Liza Koshy has quickly become one of YouTube's fastest growing stars
hitting 10 million subscribers within two years of starting.
Ten million subscribers. Are you kidding?
Liza started on Vine where she cut her teeth making videos that had to be six seconds or less.
Because of this, she is very, very good at quickly getting people
to like her, relate to her, and laugh with her.
Teen: That's me. One hundred percent.
Teen: I love this. This is a nice view.
Teen: [laughs]
Teen: I love her so much.
So today we're gonna talk about three things that Liza does consistently that make people love her
and how you can incorporate them into your own life.
I picked these three things specifically because they are easy to do, they get great reactions quickly
and if you use all three you will be the type of person that people gravitate towards and want to be around.
First and foremost, Liza is funny.
She makes people laugh which makes her fun to watch.
God, I love the Dollar store. I mean, who doesn't? Probably 50 Cent.
I hope you guys liked this video. If you did, please make sure to raise your standard.
We've talked before about Robin Williams ability to create characters
and Graham Norton's ability to make self-deprecating jokes.
So even though Liza is amazing at both of these things,
I'm going to focus on something unique to her
that you can use to get people laughing and to reframe a conversation.
That is, to purposefully misinterpret something that someone says.
That may sound complicated but it's actually really simple. Just watch how Liza answers these fan questions.
"Liza, do Kristen's makeup with a blindfold on."
You look amazing, sweetie.
"Drop your skincare routine." Okay.
"Are you christian?" No, I'm Liza.
"What is legit? Coke or Pepsi?" What kind of drug is Pepsi?
A fictional character that's great at this is Tony Stark.
He'll often answer rhetorical questions as if they're literal
or misinterpret something in order to undermine someone that's coming at him.
Watch this scene where Senator Stern is trying to take the Iron Man suit from Tony and watch what Tony does.
The suit and I are one.
To turn over the Iron Man suit would be to turn over myself which is tantamount to indentured servitude or prostitution depending on what state I'm in. I can't have it.
Look, I'm no expert—
In prostitution? Of course not, your senator. Come on.
While Tony uses this incredibly well to get a laugh,
Liza adds something to it that makes people really enjoy being around you
and that is to purposefully misinterpret things as positive.
Misinterpreting neutral things as negative is playing with fire; sometimes it'll get a laugh but sometimes it can alienate people or make things awkward.
By sticking to positive misinterpretation, you can feel much more confident that the joke will be well-received.
Liza absolutely nailed this when she did her video reading mean comments.
"Fugly." Aw, this guy thinks I'm fun and giggly. [laughs] I have a boyfriend.
"Why did 5 million people watch this?" Aw, he thinks more people should.
"This woman clearly does have a mental illness." Dude, all these doctors watching my videos are sick.
"How is this stupid b**ch so famous?" You said I'm famous.
This superpower of just assuming everything being said to you is positive will help your life in two ways.
One, you'll be happier.
Two, you'll make people laugh and turn critics into fans who want to be your friend.
It's your call at that point if you actually want to be friends with them
or, if as a positive happy person, you want to gently block negative people from your life.
Getting into the habit of misinterpreting things positively
also makes you an amazing friend to have because you become very skilled at cheering people up.
Teen: I like her attitude. She's so, like, upbeat.
My friend, Evan, is incredible with this.
One example I remember is a friend of ours had met a woman at a bar and kissed her and was super excited to see her again
but he texted her the day before and he hadn't heard back.
What was Evans response when our friend told him this?
"Oh my god, that poor girl. She's been missing her phone for 48 hours?"
It might not sound like much but even though it's an obvious joke
and they both knew that he was getting blown off, it made them both laugh and it cheered my friend up.
That brings me to my second point about Liza — she and Evan have mastered
one of the most important elements of being funny in real life — self-amusement.
Just watch her try not to laugh at her own jokes.
[Funky Music playing] I don't know what instrument this is.
Guys, this fridge is so nice I think I just nutt*d.
Also, check out Liza's delivery; she does not hold back when delivering a joke.
If she were to whisper her jokes or only half-commit to her movements,
she would sub-communicate a nervousness that would undercut her delivery.
If you were to laugh after that, it would just come off as nervous or try-hard.
But by being loud with big gestures and a goofy voice
and then laughing afterwards, she nails the trifecta of fun, funny and confident.
I used up all my water for this video so I guess I'm just gonna have to drink alcohol.
Just kidding, guys. This isn't alcohol... but this is. No, it—
I'll see you guys next Wednesday with Liza—
She also loves to make funny voices and use exaggerated body language just because it amuses her.
Humans feed off each other so when she's having fun, it makes the people watching her have fun.
If you haven't seen it, I highly recommend searching Laughter is Contagious
on YouTube for a really great example of this.
I could make an entire video around the many ways that Liza is funny
but there's one other thing that Liza does incredibly well
that I think makes her uniquely relatable and endearing.
A lot of celebrities try so hard to craft the perfect public image.
They hide their flaws and try to seem like they have it all together.
Even corporations try to present a perfect image where they try to manipulate you into buying their product without seeming manipulative.
Liza takes a very different approach with her fans.
She is honest in areas that you wouldn't expect
and that honesty creates humor and also a sense of connection.
Hey, thanks for being here. Haha! I don't have an intro and this makes the video longer.
But today I wanted to show you some bloopers to show you it's okay.
You know I mess up, you know? No one's perfect. I'm not perfect.
I'm just... running out of ideas that's why I'm doing this. Anyways...
Here are a bunch of bloopers since... after I return all of these.
If all you are is funny, you're just a class clown.
By also creating moments of honest emotion, you add depth to yourself and that makes people like you more.
In Liza's case, she shows us by reacting to things the same way we would.
Watch her reaction to publishing her first YouTube video and, later, to meeting President Obama.
I'm so new to this. YouTubers have cool interests, Liza.
But are you gonna do... Gosh, you're so lame.
...big wide world of YouTube. I'm freaking anxious.
I'm kind of scared. I'm trying to be impressive.
Liza: Hello, Mr. President. Very nice to meet you. Obama: How are you? Nice to see you.
Yup, that's exactly who you think it is. [screams]
Liza could easily pretend that she isn't nervous
but instead, she shares her anxiety around wanting to be good enough and wanting to be liked.
Those are fears we all have yet for some reason,
a lot of us feel a pressure amongst our friends to pretend that we're perfect —
that we never get rejected or if we do get rejected, that we didn't really care to begin with.
And the truth is if we were more open with the things we were struggling with,
our friends would be better able to help us and they connect with us over the things we're struggling with.
Liza is also honest in smaller ways too like her grooming habits which just makes for a great comedy.
Today, I have some beauty hacks for you.
Liza: Haven't washed your hair in 17 days? Teen: That's specifically the same...
Liza: Dry shampoo to refresh that. Teen: [laughs]
Liza: Spray all over that too. Teen: Yes.
I'm cringing at myself.
Liza: Oh. Teen: That's me.
Those reactions say it better than I could. When she shares potentially
embarrassing experiences that other people have had, the people watching
immediately liked her more and that's directly applicable to our lives too.
So to recap, one — start misinterpreting boring questions or negative situations and answering in funny positive ways.
Basically, assume everything that people say to you is positive.
Two — do things to amuse yourself.
And three — kill the need to be seen as perfect so you can start to make jokes that are about honest experiences people can relate to.
If you do all three of those things, you'll be amazed at how people
gravitate towards you and want to be around you.
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