Microexpressions

While we were in DC last month, I spotted an interesting book in the gift shop of the US Spy Museum: "I Can Read You Like a Book," by Gregory Hartley and Maryann Karinch.  There were some ideas in this book that were highly amusing:

1) Latent symbols of information processing:

Eye movement signals that you are looking for answers inside your head. The visual cortex is at the back of the brain, so when recalling an image, your eyes will drift upward. The portions of the brain that process sound are located directly over the ears, so when recalling a melody or noise, your eyes will drift toward your ears, usually between the browridge and cheekbone.
Cognitive thought and problem solving occur in the frontal lobe in adults. When calculating or analyzing, you will find your eyes - and perhaps your whole head - moving down left.  A down-right movement corresponds to intense feelings.

I do this a lot. See if you can have a conversation with me (if it's an expository or work-related conversation) without me looking off into the distance at least once.

2) Wrinkling the nose in disgust is almost always a female gesture.

3) Origin of Smiles: In a chimp, a the baring of teeth means fear. It's an expression that communicates, "I'm weaker than you, don't hurt me." Smiles are meant to be disarming. I have no intention of causing harm. Put down your guard and everyone remains alive.

TJ Jagodowski's Seven Hooks for a Scene

Go into the scene…

1. Immediately after a huge event has happened, and be in the middle of reacting to this event.
2. With a mantra or catchphrase.
3. With a secret that directly affects your partner.
4. With a large assumption about your scene partner.
5. With a physicality that has consumed your character.
6. In the middle of solving an obstacle.
7. With a hugely specific want from your scene partner.

Basso Profundo

I just finished reading The Circle by Dave Eggers. Along with Her, Spike Jonze's latest film, and The Fifth Estate, both of which I also watched recently, I've had some reflections about life in the Digital Age.

1) Remember that Social Media is a Consumer Product.

"It's not that I'm not social. I'm social enough. But the tools you guys create actually manufacture unnaturally extreme social needs. No one needs the level of contact you're purveying. It improves nothing. It's not nourishing. It's like snack food. You know how they engineer this food? They scientifically determine precisely how much salt and fat they need to include to keep you eating. You're not hungry, you don't need the food, it does nothing for you, but you keep eating these empty calories. This is what you're pushing. Same thing. Endless empty calories, but the digital-social equivalent. And you calibrate it so it's equally addictive." - Mercer, The Circle

Human beings are at once the producers and consumers of social media. You - your shares, your Likes, your comments on articles, your photos - are the product, and there are companies that are profiting off of you. Exercise moderation and discipline.

2) Talk to a real live human being! Deeply!

3) Does complete transparency make a better society? I haven't formed an opinion on this yet, but am still thinking about it.

I'm trying not to be a curmudgeon like the Dowager Countess Violet in Downton Abbey, who is quite resistant to change.

"I couldn't have electricity in the house, I wouldn't sleep a wink. All those vapors floating about."

Living the Artisanal Life

Try to find a balance between the industrial and the artisanal life, with equal parts Stark and Arcadia.

Some wonderful reads recently:

Chronicles of the minibus service in Syria. I'm wistful because we were supposed to go on our honeymoon here, and have postponed this trip into our unforeseeable future. My middle age, perhaps? 

http://blog.longreads.com/post/the-end-of-the-line-a-microbus-map-of-damascus/

Why everyone should go to graduate school.  At any level - lab assistant, undergraduate, graduate, postdoc - one can make a meaningful contribution to humanity's collective body of knowledge. 

http://www.businessinsider.com.au/the-illustrated-guide-to-a-phd-2012-3

Video Games change the way we dream.  This explains why I frequently dream water levels, nature/mountain levels, and wake up in the morning drenched in sweat, but awaken unable to remember why I broke a sweat. 

http://www.theverge.com/2014/1/21/5330636/video-games-effect-on-dreams?utm_content=buffer8eb4e&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer

I've set this photo of a poppy field in Afghanistan as my desktop background across two screens at work, panorama-style, because it inspires me. This picture represents our connection to the ancient past (mountains) and our hope for the future (flowers seeking the sun, looking upward).  

Christmas Cheer

In the darkness of winter, may your days be filled with light and good things.

Inspiration from Cornell Anthropology Faculty

[Our] ability to work between the remote past and the contemporary moment, the local and the global, the specific and the general - [this] is anthropology’s most enduring contribution to human understanding. - Adam Smith

Our uniquely skeptical, critical, and sensitive perspectives on the multiplicity of our humanity is sorely missing from important debates in our government. We need, now more than ever, anthropologically inquisitive minds to execute our government’s policies domestically and abroad. Our intellectual vocations need to be carried out from both the academy as well as within the private and public sector. Only then will our relevance make a difference.  -Saul Mercado

Cognitive Functions and Theatrical Improvisation

Ah, improv. Full engagement of all cognitive functions is always required. Here's how we use each one:

Introverted Functions:
Si - Attention to detail, fun with categories, fun with context switches. Buzzer.
Fi - Values. Character development reflecting certain attitudes and perspectives shaped by Fi.
Ti - Logic, consistency, justifying, explaining. IF/THEN and parallelisms.
Ni - Pattern recognition. Connecting vignettes, those brilliant moments when you resurrect old patterns. Finding the Game is ALL ABOUT Ni.

Extraverted Functions:
Te - Logical speaking, wit, repartee.
Se - Physicality; intent and purpose to movement.
Fe - Emoting, Reflecting your partner's emotions.
Ne - Idea generation.

Here are my Dominant, Auxiliary, Tertiary, and Inferior functions. 5th through 8th functions are Shadow functions and generally unconscious.
ISTJ: SiTeFiNe
      Opposing Senex Trickster Demonic/Devilish
      SeTiFeNi
ENFP: NeFiTeSi / NiFeTiSe

Ugh, I've realized that my Se isn't as honed as I perceive it to be. Also, I find that my ego tends to make me self-aware and censors my gut reactions, leading me to make the more conservative decision, rather than choose the more obvious or interesting one. After we finish a scene, and we get feedback from the rest of the class, I realize that everyone was able to see or sense my gut reaction and wanted me to act in a way that I had considered, but resisted (due to self-censorship). What was visible to me was also visible to everyone else. This is groupmind.

In any case, one's best work is done when one is fully present, in the moment, focused, and unhurried. Fully attune yourself to being present. The hardest part is discarding negativity and the pressure to "perform." Your essence, your true being, is the truth, and you're always ON. As an introvert, I'd like to be "On" only as I choose, but that's not the case. People are always watching you, whether you like it or not.

Triune Comedy is about engaging all levels of our triune brain:
Reptilian: Cerebellum - Slapstick, physical comedy
PaleoMammalian: Midbrain - Emotion, feelings, relationships
Neocortex - wit, repartee, longform vignettes, the Game.

Earworms for October

"Royals" Cover by Mora Mora It's pretty sad that this is the still the style of music I like. Kids today would call it "grunge." To me, it's simply the 90s style of 4-chord song that was popular back then, and what I listened to during those formative adolescent years.

I had a history teacher who told us that what you listened to in your youth would be what you listened to your whole life. It's true, for me.