How to Read People

I've gone to more job interviews than I can count with my hands and toes. Over the years, I've observed signals conveying that the interviewer isn't sufficiently interested in me as a candidate, whether it's because they've already chosen an internal candidate for the job, feel I'm asking for too much money, or think I lack job experience. Such signs may include wrapping up the interview quickly. For example, I was once invited to an interview for a job with my alma mater. It lasted a whopping five minutes, leading me to assume that job had someone else's name on it and they were just going through the motions to conform to hiring regulations. It's also not a good sign when I'm not asked any questions, when the interviewer arrives late/doesn't seem prepared for the interview, or when they're blatantly rude or disrespectful. Employers who are genuinely interested in you don't stoop to this level; they care about the impression th...

Whatever you do, don't harp on the past . Reminiscing is good, but only up to a point. If you find yourself stuck in the past rather than focusing on present and future goals, you're only inhibiting your growth.  Sure, we all have moments where we reflect on happier times in our life and say, "I almost miss those days." But we are prone to such thinking when faced with challenges in the present that drag us down. But why not tweak your thinking and reason that once you surmount those challenges, you'll be even happier -- and feel more accomplished -- than you did in the past? Then there are those of us who ruminate on bad experiences in the past -- a close friend inexplicably stabbing us in the back, a significant other we envisioned ourselves being with our whole lives suddenly proclaiming their need for space and effectively ending the relationship, an outstanding job opportunity that slipped through our fingers. But brooding over the past i...

How many letters do you handwrite and mail in a year? If you're like most people, the answer is probably zero. Email, texting, and social media have essentially rendered the practice of writing letters by hand obsolete. Despite their being old school, a person might still write one when they want to add a personal touch that doesn't carry over digitally  -- say, a child writing to his pen pal, a foreign exchange student reaching out to family from the other side of the world, or a hopeless romantic who wishes to spill his guts via pen and paper. Can you guess how many letters Thomas Jefferson, the third president of the United States, wrote in his lifetime? Mind you, there was no Yahoo, Facebook, or Twitter in the 1700s and 1800s. Even the telephone wasn't invented until 1876, and Jefferson died in 1826. That means people in Jefferson's time had to make do with communicating through correspondence. And, evidently, Jefferson was nothing short of a pro. He...

Have you ever heard or used the word apocryphal before? When I first stumbled upon the word in a book I was reading, I thought the word had a dark, brooding feel to it. Perhaps it's because you can almost spell "crypt" in the word. In reality, it means something -- whether a story, account, or statement -- that is of doubtful authenticity, although widely circulated as being true. Synonyms for apocryphal include fictitious, untrue, spurious, unsubstantiated, bogus, and false. I'm sure we can all point to one specific thing in school or the workplace that can often be described as apocryphal: rumors and gossip. Many of the statements made by candidates during the presidential election last year could also be classified as such, which is why fact checking has become all the rage in politics. All of us have friends, relatives or coworkers who relate stories that at times seem, well, exaggerated. And, yet, even though their authenticity may seem questionable...

When someone shows you their true colors, never try to paint a different picture. Many of us like giving others the benefit of the doubt. We see the glass as half full. We're optimists by nature rather than cynics. We like to see the best in people even in the face of evidence to the contrary. Unfortunately, having such a romantic view of human nature doesn't always pay off. Looking at someone through rose-colored glasses even when they've shown themselves to be unreliable, dishonest, manipulative, or opportunistic, can come back to bite us in a bad way. We've all been in situations where people -- friends, relatives, significant others -- have wronged us. We accept what we construe as their heartfelt apology and forgive them, steadfast in our belief that they won't do it again. Then, they do it again. And again. And again. I can't help but repeat that trite expression you've likely heard a million times by now: "Fool me once -- shame o...