What’s wrong with your face?

Often your facial expressions reflect your feelings more than the words you use. Even though our six basic emotions—happiness, sadness, anger, disgust, surprise, and fear—are reflected through the face, sometimes we may make inappropriate facial gestures, which confuse the listener and detract from the message we are trying to relay.
An exaggerated facial expression can change your facial appearance from attractive to ugly. For example, one noted singer looks very attractive when she sings. When she speaks, however, it is a different story. It is rather disconcerting. Her mouth goes from side to side in a camel-like fashion. In addition to her rapid-fire, hostile sounding speech pattern, she squints her eyes and furrows her brow, which is perceived as anger and disgust.
This particular woman is interested in making the transition from singing to acting. But she has a lot of work to do in terms of controlling and modifying her inappropriate and unaesthetic facial expressions before she hits the big screen (or the little screen, for that matter). When you wear an incongruous facial expression, people get angry or turned off with you and perceive you as being “weird” or “disconnected” or “not with it.” They may also misinterpret your message, as in the case of this successful singer.
As you observe yourself in the mirror or on videotape, answer these questions while paying attention to your facial expressions:

1. Do you mainly seem to have a dull or bored expression when you speak?
2. Do you look angry when you speak, even though you aren’t?
3. Do you look sad when you speak, even when you are talking about pleasant things?
4. Is your normal facial expression tense with your muscles showing when you speak?

If you answered “yes” to any of these questions, help is on the way. Since the eyes and mouth are key elements of your facial language, go back and answer the questions “yes” or “no” as they pertain to your eyes and mouth.