How to Stop Over-Analyzing Every Conversation

During every conversation I have, I analyze everything about the other person.

I’m looking at their eyes, watching body language, and listening for different keywords.

I’m reading between the lines with each social interaction and never taking anything at face value.

It’s making life more difficult than it needs to be.

Writing for Lifehacker has taught me a lot about social interaction.

I know how towatch for lies,read body language, andspot fallacies.

These are useful tricks to have, but when I do it in every conversation, Ioverthinkit.

Every problem has a scientifically proven formula for a desired outcome, right?

Communication doesn’t always work that way, though.

If this sounds like you, I’m here to help you learn from my mistakes.

I’ve come up with a set of guidelines for myself to keep this from happening.

Pay More Attention to the Moment

This might sound counterintuitive, but bear with me.

I watch for cues that reveal what’sreallygoing on, but fail to listen.

I’m not focusing on the words, I’m focusing on what I think is behind the words.

A commonly recommended solution to deal with this is to repeat what the speaker was saying.

I tend to think of conversations like a game of chess.

I’m constantly planning three moves ahead and plotting what I need to say to get there.

I’m basically pre-over-analyzing a conversation, and subsequently, I don’t get anything productive out of it.

I assume everyone else does that as well.

It turns out, that’s not the case.

Sometimes, people just mean what they say and say what they mean.

Even if someone was very direct, I assume they meant something else.

Did I come across poorly?

Did you see the expression on their face?

Oh god, they must think I’m an idiot!

There’s value in reading body language and paying attention to verbal language.

But you have to know when to use those tricks and when to just listen during a conversation.

Try and balance active listening with everything else when you’ve got the option to.

The key is to apply the knowledge when it’s useful and ignore it otherwise.

Photos byFreud,Daniel Lobo,Jamie Beverly,Alexadre Dulaunoy,Paxson Woelber.