My 101 year old friend, Oletha assures me that what truly matters in life is not how much money we made, nor the quantity or quality of possessions we accumulated. Instead, what counts in the end, is the quality of our life experiences. Sadly, the speed and pace of modern life requires most of us to stay busy with all that is required to just get through the day. 

A huge percentage of our life gets dedicated to our daily routine which we usually manage on auto-pilot. We hardly think about what we are doing and each day begins to blend into the next. We can lose sight of the fact that our life should really be a search for quality experiences.

The Certification Workshop is a personal interactive experience which gives individuals from all walks of life a chance to come together to discover a deeper understanding of others and themselves. You can see the quality of the experience reflected in their feedback:

Clelia shared, "I also wanted to say how much I enjoyed the workshop and how much it will help me in my line of work as a psychologist and professional mediator. Having the advantage of knowing something about my clients before they speak a word will give me a great advantage and the ability to help them reach solutions much quicker." 

Sherri, who is starting a new business as a trainer for massage therapists, says, "As I reflect on the class I am seeing so many possibilities. I enjoyed the whole experience, but the absolute best was the last day for me because we got to apply what we learned. The second best was the presentation on how to use our new skill in the work environment. The class was a blessing for me.Thank you for taking the time to share your awesome knowledge with us.

Joshua reported, "I had a wonderful time and as a result of the Amazing Face Reading training I feel like I now have the benefit of an additional "sense" to further enrich how I experience the world and to truly value the individuality of the people I meet.

Chris and Holly said, "The workshop was a ton of fun and we have been reading faces ever since."

We will be announcing our next evening class soon and look forward to having a reunion of all our Certified Face Readers later in the summer.

The class was composed of professionals working in sales, health care, social work, corporate management, political consulting and even a fellow speaker. The feedback and questions from the class were priceless as they allowed us to understand the issues that new face readers confront. We have addressed some of these in this newsletter. After the class, the overwhelming consensus was that this new skill was going to be a valuable tool in better understanding every person they met whether in business or their personal life.

Since I have been reading faces for more than 20 years, I sometimes forget the challenges of beginning face readers. During the workshop, I realized again how unaccustomed we are to dissembling a face and then finding the 1's and the 10's that, if read, will surely evoke the response, "That's amazing, how can you do that?", from the person being read. In this newsletter, we are going to discuss a couple of features that are usually a challenge for most beginning face readers. They are large and small irises and thin and thick or full eyelashes. I thought that since these features have not been covered in earlier newsletters it can be a good review.

The reason that reading irises is difficult is because there is a challenge in understanding the concept of relative size rather than actual size. If we look at someone's eyes and nearly the whole space between the upper and lower lid appears to be filled with the iris (the colored part of the eye), or the size of the iris is almost the same size as the tip of their nose you are seeing a large iris. This would be a 10 on a scale of 1 to 10 with a 1 being a very small iris.

This feature shows a right brain perspective of having a very open and receptive approach towards life and usually an emotional response to go with it. People with these large irises most often have rounded bottom eyelids, which makes both the eye space and the iris appear larger. Again, both of these features, full irises and round bottom lids point to the qualities of openness and receptivity. A challenge for these folks may be a tendency to sometimes over-share their feelings while wearing their hearts on their sleeves. Their emotionally open perspective can sometimes cause others to see them as being naïve.

 Just like large irises, the size of small irises is also relative. What would be considered as a large iris on one person could be a small iris on a person with a really big head. As a general rule, if the iris is smaller than the size of the tip of the person's little finger it is probably small. These folks have often been overly sensitive since early childhood. Consequently, people with very small irises often also have flat bottom eyelids. They may have experienced their external world as feeling threatening or unsafe. As a result, they often prefer the privacy and safety provided by their internal world where there is a greater feeling of being in control.

The flat bottom lids are an indication of their defensive shield. They are employing the protection of the left brain that divides the world into "us" the people I can trust and "them" which is everyone else. The main lesson to remember about your small iris friends is that they are so sensitive that they are almost allergic to anyone raising one's voice or yelling at them. If the other person's demeanor is loud or aggressive, the small iris person may shut down or retreat to their internal world.  

In other articles we have seen how a beard might serve as a chin extender by drawing attention to the person's chin. In a like manner, long or thick eyelashes draw attention to the upper eyelids. Abundant upper lids signal a person with a high capacity for intimacy and a natural ease in making relationships. Thick or long lashes telegraph the unconscious message that their owner has a gentle, tolerant and easy going disposition.

It is easy to understand why people who are concerned about their desirability may wear false eyelashes. The thick lashes send the unconscious message that their owner is gentle, non-threatening and approachable even when the lashes are artificially glued on. In face reading it doesn't matter whether a feature is natural or enhanced since both the owner of the feature and those who see it are responding to the appearance. 

People who have thin eyelashes (where there is little or no eyelash showing) can be compared to the people with small irises in that they too can be extremely sensitive. While the small iris person retreats behind the left brain's judgmental shield of flat bottom lids, the thin or no eyelash person will often employ the left brain defense mechanism of anger for protection. These overly sensitive folks are often quick to anger but their anger may be covering up their deeper feelings by erecting a protective wall between themselves and others.

Their sensitivity may include a tendency to "get their feelings  hurt" quickly and easily. Their challenge is to remain present and calm rather than taking everything personally. If you have a friend with thin or no eyelashes who is quick to anger, realize that their may be covering up hurt feelings. When we can be present and allow the other person to be themselves our relationship can be far less stressful.