Belief and Transformation

Imagine for a moment that you can only identify your own emotions correctly 40% of the time.  You get it wrong: 60%.  When one accepts this possibility, it becomes incredibly obvious how much one could actually make up about other people.  An examination of performance statistics for stock brokers and financial planners would undoubtedly reveal a similar relationship between their success rates and how they personify the market.

With over 30 years of scientific research to back him, Paul Ekman has identified the “normal” rate at which people accurately read other people’s emotions.  You guessed it.  Around 60% of the time, normal people are projecting what they think the other person is feeling.  Fortunately, they’re getting it right about 40% of the time and that seems to be enough to get by.  Personally, I want to do better than just “get by”.  Check out his web site, there’s a way to improve your accuracy.

But so what?  If 40% is enough to get by, and I’m doing just fine, then why bother?  Good point.  Let’s look at the results you’re getting.  First, 40% is the average.  Are you routinely in the top 50% of the class when it comes to the health of your relationships with other people?  With a little digging, it becomes extremely hard to tell.

Plus, one tends to become emotionally involved with social evaluations.  Upon the receipt of a message, the first area of the brain to respond is not the centre for reason, but the centre for emotion.  In Social Intelligence, Daniel Goleman identifies that people’s true emotions show on their faces for about 1/10th of a second before their rational brains kick in and make adjustments.

He also explains the way in which mirroring cells function to connect us socially, through empathy with each other on an emotional level.  Generally, the rational brain can detect what other people are feeling by feeling how the face reflects their emotions back to them.  In a nutshell, the social is fundamentally emotional because it is felt.

To transform your social life, transform your emotional life.

Today, I learned that something was obstinately getting in the way of my accomplishing a certain, important goal.  This angered me, and I realized it quickly.  To put it to rest, I began to look for ways to re-frame what had just come up.  After mulling it over and finding myself frustrated, I realized that I was trying to view the problem very subjectively.  It was in the midst of mulling that I happened to glance into a mirror and see the look on my face.  I wasn’t angry, I was sad.  I just didn’t recognize it until the mirror provided me with the opportunity to see it objectively.

It leads one to question how often one gets it wrong when one is trying to identify one’s own emotions, and it speaks volumes about the value of feedback.  Frankly, I was relieved to learn why I had (up until that point) been unable to solve the problem: All of my attempts were futile because I was trying to deal with sadness using tools that are meant for dealing with anger.  Although I have tried using a crescent wrench to drive in a nail in the past, I’ve always had much better luck with a hammer.  When I switched tools, the issue transformed in my mind.  I was no longer dealing with a limiting belief and as a result, workable options opened up almost immediately.

I had to see myself in the mirror to get it right, and since a reflection appears as another person, it leads me to suspect that the proportions are probably about the same: 40% accurate, 60% inaccurate.  The habit of projecting our thoughts and feelings, stories and values onto other people must be extremely rampant if that were the case.  And by acting on those beliefs, we continue to produce the same results in our lives.  But by improving the accuracy with which one can read other people’semotions, one can simultaneously increase the accuracy with which one can read ones own emotions.

To accurately know your emotional life, learn to read emotions accurately.

A transformation took place in my life because I was willing to step outside of my subjective reality.  I let go of the belief that I was feeling anger, and realized that I was feeling sadness instead.  The first belief was true to me because I believed it, but not after I learned to see past my inner turmoil to what I was actually feeling.  Upon seeing the way I was holding my face, the truth was revealed to me.  Upon changing my belief, I was able to produce different results.

To transform your emotional life, transform your beliefs.

By gaining awareness of my (subjectively) poor ability to read the emotions of others, I also gained awareness of how poorly I was reading my own emotions.  By developing skills to read emotions more accurately, I was able to identify my own emotions more accurately.  By reading my own face in the mirror, I was able to take action by changing my approach.  Looking back, I clearly generated much more desirable results than I would have otherwise.

The best part is: Now that I’ve done it, I believe I can do it again.  So I can!