How to Approach & Talk to Anyone

hello there welcome back here's a story that really changed my life forever I was waiting for the train one day I see someone out of the corner of my eye holding a drink I go ask them hey what is that what type of drink is that we start talking for a bit and then I go home and I didn't think they were that interesting or anything I didn't think much of it fast forward 2 years that person's one of my nearest and dearest friends ever you never know who you're going to meet when you talk

to strangers look I live in the city no one's talking to each other out here everyone's on their phone what's going on it's not a s it's a sad State of Affairs in this video I want to do something about it we're going to talk about a set of tips that one help you get out and talk to more people without fear and two give you better outcomes when you are talking to them it is so hard to get out there and talk to people I know I was just out there it's really tough it's

intimidating to talk to people but there's probably something that you can do to step a little bit outside your comfort zone whether it's saying a few more words to the cashier or going to more social events you got to get out there and seek out those people that you don't know maybe at your next social Gathering and this brings me to the first tip and this is huge when you go out and approach people no matter what social context don't presume that you're bothering them let's say you see someone wearing a crazy hat and you

look at them you're like damn that is one crazy hat that that's crazy but we don't say it we think it but we don't say it our inhibitions get in the way and then we justify it by saying oh I don't want to bother them I don't want to bother them they look busy they are wearing headphones they're working they look mean even if you think that you are truly bothering them don't act like you're bothering them do not come up and say um excuse me sorry to bother you but you're already setting up the

assumption that you're bothering them you're going to make them feel like they're being bothered can I ask you something excuse me do you mind if I ask you something they're going to be like what does this person want from me what's going on how can I get away from this you're setting yourself up for rejection because you're you're laying out the Assumption implicitly that you're bothering them instead you just start saying what you're trying to say that's a cute dog you have or start asking the question what type of dog is that people out there

are in a variety of moods they could be you know happy sad you can't predict what state they're in but nine times out of 10 if you bring them the right Vibe and how you talk to them they will reflect that back at you people in general are okay being talked to it's only in the rare case that you get someone that gives you the cold shoulder but what are you talking why are you talking to me go away ew get away can't you see I'm busy that's rare and even if that does happen ask

yourself if I had acted differently would I have gotten a different result likely yes likely yes how do I approach them what sort of vibe should I bring to them so that I don't get blown off like that and the answer I will tell you from across many different sources definitively including this book how to talk to anyone by leoes is you got to treat them like an old friend you got to treat them like you know them already hey what's up what what's going on with those baskets those look sturdy as hell what are

you guys collecting today however you talk to your friends I can't I don't know how you talk to your friends but the idea is assume familiarity like that assume that there's some familiarity between you like you know them from long ago and people respond the best to that Vibe trust me too many times they come up very formal and very too serious people will give you that energy back they reflect the energy that you bring to them and they respond to your Vibe so how you say it is often so much more important than even

what you say people when you're meeting them their sample size of you is so small it's just they only know you from that one moment so try to be positive if you can good morning it's day two of editing listen I do not want to give the impression that this is or that this should be easy it's totally normal to get shy in new social situ situations and it happens to me all the time even though even though I know a lot of techniques to try to help myself we just got to keep pushing and

every you know you go through a lot of like ups and downs and trying to sometimes you're feeling really good and confident with things and then other times you're just like not doing so well and you're not in in the mood to really talk to anyone I think it's important to understand that when you're in that state you have to remember that it's temporary and that you are going to come back to a place where you're more socially open again and talking to new people is really choosing to be more open with your thoughts with

people instead of choosing to hold Everything In It's like willing willingness to share what you're actually thinking with people so let's continue see I bet that there's a part of your personality that is more outgoing that is more sociable and willing to be more more charismatic around people maybe you it comes out when you're more comfortable around certain people you want to hone in to that emphasize that part of you and refine it and let that person out more let them have the floor let them speak more and what happens is that over time they

become more willing to come out so like you have we have these walls up that are making us stifled and preventing these more loud and charismatic people from coming out so it's about breaking down that that barrier letting that person come out the person's already in you you need to let him out that's the idea now we're going to talk about some ways that we can psychologically trick ourselves into talking to more people this is fascinating the first tip is called get close see if you see someone across the room or across the the street

you're not going to be that motivated to talk to them your eyes physically aren't taking in enough information you know this big in Your Vision you don't get the go signal from your brain to talk to them however if you Sidle up next to somebody if you're up and talking to them like this you may be a lot more inclined to to say something so try this next time get close and it kind of you find that it makes you a lot more likely to talk to somebody just by physically close when you're approaching somebody

it's like two magnets coming together and then they're getting closer and closer and then after a certain distance second tip is called build momentum there's this amazing YouTube channel called Social Animal where he has these subscribers come on the show and he challenges them to talk to a bunch of people in the same in one day getting over their approach anxiety usually it's guys talking to girls you know what's up for obvious reasons right I'm anxious about approaching people in the first place I feel like once I get over that everything will be fine but

I'm really nervous about that the Improvement that these guys make in a single day is crazy czy they get in the zone you know the first couple can be very rough but even if they go badly they still get you out of your head so what happens is that as you build momentum you're getting out of your own head you're less self-conscious your attention is more outwardly directed understand that it gets easier as you do more as you talk to more and more people sadly not all of it transfers over to the next day but

a little bit of it does a little bit of that goes over into the next day and that's what we're interested in building here that long-term growth you're increasing your inclination to just talk to to random people out here you can oh this is an interesting one that's the slow approach to gaining confidence if you want a real quick confidence boost try wearing something like this something that's loud folks I'm talking something that gets attention when you wear something loud it forces you to be more comfortable being seen when you can't stop from being seen

you don't care so much what people think of you and that's really at the core of what confidence means not caring so much what people think not being self-conscious ironically when we stop trying so hard to be cool we end up being more cool this shirt is really outside my comfort zone my style but I made myself wear this one time and go out there and I went into this store and I was just like so embarrassed sort of I was like well this is me now I can't change it love it or leave it

folks like it totally changed how I interacted with people I couldn't hide anymore and something about not being able to hide forces you to be more authentic try wearing one of Lady Gaga's outfits and walking down the street if you're really standing out you have to be confident you will find that you start acting like the person who would be wearing something like that it's amazing it works it's sounds crazy but it really really works this is a beautiful Point called speak to the inner child my friend was in a cafe they closed one section

of the cafe he walks over sits down at this table with this lady and he says oh they they closed this the section I got to come sit with you now and she's just deep in her work and she just just like uh-huh which is a totally normal response just kind of brush him off whatever later he says can you mind watching my stuff and again she's like mhm I can so he's brushed off twice right nothing wrong with that he tries a third time later to talk to her and he says oh are you

in a deadline you look really busy and then she's like oh yeah so many deadlines I got this ethics paper do I got blah blah blah and then they start having a wonderful conversation so point is don't give up on people so easily know that there is a nice person in there behind that unfriendly standoffish mask that resting face that people may have there's a nice person in there you got to talk to that person behind the mask as adults were just big grown-up children talk to that inner child if they tell you to get

lost then you got to respect their boundaries and leave okay but the problem is that people don't they leave at the first little sign of negativity and you don't want to do that you want to really stay and give them a shot and get them to open up and how do you do that by being more authentic with them because when you're more authentic you encourage them to be authentic they feel safer being authentic with you and even if someone does give you the cold shorter why are you talking to me go away I'm busy

don't take it personally you got to speak to them with compassion and warmth choose warmth you can say well I just wanted to say that you have a very nice hat today the person that's having that bad of a day go away why are you talking to me they need you the most to be kind to them this is an interesting one have you ever been in a conversation I've made this mistake so many times just as someone's starting to open up to you you change the subject Leo in this book she calls it being

a word detective and let's say someone says blah blah blah blah but I'm excited about this weekend though do not come and say oh yeah what did you eat for lunch today take the bait in conversation you instead say oh yeah what did you have plan this weekend being a word detective means you got to listen to the precise words that they said see those as Clues to what they want to talk about this again goes back to active listening where you got to be present and listening to what they're saying and processing it and

envisioning what they're talking about and then when they're done talking and then you start responding okay don't try not to interrupt people there's a time and a place to interrupt of course but you got to listen and be present when you're listening to people and this is one of those things going back to the cafe story or he says are you on a deadline she says oh yeah so many deadlines imagine if then he said oh that sucks do you come here often no no you you got to set instead you could say something like

oh ethics that's interesting I don't like it that much either I think it's doing this and that and blah blah blah Branch off what they said never the naked reply you may tend to respond with one or two word responses mhm yeah maybe Yep this isn't good and I know I do this a lot too okay but when someone's talking to you the first time they just want to see what your Vibe is they want to know who this person is and if they ask you like what do you do they're really just asking you

you know give me something here that we can talk about something that I can relate to right like fill your response with different aspects of life and different things that they might be able to hook on to they say what do you do I could say well I I went to Maryland to study Physics and I was studying Arizona for several years applied math then I got laid off and I also found it very stressful there anyway and I came back here I knew I wanted to do something more creative so now I plan birthday

parties for dogs okay if I had just said oh I'm a party planner it puts a lot of onus on them to what do how do I connect with this what do I how what can I come up with it's like a lot of conversational pressure in that sense eye contact is very important when you're talking to people it conveys confidence okay it makes people respect you more it gets people's attention it is very intimate when you're talking to somebody if you're in a group setting you want distribute the eye contact and give each person

a little bit of you know a couple seconds each imagine if I was just talking to one person in the group here and these people are totally shut out and we're just like talking the whole time these people are like by looking at everyone you make them feel more welcome I see you I see you and you and you and you something like that that's a little bit overdramatic but you get the idea Jordan Peterson actually does this does this a lot in his uh talks or if you look at those old lectures is like

looking and talking to one individual at a time that's a nice it's more engaging if you're trying to talk to more people you got to try to find ways to make it a habit knowing these tips is not enough James Clear in this book famous book Atomic habits he talks about make small changes small actions that are taken more frequently and then over time these really compound into massive results that you would not expect so don't try to do large actions taken less frequently but see every single person you come across in your life as

someone that you could potentially talk to and practice that skill I've personally determined that the smallest action that you can take towards that goal is simply the act of getting someone's attention hey I'm here you know people come up to the bar sometimes and they'll be like excuse me can I I've got I've tried to make myself now be like hello I'm here hi what's going on come over here please practice that getting people's attention more it's just that's the smallest moment at which you go from not interacting with someone to interacting with someone it's

that moment of getting their attention thank you so much for watching thank you so much for all those comments please if you have anything any tiny little thought positive or negative I want to hear that really read every single one and really enjoy hearing the feedback that you give me so that's it it thank you for listening see you next time bye