Unmasking the Face

The face provides more than one kind of signal to convey more than one kind of message.

Often you do not know that a facial expression was the basis for your hunch or intuition about someone. You may only sense something about a person without being able to trace the source of your impression

Much of what you know about emotions and facial expressions was shaped by your parents and other members of your family

There is no specific body movement pattern that always signals anger or fear, but there are facial patterns specific to each emotion.

Emotions are shown primarily in the face, not in the body. The body instead shows how people are coping with emotion.

the sections on facial appearance in Chapters 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9 are practice instructions. Each of those chapters also tells you how to make certain faces, constructing changes in expression so you can better learn how the face works. When you can accurately recognize the faces shown in Chapters 4 through 9, Chapter 10 shows you how to use a new set of faces to practice further and improve your skills.

Sexual needs may not be satisfied, hunger not met, work not completed because of feelings that interfere.

can help you understand the most private, personal, unique part of your self. This is a part of your self which has enormous power over your life. Your work, your life, and even your death can be determined by your feelings

If you don’t fully understand the different ways a feeling may be experienced, how another’s way may differ from your way of experiencing that feeling--if you don’t know the various ways the face may show that same feeling--the chances for misunderstanding, for seeming inconsideration, multiply.

Intimacy may not survive such differences precisely because they are not understood. “You can’t be angry about that; I don’t believe it!” “If you were afraid, why didn’t you tell me?” It is very hard to understand that people you care about, people you love, don’t experience feelings the same way you do