I’m not talking about more vague feelings like “I just had this gut feeling”, I’m talking about concrete signs.
The usual stuff:
- conversation flow
- physical cues
- the kiss
- the sex
All clicking signs. 
If you have to wonder, you haven’t clicked.
You can learn to appreciate people, but a click happens within the first one or two meetings. Otherwise, no click!
I thought of this in terms of friendship rather than romance. For me, humor is usually a key element. If they display a similar sense of humor to mine, chances are pretty good that we’ll “click” and end up friends, unless something else is a negative issue.
And it can be a key in romance as well, actually. That, and a great smile and certain glimmer in the eye.
There seems to be a way of communicating humour with the eyes that is difficult to explain but clear when you see it. Much more subtle than rolling the eyes at a noticed faux pas. A sort of glance and perhapse slightest suggestion of a smile that says “I know that you can see the funny side to this situation, and no more need be said to avoid embarissing others, but we can share the humour of this.”
Not sure what you mean by “concrete” signs, aside from outward behavior/mannerisms, which are obvious.
For me, I need an intellectual connection. If that person “gets” me, I know we’ll click. Two minds can have a very powerful bond.
If you are speaking romantically, of course physical chemistry/attraction has to be there. But for me, that still comes after the mental connection.
When my wife and I were first dating, we went to a picnic where they handed out those little cups of half chocolate and half vanilla ice cream. We each ate up, and when we finished, we looked at each others cup. She didn’t eat vanilla, and I don’t like chocolate ice cream.
We traded our cups, and lived happily ever after, complimenting each other perfectly.
Yes, I’m purely talking about budding friendships. What are that thing(s) that makes you go, AHA I like that person!
For me, clicking has a lot do with feeling instantly like I could be in a one-on-one situation with them without it being awkward or boring.
Yeah, that’s the way I feel. If I was talking with someone and everyone else left the room, would we still feel comfortable and have the same chemistry as before? If so, we’re clicking. Also when I find it hard to get up and leave when I’m hanging out with someone I don’t really know well, I know that we’ll be good friends.
The old fashioned term “butterflies in my tummy” sums up exactly how I felt the first time I saw Mr. Adoptamom. He was different from anyone I’d ever been interested in before … there was some inexplainable something about him that made me want to get to know him better. He felt the same thing the first time he saw me. We call it “zing” and it was what brought us together and frankly, has kept us together for 20 years. Even when I’m VERY angry with him, I still get that little tingling feeling deep in my belly when I look at him and imagine kissing him.
You call it clicking, I call it zing. Don’t give up until you find it, but don’t let that be the only thing your relationship is built on.
I know the feeling, and… it’s just a thing. I can’t really explain. We’re comfortable together, and that’s it.
Whatever it is–click, zing, bam, shoo bop shoo wadda wadda yipitty boom de boom–it’s good stuff.
You guys might think I’m crazy for saying this but I can usually tell with in the first five or so seconds if there is a mutual attraction between me and a potential lady friend.
After that, it’s all about the conversation flow.
If these two requirments are met; that’s what I consider “clicking”
Some kind of connection. Usually its laughter for me, and sometimes it’s just a shared interest in something. The latter is harder, though. Laughter is such an instantaneous bond. If I can’t make someone laugh, I think odds are good that we won’t be friends. In fairness, I have a number of friends (I’m thinking of one in particular) who rarely laugh with me. But with them, we have other things in common. The friend I’m thinking of reads the same stuff I read, we have kind of the same perspective on careers and finances, and we enjoy the same types of restaurants (and wines), so we always have something to talk about. Makes me sad she’s thousands of miles away now.
It’s usually more of a slow development for me than a ‘click’, but there was one time I realized off the bat that a new teacher and I had a lot in common. He had just arrived in Japan that day and was wandering around the town kind of lost, so I invited him along with some students I was going out drinking with. Afterwards, he and I were sitting around talking when I asked him, “do you know a show called Mystery Science Theater 3000?” His response “oh, I love that show! Watch it all the time.”
click
For friendship: common interests, shared hatreds, similar senses of humor, complementary conversation flow, same background, the promise of novel experiences.
For sex: Pheromones, body type and hygiene.
You know how, upon meeting some people, you know instantly you don’t ever want to be bothered with them if you can help it? Clicking is similar, but opposite: it’s an inexplicable willingness to obligate yourself to someone.
Well, a very concrete give-away, and on you can use consciously as well, is when you both start “mirroring”. Mirroring consists of copying each others bodyposture, synchronizing how you sit, adopting the same hand positions etc.
If you both are mirroring, you’re clicking.
It’s all in how open the person is with me. If they’re at the same level of “openness” as I am, I think we click.
For example, if the first “small talk” we ever share is neither too personal nor too impersonal, click!
If the other person starts talking about her recent messy breakup or her obsession with Buffy within the first few seconds of meeting, or in a conversation where I wouldn’t yet feel comfortable sharing that sort of thing, no click.
If I feel comfortable enough to start talking about what I did last weekend or my favorite band and the other person is all, “that’s nice…say, how’s the weather?”, no click.
I guess I have an idea about the perfect pacing of a relationship, and if the other person doens’t groove to the same pacing, I can tell, and things are weird. Maybe the lack of openness is why I never have any interest in making friends at work.
That’s funny; my wife and I had a very similar experience. As a sort of ice-breaker, we were asked by a third party, “If you could do just one thing for the rest of your life, what would it be?”
Our simultaneous one-word answers?
Me: Read!
She: Write!