How to Cheat

You may not like me for this one

I’m exhausted. Feeling all the division and strife in our world is a drag. I’ve often wondered if there would be anything that could bring us together.

And then it dropped in my lap. For a few days in July, everyone became and remains united around one concept: Body language reveals secrets. Everyone agrees.

How do I know this? Reactions to the couple caught cheating on the Kiss Cam at the Coldplay concert proved it. If you haven’t seen it—or haven’t seen it lately—give this a look:

You don’t have to be a body language expert to see something is wrong. The signs are too big to miss: quick movements and hiding. Everyone knew the red flags were flying. The internet sleuths did their jobs and the truth came out. They were cheating AND violating company rules on not dating co-workers. He was the CEO of a tech company Astronomer, she was the head of HR. Both knew better. And they were busted.

But how exactly did everyone know? The principle here is that people who move the slowest and least have the most authority. (envision a police officer or security guard –they don’t move much as they survey a situation. We all know they’re in charge)

This couple is showing they have no authority in the situation at all. They panicked in this moment of stress. She hides her face as quickly as she can and he immediately echoes her stress by ducking. In times of stress you’ve probably heard responses are fight, flight or freeze. This is a perfect example of flight.

They’re also showing they are really bad at playing the cheating game, by snuggling in public. You’d think they’d do a better job of being sneaky. They’re smart, educated people right?

I’ve talked to lots of white collar criminals and they all say that at first they are nervous, then when they realize nobody is really looking at what they’re doing and they’re not immediately getting caught, they get confident, greedy and sloppy. I think that’s what we are seeing from this couple. Slop.

From what I understand they’re both fairly prominent in the Boston area. It would be unusual to go to a huge concert and not know anyone there. Going together is a big risk by itself, the kiss cam magnified it.

So what are your take aways?

1. Don’t cheat or stretch the truth- honesty is the best policy. It’s much easier in the long run. Short term fun rarely ends in a lasting foundation for success.

2. Whenever you want to show authority in any situation- at work in an important meeting or at home with your kids, be the one who moves the least. Don’t tap your fingers or fidget. Stay still in your chair, don’t sway or run in place. Practice moving more slowly and see how people respond to you.

3. Notice how much others are using unnecessary movements in stressful situations. Are they telling you something without opening their mouths?

I do get calls from people asking me how to reverse engineer my tips so they can lie. The tells are deeply unconscious and hard to rub out. So I always keep the conversations short and tell them it’s hard to do and they’ll come across in exactly the manner they don’t want to.

I don’t want to get into the habit of making my updates a how-to for bad behavior. But this time it’s so obvious I can’t resist. So here’s a couple of ideas on how to pull this off, should you decide to:

4. If you do cheat- don’t go out in public together. Try harder. Get more creative. And don’t think it’s gonna be inexpensive. You’re not working with the same rules as a legit couple at any time in your relationship, now or later. In this case, a few extra bucks springing for that VIP backstage package they thought was too spendy would have been worth it to stay behind the scenes. In retrospect, those tickets probably seem pretty cheap now.

5. If you get caught, move slow, pretend like nothing is wrong and many of your secrets will be safe. Had this couple tapped into their inner Bart Simpson and said ‘Nothin’ to see here!’ , the moment would have slipped right by and not attracted the attention. When is question, always ask yourself what would Bart do.

Remember: Body language reveals secrets. Everyone agrees. And the world just may be watching.