Do you want to learn how to connect with people and influnce their actions?
This is an extremely valuble ability that can make all the difference in your life in terms of success, career and relationships, it all starts with a simple conversation.
Have you ever had a conversation with another person that just seemed to click?
Sometimes a good conversation can last for hours and you just want it to go on and on regardless if tou have something else to do, it's kinda like the two of you are in another dimension and everything else doesn't seem to matter.
This is called a state of Rapport.
Rapport is a term in NLP( Neuro Linguistic Programming) that describes a situation when two people are in sync with each other on a subconscious level and have an open communication channel.
In my life the ability to connect with people brought me a long way forward from the place that I started with and I consider my skill in interpersonal communication as the most valuble skill I posses. It litterally, helped me dozens of times to get what I want and many times saved me from trouble.
The ability to create Rapport with another person is a skill you can master by following a few simple guidelines, once you created a real connection with another person at one point in time, the subconscious connection will always remain and that can help you in many situations in life.
Guidlines to Rapport
Asking smart questions - The favorite topic for conversation for any person in the world is themselves. When you ask a smart question that touches the inner world of the person you want to get in Rapport with it is much easier to establish a connection with that person.
The simplest way to do that is to find something unique or extra ordinary in the way the other person looks or behaves and ask an open question about that special feature with genuine intrest in the answer. Usually, the other person will gladly start sharing with you where he got that special necklace or where does that accent from.Active Listening- Listening and paying attention to what your converstion partner is saying is not as common and not as simple is it seems. In most cases, we don't actually listen to what the other person is saying, we are commentating his words and judging them.
Active listening is not just hearing what the other person is saying, it is also trying to experience the same states, emotions and feelings that the speaker is trying to convey in his conversation.
After you asked a smart question and your partner is telling where he got that special necklace from listen to him carefully and try to experience the full spectrum of the story by smiling, looking shocked, being sad and in general responding to what is being said with the correct emotion.
Of course, be genuine and really interested otherwise your partner will immediately pick up on your dishonesty.
- Match & Mirror - We easily connect to people that are like us, the more similar the better because our subconciusos is geared on picking up subtle signs that show us that the other person is the same as we. These are similarities in voice, pitch, tonality, body language and word choice.
If we manage to match these similarities with our partner, then the subconciusos connection is easily obtained.
Try to pick up the way your partner talks, moves once he tells you the story. Try to mirror his pose in a subtle way and be as similar as possible to him. With that said, if your partner picks up that you are trying to mirror him it will cause a serious trust issue and you will never manage to create that trust again.
These simple rules to create rapport and you will see that connecting and influencing people will become much simpler.
There are many more ways to use NLP in interpersonal communication and I will share more communication hacks in the next chapter about effective communication Perception Maps.
Thank you for your time.
With love.
Eugene
