Everything you need to know about body language Part IV: The Hand

The human hand is truly remarkable and sets us apart as a superior species on Earth. It has played a vital role in our progress and development. Our journey began with the invention of tools, where the hand’s dexterity and adaptability were first showcased. As time passed, our hands became capable of intricate tasks. Consider the ancient stone carvers or modern neurosurgeons who demonstrate the incredible capabilities of our hands

Why should we trust the hand?

In addition to its ability to perform intricate tasks, the human hand is also crucial for communication. This is something we witness every day: when people talk, they often enhance their words with hand gestures to express themselves. A perfect example of this is the creation of sign language, which was developed by humans to communicate effectively without relying solely on spoken words. It’s truly remarkable how our hands enable us to convey meaning and connect with others in such a visual and expressive way.

Positive sign

Steepling hand: Confidence. When fingertips touch each others.

When half the hand is inside pocket, if the thumb is outside the pocket: confidence.

Thumbs up is usually sign of positive thought.

Negative sign

When handshaking with someone, if that person is trying to put their hand on top of yours, they are trying to get dominance.

Sweaty hand: If the person is not sick, they are under stress.

Shaky hand: Worry or Joy. This can also be observed in heavy coffee drinkers, drug and alcohol abusers.

Hand wriggling: worry, low confidence. You often see this when women get worried and start praying. That praying is the sign. If they’re at the church then that might be just praying.

When half the hand is inside pocket, if the thumb is inside the pocket: low confidence.

Genital framing: Showing dominance. When thumbs are in the pants, above the waist and other fingers are hanging down around genital area.

Thumbs down, hiding: negative.

Frozen hand, hands move less as the conversation continues: lower confidence.

Rubbing hands together: nervous.

Neck touching: nervousness, low confidence.

Withdraw hand: Something negative just happened.

When hands stop illustrating: Something stops their thought pattern.

Sign to watch out for

When someone has their knife out, they want to scare you. But when the knife is behind their back, they want to stab you.

Pointing fingers and preening while talking can be interpreted as disrespectful to a lot of people and often lead to conflict.

Sometimes people have a story of them being victims, but when telling their stories, there are no sign of nervousness or low confidence. Watch out for their lies.

Tips

Keep your hand out in the open when talking to somebody, it will signal that you’re not suspicious. Keep hands out of pocket, or hands on table when talking.

Hand is a big part of communication, learn to corporate hand movements while talking to communicate more effectively. Another reason is when you communicate with your hands, it’s less suspicious when your hands are out and close to the other person which make it natural to touch a girl for escalation in pick up or hand out a sneaky punch to an aggressor.

Generally, handshake is for creating good impression. Have a firm handshake.

I recommend: What everyone is saying – Joe Navarro.