The Powers of Observation

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The other night, my husband and I went out to dinner at my favorite sushi restaurant. We walked in the front door, and we were the only two guests in the entrance. There was a man behind the desk who looked up at us as we walked in. He was tall, slightly stocky, had sandy blond hair, and boyish features. I suspect he was in his mid-twenties.

Read moreWhen this man’s eyes met mine, I noticed he was startled. I thought it was odd. It’s rare to see someone startled when you walk into a restaurant. Then he grabbed some paperwork on the counter and shuffled it, but he didn’t look at it. He just took the papers and moved them from one hand to the other as he watched us approach.

Without a conscious thought, my brain kicked in and said to me, “He must be new!” before I could even rationalize all that just occurred in the seconds it took me to walk the 10 feet to the counter.

“Good evening,” he said. “How are you tonight?” He grabbed two menus and brought us to our seats. Once we were comfortable, he came back and introduced himself.

“Hi. I’m John. I’ll be your server today. Would you like the à la carte menu today?”

“Yes, actually we would. Thanks!” I replied back as he handed them to us.

He laughed. “You’re going to put me to the test today, aren’t you?” He cracked a slight smile.

For those of you who don’t eat sushi, eating à la carte is more complex and involved. You have to know the different fish, rolls and wraps, etc. Many people even order them by their Japanese name.

I couldn’t help but jump in. I said, “We are going to put you to the test, but don’t worry, we don’t bite. I promise. Are you new here?”

To no surprise of mine, he said, “Yes, this is my second day.”

We placed the order for our appetizers.

When the waiter left, I was dying to say to my husband, “I knew it!! I knew it!!! I knew he was new! It was written all over his face. Did you see it?? Did you see it??”

My husband, who thankfully allows me all the space to share everything I see, laughed and said, “No. I missed it. Sorry.” You could tell I was blind-siding him with this information out of nowhere!

It was a fascinating experience for me to pick up on such small nuances. I am becoming more consciously aware of how I process things subconsciously and instantaneously.

This man showed two emotions. His face expressed fear as we walked in. He was startled. I have no idea, if he showed it as a macro or micro expression, but he clearly expressed surprise. However, I am not sure how I registered the fear.

Did he express it on his face alone, or did I pick up on his body language (paper shuffling), or was it a combination of both? I have no idea because it all happened so fast that it became a blur once I started to put the pieces together. But it just amazes me how my brain connected those two emotions and knew instantly it meant that he had to be new. If I was asked to do that consciously, I think it would have taken me several minutes to come to that conclusion.

My subconscious brain comes to conclusions long before my conscious brain has even had time to analyze things. I’ve learned, however, if I can slow down what just happened, seconds after it happens, and go through it step-by-step, I can often learn from it. I can connect some of the dots consciously that I subconsciously put together without being aware of it. Does that make sense?

On a happy ending, the man was an excellent waiter. He has a bright future, if he keeps this as a career choice. He was top-notch, his timing was excellent and his service superb. I hope I calmed his nerves, because when we left, I told the owner right in front of him that his new employee was outstanding!

Trying to Fake Me Out

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Naturally, you can guess, when people know I am a lie detector, one thing they do is try to fake me out with a lie, jokingly, to see if I will catch it, and my husband is no exception.

Yesterday, I was out and about with a friend, and when I came home, I asked my hubby if he sat outside and relaxed. Before I left, I told him it would do him wonders if he did, so I was hoping, when I came back, that he did just that. He needed some fresh air (after painting my office, of course!).

Read moreHe was standing over a huge, delicious pan of lasagna when I asked him, “Did you take some time to relax today?” He was looking down, trying to cut a piece and serve it.

He said very seriously, “No, I didn’t.”

His face was as still as a piece of wall art. I was in the dark for a second. Then he said “No, I didn’t” again, and in an instant, something caused the lower portion of the center of his left eyebrow to twitch in a flash.

“Ah!,” I said as I grabbed my plate of lasagna from him. “You did sit out. I am so glad to know that. Do you know your eyebrow just twitched and gave you away?”

My husband look up at me, grinned and looked left and then right and said, “It did?”

I smiled and sat down at the table to share Sunday dinner. “That was amazing,” I said. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen that one before.”

Unless my husband happened to get an involuntary body twitch at the exact precise moment of his lie, there was no other explanation for him to show a sign of tension like that. I think he was working so hard to prevent himself from making any smirks or smiles that his face was so tense, it hiccuped.

So, while I couldn’t be 100% certain it was a lie by his twitch only, the odds were quite high that it was, and when I told him it was and he smiled, I knew for sure that I had called it right on the money.

The odds were low that he experienced an involuntary twitch at that precise moment, and more than that, they were low because the twitch didn’t repeat itself–which is common for the average twitch we all experience, without reason, from time-to-time.

I am so grateful my husband thinks that my abilities are something to poke fun at, and he is very playful about it. That is a big blessing!

“Nothing Gets Past Real-life Human Lie Detector”

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I thought you might enjoy seeing this article that was featured in the Chicago Sun-Times yesterday.

Preview of “Lie to Me”

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Fox has uploaded four clips from the pilot of “Lie to Me”, which premieres this Wednesday night. I thought you might enjoy getting to see a preview.

From Fox: Adjust Your DVRs!
The premiere of LIE TO ME
runs after American Idol
from 9:03-10:06 ET (8:03-9:06 CST)

I really enjoyed watching these clips. They were somewhat “healing” for me. They reflect my own experiences in life, quite beautifully. It feels so good to say “There! That’s how I feel!” It feels even better to watch Dr. Cal Lightman do what I’ve always wanted to do in my adult life, but chose not to: call people out on their lies! That’s what was so healing for me. Yes, I see life through very similar eyes, and at times, it gets overwhelming.

Furthermore, I have tried to offer others glimpses of what it is like to see through my eyes when people ask, only to see people gloss over in a fog of unknowing when I try to explain it. I’ve learn to accept I was not someone who was easily understood, but this show offers hope for me. It’s exciting. It feels good. People will finally understand what it is like to have this ability (and to be me).

Fox, at least from the pilot previews, has nailed it.

Read moreThree of the four clips really “hit home” for me.

I really related to Clip 2. I work for myself and I have been in countless business meetings where I have seen heaps of *stuff*. I would have loved nothing better than to unload it, or call people out on it just like Dr. Lightman does in this clip. Would it ever feel good!! But of course, to actually do so in real life wouldn’t go over well. I can tell you, people would write you off as a loony! So watching Dr. Cal Lightman do what I’ve always wanted to do with the audience on this side–now that’s healing!

I also got a great chuckle out of clip #3 for the same reason as clip #2.

In clip 4, when Dr. Cal Lightman walks out of his office and on to the streets, he sees one lie after another. In February of 2007, I wrote a post I titled the “difficult side” (of this ability). I wrote about all the emotions that I encounter when I am out in public and how it can be overwhelming for me. I also see lies, too, from time-to-time as shown in this video, though not as frequently –it just depends where I am, and more or less if I can hear people talking. This clip is not “unrealistic”. I was actually taken by it after watching it. I was like “Wow”. They captured it. They got it. They nailed it!

The only thing I didn’t get was in Clip 1. Why do they use a polygraph? It doesn’t make any sense. Is it simply for effect–for show dramatization?

Thankfully, I have a very caring and compassionate husband who is willing to listen to all my experiences, and lets me vent out all the stuff I see, because much of what I see is not “socially acceptable” to talk about. It’s not politically correct. It’s the stuff that we as a society don’t talk about, we don’t want to face, that we would rather deny and bury. It’s the stuff we hope that no one else sees. It’s the stuff sometimes even I won’t dare to write about here on my blog because it is too damn personal for the people whose lives I see into without ever asking to!

What do you think of the pilot clips?

Improving Your Detection Skills

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In the past week, several people have mentioned to me that they come to my blog with the hopes of improving their deception detection skills. And while I would love to write that is the reason why I write this blog, it’s not.

I don’t doubt that you will pick up a clue or two that hints at deception, but I don’t believe it will improve your overall accuracy at spotting a lie to any great degree. There are so many nuances that go into determining if someone is deceptive that vary case-by-case, it isn’t as easy as applying one clue or another across the board to become a skilled detector. If you do, it will trip you up one too many times and be costly for you. Guaranteed (see this post). I strongly discourage it.

If deception detection were about knowing and understanding the clues, most people would be masters of it, but studies show us this is not the case.

Read moreBelieve it or not, but before I wrote this blog and tried to understand what I do naturally, I know if you asked me to list all the clues I used to spot deception, I would have struggled to tell you one or two. I say that in all honesty. I truly don’t believe I could have identified them to save my soul. In fact, it has taken me four years to verbalize the clues that I see when I spot deception.

But I can tell you that I was good at understanding other people. I was good at understanding human behavior down to the little ticks we make when we are about to speak, but don’t. I understood the signs of hesitation, the facial expression one makes when he is thinking, pondering and wondering. I could spot a dreamer out of a crowd, and identify the hidden signs someone was truly depressed despite their verbal message.

Understanding human behavior is where my strongest talent is, even today. Deception detection is just a sub-skill of that.

All my life, I loved to ask people “What are you thinking?”, “How are you feeling?”, “Why do you feel that way?” to the point I drove my friends when I was younger INSANE. I always wanted to know the who, what, why, where, and when [sometimes the how]. I just had to know. I was beyond curious! Even when we made up after an argument, I had to understand why they felt and acted the way they did, even if they were right. Of course, being a child in this quest for knowledge made it easier to be so nosy.

On the first day at my new job as a “professional” after graduating from university, the woman who was assigned to show me the ropes stopped me in the middle of my introduction to some equipment and said, “What is this 20 questions?” in a very exasperated tone.

Mind you, the 20 questions were not about the equipment before us, the company or my job, they were about her, personally.

Yes, that’s right, no one was exempt from my desire to be understood. There was never a predicament that I found myself in where I didn’t seek to understand the other side. I wanted to walk in their shoes, if only for a second. I wanted to understand them, to the core.

So if you want to improve your deception detection skills, start by studying and getting to know the truly intricate behavior of honest people. Watch their behaviors. Watch them talk, move, interact, react and behave in a variety of situations. Get to know people like the hairs on the back of your hand and study how they react in every situation.

I can tell you it takes time. Lots of time, but persistence should yield some results–if you are truly interested and dedicated.

Then test yourself. Watch someone and see if you understand what each minute gesture they make means. Don’t just guess–ask them “Were you just thinking this? I’m curious.” See how often you are accurate.

Work until your accuracy is stellar.

Talk to people when you don’t understand them, and ask them what they are thinking and why they are thinking what they are. Open up dialog. Ask questions until you do understand.

Learn about other people — familiar and foreign. Learn to understand the nuance of normal human behavior in every situation you can because once you can do that, deception detection will become a whole lot easier. It will become like second nature.

So there you have it. Do know that I never did set out on a quest to do this. It was my nature, how I was born, how I took in and approached the world. But this, I think, is one of the more powerful ways that you can improve your ability to understand others, and improve your potential to spot a lie.

Why do I write this blog? Do you still wonder? I thought people would enjoy seeing how someone with my ability thinks, how I come to my conclusions and how I see the world. I also write it because it is healing for me to share my thoughts with strangers, as people one-on-one often get uncomfortable when I share my inner thoughts. And last, I’d like to show that truth wizards really do exist and that we do have talent. By writing my thoughts before a live audience, I hope to build a record of what is possible with regards to deception detection.