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Last annotated on February 12, 2017
The goal is to understand better what other people really want, to identify where that intersects with what you want, and to have the social tools required to get both people what they're hoping for. It's also about understanding where there isn't an intersection, and moving on. The tools we use to do this are self-awareness, situational awareness, good communication skills, and an understanding of humor, empathy, and social dynamics.Read more at location 67
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So many of our conversations are electronic that we've dulled some of those skills that are only useful in real life: timing, yielding, listening, and perceiving facial expressions and body language.Read more at location 82
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With the possible exception of your daily habits, nothing will influence your life so much as your core friend group. Whether you're aware of it or not, you are constantly molded and influenced by those closest to you. You'll receive advice from them, absorb their mannerisms and habits, and even subconsciously adopt some of their opinions.Read more at location 122
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With so much on the line, choosing those closest to you should be a very deliberate decision.Read more at location 126
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The goal is to build a social circle that will both challenge and support you, depending on what you need at the time.Read more at location 128
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But what happens when someone needs external support but doesn't have close friendships? If he can't solve the problem himself, he ends up imposing on acquaintances. This is undesirable not just because it creates an imposition on the acquaintance, but also because it damages that relationship and decreases the likelihood of it growing into a meaningful friendship.Read more at location 140
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A person who is emotionally independent from acquaintances is most likely minimizing the impositions he creates on his friends, but is also making it very easy for new people to become his friends, since he asks nothing from them in the early stages of the friendship.Read more at location 145
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There are four main channels being communicated on at all times: content, meta, emotion, and status.Read more at location 181
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Content is what we think of when we talk about communication superficially.Read more at location 182
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The meta channel is the undercurrent of the conversation. It's the meaning behind the meaning-- the implication.Read more at location 184
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Sometimes meta can be read in isolation, but it usually requires context.Read more at location 186
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The emotion channel is more of a passive signal than an active channel. Those of us who are not expert poker players are constantly leaking out our emotions as we speak.Read more at location 187
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And last, the status channel is constantly sending out clues about our relative status.Read more at location 192
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A master of communication must be able to have two major conversations (content and meta), while maintaining two minor conversations (emotion and status).Read more at location 198
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The meta channel may be the most important of the four. It's where real discussions happen. In fact, sometimes you intentionally communicate incorrect information on the content channel, through sarcasm or joking, allowing your real message to come through on meta. The key thing to understand about the meta channel is that it's running all the time. Nothing you say will be taken entirely at face value. People you speak with will always be wondering what you really mean.Read more at location 206
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The point of the meta channel is that it allows for shades of gray not afforded by the content channel. If the content channel is a lecture, the meta channel is a dance.Read more at location 221
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Communicating on the meta channel also allows people to save face.Read more at location 226
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The first step to communicating on the meta channel is to constantly ask yourself why people are saying the things they say.Read more at location 236
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Once you understand meta communication, you want to start shaping your own meta communication.Read more at location 240
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Sometimes when I read a non-fiction book, I decide that no matter what, I'm going to at least make one change as a result. I hope for a big breakthrough, but even a small tip can make a book worth reading. If you were to decide to do that with this book, I'd recommend having that change be focused on communicating more through the meta channel.Read more at location 245
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A lot of conversing is taking the other person on an emotional journey. You think about where they are emotionally, as well as where they want to be, and you use the emotional channel to guide them there, or keep them there if they want to stay in the same place.Read more at location 249
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Be aware of the emotional tone of conversation and think about the directions you could move that emotion.Read more at location 265
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There is an invisible hierarchy in every group of people from two on up. If a decision had to be made, who would make it? If there were a crisis, to whom would people in the group turn to solve it? Who has to be more careful about what they say? Humans are hierarchical creatures. We want to know where we stand, not for vanity, but to inform how we speak and act.Read more at location 267
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Direct eye contact conveys high status universally. Taking up a lot of space with your body also conveys high status.Read more at location 280
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Vocal tone also communicates a lot about status. Someone who talks slightly louder than average and with clarity will appear to be more important.Read more at location 284
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When you are introduced to someone or put into a social situation where people don't know you, your first goal should be to convey as quickly as possible what makes you interesting and worth knowing.Read more at location 307
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focus less on what you've done and more on who you are. And you want this information to be second-order information, meaning that you want a reasonable person to infer attributes about you based on what you say.Read more at location 318
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If you're not sure if you're bragging or not, don't say it. Bragging is extremely detrimental, and you'll have plenty of other opportunities to convey value.Read more at location 330
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Consider what about you makes you valuable as a friend, and whenever you're in a new social situation, think about which of your assets will most be appreciated by that group and work on conveying them. Do it early in the interaction and then move on to getting to know everyone else.Read more at location 338
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talking too much about things that the other person isn't interested in.Read more at location 348
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making bad jokes.Read more at location 353
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Some people are so oblivious about overtalking that they won't pick up on any subtle cues.Read more at location 359
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If you have a friend or family member who is willing to be completely honest with you, you can ask them what annoying habits you have. Don't ask if you have any, just assume that you do, and ask what they are. This saves your friend the awkward step of revealing to you that you have some. Think about how often you'd be wrong when pointing out someone else's annoying habit. Probably rarely to never, so when someone gives you that sort of feedback, assume that they are correct. You will have to find some annoying habits on your own, though. The biggest red flag is when you are consistently getting reactions that differ from those you expect.Read more at location 364
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When you begin a conversation with a new person, you should have a loose default of doing all or most of the talking. If the person isn't socially adept and can't think of things to say, it won't be a problem, since you'll fill any silence with interesting stories, questions, and observations. Eventually you want to transition to a lower ratio, preferably fifty-fifty. If you have someone who is really shy, you may always be at sixty or seventy percent, but greater than that is a lecture, not a conversation, and it's very likely the other person will become frustrated.Read more at location 375
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If he hasn't asked you to explain something and you're talking more than fifty percent of the time, you're making a mistake. If the other person gives short answers or the same answer repeatedly, he is not interestedRead more at location 385
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If you never get questions, that probably means the other person is concerned that you won't stop talking if you start answering.Read more at location 391
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As a general rule, never over-explain. If you're talking about something intellectual, do the bare minimum amount of explanation. As soon as someone nods or agrees with something you say, move on to your next point.Read more at location 392
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If you need to share a long story or provide and involved explanation, put in lots of pauses. The best stories and explanations leave the listener rapt, afraid to speak and miss something. If the silences aren't filled, you can be sure that the person wants to hear what you have to say. If he asks questions, that's equally good. But if he changes the subject or decreases the depth of the conversation, he's probably looking for a way out.Read more at location 396
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As you're speaking with someone, you should intently gauge their responses. This isn't to feed your ego or to beat yourself up, but to enable you to take responsibility for the conversation and to give the other person the experience that they want.Read more at location 404
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conversations should create a feedback loop. You make a statement, tell a story, or ask a question, and then you gauge the response.Read more at location 416
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Much of social skills is creating the experience that the other person wants, and making it as effortless and natural as possible. A big part of this is making sure that the topics you cover are topics about which the other person wants to talk. The easiest way to do this is to drop conversational hooks and allow the other person to pick up on those that hold his interest. This is not a one-time strategy, but a framework to use for conversations on an ongoing basis.Read more at location 422
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The general idea is that you tell one story and lace it with as many hints about other stories and conversations as possible.Read more at location 431
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Early in a relationship, a subgoal of any conversation is to give as much accurate information about yourself as possible. The more context someone has, the more they'll get out of every bit of information you give them. By dropping hooks, even if they're not picked up, you provide more points to connect about you.Read more at location 441
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Be careful to avoid bragging when dropping hooks.Read more at location 444
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Your primary tool for conveying who you are and making people interested is through your stories.Read more at location 454
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Some experts believe that a sense of humor is attractive because it is proof of intelligence that can't be faked.Read more at location 456
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A common interview technique, in lieu of asking people whether they have desirable attributes, is to ask them to tell a story about a time they exhibited one of the attributes for which you're selecting. If you ask someone if they react well in a crisis, the answer is always yes, but asking them them to tell you about a crisis that they resolved successfully will prove it.Read more at location 461
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If there's a single skill I can recommend that you spend time on, it's the art of telling a story. It provides you with a way to entertain your friends, control the mood of an interaction, and efficiently convey who you are.Read more at location 467
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Your goal when telling a story is to convey something noteworthy about yourself in a way that is enjoyable to the other party or parties. You want for it to be a good time for them, and for it to reflect well upon you. This should be your primary motivation when you begin to tell a story. When someone is getting to know you, they are trying to understand your character and your status. Who are you, and how do you fit into the world they know? These questions are answered not so much by the main arc of the story, but by the arc's shadow. It's the small details of the story that will illustrate who you are.Read more at location 473
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When telling a story, you should have three primary phases in order: the setup, the buildup, and the payoff.Read more at location 493
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the setup part of your story should be very concise. This is because there is no tension or drama in the setting, and those are the elements that keep people interested in the story. Use the setup to transport the listener or listeners into the story. The biggest mistake that people make in the setup is that they include far too many details.Read more at location 500
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The buildup is the variable length portion of the story. Any given story will have a relatively short setup and payoff, but the buildup could be any length. The buildup tells the facts of the story, in such a way as to build the tension and keep the listener engaged. It should be a constantly escalating journey that you take your listener on. This is also the part of the story that you never tell the same way twice. That's because it should be dynamic, based on the reaction of your listeners. If they are rapt and hanging on your every word, you can draw the story out longer, ratcheting up the tension. The best way to do that is to tell the story in such a way that your friends will mentally try to guess what happens next, but constantly be hit with surprises. If they're bored or not fully engaging with the story, you keep the buildup quick.Read more at location 505
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Last comes the payoff, which must resolve the story in one way or another and hopefully include some sort of revelation.Read more at location 520
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You'll notice that stand-up comedians have two standard segues. One is to say, "Yesterday I ______", and the other is "Speaking of ______". The former makes a story relevant based on the time it happened, and the other makes it relevant due to the topic. Comedians are always lying about when things happened. This is expected, because they're comics, but you should not do the same. For that reason, most of your stories will have to be topically relevant.Read more at location 551
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If you don't feel like you have a lot of interesting stories, a good exercise is to take a sheet of paper and write the letters of the alphabet down the left side. Then come up with a short description of a story that begins with each letter.Read more at location 572
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The simple act of racking your brain to come up with twenty-six stories is valuable. You could throw away the paper afterwards and still benefit from the exercise, just because it makes you realize how many stories you have. But you can also go a step further and memorize the list.Read more at location 575
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Tell Stories About Your Friends that Make Them Look GoodRead more at location 583
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On the other hand, you should never tell stories that make your friends look bad. It's fine to expose their quirks, but if they messed something up, you'd never want to talk about that, even if it was a funny story. By doing that your friend looks bad, but you also look bad for putting down your friend.Read more at location 594
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Both of you sitting is better than one sitting and one standing, but both standing is better than one person sitting.Read more at location 631
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If they are turned away from you, this is a sign that you are too close.Read more at location 635
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A good shortcut to expressive comfort is to pleasantly disagree with the other person.Read more at location 642
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As you speak with someone, constantly monitor their comfort level. Are they making eye contact? Do they laugh easily? Can they offer an opinion without feeling like they need to disclaim it? Are they focused on you, or are they looking away? People often misread discomfort as disinterest, but they're two very different things. If there are warning signs of discomfort, aim to relieve it before assuming it is disinterest.Read more at location 653
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There is an important rule that must be observed during all conversations, especially those involving banter: always give the other person an out.Read more at location 661
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Like many concepts in the book, you want to create an unfair playing field tilted towards the other person. You take responsibility for conversations, but never require them to take responsibility.Read more at location 668
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always make eye contact. In every conversation you have, you should maintain eye contact eighty percent of the time or more. Over ninety percent of the time is better. Studies show that, while controlling for other variables, eye contact causes people to like and trust each other more.Read more at location 694
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Friendships deepen with voluntary increases in intimacy. There's a wag the dog sort of effect where deepening friendships cause intimacy to increase,Read more at location 731
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When you're taking conversational responsibility of a group, it is your obligation to make sure that everyone is involved in the discussion. Not actively, necessarily, but everyone must be interested in what you're talking about.Read more at location 775
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It never feels good to be wrong, but I'm glad to have been wrong so many times. For one, it gives me proof that I'm actually learning, and second it has beaten into submission my confidence that I'm always right about everything. And that's made me a better conversationalist. No one ever thinks that they're wrong in an argument, and yet at least fifty percent of people are (sometimes both can be wrong). If you're hanging out with people of approximately your same intellectual level, your odds of being right are around fifty percent. And if you're only hanging out with people much less intelligent than yourself, you're probably doing yourself a big disservice. It's fine to have an argument with someone and believe that you're right. Some people really like debating each other, and it can actually bring people closer. But when one or both people refuse to admit the possibility that they could be wrong, the argument can be destructive. So go in knowing the odds. You're just as likely to be right as wrong. If you realize that you're wrong, don't cling to your old belief to be safe or save face. Give your friend the satisfaction and respect of having convinced you, and he'll be more likely to admit when he's wrong next time. If you don't do this, and you always believe that you're right and never give an inch of doubt, people won't want to argue with you. They'll avoid any topic that's remotely controversial and you'll find yourself unable to engage in meaningful debate. Remember that it's not important to be right in the beginning, only in the end. And if your friend gets the satisfaction of teaching you something as you become right, that's a good thing for both of you.Read more at location 822
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Try to imagine how the person or group you're interacting with thinks. What motivates them? To what do they ascribe their successes and failures? What is an average day like? What qualities do they respect? What do they like to do?Read more at location 844
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If you are cheerful and positive, people will enjoy spending time around you. The happy and positive version of you is the best version you have to offer other people.Read more at location 876
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being dynamic applies to everyone and is essential. If you think there's any chance you're not very dynamic, improving should be a top priority. Someone who is dynamic is really engaged with life. He's going through life looking for the interesting and exciting. He's engaged with people, too. It's not enough to find these interesting and exciting things for himself, he must share it with the world.Read more at location 907
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When you really like being friends with someone, it's because they're bringing a lot of value to the friendship.Read more at location 927
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A good exercise is to think about what it might be like to be your friend. What would that feel like? What would the good parts of that friendship be? What would the bad parts be? What could you do to make that experience better for the other person?Read more at location 934
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friendships are mostly based on shared experiences and the realizations and consequences of those experiences.Read more at location 953
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One of your top social priorities should be helping others meet their future best friends. Among your first thoughts upon getting to know someone should be: who do I know who would love this person? Who of the people I know would they love?Read more at location 968
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By introducing two people, you also become a part of their relationship. The three of you will do things together, and they'll talk positively about you when you're not there. So if there's someone you're working on building a friendship with, making an introduction can help solidify the friendship.Read more at location 983
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your primary goal when being introduced is to make your friend look really good.Read more at location 1002
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When contacting someone who might not reply to you because he's too busy, or when trying to get him to hang out with you for the first time, think about what sorts of requests he gets a lot of, and which he gets none of. What can you do or say that will get his attention? Sharing unique skills you have is a reliable standard, but you can also think about events you can invite the person to, people you can introduce him to, or experiences you can create for him.Read more at location 1046
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Pick an off night like Sunday, and just agree to have dinner at the same place every week. It's easy to remember, doesn't cost you anything more than your dinner, and the focus is on people and conversation. Find a core group of friends that will go with you every week, maybe people you're hoping to get to know better, and then all of you can invite people you meet to the dinner. Now you have an easy way to begin new friendships.Read more at location 1075
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Travel is a Friendship ShortcutRead more at location 1079
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Why does this work? I think there are a lot of reasons, but two major ones. First, you rack up a huge number of shared experiences in a very short amount of time.Read more at location 1093
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Second, some of the most interesting people you'll meet are also the busiest. You don't become interesting by being idle. Often the only way you're actually going to get a chance to become good friends with interesting people is to separate them from their normal life. This is one reason I particularly like cruises. Being on a cruise is such a bizarre and foreign experience, situated way out in the middle of the ocean, that it may as well be another world. Plenty of time to sit down and really get to know someone. Travel doesn't have to be exotic or faraway to be a great binder, though.Read more at location 1098
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Traveling is a great way to make yourself more interesting, if you feel like being interesting is something you need to work on. It puts you in enough unusual situations that you build a bank of stories and experiences, and it gives you perspective you wouldn't have otherwise gotten. Couple that with trips with your friends, new and old, and it becomes an extremely valuable social activity.Read more at location 1106
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Focus is such a powerful tool in learning and work, but we underestimate its benefit socially. By focusing my limited time on the people that matter most to me, those friendships become and stay very strong. And my social time is better than ever, because all of it is with my favorite people or new people I'm excited to get to know. It can be scary and counterintuitive, when trying to improve your social skills, to say no to invitations or to trim down your roster of friends, but the focus makes it worth it. The goal isn't to have a million friends, it's to have a close group of amazing friends.Read more at location 1126
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Treat everyone as an equal, not because they are, but because they can be. People will often take on roles foisted upon them in social situations, and everyone is used to having peers around. If you act like a peer, you will usually be treated like one.Read more at location 1165
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My friend Todd used to have a small text file on his phone. Every time he met anyone, and I mean anyone, he would write down their name and a few little details about them.Read more at location 1175
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Most of the time he'd never run into that person again, and he'd just have another name in his file. But every time he would go into a store or a party, he'd look at his list and quickly refresh his memory on people's names.Read more at location 1178
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It's a shortcut. Creating a close relationship with a family member takes a fraction of the effort it would take to create a relationship with an acquaintance.Read more at location 1205
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If you have trouble making friends or are looking for a comfortable place to practice your social skills, start with your family.Read more at location 1211
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Think very carefully about how you spend your social time. I'd say that one of the biggest indicators into how good someone's friend group is going to be in a few years is how high of a percentage of that time is spent with either close friends or people with clear potential to become close friends. When you have friends or acquaintances with whom you don't want a closer friendship, or who don't want a closer friendship with you, it's best to cease all effort to spend time with them. That doesn't mean not to be friendly and kind to them, just to make the best use of your time as well as theirs.Read more at location 1237
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When you decide to treat someone well, you are creating goodwill and positive emotions out of nothing. Sometimes the effects of your manner will be small, but other times they'll have a huge impact on another person. You just never know, and there's a lot of variance.Read more at location 1251
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You also benefit from treating people well. Friendships start in unexpected places, and treating someone well who gave you a bad first impression could lead to you getting to knowing them better and changing your opinion of them. Being kind to people feels good to you and them. Treating people well is a no-brainer. It takes very little effort, benefits everyone, and could lead to new friendships. The reasons for not doing it, like generating a feeling of superiority or not wanting to waste a few seconds, don't hold up against the benefits. Be selective about in whom you invest time and become friends with, but treat everyone else like friends as much as possible.Read more at location 1256
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Choose friends not because of what they can do for you, but because you love who they are.Read more at location 1278
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Knowing what my friends had in common turned out to be more practical knowledge than I had expected. Having discovered what my filter was, I was constantly evaluating peopleRead more at location 1293
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think about what the people whom you admire most and would like to be friends with have in common. Once you know, filter new acquaintances through those criteria and adjust your effort accordingly.Read more at location 1307
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Be extremely vigilant about when you tell someone that you're going to do something. Make it a personal goal to follow up as soon as possible and to never fail to do it. It's best to write it down on your phone when you make the promise, but if you don't do that, ask yourself after every social interaction whether you made any commitments that need to be acted upon.Read more at location 1325
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If you are consistently honest, even at the risk of inviting disagreement, your friends can trust everything you say, including the good things. Compliments mean more from people who don't give them out unless they're actually true.Read more at location 1340
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you will be noticed and appreciated if you switch to always being on time. Being on time also shows a tremendous amount of respect, especially in groups.Read more at location 1347
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A side benefit of always being on time is that it can influence everyone else to be prompt as well.Read more at location 1351
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The primary goal of a friend group is to create a group of people, all of whose lives are disproportionately improved by being a part of the group.Read more at location 1358
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Too often people think about what people can do for them, but they don't think about the balancing part of that formula.Read more at location 1361
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A friend group should be a group of people who will be honest with each other when they need it.Read more at location 1364
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A friend group should be a default group of people to do activities with.Read more at location 1366
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A friend group should be an emotional support system.Read more at location 1369
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A friend group should be small enough that each person can have a relationship with every other one.Read more at location 1371
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A friend group should be able to provide perspective and advice to each other. The best advice comes from two sources: people who know the subject really well and people who know you really well. Ideally you'd have both in one person, but if you don't, a varied group of people who know you well enough to satisfy the latter can be very powerful. Coupled with the honesty mentioned above, your friend group will end up shaping the course of your life. To build a friend group with these specific components is to build an extremely valuable asset for yourself and for your friends. It can be composed of friends you already have, all new people, or a mix of both. As time goes on, relationships deepen and people get to know each other better, the friend group becomes even more valuable for everyone involved. If you don't already have a friend group that you love, building one may be the best possible use of your time. The approach I prescribe takes a lot of effort and requires you to assume much of the responsibility, but that's because it's worth it to expend those resources to build something so great.Read more at location 1376
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Being a Leader of Friends Being a leader isn't a title or something to brag about, it's about serving your friends. Within your friend group, one or more people will have to take leadership roles. You should make the effort to be one of the leaders, because it allows you to bring more value to your group. If there are other leaders, you work in harmony with them, never struggling for power, which causes damage to the group. Leaders of friend groups aren't voted in, they just take power and use it benevolently. A leader has one main function: to further the interests of the group. Furthering the interests of the group comes in many flavors. The basic building block of furthering interests is creating opportunities for the group to spend time together and to bond.Read more at location 1386
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There are a million different things that you can do for your friends. The general formula is to find something that will multiply your own efforts to benefit all of your friends. This is also why fighting for leadership in a group is counterproductive. Having multiple leaders all working to further the interests of the group benefits everybody.Read more at location 1401
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Every event that you and your friends do as a group, on average, will bring you closer together.Read more at location 1405
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Anything you do for the group makes the group stronger, and makes it better for everyone, including yourself. It's always worth the time to create the events, because that ensures that they happen.Read more at location 1410
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If there's one area in social skills that is notoriously difficult, it's building an accurate level of self-awareness. Part of what makes it difficult is that you can never be self-aware enough to truly know how self-aware you are. In an ideal situation, you'd be able to gauge the reactions to everything you do, and you'd know both what your strengths and weaknesses are, and the magnitude of each. In reality, even with practice, you'll have only a fuzzy concept of each.Read more at location 1422
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As a leader within your group, one of your responsibilities is to maintain harmony,Read more at location 1447
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The more you appreciate and respect your friends, the better the relationship will work in general. John Gottman, a researcher at the University of Washington, studies couples to figure out what causes divorce. The biggest factor is contempt, which sounds a lot like the opposite of appreciation.Read more at location 1467
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There's no reason you can't become one of the top one percent of storytellers in the world. It's just a skill, and it's one that very few people actively practice. We all have our social deficiencies, but plenty of people have chiseled away at them to the point of having so few that they're not even noticeable.Read more at location 1485
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Christopher Hurtado

Christopher Hurtado has over twenty-five years' experience teaching a broad range of subjects. He is self-taught in the classics, holds a Bachelor's in Middle East Studies/Arabic and Philosophy from Brigham Young University, and an MA in Nonproliferation and Terrorism Studies from the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey. He is a serial entrepreneur with startup and takeover/turnaround experience in various industries. He has varying degrees of fluency in twelve languages and has lived and traveled abroad extensively. He lives in Mapleton, Utah with his wife, Alysia, and their children.

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