One of my favorite parts of my day is waiting for a light to turn green during the daily walks I like to take along the streets of NYC. Yes, I’m trying to get some exercise, but the bigger value for me is the flow my mind enters. And, oddly enough, it is often at the red lights where my best ideas arise.
Walking frees my mind to wander along with my body. One thought bumps into another. Something I’ve been considering suddenly makes sense. An idea I couldn’t quite formulate earlier finds its words.
And then I stop at a red light.
For thirty seconds or so, there’s nowhere to go. So I look around. And, I guess one could say I’m a bit of a busybody, too. But from my perspective, I’d say I’m simply highly attuned to my environment. I start noticing people and interactions. Invariably I overhear someone say something that gives me an idea.
Usually, not anything dramatic. Maybe half a sentence between two people walking behind me. Someone on a phone call. A couple disagreeing about where they’re going. A parent answering a child. Colleagues discussing something that obviously started long before I came within hearing distance.
But very often, it isn’t even the words themselves that catch my attention.
It’s the tone of voice. The hand motions. The facial expressions. The pacing of the words. The hesitation before an answer. The slight edge behind what was supposedly a joke. The way one person moves closer while another subtly moves away.
All those little signals are telling a story alongside the actual conversation.
Personalities. They are expressed in so many ways.
We tend to think personality is something we describe with adjectives: confident, shy, funny, intense, generous, difficult, warm, controlling, thoughtful. But personality is constantly being communicated through hundreds of smaller behaviors.
How quickly someone answers a question. Whether they interrupt. How comfortable they are with silence. Whether they make eye contact when they’re listening or only when they’re speaking. What happens to their voice when they’re challenged. Whether they need to fill empty space. How much room they physically take up. What they do when they think nobody is paying attention.
These are the details that fascinate me because so much communication happens outside the actual words being exchanged. And, of course, there are always at least two perceptions operating at once.
One person is expressing something through their words, gestures, tone and behavior. Another person is interpreting all of it through the filter of their own experiences, expectations, sensitivities and beliefs. Neither may be completely aware of how much information is passing between them.
Yet impressions are forming. Assumptions are being made. Trust may be growing—or quietly disappearing.
All while everyone thinks they’re simply having a conversation.
NYC is an extraordinary laboratory of human behavior. Hundreds of personalities pass within a few feet of me every day, each broadcasting far more than they probably realize.
And sometimes, if I’m lucky, the light stays red just long enough for me to notice.
© Dian Griesel 2026 Perception Dynamics Inc. Photo credit: @Grok
