Peta Heskell is known as The Original Flirt Coach and has been on just about every TV and radio show you can imagine. Her expertise is all things relationship and uses flirting as a powerful metaphor for effective communication whether that's with loved ones, friends or in the workplace. If there are relationships in your life that are holding you back (or making you eat) then Peta can help you…and make it fun...
Learn from their stories
The stories people tell about their past relationships, how they are at work and how they treat their friends are clues to their personality. Listen for these clues and use them as a cue to get a clearer feel for that person by asking questions.
How they behaved
Kevin and Irene had an affair and fell in love. He left his wife because they’d grown apart and Irene was so much more in tune with him.. Irene was worried about Kevin’s ‘over attentiveness’ to his wife.
Irene understandably felt insecure. I asked her to imagine that Kevin and she were separating. Would she want him to be bitter and greedy with her and treat her coldly
Pay attention to how they have treated other people in previous relationships. If it is consistent the chances are they’re going to behave in the same way to you in similar circumstances.
Nick appeared to be Susan’s dream man. One day Nick told her about his father’s infidelity. He remarked that the men in his family seemed to have a propensity for keeping more than one woman. Susan wanted to ask if he was like that but she didn’t.
After about 8 months, she found out that not only was he seeing his ex wife, but also a former girlfriend. When she confronted him with this, he said ‘But you’re no one’. He’d given her the signs but she’d paid no attention to this because she didn’t want to.
When people tell you stories listen for the subtle message. The more alert you are, the more you’re going to pick up. If someone tells you something about themselves like this, be prepared to find out more. And then you can decide what to do.
What’s important to them
When Derek met Cynthia they talked a lot about their ex’s. They were still at the ‘complaining’ stage. Derek used to complain how she always scowled. He used to say ‘she didn’t realise how ugly she made herself when she did that’. Cynthia remembered this and each time she began to make a nasty face at something Derek said, she’d stop herself and smile.
This was a very useful lesson. Cynthia didn’t want to be a scowler, whether she was with Derek or not. When I asked Derek what was special about Cynthia, one of the things he mentioned was how her ‘happy smiling face’ brightened up his day.
Paula told Tom how she’d left Al because he was always bringing her work down. She writes about health and beauty and Al used to scoff. That’s not real writing, that’s just women’s mag stuff. Al never read her work and they rarely discussed it. Tom remembered this. He wasn’t much interested in women’s beauty but after hearing how Al had cocked up, he decided to open out and find out about what Paula did. He loved seeing her light up when she talked about her work and he would ask questions when he didn’t understand. Tom learned from the story of Al.