How Impressive is First Impression

The University of Minnesota - family social science professor Paul Rosenblatt explored the art of sleeping with a partner in a new book titled ‘Two in a Bed: The social system of couple bed sharing’. He says,” sharing a bed is a complicated, changing and often a challenging experience and no one has written about it”. ‘uhh disgusting!! What is there to research on 2 people sleeping together?’ I thought. I was reading an article in Bangalore Times on a Monday morning. What a nasty way to start the week.. I started reading BT a year ago. I used to be thrilled reading these surveys and so called studies about less explored things like ‘why looking good is important’, ‘What kind of guys are women attracted to’, ‘Is attraction physical?’, ‘Can money bring happiness?’…But of late I find these kinds of topics less interesting. Maybe because most of the times I don’t buy what is said there. Why is it inappropriate? I think. Maybe because most of the studies and surveys are done by a university professor in Chicago or an organization in Amsterdam, and they don’t fit into our culture, value system and the way we are brought up. Obviously I can’t nod to a survey saying ‘90% of the people have their first sexual experience while in high school’ maybe there, not here, I say.

Few days ago I came across one of these Tips on ‘how to make good first impression’. “Important, very important, you never get a second chance to make that first impression” these were my first thoughts. I read along.. There were tips like, wearing neat and clean clothes, a smile on the face, a firm hand shake, words to use while greeting etc.. Ok, so that’s it?? So anybody can learn to make a good first impression? Yes, the article was saying. Except for the most natural things which are not in ones control, most of the soft skill part of it can be inculcated. Ironically, the things which are not in ones control, like ones color, height etc influences significantly in forming first impression.

Interesting!! I had started to think…

Whenever I meet someone I can choose to act in 3 ways. I can choose to make good impression on them by projecting myself rightly. I can choose to make bad impression, but there is no reason why one would do that except in specific cases or I can choose not to bother about it and let the situation free, out of my control. In the last case, since I don’t try to control and mend the situation as I need it may turn out to fall anywhere between the good-bad gradient. Impressions are not a specific cutout between good and bad, it’s a fine gradient line with good and bad in the two extremes. Can I choose not to make any impression? say I don’t want to make any impression. No, it’s not possible since building impression happens in other peoples mind and I can’t control that, can I?

So, what opinion do we make in first impressions? Do we make an opinion about ones personality? Then, what is personality? Is it the totality of what kind of person I am? Than how do I know what kind of person I am? A simple explanation could be ‘I am what I repeatedly do’. If I take a pista flavored ice-cream once, that does not say much, but if I take pista flavor all the times I take ice-cream then that means I am a person who likes pista flavor. This simple thing also determines the personality of a person, only that we can call ‘doing things repeatedly’ as habit. So, our habits determine our personality. This means if I want to have certain kind of personality, I can develop habits which would ultimately help me develop that personality. This means I can mould my personality as I want.

Making good first Impression and having charming personality becomes important in business relations and in short encounters with people. But when it comes to personal relationships there is a missing a piece of puzzle to fit in -‘Character’. Considering the people whom I have close relationship now, In 70% of the cases the first impression I had on them has not remained. Then how impressive is first impression? This is when the ‘Character’ has played its trick. So what is character? Character is the collection of logically interrelated values. So what are Values? Values are beliefs, trust or faith that a person has in something. For example one person’s value system may say “life is very precious, one should struggle, work hard and mend it to suit his ways” and the other person’s value system may say “Life is short, enjoy it, don’t try to control it and take it as it comes”. None of these is good or bad, it’s a question of choice.

People with similar values happen to get along well and be close to each other. But not all people who are close have similar value system. That’s the beauty of relationships. When you love a person, you don love him/her for a reason. You need not like the way the person has reacted or behaved in a situation, maybe your opinion about things differ. Whatever the differences be, you don’t form an opinion about that person, because you love that person. Same is true with me, good or bad , I tell everything to my sister because I know she loves me and will not form an opinion about me on what I said. Besides opinion doesn’t last long as the values are ever changing and people change along with them forcing one to rethink about the opinion they made.

So what does my opinion about people say? Does it say what kind of persons they are? No, it says what kind of person I am. If I say “Sania should not do any ads, she should respect her religion and refrain from public appearances in such revealing clothes”, then it says about my values and helps form an opinion about me not her.With so much emphasis being given to ‘Values’, it can be seen that some of these values are general community values. We can see how differently Indians and people of USA view certain things, may it be teenage sex, divorce, dating, parent children relationships, even music, that’s the community value. With exposure to different value systems people find one more appropriate than the other and that’s how we see Cultural Revolution happening.

At last we can say, Impressions are impressive if the encounters are professional or short lived but in a personal relationship Impressions itself become short lived and Character takes the center stage.

Umm that’s quite a realization. But sometimes I ask myself “I have realized all this, but do I make good first impression on people?” Ya may be sometimes, but not always. Why not always? I know how important it is but still I don’t try to develop those skills and habits. Am I lazy? Is there something wrong with me? eeev, I better not open that window now..