Narrator: A hiring manager named Sarah is interviewing Mark, a seemingly confident applicant for a high-pressure sales job. He has all the right answers, a polished resume, and an enthusiastic demeanor. Yet, something feels off. As Mark describes his past successes, Sarah notices a fleeting, almost imperceptible flash of fear around his eyes. When he claims to have consistently exceeded targets, a microexpression of sadness flickers across his face for less than a second. Relying on these subtle, involuntary tells, Sarah concludes that Mark is exaggerating his accomplishments and would likely crumble under pressure. She hires another candidate who proves to be a resounding success, validating her decision to trust the story his face told over the one his words did.

This ability to perceive hidden feelings is not a superpower; it is a learnable skill at the heart of Paul Ekman’s groundbreaking book, Emotions Revealed: Recognizing Faces and Feelings to Improve Communication and Emotional Life. Ekman, a world-renowned expert in facial expressions and deception detection, provides a scientific roadmap into the inner world of human emotion, revealing how our faces betray our deepest feelings and how understanding this language can transform our personal and professional lives.

Narrator: For much of the 20th century, the prevailing belief in psychology was that emotional expressions were culturally learned, like language. Paul Ekman initially shared this view. However, his research led him to a revolutionary discovery that would change the field forever. To test the idea of universality, he traveled to the remote highlands of Papua New Guinea in the late 1960s to study the Fore people, a visually isolated culture with virtually no exposure to the outside world or its media.

If emotions were purely cultural, the Fore people would have no way of understanding the facial expressions of Westerners. Ekman presented them with photographs of Americans expressing basic emotions—happiness, sadness, anger, fear, surprise, and disgust. He would tell a simple story, such as "This person's child has died," and ask them to point to the face that matched. The results were undeniable. With an accuracy rate of 80-90%, the Fore people correctly identified the emotions, proving that the link between a feeling and its facial expression is not learned, but innate and universal. From the streets of Tokyo to the jungles of New Guinea, a smile means happiness and furrowed brows can signal anger. This discovery established that our emotional expressions are a shared, biological inheritance.

Narrator: While the expressions themselves are universal, their application is not. Ekman’s research also uncovered a crucial layer of complexity: cultural "display rules." These are the unwritten, socially learned guidelines that dictate when, how, and to whom it is appropriate to express certain emotions.

A powerful example of this is the case of the misunderstood smile. An American businesswoman, Maria, is in a tense negotiation in Tokyo. Feeling uncomfortable, she offers a polite smile, intending to convey goodwill and ease the tension. However, her Japanese counterpart, Mr. Tanaka, interprets this as a sign of insincerity or even disrespect. In his culture, smiling during a serious discussion can be seen as inappropriate. The atmosphere chills, and the negotiation stalls. It was only after a cultural consultant explained the misinterpretation that the deal could be salvaged. This illustrates that while the muscle movements of a smile are universal, the social meaning attached to it is filtered through a cultural lens. Understanding these display rules is critical for effective cross-cultural communication.

Narrator: One of Ekman’s most fascinating discoveries is the existence of microexpressions. These are incredibly brief, involuntary facial expressions, lasting as little as 1/25th of a second, that occur when a person is consciously or unconsciously trying to conceal a feeling. Because they are involuntary, they can leak a person's true emotion, betraying the mask they are trying to present.

This is precisely what the hiring manager Sarah observed in the nervous job applicant, Mark. His confident words were contradicted by fleeting microexpressions of fear and sadness, revealing his underlying anxiety and insecurity. With training, anyone can learn to spot these flashes. They are not definitive proof of lying—a person might be afraid of being disbelieved, not because they are guilty—but they are a powerful signal that a deeper emotion is at play. Recognizing microexpressions provides a window into a person’s true feelings, offering invaluable insight in high-stakes situations from business negotiations to personal relationships.

Narrator: Ekman explains that when an emotion is triggered, we enter what he calls a "refractory period." During this time, which can last from a few seconds to much longer, our mind processes information in a way that confirms the emotion we are feeling, effectively blinding us to facts that contradict it.

Consider the story of Jim and Helen. One morning, Jim tells Helen he can't pick up their daughter from school because of a last-minute emergency meeting. Helen immediately feels annoyed, interpreting his action as inconsiderate. Her anger is triggered. A moment later, Jim explains his boss called the meeting and threatened his job if he didn't attend. Logically, this new information should defuse Helen's anger. But because she is in the refractory period of her anger, she struggles to accept it. Her mind is still filtering the world through an "I've been wronged" lens. She might ignore his explanation or see it as a flimsy excuse. This concept explains why arguments can escalate so easily; once we are in the grip of a strong emotion, our ability to think rationally and absorb new information is severely compromised.

Narrator: Ekman identifies anger as the most dangerous emotion, primarily because its core impulse is to remove the obstacle causing the anger, which can often involve a desire to harm. This impulse can be seen in its most raw form in extreme circumstances. In 1997, after a man named David Scott was convicted of murdering her daughter, Maxine Kenny was allowed to address him in court. Faced with his remorseless smile, she unleashed a verbal tirade before physically attacking him, screaming, "It was just like temporary insanity." Her actions, while shocking, illustrate the immense power of anger to overwhelm control.

However, anger is not always destructive. The book tells the story of Ralph, who was in a research meeting where a colleague named John was being persistently disruptive. Instead of lashing out, Ralph became firm. He calmly told John that his objections had been heard but that his interruptions could no longer be tolerated, giving him the choice to participate constructively or leave. John, not feeling personally attacked, left the room without resentment. Ralph’s constructive anger resolved the problem without causing harm, demonstrating that when managed with awareness, anger can be a powerful force for positive change.

Narrator: Beyond the difficult emotions, Ekman explores the rich and varied world of enjoyable feelings, many of which lack a simple name in English. He introduces fiero, an Italian term for the feeling of triumph and pride that comes after overcoming a significant challenge. This is the emotion a marathon runner feels crossing the finish line or that tennis player Maria Capriati displayed after winning a grueling match. It is the deep satisfaction of having stretched one's own capabilities.

He also describes naches, a Yiddish term for the specific pride and joy a parent feels in their child's accomplishments. It is the vicarious glow a mother feels watching her daughter perform beautifully in a recital or a father feels when his son receives an award. These enjoyable emotions, Ekman argues, are the primary motivators of our lives, encouraging us to create, to strive, and to connect with one another.

Narrator: The single most important takeaway from Emotions Revealed is that achieving a healthy emotional life is not about suppressing our feelings, but about cultivating a new kind of consciousness. We cannot always control what triggers an emotion, as these systems are ancient, automatic, and designed for survival. However, by developing what Ekman calls "attentiveness"—the ability to recognize an emotion as it arises within us—we can create a crucial space between feeling and action. In that space lies the power to choose how we respond.

Paul Ekman’s work fundamentally changes how we see others, turning every face into a potential story. But its greatest challenge is to turn that observational power inward. The ultimate goal is not just to become an expert at reading the emotions of others, but to become an expert at understanding and managing our own, giving us the choice to live with our emotions, not just be ruled by them.