The 50th Law (with 50 Cent)

Understand: We are the preeminent social animal on the planet,
depending on our ability to communicate with others for our survival
and success. It is estimated that over 65 percent of all human
communication is nonverbal but that people pick up and internalize
only about 5 percent of this information. Instead, almost all of our
social attention is absorbed by what people say, which more often than
not actually serves to conceal what they are really thinking and feeling.
Nonverbal cues tell us what people are trying to emphasize with their
words and the subtext of their message, the nuances of

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communication. These cues tell us what they are actively hiding, their
real desires. They reflect in an immediate way people’s emotions and
moods. To miss this information is to operate blindly, to invite
misunderstanding, and to lose endless opportunities to influence
people by not noticing the signs of what they really want or need.
Your task is simple: First you must recognize your state of self-
absorption and how little you actually observe. With this
understanding you will be motivated to develop observation skills.
Second you must understand, as Erickson did, the different nature of
this form of communication. It requires opening up your senses and
relating to people more on the physical level, absorbing their physical
energy and not just their words. You do not simply observe their facial
expression, but you register it from within, so that the impression stays
with you and communicates. As you gain greater vocabulary in this
language, you will be able to correlate a gesture with a possible
emotion. As your sensitivity increases, you will begin to notice more
and more of what you have been missing. And equally important, you
will discover a new and deeper way of relating to people, with the
increased social powers this will bring you.
You will always be the prey or the plaything of the devils and fools in this
world, if you expect to see them going about with horns or jangling their
bells. And it should be borne in mind that, in their intercourse with others,
people are like the moon: they show you only one of their sides. Every man
has an innate talent for . . . making a mask out of his physiognomy, so that
he can always look as if he really were what he pretends to be . . . and its
effect is extremely deceptive. He dons his mask whenever his object is to
flatter himself into some one’s good opinion; and you may pay just as much
attention to it as if it were made of wax or cardboard.
—Arthur Schopenhauer