The Bizarreness is probably my favourite social tool and the first of an unlimited series of simple short blogs with useful social tips that you can apply instantly.

What is The Bizarreness, Iván?

The Bizarreness is basically bringing to the interaction something that is too weird to be not-funny and that is totally clear that you do it on purpose. It instantly makes everyone around start reacting to you, now you lead the interaction.

Rules:

  • The more bizarre, the more you have to believe in it.
  • The more bizarre, the more fun it is.
  • The more bizarre, the more confused and reactive people become.
  • The more bizarre, the cooler you are.
  • The more bizarre, the more you lead.

Examples:

– Someone is trying to make fun of you, but in a friendly way (if not, the bizarre is to cut that person off):

Someone: “I think you are very silly, how can you not know that?”
YOU: “IME, the economy is going downfall, in 10 years we will be walking around like Tarzan.”
Someone (totally confused, now he or she is the one feeling silly): “What are you talking about?”
YOU: “Me Tarzan, you Cheeta.”

Now from there transition if you want to a normal conversation like before, the difference is that now, you are the one leading it. We were obviously not talking about economy first, it could be sports, films or anything.

– You are chilling with your friends on a Saturday night:

Friend 1: “Have you studied for the exam we are having on Monday?
Friend 2: “No.”
Friend 3: “Me neither, I will have to study tomorrow, although I will be tired with all this party…”

Now it’s time to drop some out of context quote. My favourites are from The Simpsons, Family Guy, House or some rock song. Every starts laughing and stops thinking.

This same example would serve for when any conversation stalls and everybody is in silence, just drop a quote. One of my favourites, multi-purpose quotes is from Peter Griffin:
“When you’re feeling down just go to Imagination Land! Where you fart when you burp, and you burp when you fart!”

Other uses

Another use of the Bizarreness is in the way you express yourself in social nets like facebook and things like that. Fill everything on your profile with Bizarreness. Also take bizarre photos with your friends, you will have fun a lot of fun with it.

You can also wear the Bizarreness. Take something that is fashionable, not weird itself, and make it bizarre. For example: funny t-shirts with texts and pics are a must. You should have several in your closet. Also, if someone laughs about something you are wearing, make what they are saying a reality and exaggerate it. Make it even more weird. What I do a lot of times is to say that they are right, it’s not cool and then take it off. The next thing is to put it on again in the most weird you know, when in doubt just put it the wrong side. Examples of this are a cap, glasses, shirts, trousers and shoes. Remember that the more bizarre the more you have to believe it is the right thing to do. If you do it like that you are the coolest one, if you don’t you are the weirdest. This is basically exaggerated weird self-deprecating humour that only a cool, smart dude would say.

One thing that helped me a lot was to realize that I was a weird dude. Then, I started to be proud of it and the Bizarreness was born. This is about having personality, showing that you are unique and you love you. Remember that the most important thing with the bizarre is that you have to express yourself, not try to impress people. What are you expressing? You express that you don’t give a damn what people think about you, that you are weird and you like it. No, like is not the word… love, yes, you love yourself and that what you are communicating.

Also, if you are like me, you could add sexual content in the interaction. With my friends and with girls I just have the habit of voicing my thought when it’s not a work conversation, so as a lot of my thoughts are sexual I just pop them out. Sexual Bizarreness is good because sex is taboo for a lot of people.

The Bizarreness is something that serves a lot of purposes. When do you bring the Bizarreness?

  • To change topics.
  • To get everyone out of thinking mode.
  • To have fun.
  • To be the one leading the interaction, if you can stay cool with bringing the bizarreness everyone else will be confused.
  • To show anyone else and yourself that you don’t care about making mistakes and eclipse mistakes you may commit later.
  • To show your uniqueness.
  • To get into social mode.

Use it in your next social interaction, be careful it may cause addiction.