Your facial expression conveys a lot despite not having to employ words. It also impacts your speech and the message you want to deliver. Your facial expression can show your sincerity or lack of it.
And as they say, action, or in this case, your expression, speaks louder than words.
That being said, one of the skills you need to master in order to improve your communication is your facial expression.
Facial expression in communication
One of the most important aspects of human communication is facial expression. The face is in charge of conveying not only thoughts or ideas but also emotions.
What’s fascinating about emotional communication is that most of our expressions of emotion, such as anger, disgust, fear, happiness, sadness, surprise, and, to a lesser extent, contempt, embarrassment, interest, pain, and shame are expressed in the same way by all peoples of all cultures.
Our facial expressions are universal in that a smile or a frown can be easily understood in whatever part of the globe you are in. And thus the importance of having great facial expressions to match your speech for a more understandable, relatable, meaningful, and powerful message.
Facial expressions to look approachable and attractive
Our facial expressions can convey a lot of meaning and more importantly, they can become a powerful tool for us to become approachable and appear more attractive.
Since our facial is where the attention is focused in a conversation, we should therefore learn to use the top 3 most important expressions to be more approachable and win more friends or network connections for personal and professional success.
Emotional Entry Points
Our facial expressions are a combination of muscle movements in the face and these muscles are also called the Emotional Entry Point (EEP) which include the following:
- The Orbicularis Oculi Muscle- or the eyes
- The Nasalis Muscle- the nose, and
- The Orbicularis Oris Muscle- the mouth.
To convey genuine emotions, these three muscles should be used often.
Facial expressions showing genuine Emotions
Our facial expressions show our emotions at a glance- happiness, anger, sadness, disgust, fear, excitement, surprise, confusion, etc. To become instantly approachable and attractive, however, the most important emotions that should be mastered are happiness, pleasant surprise, and assertiveness.
1.) Happiness
Or to be more precise genuine happiness. This emotion is a curved smile and genuine happiness shows in the eyes.
This emotion can be distinguished from a fake or formal smile, in that the formal smile does not reach the eyes. You see a person smiling but the eye muscles are not involved.
So an observer will instantly know that a person is genuinely happy when their smile reaches their eyes. The eyes will naturally crinkle in the corner, and develop crow’s feet.
In order to show the emotion of genuine happiness, think of an event or a person, something that will make you happy instantly.
2.) Surprise
The expression of a pleasantly surprised emotion involves the eyes, the eyebrows, and the mouth as well. In this expression, the eyebrows flash and the mouth is wide open. Note that the jaw does not drop- as this will be the emotion of shock, not a pleasant surprise.
Use this emotion in conversations when you want to come across as a genuine person, like when you hear a colleague is being promoted, paying a compliment, or seeing a person you like but have not seen for a long time. Compared to an expressionless face saying congratulations or nice to see you, the one showing a pleasantly surprised expression would be more delightful to see.
3.) Assertiveness
Assertiveness does not only come in the form of what you say and how you say it but also comes in a person’s facial expression. This kind of facial expression is shown where your mouth is about to smile but does not completely break out into one, a half-smile if you will. The muscles of the nose are also slightly engaged, in that it flares open but not like in an angry expression. The eyes will also be engaged but will not be wide open but rather focused on someone or something.
This expression will take a lot more time to practice but will be a great expression to use when you want to convey that you are serious about something but not angry about it, like when someone makes a mistake and you want to let them learn from their mistake and not do it again.
So these are the top 3 expressions that will help show genuine emotions for happiness, surprise, and assertiveness. Use them in daily conversations to become more attractive and approachable. I certainly will use these tips to improve my facial expressions in my upcoming videos.
