I’ve had to work very hard on not twirling my hair in meetings with clients. It gets so easy sometimes, especially when bored or stressed/anxious, to twirltwirltwirl away. But I’ve managed to replace it with a less obvious comfort behavior (as they’re sometimes called), like turning a pen cap around and around its pen, which can be done very subtly.

I used to be a big hair twirler. More recently, my “tell” is that I start rubbing my face when I’m exasperated. I have to deliberately keep my hands occupied with a pen or else I seem to be saying YOU ARE BORING ME WITH YOUR TEDIUM, which is not necessarily the message I wish to transmit.