The vast majority of us interact with others multiple times on a daily basis, (this is just a guess, maybe it’s just me), but scarcely do we happen upon just what it is that makes one person a popular hangout and another person not. Whilst this question begs a complicated answer, there is one thing that stands apart as being one of the more important aspects of interpersonal play, and that is the skill of building comfort.
Everyone is constantly forming and opinion of you. An opinion which is constantly reinvented second after second as they get to know you better and better, eventually, this opinion will solidify somewhat, becoming harder and harder to change. However, whatever someone thinks of you will always boil down to a simple answer to a very fundamental question: How does this person make me feel?
Whilst we could linger on humour, gratification, bliss, joy, or other complicated emotions that are difficult to consistently produce, one of the fastest ways to ensuring you are good company is to look for the signs that another is uncomfortable and learn how to distill them. I am going to break down five ways in which you can make someone feel comfortable around you.
1. Learn to Create Calming Silences
There is little more benignly uncomfortable than a person who never seems to take a break. They may not realise their flaw, but the implications of their constant writhing, their desire to fill every vacuum with any kind of noise, can quickly grind upon us and make us want to leave. In the same vein, if we feel like the person we are talking to is judgemental, condescending an difficult to convince of anything, we may not be able to stand a silence with them, and may jump at every oppourtunity to justify outselves to them.
Whether you are the proporiator or recipient of an awkward silence best avoided, both positions are extremely uncomfortable. No one wants to feel that they must fill every space to make their voice heard, and equally no one wants to feel that every second of silence is taken up by someone a little too eager to get their world out, both positions are incredibly unnerving.
By creating calming silences, you are essentially cultivating the inverse of the above, subcommunicating feelings of calmness, ease and, most importantly, trust that there is nothing for you nor the other person to be worried about.
Decorate your speech with little breaks; vacuums in which you and the person you’re conversing with to soak in the mood a little, time to reflect on what was said, to consider the wider world around you – to give the other person time to respond.
As you do this, maintain your focus on whomever you’re speaking to, relax yourself, breathe, and let them feel your comfort in their prescence. They too, will come to understand that they can relax, and feel at ease.
2. Take a Step Back
Of all the techniques in this list, this is by far the most basic and immediately actionable that you will learn. Taking an obvious and pronounced step away from whomever you are speaking to is a notoriously simple idea and yet when matched with a keen, real-time social calibration, becomes ridiculously effective technique to make the other person feel comfortable.
Often, conversations drift onto topics that would uplift and make us excited, drawing us deep into an almost trance like state of excitation. Anxious to draw as much satisfaction out of the topic as we possibly can, we find ourselves creeping closer and closer to whoever we’re talking about. There is a real humane and empathetic quality to this mostly unconscious manuever. It is as if desire to share so deeply that we must bridge the physical chasm between oneself and the other. However, more often than not, this sense of shared excitation is often felt more strongly from one side than the other. It is in time like these that we must learn to settle ourselves, and to take the time to read the other person. They may share in your joy of the subject, but perhaps they also feel threatened or locked in unsteady anticipation of your sudden closing in on them.
It is in these times that we owe it to others to take a step back, to move out of that intimate zone of closeness and into a settled space we more easily identify as “our own”.
Not only is this likely to inspire a mental sigh of relief from the person we have been conversing with, especially if they are a new aqauintence, but it also communicates concern, care and respect. Subconciously, this simple action is affirming in the other person that you are conscious of their feelings and that you do care about their comfort. That is a very powerful emotion indeed. And paradoxically, this relinquishment of physical closeness can in many cases act as a conduit to making further closeness, further intimacy, feel more natural and comforting in the future. In one simple action you have convinced the other that in all future liasions, they need not feel concern for their safety
3. Be Sure of You Own Position
Nothing forms friendships faster than the feeling that the person we are talking to considers us a good friend. It can be so easy to doubt ourselves in our day to day lives, sometimes all it takes is a small, helping hand to gently nudge us in the right direction.
Whilst this may well be reality for many people, you must not give in to doubt so easily. Take on a positive attitude, convince yourself that fundamentally, all people want to like you, and will continue to unconditionally until given a reason not to. And even when faced with such doubt, most will jump to defend you.
On the other hand, by feeling unsure and unsteady around your relationships with others, you lull them into the position of imagining what could possibly be wrong. Perhaps you are harbouring some negative judgements about their character, some uncouth desire they would rather not be a part of, perhaps you believe you are simply just too boring to bother with.
By being sure of where we stand with other people, by being sure that fundamentally, we are liked by others and deserving of love, we make it so much easier for others to believe that too. Outward displays of doubt and hesitation only lead others to wonder why we might feel that way, is it something about them? Something about you? Lend a helping hand and answer the question in your own mind first. The strength of your belief will show itself in your actions and people will feel your certainty. They will feel sure that their aqauintence, their friendship, their companionship with you is a stable one, and they will relax in your prescence because of it.
4. Validate Others by Reaffirming Their Worldview
This is one of the more advanced techniques on this list, and one which perhaps pertains to the most nuance of them all.
You see, one of the most insidiuous enemies to comfort is doubt. In particular, the feeling that you are alone in your sense of greater strife or worldview, that your perception of things is somehow different than those around you and that they don’t quite seem to understand it as you do. Whilst it sounds benign, it is one of the most agonizing feelings a person can feel if left for a prolonged length of time and, subconsciously pushes us away from people who can’t see things as we do.
To take a simple example, perhaps a co-worker of yours feels that management is unfair to the workers, perhaps they feel that the pay is not worth the responsibility, or that the conditions of their workplace are never prepared to an acceptable standard. In order to make this more interesting, let’s say that you happen to hold the opposite fews, perhaps you feel that your pay is quite well worth the hours you work, and that the workplace, whilst not exemplary, is maintained to a more than acceptable standard.
You need to get along with your co-worker, to lift up their spirits or otherwise, but all they can do is complain about poor treatment. What do you do? It’s easy to think that the solution would either be to tell them that everyone has to “Make the best of things”, or offer some sort of solution. It is also deceptively easy to fall into their pattern of belief and begin to be swayed by their point of view. There is however a much simpler and much more straightforward way of bringing yourself and your co-worker into social harmony, and that is simply to humor their position.
In situations where you are ambivilant to another opinions; moreso when you outright disagree with them, it can be difficult to provide any sort of validation. Our initial instinct is to disagree, to contest their position and pur ours forward as the correct way to be. This method only builds walls between people.
In the same way, it may seem as though outright agreeing with someone, especially when you don’t care or are opposed to the idea, is undignified and unworthy of respect. This is especially the case when validating ideas concerning a third-party. No one likes someone who talks negatively behind their back.
The key is not to agree or disagree, but simply to humor the point of view. This communicates that you are listening and invested, but much more importantly it also allows the other person to feel that their reasoning has at least some validity, and that they may not be alone in feeling the way they do.
To do this, use sentences including phrases such as “I can see why you might think that way” or “That’s definitely an understandable concern”. Highlighting the various reasons you can imagine as to why their point of view may be a relatable one; better still if you mirror back to them their own reasoning.
Remember that the key point here is not to agree, but to communicate that you understand why someone might agree. You can do this as impartially or partially as you prefer.
5. Focus Your Attention
In 1937 Dale Carnegie famously said in his book How to Win friends and Influence People, that if there was one unspoken currency everyone has wanting but never receiving, it was the desire to feel valuable. People are constantly on their guard, subliminaly asking themselves the question “Is what I’m doing worth doing?” Even a simple conversation can later become the object of countless cycling thoughts, ruminating on the value of what was said, the apparently desire, or lack other, that others showed when listening to it, and so on.
There is one simple, yet devistatingly effective way to make others feel although their words hold an inherent value, that they needn’t fixate on their style, topic or delivery, and that is to focus your full attention on them as they speak.
This is an art which is simple to communicate but difficult to master. In a world with endless distractions and competition over our attention, we may feel that we are listening when in actual fact we are just strategizing. We may feel like we are spending our time with someone else when we are really dividing it into smaller chunks – never really focused on a single thing in depth.
Do not split your attention. Give it in full to the other thing … and when it is ready to be brought back, bring it back in full.
To bring our full attention to someone not only means we are succeeding in providing an otherwise rare and fulfilling experience, it also mentally sets us apart from the rest of the people they communicate with on a day to day basis. The fulfilment of the craving for a feeling of value has the effect of relaxing the person you are conversing with, settling you in their mind as someone they can be at peace with. They will feel valued by you
Of course, life is as distracting as it has ever been, and sometimes the situation at hand demands your attention here or there, anywhere but the person you are currently engaged with. When this happens, do not split your attention. Give it in full to the other thing, bring it away from your aquaintence, and when it is ready to be brought back, bring it back in full. Nothing is more disconcerting than feeling a split in the attention of the person you are giving your time to. Although it may not be felt on the surface, it undermines the self-worth and feeling of value your partner has for themselves, and if it doesn’t do that, it is certainly grounds to be believed as a subtle form of disrespect, at the very least.
You Must Master The Art of Calibration
No matter how you decide to follow through with your life, the art of dealing with people will constantly be at the forefront. Day to day, it may not seem so difficult, but as months accumulate into years, you will quickly come to understand the effect your limited social understanding has had on your life. Whether it be enjoying a social hobby, playing online games with people, working or living in a communal environment, or having a romantic relationship, the skill with which you are able to curate comfort in others, as well as to kindle the desire in others to invest in yourself, (or, more plainly, your ability to make friends), will determine to a large extent the quality of life you are able to enjoy.
It may seem trivial, even unnecerssary to devote so much time to something that most humans seem able to do naturally, so instead I would like to put it forward in a different light.
By understanding how to read people and make them feel more comfortable in your prescence, you are improving people’s quality of life. You are putting them at ease and giving them space to feel better within themselves. You will be greatly rewarded for this.
