The ability of liking someone or something

Have you ever asked yourself why you like someone, or not? It mostly happens in the first few seconds. Imagine you are sitting in a bar, having a drink with you friend and then you see this person. You can't hear her voice yet, because she's too far away, but coming towards you slowly. The closer she comes, the better you can see her. And already in that very moment you have made your first opinion of her. At college we learned that communication already starts the way we are dressed. Clothes showcases our personality to others. Clothes represents us. So when someone wears something that you would wear too, it's more likely you think positive about her.
And what is you meet that person on the internet? Well, more or less it depends on the person's writing. Does she use similar words like you, you keep writing with her, also when you figure out she likes the same things or she went through the same, like getting through a divorce.

But back to the bar. Imagine that person sits right next to you, talking to you. Now it's not only her clothes that you recognize, it's her voice, the way she talks, her gestures and her smell. In the German language there's the saying "Ich kann dich gut riechen", which simply means "I like you", but when you translate it word by word it's "I can smell you well". This might sounds weird to you, but it makes sense because several studies proved that smell is also an important factor if you like someone or not. It reminds you of a good childhood memory, or this person just smells like someone you know and like. We don't recognize this actively, but passively. I guess you all smelled something and then remembered something. For me it's like when I use the scent I used on a vacation. So every time I smell it, my memory of the vacation comes back, so I love it now even more.

Who are the reasons we like someone or something?
picture taken by D. Sharon Pruitt

But what is about Sheldon, the quirky character of the sitcom The Big Bang Theory, played by Jim Parsons? Is he liked by more and more guys because so many people already like, write and talk about him? I guess if he would exist the way Jim plays him, he would be as popular as in the show. So can it also be possible that someone who is liked by many people, will be liked by even more just because of that? Yes. We are interested in what others like, especially if it's liked by someone we like because of the above mentioned things. So we keep focused and even though we don't understand what people like about that person at the beginning, we stay interested. And some day, we start liking that person, maybe because we wanted to know more about him because so many guys seem to like him. And then these facts we learned about that person, make us feel we know him well, and maybe let us realize that we have more similarities with him than we thought at first.

It's also about other stuff for sure, not only people. So often that some friends talked about something like a book, a movie or a TV show, then I was curious, started to watch or read it and liked it, or not. It's not always working, because we are all different, and it's not the worst thing when two people who like each other don't agree with everything. Sometimes it's good to have a different opinion on something. Maybe this interest will bring you to someone else who also is a fan of that. So you meet people in your life. Sometimes the more you know about them, the more you like them, and sometimes people drift apart because their interests changes too much and they have less and less in common.

What do you think of that? How do you know when you really like someone or something? What's important to you?