124 I Can Read You Like a Book
There is also intentional mirroring, or adaptational mirroring.
That is part of manipulation, and in Part III I’ll tell you how to use it
so that it looks natural.Rituals
Rituals range from formalized bits of ceremony to microcul-
tural norms to personal habits. Sometimes we know their origins
and purpose, and sometimes we don’t have a clue, but we do them
anyway. Why do most Americans put their knife down after cutting
their meat, and then put their fork in the hand that held their knife?
In the days of the American Revolution, the separatists and loyal-
ists argued bitterly. These people were neighbors who shopped,
worshipped, and ate together. So they developed a ritual that averted
stabbings at the table and we follow it to this day: they put down the
knife after they cut their meat.
If you are a non-Catholic and you have ever attended a Catholic
Mass, you know you’re an outsider because you don’t know the
rituals of the hundreds of other people in that church. On the other
end of the spectrum, I know a skydiver who always puts her left
glove on and then her right as she’s preparing to jump; this has
nothing to do with rituals of safety that her fellow skydivers follow.
It’s a personal superstition.
In the middle of the spectrum, you have cultural norms related
to proximity to another person, signs of respect for people in author-
ity, and so on. One arcane norm that relates to space, as well as
eye contact, plays out in public bathrooms every day. In the average