re outside, she’s probably just cold). If a girl just has one hand crossed in front of her, she’s feeling either slightly insecure or uncomfortable. The same applies for a guy but men generally tend to cover their groin area or put their hands in front of themselves (fixing cuff links, adjusting watches).

Self-touching has been infamous for being one of the more obvious IOIs. It is the subconscious way a girl projects her need to be groomed / nurtured.

The face platter (resting her face on both her hands with her palms facing down, as if her face was on a platter) is a sign of interest. It means you’ve built enough attraction to start backing off as the dynamic between you two has reversed. Once you’ve fostered enough attraction with a girl, you need to start playing more aloof non-sequitur game to let it grow. The face platter, or any sign that she’s now trying to qualify herself to you rather than the other way around, is about the time when your game should shift from aggressive to passive.

When a person’s lying, they are likely to cover some part of their face with their hands. The process is unconscious and only noticeable by those who know what to look for. The gesture will seem completely natural. It can be a nose itch, an ear grab, an eye rub, or anything of that sort.

If they put something in their mouth during the course of making a decision or while they’re evaluating you, it means they are unsure and require more confidence. Girls will do this with their glasses, biting their lips, or the drink in their hand.

genuine smiles pull the eyes and the mouth back, you can differentiate them with fake smiles after a bit of practice. Fake smiles don’t cause wrinkle formations around the cheeks or eyes.

A closed slip smile means she isn’t interested.

Voluptuous licking of the lips means she’s very interested

Legs crossed away from you means she’s not interested, crossed towards you means she is.

Steepling (holding your hands in a prayer like position) is a sign of confidence. If a person gets into a steeple position while making a decision, it means they are somewhat sure about their decision (whether it’s positive or negative is irrelevant). Other hand to face gestures, like twitches or itches indicate nervousness.

Observing pupil dilation is an easy way to measure interest. Dilated pupils are indicative of a high level of attraction. Contracted pupils correlate with a negative or bored mood. Pupil dilation / contraction is much easier to catch than you think, our subconscious minds are already trained to notice it. Every time you’re on a date or around a girl, your brain registers pupil dilation as a signal to increase feelings of attraction / rapport. You just need to begin training your conscious mind to catch it you. It took me about 2 weeks.

Facing down while looking up, excessive smiling, or glancing down are all signs of submission. A girl will display signs of submission as her way to signal attraction.

Eye contact is a sign of rapport, if a girl holds eye contact with you and glances down sporadically, it’s a sign of both rapport and submission. Men do it all the time with guys they consider more Alpha than them.

In a group of people, whoever’s talking will constantly glance at whoever they consider to be most alpha for approval.

No matter how hard you try to withhold signs of submission, your gestures will follow through. If you recognize a guy as more alpha than you (your body will do it subconsciously), you will glance down while speaking to him or at him for approval.

If a girl wants to get your attention, she will hold eye contact for 2 or 3 seconds and follow up with a hand gesture, smile, eye-brow raise, mouthing the word “hi,” or laugh. She will generate some sort of signal to indicate coy submissiveness. Never believe people when they say women are stupid and oblivious to their surroundings. When it comes to romance, women plan things out with surgical precision.

Tight lipped smiles, darting eyes, and extended blinking are all signals of disinterest.
Lymphatic movements indicate she’s playing hard to get or she’s not interested. You’ll know the difference because in the former, she will still respond to negs or be slightly jumpy. If she’s not interested at all, her impassiveness will continue undisturbed.

Social proximity can be broken up into 2 important zones. 6-18 inches is the intimate zone, anything above that is either a social or public zone. When a person enters your intimate zone, your body reacts with a flight or fight response. Kino, or any form of physical touch, is always recommended in pick ups because it greatly increases rapport by making a person feel comfortable to physical advances. Getting within 6-18 inches of a girl will have one of three affects. If she’s unsure about you, she’ll feel more insecure or uncomfortable. If she’s already attracted to you, it will make her more attracted to you. If she doesn’t like you, she’ll like you even less. The same applies for all forms of spatial situations. If a girl already likes you, she will like you more if you get close to her. If she already dislikes you, she will like you less if you come close to her.

If a person’s feet are in a relaxed position, they will point in the direction they want to go. This is why a girl who crosses her feet away from you is void of interest. The feet play an important role in reading body language because our brains have the least amount of conscious control over our legs.

If a girl crosses both her legs and her arms, communicating an idea to her will become substantially harder (including the idea that she should sleep with you).

Ankle locking indicates uncertainty or fear.

If a girl is into a conversation with you, she will extend her feet towards you or point them at you if she’s in a standing position. If one of her feet are pointing away, she would rather be somewhere else.

Quick, jerky movements like fast head nods of excessive blinking means she wants you to finish talking and go away. Slow, deliberate movements indicates that she’s into the conversation.

Tilting her head to one side is an IOI.

All of these signals must be read appropriately in context and holistically. A person may be sitting or standing in a certain way because of their attire or the temperature rather than because they are interested / disinterested in you.

If a girl shows disinterest through her body language, you must reciprocate with a greater show of disinterest. If you engage further when a girl pulls away from you, it’s a sign of lower status and will further reduce the amount of interest she has in you. If you’re able to pull away and talk to someone else, you are displaying higher status and utilizing female hypergamy the right way. If she points her body towards you, do the same to condition her mind to wanting to give you IOIs.

Even if you catch an IOI from a girl, act oblivious to it. Women are used to men not catching their subtle advances and thus will repeat them several times for him to finally get it. Each time a girl is forced to repeat an IOI, her brain rationalizes by assuming she must like you that much more (cognitive dissonance).

 

 

 

14 Responses to “Cold Reading”

  • Jay

    Been waiting, thanks a bunch, your articles always help me heaps.

  • John

    Wow, i can’t wait for your book.

  • rajah

    not a bad article Shark, but this is not about cold reading but body language. reading body language is just a very small part in the process of cold reading.

  • John

    @rajah

    ‘This section is specifically referring to reading body language’

  • John

    Shark, what book would you recommend to learn about cold reading? All the stuff I’m coming across is to do with pretending to be a psychic and whatever.

  • @John – Same here. Search for “Darren Brown” on YouTube, he has a FEW good videos.

    @Shark – Excellent post! Just remember I want an autographed copy, even if it’s just a scan!

  • rajah

    @john

    full facts book on cold reading. definetly worth its money.

    missed the part about this being a section.

  • Taylor

    Thanks. It’ll be tough to keep all of that in mind, but I’ll work my way up to it.

  • Dude

    shark youre the man, keep it up.
    I want to know how you should act around your ex if you want to have the possibility of getting back together

  • Anonymous

    Hey Shark

    Question, my ex and I broke up 6months ago and went our separate ways, it was not a bad breakup. She went off to another city for a new job and the distance would not work, she initiated the break up and although at the time I wanted to still try, I came to the realization it would never work I respected her decision about the break up and we just didn’t up talking. Recently she came back to visit some family for a week and I have some of her stuff at my place she asked for it back and asked me to hang out, we went out for dinner, normal conversations, she seemed overly happy and in an unusual upbeat type of mood, she did throw some subtly references about how there are a few guys in her new city that think she is so beautiful and how some of her female co-workers don’t like her because these guys think she is very pretty etc. The flow of the conversation I felt like she was trying to make me feel like shit for her breaking up with me, which is quite strange, so I guess my questions are, why is it that your ex wants you to feel bad when they were the ones that broke up with you? Although we haven’t spoken at all in 6months, I felt she reached out intentionally just to make me to feel like shit for her ending it with me, does this make them feel better about themselves? Do they feel good like they made the right choice? I didn’t chase at all post break up. I felt the entire time she was trying to say to me “you lost this, this could have been yours etc…” Most importantly, what would have been the best way(s) to make her have the most regret and tingles?

    Thanks.

  • Out of all the crazy love-guru sort of people out there….. u seem like the most sensible and scientific to me. Thanks a lot, ur blog solved a lot of my problems :)

  • Body Language Basics

    Cold reading has a lot to do with reading body language. Essentially you’re just reacting to how you read her body language.

    So if you say “you’re the type of person that parties all hours of the day aren’t you?” and as you’re saying that, she responds with negative body language, you can adjust your response accordingly. Before she even SAYS anything, you can say “nah.. you’re definitely one of those girls that sits around playing with barbies all day aren’t you.”

    Read her correctly, and you’ll surprise her with how well you already know her

  • John

    What does having your hands in your pockets mean?

  • Mongoose

    God, it’s just like fishing

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