What's up everybody? I'm Charlie from Charisma on Command and today I want to do a breakdown
of charismatic gesticulations, specifically, what to do with your hands because this is
one that people don't realize sabotages you without you even realizing it.
So, I want to start with good examples and then get to bad, and there's three specific
things to keep in mind. First thing I want you to do with Chris Evans here is pay attention
to how he reveals his palms.
So first thing to notice is that his palm is open and available for the audience to
see from the get go, and he continues to do this. Just a little bit of nuance here, this
is not a hard and fast rule, but if you place your palm out and down, people tend to understand
this as more authoritarian, like you're giving a command. If you extend your palm out and
up, people see this more as a request, like you are inviting them to do things.
In either case, you are better off revealing your palms than not. From an evolutionary
perspective, what this shows people is that you have nothing to hide. You are not trying
to do them harm. This is true across many, many cultures, so, definitely, keep this in mind.
So there is the first run through the clip. Same clip, what I want you to pay attention
to this time is tension in the fingers and wrists. This is a big no-no. A lot of people
have floppy wrists, floppy fingers. If you have either of those, you actually come across
as more flimsy and less in command. So just pay attention how there is some muscular tension
without feeling robotic in the hands and wrists.
Which you'll notice this tension causes the fingers will be separate from each other at
times or together at times, but it allows him to pause and not have the wrists just
completely collapse under itself. So you'll see motions, and then, pauses, because there
is muscular tension there.
So that might not look too impressive right now, but I want to go to another clip and
you'll see what a big difference it can make. This is a bad example of what to do with your
hands and you'll notice right from the get-go we've got crossed hands on the lap.
So the first thing, pay attention, one, for no use of like making the palms available,
second, for flimsy fingers and wrists, and then, third tip today is to avoid ticks. You're
gonna see that Jonah has a tick where he constantly touches his tie.
So this isn't to say that Jonah isn't telling that story or making people laugh. We're actually
talking just about hand gesticulations today, so focus on that, but he has not yet revealed
his palms, and he will do very little of that.
Another tie touch, I think there's even one or two more before the end of this.
So pay attention to this, contrast this with Chris Evans' very open, available palms and strong
fingers to see what Jonah has going on with his wrist, which is it's kind of flimsy, kind
of just shakes there.
You see what's going on with his fingers? He had this weird shape going on because there's
not any really muscular tension going on in his fingers.
And his wrist is bent backwards here, again, it's great to show your palms, but if your
wrist is bent, you actually come across as more flimsy.
Here, he actually does a little bit better. He's got some tension going on in his wrist and his fingers.
To recap really quick, the things that you want to take from this video are: one, reveal
your palms, whether it's face up or face down; two, have some tension in your wrists and
in your fingers; and, three, eliminate any ticks so that you don't come across as nervous.
If you've liked this video and I hope you have, go ahead and subscribe to the channel.
We've got lots more, everything from eye contact, gesticulation, story-telling, from people
who do it right and people who don't. So, I hope that you found this helpful, hope that
you subscribe, and I look forward to seeing you again on the next video.