Love This Girl

Reading minds is a super-power that I hope to develop some day.  Sounds like a gypsy fairy tale, but some researchers out of San Francisco have made it a Science.  Paul Ekman and Wallace Friesen created FACS, the Facial Action Coding System.  By studying each of the muscles in the face and their corresponding movements, they were able to document every anatomically possible facial expression.  There are  over 10,000 facial expressions!

Amazingly, a persons facial expressions consistently betray their emotions.  This means that if you know the system well, you can accurately determine the emotional state that a person is in.

It supposedly takes a few weeks to master, but the pay-off is immense. Know what your co-workers are thinking, or even catch someone in a lie.  You know all those times when your girl tells you its OK but then gets upset that you went ahead and did it?  Let’s face it, sometimes women don’t communicate on purpose, expecting you to know. Then you mess-up.  This would be great for all of those moments.

Ekman and Friesen also found that facial expressions also affect your mood.  So if you force a smile, you’ll eventually start feeling good.  My girlfriend said there is a type of Yoga that supports their research.  Funny how ancient arts don’t get validated in our minds until science comes along.

I learned this info from Blink, The Power of Thinking Without Thinking by Malcolm Gladwell.

Have you ever given a woman directions? Avoid compass talk, like, “turn north on Main st”. Women don’t work that way. For the longest time I thought it was just the women I was talking to. I never thought to find a reason, just figured they couldn’t handle directions.

Now I know why. We are basically wired differently. Guys have the spatial thing worked out. We like maps, and always having a sense of direction in a place. Women find places based on landmarks. “Turn left at the gas station, then right at the church.”

Throw a man and a woman into a virtual reality maze, which will get out first? The guy. This Time’s article, “In a Virtual Maze, Men Are Smart Rats“, mentions a study that highlights this small but significant difference between men and women. Why significant you ask? If we are so different in this simple aspect, what about stuff that really matters? How many times have I dismissed/angered/upset the women in my life because I thought they were like me?

So why does this difference exist? If it is learned, can it be unlearned? Can men be made to think like women and vice-versa? This study about gay men hints that it goes back to the womb. Apparently gay men use male and female spatial techniques.

Its an interesting topic, but I just need advice. When getting directions for my girl, I guess I’ll just use the Google Maps Satelite option. Then I can say, “Turn right at that little grey spec that looks like a church.”