By selectively targeting the famous politicians, celebrities or athletes; it's very easy to post-evaluate, post-analyse, post-access or post-read their body language in a past event, incident, situation or circumstance. However, I do strongly believe in the real-time reading of body language to understand the underlying mental, physical, emotional and/or cognitive state of a person or a group of people. Moreover, I try my best to verify the accuracy of my body language readings through further observations, cross-examination or enquiries.
There're several serious events, incidents, situations or circumstances in which I've accurately accessed or evaluated the underlying mental, physical, emotional and/or cognitive state of the involved individuals by analyzing their body language, movements and/or vocal cues. Additionally, I tried to help them out of the trouble or challenge they were facing in the same situation or circumstance.
However, following are three best examples that are truly worth sharing with you:
1) 16-Dec-2017: According to the Indian Standard Time (IST), it was 9:30 PM. The place was 20 KM south to Chennai city. I was standing with my bicycle at the entrance gate of a playground. Actually, I was waiting to cheer my friend who had participated in a full iron distance triathlon (Swim 3.8 km, Bike 180 km and Run 42 km) event. The moment I got his first glimpse through the darkness and dusty air, his lethargic body movements and downward held chin caught my immediate attention. I realized that he was struggling badly to maintain his pace due to extreme exhaustion after riding 180 KM on his bicycle.
What I realized upon his first glance proved right once he got closer enough to be able to clearly see his face. His eyes were turned red but face was faint. His pronunciations were sluggish and vocal tone was dull as I heard him saying, "Hello!". I thought that it was right time to give him support so that he could finish his last 21 KM of run. I chose to ride my bicycle for 21 KM along side him at his own pace, frequently cheering and encouraging him in an upbeat vocal tone. After almost 2 hours, I was glad that he could finish his race.
After returning to his home victoriously, the friend wrote an elaborate (too much!) article on his first-ever full iron distance triathlon experience. He didn't miss to mention about my accurate reading or assessment of his mental and physical state from his body language at the first glance. Perhaps, the most likely reason of my accurate assessment was my involvement in the endurance sports such as long distance cycling and half-marathons since 2012.
2) 30-Apr-2022: The place was my relative's home in the western India. A 50+ year old mother requested both of us to suggest a suitable girl for her young, charming and 'very busy' son when my wife and I were leaving her house. She further added that her son had booked an apartment/flat in Pune for the new couple to move in. However, no specific locality or area of the apartment/flat was clearly mentioned. I sensed that something was odd, fishy or suspicious. According to me, it was the first ever RED FLAG. So I started paying acute attention to her words, voice and body language cues.
Her gaze was fixated and her face was frozen. However, she had tightly clasped her both hands together, as if somebody glued them together with the world’s strongest adhesive (2nd red flag). I suddenly turned my eyes towards her feet, only to find that fingers of her feet (toe fingers) were pulled inside, as if she was trying to save them from getting trampled by somebody (3rd red flag). Also, there was a moderate tension in her voice while speaking, as if somebody was choking her. Of course, it wasn’t her normal/baseline tone of voice (4th and final red flag).
Before and after the meeting, I happened to meet and talk with her son on a very few occasions. He used to share unverifiable facts (countless RED FLAGS) about wealth, property and reputation earned by him, without any discomfort in his body language and/or speech. For the blind believers, it was very convincing. Wasn’t it? Almost every closed relatives blindly believed in his impressive claims BUT not me. I publicly told them twice, "I'd trust him only if he stays out of any trouble, at least for next 10 years."
Six months passed after the meeting and her son got married in an extravagant wedding ceremony. Shockingly, he turned out to be a fraudster within next few months. He had committed an investment fraud of almost INR 1.5 crore rupees (equivalent to USD 175,000). Now, he's constantly running away from the investors and some of them were his close relatives.
Sadly, the mother has been out casted to due lying about his son's fraudulent undertakings and possession. Also, she has been blamed to support her son even after discovering his financial fraud. Today, she can't even walk with face held upwards, due to enormous amount of shame. Except a few people, nobody invites her to home or even greets her.
3) 07-Jul-2024: The place was my hometown in the western India. I was chosen as a member of a small committee to visit the house of a newly wed couple. They had married without taking a formal consent from their respective families. The visiting committee was sent by the girl's family to discuss about formalizing their marriage through a public ceremony. When we settled in the boy's house, the boy and his family greeted us. According to the Indian cultural tradition, he touched the feet of all senior members of the visiting committee.
Finally, the girl was asked to come in the hall in which we were sitting. As she came in the hall after a few moment, she straightly went to the chair that was placed next to the boy. There were no expressions on her face, as if it was completely frozen. However, she was sitting in an upright posture with her chin head high. Also, she kept her widely open eyes running over the members of the visiting committee. Some of them were her close relatives.
Once the discussion concluded amicably and formalizing their marriage was decided by both parties, I and rest of the committee members left the house while discussing the girl's unexpected reactions. Once we came back to meet the girl's father in his house, some of the committee members claimed that his daughter appeared extremely arrogant or rigid throughout their face to face interaction that lasted for 15 minutes.
According to a member with whom the girl had a bitter argument a few months ago, she had turned into a narcissist after getting married to a wealthy guy. All of these negative evaluations or assessments about the girl's reactions (or actually - complete lack of them) deeply hurt her father who was already suffering from high blood pressure. However, my own assessment was entirely different from them.
While everybody was evaluating or accessing the girl's body language and facial expressions out of prejudice, prior experiences or confirmation bias; I had completely suspended my judgement and kept collecting the contextual cues before I left the house. According to my well-thought-over evaluation or assessment, the girl had reserved her reactions. I called it as "Reserved Reactions".
A few days passed and I happened to meet and talk with the same girl's close friend. My assessment turned out to be right when she confirmed that the girl couldn't figure out how to react to the relatives visiting her and her newly wed husband under the enormous amount of stress she was experiencing since the day they got married.
There're several serious events, incidents, situations or circumstances in which I've accurately accessed or evaluated the underlying mental, physical, emotional and/or cognitive state of the involved individuals by analyzing their body language, movements and/or vocal cues. Additionally, I tried to help them out of the trouble or challenge they were facing in the same situation or circumstance.
However, following are three best examples that are truly worth sharing with you:
1) 16-Dec-2017: According to the Indian Standard Time (IST), it was 9:30 PM. The place was 20 KM south to Chennai city. I was standing with my bicycle at the entrance gate of a playground. Actually, I was waiting to cheer my friend who had participated in a full iron distance triathlon (Swim 3.8 km, Bike 180 km and Run 42 km) event. The moment I got his first glimpse through the darkness and dusty air, his lethargic body movements and downward held chin caught my immediate attention. I realized that he was struggling badly to maintain his pace due to extreme exhaustion after riding 180 KM on his bicycle.
What I realized upon his first glance proved right once he got closer enough to be able to clearly see his face. His eyes were turned red but face was faint. His pronunciations were sluggish and vocal tone was dull as I heard him saying, "Hello!". I thought that it was right time to give him support so that he could finish his last 21 KM of run. I chose to ride my bicycle for 21 KM along side him at his own pace, frequently cheering and encouraging him in an upbeat vocal tone. After almost 2 hours, I was glad that he could finish his race.
After returning to his home victoriously, the friend wrote an elaborate (too much!) article on his first-ever full iron distance triathlon experience. He didn't miss to mention about my accurate reading or assessment of his mental and physical state from his body language at the first glance. Perhaps, the most likely reason of my accurate assessment was my involvement in the endurance sports such as long distance cycling and half-marathons since 2012.
 |
| An exhausted athlete (symbolic image) |
2) 30-Apr-2022: The place was my relative's home in the western India. A 50+ year old mother requested both of us to suggest a suitable girl for her young, charming and 'very busy' son when my wife and I were leaving her house. She further added that her son had booked an apartment/flat in Pune for the new couple to move in. However, no specific locality or area of the apartment/flat was clearly mentioned. I sensed that something was odd, fishy or suspicious. According to me, it was the first ever RED FLAG. So I started paying acute attention to her words, voice and body language cues.
Her gaze was fixated and her face was frozen. However, she had tightly clasped her both hands together, as if somebody glued them together with the world’s strongest adhesive (2nd red flag). I suddenly turned my eyes towards her feet, only to find that fingers of her feet (toe fingers) were pulled inside, as if she was trying to save them from getting trampled by somebody (3rd red flag). Also, there was a moderate tension in her voice while speaking, as if somebody was choking her. Of course, it wasn’t her normal/baseline tone of voice (4th and final red flag).
Before and after the meeting, I happened to meet and talk with her son on a very few occasions. He used to share unverifiable facts (countless RED FLAGS) about wealth, property and reputation earned by him, without any discomfort in his body language and/or speech. For the blind believers, it was very convincing. Wasn’t it? Almost every closed relatives blindly believed in his impressive claims BUT not me. I publicly told them twice, "I'd trust him only if he stays out of any trouble, at least for next 10 years."
Six months passed after the meeting and her son got married in an extravagant wedding ceremony. Shockingly, he turned out to be a fraudster within next few months. He had committed an investment fraud of almost INR 1.5 crore rupees (equivalent to USD 175,000). Now, he's constantly running away from the investors and some of them were his close relatives.
Sadly, the mother has been out casted to due lying about his son's fraudulent undertakings and possession. Also, she has been blamed to support her son even after discovering his financial fraud. Today, she can't even walk with face held upwards, due to enormous amount of shame. Except a few people, nobody invites her to home or even greets her.
3) 07-Jul-2024: The place was my hometown in the western India. I was chosen as a member of a small committee to visit the house of a newly wed couple. They had married without taking a formal consent from their respective families. The visiting committee was sent by the girl's family to discuss about formalizing their marriage through a public ceremony. When we settled in the boy's house, the boy and his family greeted us. According to the Indian cultural tradition, he touched the feet of all senior members of the visiting committee.
Finally, the girl was asked to come in the hall in which we were sitting. As she came in the hall after a few moment, she straightly went to the chair that was placed next to the boy. There were no expressions on her face, as if it was completely frozen. However, she was sitting in an upright posture with her chin head high. Also, she kept her widely open eyes running over the members of the visiting committee. Some of them were her close relatives.
Once the discussion concluded amicably and formalizing their marriage was decided by both parties, I and rest of the committee members left the house while discussing the girl's unexpected reactions. Once we came back to meet the girl's father in his house, some of the committee members claimed that his daughter appeared extremely arrogant or rigid throughout their face to face interaction that lasted for 15 minutes.
According to a member with whom the girl had a bitter argument a few months ago, she had turned into a narcissist after getting married to a wealthy guy. All of these negative evaluations or assessments about the girl's reactions (or actually - complete lack of them) deeply hurt her father who was already suffering from high blood pressure. However, my own assessment was entirely different from them.
While everybody was evaluating or accessing the girl's body language and facial expressions out of prejudice, prior experiences or confirmation bias; I had completely suspended my judgement and kept collecting the contextual cues before I left the house. According to my well-thought-over evaluation or assessment, the girl had reserved her reactions. I called it as "Reserved Reactions".
A few days passed and I happened to meet and talk with the same girl's close friend. My assessment turned out to be right when she confirmed that the girl couldn't figure out how to react to the relatives visiting her and her newly wed husband under the enormous amount of stress she was experiencing since the day they got married.
 |
| A short paragraph from my friend's article |
"While speaking to curiously excited audience, slowly dissecting the body language of the famous celebrities or politicians photographed or videotaped in some past event is easier.
However, the real challenge is to accurately read, access or understand the emotions, intentions or next likely moves of a person in real-time and face-to-face."
- Body Language Insights (Book)
However, the real challenge is to accurately read, access or understand the emotions, intentions or next likely moves of a person in real-time and face-to-face."
- Body Language Insights (Book)
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