I've been included in a Minnesota anthology "Under Purple Skies", now available on Amazon!

My second chapbook, "The Second Book of Pearl: The Cats" is now available as either a paper chapbook or as a downloadable item. See below for the Pay Pal link or click on its cover just to the right of the newest blog post to download to your Kindle, iPad, or Nook. Just $3.99 for inspired tales of gin, gambling addiction and inter-feline betrayal.

My first chapbook, I Was Raised to be A Lert is in its third printing and is available both via the PayPal link below and on smashwords! Order one? Download one? It's all for you, baby!

Sunday, October 16, 2011

And If Your Second Toe is Longer Than the Big Toe, It Means You’re the Leader In Your Family

I read somewhere that you could tell if a person was an extrovert or an introvert by where they looked when they were concentrating.

Let’s do a little experiment.

Quickly now! When was the last time you had a really good pastry? Not just a so-so pastry, but something light and flaky, something that made you think of calling a friend and asking if she’s heard of this place?

Did you have to think about that? If so, where did you look? Up? Down?

Wait. You didn’t close your eyes, did you? Because now that I think about it, I don’t recall what it means if you close your eyes while thinking.

According to whatever it was I was reading at the time – and with my library, it could be anything from Home Dentistry Saves Money! to 101 Things To Do With Questionable Mushrooms – extroverts look up while seeking answers while introverts look down.

I suspect we all have our methods, our peccadilloes regarding concentration. I have a nephew, for example, who, even as a baby, rubbed his thumb against his first two fingers while searching for an answer.

“Would you like some milk, Liam?”

“Hmm.” Rub rub rub. “Yeh. Yike mewk.”

Anyway, this all came back to mind the other day in yoga. We were working our way into a balancing pose (“place both hands on the floor, rest your ribs on your elbows, and shoot your legs out behind you, allowing them to float up and hover six inches above the floor”) and invited to concentrate on our “drishdi”, a point of intense focus.

And that’s when I noticed that I have a drishdi and that it has been the same all my life: slightly up and to the left. In my world, the answers are just over that hill, just over there to the left.

The answers are just over there.

I’m an extrovert.

And for some reason, I’ve got a craving for a really good pastry.

39 comments:

Unknown said...

I must be an extrovert, too; I was looking for that pastry somewhere just below the ceiling. Gotta go have me some cake now.

vanyelmoon said...

I don't know what I am, I look all over the place. Confused, perhaps?

Douglas said...

I turned inward, my eyes glazed over (like a doughnut) but I was not aware of any particular direction they took. All was a blur except for this intense sugar craving...

raydenzel1 said...

I find I look down when someone asks me how to do something or where to find something at work. (brain analyzing), I am an introvert masquerading as an extrovert when necessary. I am in sales. However, when at a party, (when someone makes a mistake and invites me, you will find me in a corner wondering why I am here.

JeannetteLS said...

Well, thank you very much. Had to go and eat the pastry I've been saving for today's dinner. I had managed NOT to eat it last night> But, no. I had to read this. FINE.

Yeah, and furthermore, now I have a new blog to follow. If I followed them all every day, I would never write. there are far too many wonderful writers blogging, and you are one of them. I am enjoying your site very much.

smalltownme said...

I looked straight ahead and squinted. Wonder what that means.

Linda Myers said...

Up and to the left. I, too, masquerade as an extrovert.

Ms Scarlet said...

Er... I couldn't remember where I looked. I did spend sometime thinking about the question... and couldn't answer that either! Oh dear.
Sx

BB said...

Oh a fresh Cherry Cheese Danish! You've just made me hungry also. I tend to close my eyes when I have to think of something that's right on the tip of my tongue! Weird I know.

jenny_o said...

Okay, I can't get past the floating legs part. Is this pool yoga? Because that's the only way my legs would float horizontal to the floor...

Actually I look up and to the left too. And doesn't this also have something to do with if you're lying or telling the truth? But who would want to lie about pastries? So many questions today!

Belle said...

I think I looked down, which would be the right direction as I am an introvert. I have also read that extroverts walk with their feet turned outward a bit. An introvert walks with feet inward or straight.

Not So Simply Single said...

Definitely an extrovert!

No danish for me, gave up sugar and wheat...

Although if I get back to Paris, that will go out the window, a cup of French roast and a croissant sounds pretty good right now....

Lisa

Anonymous said...

Oh gaawd...im an introvert with a dash of something else thrown in there....i do the look down thing but also tend to scratch the side of my nose and stand on one leg when thinking really hard.
Aaah yoga....yes...hmmm...im the expert of the twisting fart pose...yeah well i couldnt help it...and the teacher wasnt very nice to me after that little gaseous misfortune....i never went back.

karensomethingorother said...

FREAKISH! THIS IS FREAKISH! Do you know how much I've been pondering INTROVERT vs EXTROVERT lately? NO, of course you don't, but I'm delighted just the same.

Pastry--the last best pastry I had I made my damn self. THAT'S RIGHT! But, I talk about good cake and how rare it is to find so much, I'm almost TIRESOME. I found some exquisite cupcake place recently, and I'm sure I look down to think about it because I'm wickedly introverted. Hooray!

Thanks--great post!

Glen said...

I can be whatever you want me to be - just gimme some damned cake

Nancy/BLissed-Out Grandma said...

I'm an off-the-charts introvert. But sometimes I look up while concentrating. Then I have to go take a nap.

vanilla said...

Okay, what do "triplet toes" mean? (First three the same length.)

--Look slightly up, and to the left.--

who said...

I had a teacher, way back when, that had a complex because in her mind her toes were arranged like your title. Like the body of your post is written, she was beautiful. She wouldn't wear open toed shoes throughout high school or college because someone had innocently made a comment.

Before the third grade, it was stuck in my brain that one should never comment regarding anything about a woman unless it's honestly about how good it looks.

it's crazy the things one remembers after hearing it just once (and the effect words can have on lives)

Ach du lieber said...

One eye looked up and one looked down. Pretty sure that's within the realm of normal, right?? Seriously. Isn't it?

Unknown said...

Your legs out behind you and hovering 6 inches above the floor????? Do you have your own personal force field? Never mind what you do with your eyes. If you can do that with your body, you belong in the Cirque de Soliel!
Rosemary

Anonymous said...

My head dropped forward and I contemplated my navel whilst working out the answer. You know a good place for pastry?

Anonymous said...

I think I do both! I must be multi-verted! LOL!

Notes From ABroad said...

I have quit concentrating .. now what ?

the toe next to my big toe is almost exactly the same length.
.which, today, just makes me glad that my little toe isn't the same length as my big toe.

Cal's Canadian Cave of Coolness said...

In a world where severed thumbs can be replaced by toes, your theory isn't practical to me.

Lolamouse said...

I definitely look down, and I'm an introvert. Maybe that's why I always fall during balancing poses in yoga-too busy looking for the soft spot to fall!

Leenie said...

There is NO good place to get a really good pastry in Idaho. And I didn't even have to think to know that.

What does it mean if your toes are all the same length and spread out like fingers?

Nessa Locke said...

I wikipedia-ed it. I have a new word for you. "ambivert". Use it at your leisure.

Watson said...

I was looking down to catch my drool while imagining that pastry. Guess I'm just hungry!

Jenn said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Jenn said...

No thanks to you I have to make homemade Shortbread tomorrow. Luckily I was looking for a reason to make it. YUM

HermanTurnip said...

There's also something about handwriting. If your lines tend to curve up you're an extrovert, and if they curve down you're an introvert. I get over this problem by writing letters with typography cut out from magazines, but that's sometimes impossible when the nurses take away my scissors...

Roses said...

I looked down and to the right, because I know how good pastry tastes (and feels) mmmmm....

My darling, I've had to make my blogs subscription only because of my NLP work.

If you (and anyone else interested) would like to sign up. Send me your gmail e-mail to:

rhhblackthorn@gmail.com

Sush said...

Yep, extrovert! Hands down and eyes up! Hugs~

The Savage said...

In interrogation if you look left it means you're remembering and if you look right it means you're just making up a story on the spot.... Just some info I have in case I get on Jeopardy...

Gary Baker said...

My bro rubs his fingers together too. I just stared at the page while I thought about it.
Now I'm hungry.
Thanks

That gentleman's lady said...

I grew up with that too! Or rather the one I grew up was "whoever has the larger 2nd toe will be the one that wears the pants in a relationship..."

Hmm...

Indigo Roth said...

Hey Pearl! Just over there? Well dammit, I've started looking everywhere. My memory's getting flaky, and anything that prompts it is welcome. A friend of mine used to stare at the ceiling when thinking, allegedly to remove distractions from his field of vision. Tho actually, I think he just he was praying for inspiration. Indigo

Pat said...

My tongue goes walk about.

Kara said...

Can I borrow your book about questionable mushrooms?