Interview with Sheila Lowe

MJ: Sheila, thanks for joining us today.

SL: Thank you.

MJ: Can you tell us about your work and exactly what a graphologist is?

SL: Yes, I'd love to. A graphologist is someone who analyzes handwriting to

understand the personality of the writer.

MJ: What sort of things are you able to tell about a person by their

handwriting?

SL: Well, handwriting doesn't tell everything, but it does tell a lot,

particularly how....the state of your ego, how you think, how you relate to

other people, your drive, your fears, and also your controls.

MJ: What do you mean by controls?

SL: Well, people are controlled by different means. Self discipline is the

best, because it's a conscious control, it's things... you've learned right

and wrong. Then there's the control by fears - things that have happened to

you in the past, and you say, "I'm never going to let that happen again."

And then you have fears by defenses, which are... have to do with what

you've learned as a child, and those old messages that play in your head

like your parents looking over your shoulder. So if that's very strong in

you , your handwriting will look a particular way, and if it's by

inhibition, it's another way, if it's by self discipline it's yet another

way.

MJ: How do those things come out and express themselves in the handwriting?

SL: They... In particular the fears and controls? Well, if the handwriting

is controlled #

by your defenses, if the person's defenses are very strong, the writing is

likely to look very much like the school type that they learned. They'll

stick very much to the model. They need rules and regulations. If it's by

fears, then there will be things like rigidity, it'll be not flexible,

there might be a lot of little hooks all over it. The loops will be

squeezed together. And then if it's conscious control, self discipline, it

will have good spacing, good rhythm, space between the words, and the lines

will be regular, and it will look more harmonious.

MJ: How did you begin to get into this line of work, and what made you

interested in this, and what sort of accreditation do you get? How are you

graphologists accredited?

SL: O.K., I'll start with the last question first. There is no official

governmental control on handwriting analysis. Anybody can pick up a book

and call themselves a graphologist, unfortunately. There are, however,

organizations, non-profit organizations who certify, or schools,

proprietary schools that certify their members. So it's really an

unofficial thing. But there are some good certification tests through these

various organizations. As to how I got started in it, and by the way I am

certified by the American Handwriting Analysis Foundation, and the Society

of Handwriting Analysis in Washington, D.C. and I'm qualified in the court

system as a handwriting expert. When I was about 17, my boyfriend at the

time, who became my husband, his mother read a book on graphology and she

analyzed my handwriting, and I was so impressed that I started reading

about it, and it became sort of an entree for me, because I was very shy,

and now when I would go to parities, everybody would want their handwriting

analyzed, so I didn't have to really be too sociable, I could just have

them come to me. So anyway, I studied on

#

my own for about ten years, and then I discovered that there were

correspondence schools and meetings, and so then I did do some official

study.

MJ: Now, there are some people watching who may think this is sort of

mystical, like palm reading or, you know, fortune telling. But this is

quite different from that?

SL: It is. It's not a predictive tool in that sense. The handwriting tells

a lot about potentials, but it can't say what is going to happen in the

future. It is an art and a science, and it's been validated mostly in

European universities in last 40, 50 years, and there's a lot of studies

going on in this country at the moment. I have a list of about four pages

of published studies over the past 25 years.

MJ: What are some examples of some of the people who have come to you

looking for handwriting analysis?

SL: Most of my clients are companies who are hiring people, and they want

to make sure that they've got the right person for the job, because you can

have somebody who has really got, you know, plenty of skills for what

they're going to do, but their personality may not match with, in the

corporate structure. They may not.... you know, the corporate culture may

be different than... and they wouldn't be comfortable. So it's real

important to them, and how to manage their employees too. Also I get people

who want compatibility reports, either business partners or marriage

partners or roommates.

MJ: Boyfriend and girlfriend.

SL: Boyfriend-girlfriend. Parents and children, teachers and students.

There's also a branch of what I do called graphotherapy where you can

change certain handwriting

#

characteristics to change personality traits that you don't like. And I do

vocational reports, and personal reports for individuals. And then there's

also the questioned document side, where I do forgery identification

through handwriting.

MJ: For instance, a will, or some other legal documents, somebody may have

tried to forge it, and they will call on you to analyze that.

SL: Right. Yes.

MJ: What about your work in the courts?

SL: It's not a very large part of what I do. My testimony is accepted as an

expert, but I prefer the personality assessment side of it, so I don't

really advertise. When it comes to me I do it. But I've had some

interesting cases, like the Kurt Cobain suicide note, which I was asked to

identify and make sure that it was really his. I've asked, been asked to do

Elvis Presley. There was somebody who wrote a letter that was very similar

to his handwriting, and they thought maybe it was his and that he was still

alive. And others like a seven million dollar estate where the will was

being questioned, and in that one, I had not seen originals, I only got

copies, and because it was such a large amount, the judge stopped the

proceedings, took a recess, and sent me to the attorney's office where the

original was kept, and there we found that it very obvious that it had been

whited out, the signature was whited out, and another one written on top.

MJ: What about for police? Do police call for upon you?

SL: Not very often, although I did recently do a case for the Australian

police, which was wasn't a document case, it was where they have a serial

killer in jail, and

5

somebody was writing him notes, and some girls were missing, and so they

wanted a profile on this note writer, to see if he might be a suspect.

MJ: You mentioned that you can change your handwriting, and then your

personality will follow your handwriting, is that accurate?

SL: Yeah, if you have that potential in you. Of course it's not going to

make you do something that you don't have, you know. It's like with

hypnosis. They can't make you do something that you're not willing to do.

But if you want to change a particular trait, then handwriting exercises...

it's not so much changing individual features of your handwriting, but

there are exercises called "form drawings," and if you do those, and you

write affirmations, you will see a change. I've done it on myself.

MJ: Now, is it something as simple as a person who is, let's say, messy

around his house, beginning to write neat, and does he become a neat person

then?

SL: Well, he would pay more attention to details, but there would be

certain things that I would have him do, these exercises, and yes, he would

begin to work... it comes from the inside out. It's like a subliminal

message. And you begin to see these exercises incorporated automatically

into the handwriting. There are some things that we would change, like we

might have somebody cross their "t's" a little differently, but those are

rather superficial things.

MJ: We're talking about English primarily here.

SL: Yes.

6

MJ: What about, for instance, Japanese, with the kanji characters, or the

hiragana katakana, what can you tell, and are you able to tell things from

reading those?

SL: It's not something... I have not studied Japanese writing, but I have

an associate who is Japanese, and I would call on her to do that. She tells

me that it would be difficult to do an analysis on Japanese writing because

some of the principles of the writing are not the same. For instance, in

the English we have a certain kind of slant, and we have what we call

"zones" in the writing that do not exist in the Japanese writing.

MJ: Now, is that something you would be able to study, and if you decided

to, you could learn that as well?

SL: Well, I would imagine I could, because I do analysis on Arabic and

Hebrew and Cyrillic, and other languages, so I'm sure it could be learned.

The principles are the same.

MJ: Do you know of any graphologists in Japan?

SL: I understand there's a Dr. Kuroda, who has been working with

handwriting for about 30 years, and just a very few people, but it's

beginning to blossom a little bit in Japan.

MJ: You've done some analysis of well known people. What kind of groups

call upon you to analyze people's handwriting, as far as well known people?

SL: Usually it's from the media.

MJ: A television show...

7

SL: Television, radio, newspapers, and they'll ask me if I have samples, or

they'll provide samples, and I'll do analysis for them.

MJ: Is it difficult to keep your personal feelings about the person

separate from the analysis of the handwriting?

SL: Not really, because I have to be objective in my work. I may get a

certain impression of a person, and then I see their handwriting, and it's

not the same. But I've found that handwriting doesn't lie. My impressions

may lie, but that way I always have to be objective.

MJ: Can you give us some examples of some people, what you can tell us

about them, for instance I know you've done some analysis on Princess

Diana.

SL: Right.

MJ: What can we learn about her from her writing?

SL: Should we show her writing?

MJ: Sure.

SL: Princess Diana's writing is very rounded, like a young girl. We usually

see that kind of writing in teenagers. And the roundedness shows her need

for nurturing and security, and for approval. She also has a very large D

on her name, and it's underscored, so that's like putting herself forward,

and saying, you know, "The emphasis is on me, here I am, look at me."

MJ: And then there was Prince Charles?

8

SL: Yes. Prince Charles is over here. His writing shows him to be more of a

poet than a prince. He's a sensitive guy. He has very simplified writing.

He also has, I don't know if you can see that, the letter D going back to

the left, it's called a lyrical D, and we see that in the handwritings of

poets and those who love literature.

MJ: In the U.S. we just had an election several months ago, and it was

President Clinton versus Bob Dole. What did you notice about those two

candidates?

SL: This is President Clinton's handwriting, and it's a combination of

rounded strokes and angles. The roundedness gives a softness to the

personality, it shows that he's a really "people person." He really cares

about what happens to people. But the angles stop it from being too soft.

They give it strength. So it's also somebody who can make quick changes,

but he has the strength to stick with what he wants if he feels that it's

important. On his signature, the B in Bill is much larger than the C in

Clinton, and that tells us that he's just kind of an affable person, he

wants you to feel like he's just Bill, not Mr. President or Mr. Clinton.

MJ: Easygoing.

SL: Yes.

MJ: What about Mr. Dole?

SL: Mr. Dole, we only have the signature right here, this is very limited.

With a signature all you can tell is the person's public image. His

signature is very close to school type, copy book, and that means that he's

a conventional, conservative type, and he doesn't make big changes easily.

Also the end stroke here is very long and blunt, and that's a dogmatic

person, someone who doesn't like to admit when

9

they're wrong.

MJ: So he learned to write when he was very young, and has kept writing

like that all throughout his life, never changed.

SL: Evidently, yes.

MJ: And you also have Madonna's handwriting.

SL: I do. Somewhere back here. Here she is. And this is one I haven't

looked at too much. Madonna's handwriting shows that she's very

intelligent. It's simplified, it's cut down, and she's able to kind of get

to the essence of things without a lot of detail. But there's also this

long rounded form in her signature. And we usually see this in women who

are very flirtatious, which would make sense.

MJ: There was also one of Sadaam Hussein. It's not even in English, but

you were able to analyze that as well?

SL: Yeah, that was in Arabic. This is the writing of Sadaam Hussein

himself. And this is the same word written by an ordinary citizen. And you

can see that there's quite a bit of difference. His is very explosive and

careless and there's angles where there shouldn't be, which show his brutal

nature.

MJ: Interesting. Now, if you didn't know the public persona of Sadaam

Hussein, you would still come to the same conclusions?

SL: Yes, I would. Any analyst should.

MJ: Now, do you, in your personal life to you analyze, you know, people you

meet,

10

or business contacts, or your own family?

SL: Well, I certainly analyzed my husband's writing before we ever went

out, and that helped me. Now, everybody has things that they need to make

adjustments on to have a successful relationship, and so having the

handwriting has certainly been a big help to me. I also look at my

children's handwriting from time to time. And I think that's been a help

too.

MJ: Does handwriting change? For instance, if one of your kids was going

through a difficult period in his life, would it change and then would it

revert back?

SL: Yes. There are temporary changes. Usually with moods we see a change in

size and slant. I know one of my children was going through a very

difficult period a few years ago, and the handwriting got so small it

practically disappeared off the page. And he was feeling very depressed.

But then later it got back to its normal size, after the situation was

over.

MJ: You've also analyzed a number of suicide notes. What do those typically

look like? What are characteristics of those?

SL: Well, I don't know that there is a typical suicide note. A lot of them

you would never know. Somebody who's depressed is generally going to write

with a downhill slant, and especially words at the end of a line might fall

down; they're leaning down, or running off the edge of the page. But many

times a suicide will feel sort of happy and relaxed after they've made the

decision, and so we might see the opposite; the handwriting may be going

up, you don't see any signs of depression. I'm currently... well, I'm about

to launch into a study with an Israeli doctor who is a colleague of mine,

on depression. We're going to be comparing handwritings of

11

normal people and depressed people to one of the established psychological

tests.

MJ: Do you ever analyze your children's boyfriends or girlfriends for them?

SL: Of course. They always bring them to me. Sometimes I wish they didn't.

MJ: How do you charge for your services? This is obviously your

profession, do you charge a different rate for personal or corporate or

government clients?

SL: Yes. Well, there are differences in the type of analyses. And I charge

a flat rate. For personal analysis, personality profile is $75, brings out

the high points of the personality. An in depth analysis is $150, and they

come with a consultation, a telephone consultation for any questions. In

the business analyses, the one that most people use, the personality

profile, is $95. They can actually get one for $45, it's just a checklist

of traits, and a summary paragraph. And it goes all the way up to $250 for

an executive report, on higher level positions.

MJ: Those are the basic categories.

SL: Yeah, well, I do compatibility reports, and vocational.

MJ: What is a compatibility report?

SL: What is the cost?

MJ: What is it?

SL: It's... Compatibility is, when somebody, for instance, wants to get

married, and they want to know what they need to know about the person. And

so I do a personality profile on each of the handwritings, and then a

report to bring them

12

together, and show what the potentials are, and where there may be

potential problems. I don't tell them they should or shouldn't get

married, but at least it helps them to see more clearly.

MJ: So they can see if this would be a good match, or a bad match.

SL: Yeah. I have one lady that stands out the most in my mind, because it

was not a good idea at all, and I made it very clear, even though I didn't

say, "Don't do it." But she went ahead and married the guy, and about three

years later, she wrote to me and said, "I wish I'd listened to the

analysis, because I lost my home and all my money and I'm running for my

life." And I've had other people say, "I wish I had listened," but usually

they'll do what they want to do anyway.

MJ: Do different personality types write in different ways? For instance, a

person who's very angry, will they write a certain way? A person who's very

happy, sad, and so on down the line?

SL: Yes, absolutely. Because handwriting is like a mirror image of who you

are inside. You may act differently on the outside, but who you are is

reflected in your handwriting. So an angry person for instance might

have... Oh, let me first say that nothing means anything by itself, no one

thing. It's how everything looks in the whole picture. But an an angry

person is probably going to have a lot of angles in their writing, sharp

points, heavy pressure, and possibly a strong right slant.

MJ: What about a happy person?

SL: Then you're going to have more rounded writing, maybe an uphill slant,

and right slanted loops.

13

MJ: A sad person.

SL: Smaller, less pressure, downhill. Those are just some of the features.

MJ: We had a presidential candidate in the U.S. several years ago, Gary

Hart, who at one point in his life, completely changed his autograph.

SL: Yes.

MJ: What does... Does that indicate... What does that indicate, when

somebody changes their autograph very obviously?

SL: They want to change their public image. I have a couple of signatures.

The first one... of the same person. The first one is completely

illegible. And it has a big circle around it, which shows a self

protectedness. The illegibility is a sign that he has something to hide.

And then with the circle around it, he's really hiding. It's like doing

this... protective. This... you can see the change in the second signature.

It's completely clear, and it's Jimmy Swaggart, who was found... you know,

is a minister on t.v., an evangelist, who was found with a prostitute. So

he had something to hide, but after it all came out, he didn't have to hide

anymore. So his signature opened up.

MJ: Can you tell us something about your personal life, and how you came to

this country?

SL: I came into this country from England, first when I was ten, then we

went back, and then when I was fourteen. My father felt that he could make

a better life here. And, gee, what can I tell you? My parents separated,

divorced when I was fourteen, and I grew up with my mother and my brother,

and we lived in southern California

14

all that time.

MJ: Was there something in your background, you think, that interested you

in your work?

SL: I think it's being a Scorpio. I like to look at the hidden things. I've

always been interested in human nature and graphology gives you the key to

open the secrets.

MJ: Can this knowledge that you have, you know, be misused by somebody

potentially?

SL: It can, and that's why we would like to have some kind of government

standards or controls on it, because when you're doing an analysis, you

have somebody's psyche in your hands, and if you're not careful... you

know, it can be very fragile. I think it's important for all handwriting

analysts to have their handwriting analyzed so that they know how it feels.

I was just writing an article in my newsletter that somebody had an

experience where this man came to a class she was teaching, and he came up

to her at the break, and he drew a particular form on the blackboard, and

he said, "What does this mean?" And she said, "Well, why do you ask?" And

he said, "Well, somebody told me... my wife died ten years ago, and a

handwriting analyst told me that this meant I was a homosexual. So I never

looked for another woman." And so this woman that he was talking to

explained to him all the good things in his handwriting, and she said he

turned around, and tears were streaming down his face. That happens. People

can be very careless and hurt rather than help.

MJ: What sorts of projects are you involved in now?

15

SL: One of my main focuses is to raise the professionalism of graphologists

in the United States. And last year I came up with a code of ethics, a

global... It's not attached to any organization, but for people to commit

to a particular standard. I give an annual conference for handwriting

professionals, and I have a newsletter for this group, it's called the

Vanguard. And it's not an organization, but it's a network of handwriting

professionals in this country and in Canada and any other country who would

like to subscribe. I have subscribers in England. And also the big project

now is a CD-ROM that is going on the market, and there are two products,

one for home use, called, it's called the Sheila Lowe's Personal

Handwriting Analyzer, and the other one is for business, called Sheila

Lowe's Professional Handwriting Analyzer, and this CD has a list of

handwriting characteristics, like for instance, size, slant, margins, and

for each one of these characteristics, there are several screens giving

different examples, and what you would do, is take the handwriting that you

are looking at, and compare it to the screens, and click on the one that's

most like the writing. And when you've gone through the whole list, or as

many as you want to do, click on "Finish," and you get a report and a

graph.

MJ: What are your goals for the future? Where would you like to see the

whole... graphology go in terms of the way it's viewed?

SL: Well, I would like it to be seen as attached to and related to

psychology, with the same kind of licensing requirements and schooling.

There really are no schools for credit that are set up, and so it's mostly

taught by correspondence or by private teachers like myself, so it would be

my goal to see it accepted as one of the professions.

16

MJ: Thanks for joining us today.

SL: Thank you.

Interview with Sheila Lowe

MJ: Sheila, thanks for joining us today.

SL: Thank you.

MJ: Can you tell us about your work and exactly what a graphologist is?

SL: Yes, I'd love to. A graphologist is someone who analyzes handwriting to

understand the personality of the writer.

MJ: What sort of things are you able to tell about a person by their

handwriting?

SL: Well, handwriting doesn't tell everything, but it does tell a lot,

particularly how....the state of your ego, how you think, how you relate to

other people, your drive, your fears, and also your controls.

MJ: What do you mean by controls?

SL: Well, people are controlled by different means. Self discipline is the

best, because it's a conscious control, it's things... you've learned right

and wrong. Then there's the control by fears - things that have happened to

you in the past, and you say, "I'm never going to let that happen again."

And then you have fears by defenses, which are... have to do with what

you've learned as a child, and those old messages that play in your head

like your parents looking over your shoulder. So if that's very strong in

you , your handwriting will look a particular way, and if it's by

inhibition, it's another way, if it's by self discipline it's yet another

way.

MJ: How do those things come out and express themselves in the handwriting?

SL: They... In particular the fears and controls? Well, if the handwriting

is controlled #

by your defenses, if the person's defenses are very strong, the writing is

likely to look very much like the school type that they learned. They'll

stick very much to the model. They need rules and regulations. If it's by

fears, then there will be things like rigidity, it'll be not flexible,

there might be a lot of little hooks all over it. The loops will be

squeezed together. And then if it's conscious control, self discipline, it

will have good spacing, good rhythm, space between the words, and the lines

will be regular, and it will look more harmonious.

MJ: How did you begin to get into this line of work, and what made you

interested in this, and what sort of accreditation do you get? How are you

graphologists accredited?

SL: O.K., I'll start with the last question first. There is no official

governmental control on handwriting analysis. Anybody can pick up a book

and call themselves a graphologist, unfortunately. There are, however,

organizations, non-profit organizations who certify, or schools,

proprietary schools that certify their members. So it's really an

unofficial thing. But there are some good certification tests through these

various organizations. As to how I got started in it, and by the way I am

certified by the American Handwriting Analysis Foundation, and the Society

of Handwriting Analysis in Washington, D.C. and I'm qualified in the court

system as a handwriting expert. When I was about 17, my boyfriend at the

time, who became my husband, his mother read a book on graphology and she

analyzed my handwriting, and I was so impressed that I started reading

about it, and it became sort of an entree for me, because I was very shy,

and now when I would go to parities, everybody would want their handwriting

analyzed, so I didn't have to really be too sociable, I could just have

them come to me. So anyway, I studied on

#

my own for about ten years, and then I discovered that there were

correspondence schools and meetings, and so then I did do some official

study.

MJ: Now, there are some people watching who may think this is sort of

mystical, like palm reading or, you know, fortune telling. But this is

quite different from that?

SL: It is. It's not a predictive tool in that sense. The handwriting tells

a lot about potentials, but it can't say what is going to happen in the

future. It is an art and a science, and it's been validated mostly in

European universities in last 40, 50 years, and there's a lot of studies

going on in this country at the moment. I have a list of about four pages

of published studies over the past 25 years.

MJ: What are some examples of some of the people who have come to you

looking for handwriting analysis?

SL: Most of my clients are companies who are hiring people, and they want

to make sure that they've got the right person for the job, because you can

have somebody who has really got, you know, plenty of skills for what

they're going to do, but their personality may not match with, in the

corporate structure. They may not.... you know, the corporate culture may

be different than... and they wouldn't be comfortable. So it's real

important to them, and how to manage their employees too. Also I get people

who want compatibility reports, either business partners or marriage

partners or roommates.

MJ: Boyfriend and girlfriend.

SL: Boyfriend-girlfriend. Parents and children, teachers and students.

There's also a branch of what I do called graphotherapy where you can

change certain handwriting

#

characteristics to change personality traits that you don't like. And I do

vocational reports, and personal reports for individuals. And then there's

also the questioned document side, where I do forgery identification

through handwriting.

MJ: For instance, a will, or some other legal documents, somebody may have

tried to forge it, and they will call on you to analyze that.

SL: Right. Yes.

MJ: What about your work in the courts?

SL: It's not a very large part of what I do. My testimony is accepted as an

expert, but I prefer the personality assessment side of it, so I don't

really advertise. When it comes to me I do it. But I've had some

interesting cases, like the Kurt Cobain suicide note, which I was asked to

identify and make sure that it was really his. I've asked, been asked to do

Elvis Presley. There was somebody who wrote a letter that was very similar

to his handwriting, and they thought maybe it was his and that he was still

alive. And others like a seven million dollar estate where the will was

being questioned, and in that one, I had not seen originals, I only got

copies, and because it was such a large amount, the judge stopped the

proceedings, took a recess, and sent me to the attorney's office where the

original was kept, and there we found that it very obvious that it had been

whited out, the signature was whited out, and another one written on top.

MJ: What about for police? Do police call for upon you?

SL: Not very often, although I did recently do a case for the Australian

police, which was wasn't a document case, it was where they have a serial

killer in jail, and

5

somebody was writing him notes, and some girls were missing, and so they

wanted a profile on this note writer, to see if he might be a suspect.

MJ: You mentioned that you can change your handwriting, and then your

personality will follow your handwriting, is that accurate?

SL: Yeah, if you have that potential in you. Of course it's not going to

make you do something that you don't have, you know. It's like with

hypnosis. They can't make you do something that you're not willing to do.

But if you want to change a particular trait, then handwriting exercises...

it's not so much changing individual features of your handwriting, but

there are exercises called "form drawings," and if you do those, and you

write affirmations, you will see a change. I've done it on myself.

MJ: Now, is it something as simple as a person who is, let's say, messy

around his house, beginning to write neat, and does he become a neat person

then?

SL: Well, he would pay more attention to details, but there would be

certain things that I would have him do, these exercises, and yes, he would

begin to work... it comes from the inside out. It's like a subliminal

message. And you begin to see these exercises incorporated automatically

into the handwriting. There are some things that we would change, like we

might have somebody cross their "t's" a little differently, but those are

rather superficial things.

MJ: We're talking about English primarily here.

SL: Yes.

6

MJ: What about, for instance, Japanese, with the kanji characters, or the

hiragana katakana, what can you tell, and are you able to tell things from

reading those?

SL: It's not something... I have not studied Japanese writing, but I have

an associate who is Japanese, and I would call on her to do that. She tells

me that it would be difficult to do an analysis on Japanese writing because

some of the principles of the writing are not the same. For instance, in

the English we have a certain kind of slant, and we have what we call

"zones" in the writing that do not exist in the Japanese writing.

MJ: Now, is that something you would be able to study, and if you decided

to, you could learn that as well?

SL: Well, I would imagine I could, because I do analysis on Arabic and

Hebrew and Cyrillic, and other languages, so I'm sure it could be learned.

The principles are the same.

MJ: Do you know of any graphologists in Japan?

SL: I understand there's a Dr. Kuroda, who has been working with

handwriting for about 30 years, and just a very few people, but it's

beginning to blossom a little bit in Japan.

MJ: You've done some analysis of well known people. What kind of groups

call upon you to analyze people's handwriting, as far as well known people?

SL: Usually it's from the media.

MJ: A television show...

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SL: Television, radio, newspapers, and they'll ask me if I have samples, or

they'll provide samples, and I'll do analysis for them.

MJ: Is it difficult to keep your personal feelings about the person

separate from the analysis of the handwriting?

SL: Not really, because I have to be objective in my work. I may get a

certain impression of a person, and then I see their handwriting, and it's

not the same. But I've found that handwriting doesn't lie. My impressions

may lie, but that way I always have to be objective.

MJ: Can you give us some examples of some people, what you can tell us

about them, for instance I know you've done some analysis on Princess

Diana.

SL: Right.

MJ: What can we learn about her from her writing?

SL: Should we show her writing?

MJ: Sure.

SL: Princess Diana's writing is very rounded, like a young girl. We usually

see that kind of writing in teenagers. And the roundedness shows her need

for nurturing and security, and for approval. She also has a very large D

on her name, and it's underscored, so that's like putting herself forward,

and saying, you know, "The emphasis is on me, here I am, look at me."

MJ: And then there was Prince Charles?

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SL: Yes. Prince Charles is over here. His writing shows him to be more of a

poet than a prince. He's a sensitive guy. He has very simplified writing.

He also has, I don't know if you can see that, the letter D going back to

the left, it's called a lyrical D, and we see that in the handwritings of

poets and those who love literature.

MJ: In the U.S. we just had an election several months ago, and it was

President Clinton versus Bob Dole. What did you notice about those two

candidates?

SL: This is President Clinton's handwriting, and it's a combination of

rounded strokes and angles. The roundedness gives a softness to the

personality, it shows that he's a really "people person." He really cares

about what happens to people. But the angles stop it from being too soft.

They give it strength. So it's also somebody who can make quick changes,

but he has the strength to stick with what he wants if he feels that it's

important. On his signature, the B in Bill is much larger than the C in

Clinton, and that tells us that he's just kind of an affable person, he

wants you to feel like he's just Bill, not Mr. President or Mr. Clinton.

MJ: Easygoing.

SL: Yes.

MJ: What about Mr. Dole?

SL: Mr. Dole, we only have the signature right here, this is very limited.

With a signature all you can tell is the person's public image. His

signature is very close to school type, copy book, and that means that he's

a conventional, conservative type, and he doesn't make big changes easily.

Also the end stroke here is very long and blunt, and that's a dogmatic

person, someone who doesn't like to admit when

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they're wrong.

MJ: So he learned to write when he was very young, and has kept writing

like that all throughout his life, never changed.

SL: Evidently, yes.

MJ: And you also have Madonna's handwriting.

SL: I do. Somewhere back here. Here she is. And this is one I haven't

looked at too much. Madonna's handwriting shows that she's very

intelligent. It's simplified, it's cut down, and she's able to kind of get

to the essence of things without a lot of detail. But there's also this

long rounded form in her signature. And we usually see this in women who

are very flirtatious, which would make sense.

MJ: There was also one of Sadaam Hussein. It's not even in English, but

you were able to analyze that as well?

SL: Yeah, that was in Arabic. This is the writing of Sadaam Hussein

himself. And this is the same word written by an ordinary citizen. And you

can see that there's quite a bit of difference. His is very explosive and

careless and there's angles where there shouldn't be, which show his brutal

nature.

MJ: Interesting. Now, if you didn't know the public persona of Sadaam

Hussein, you would still come to the same conclusions?

SL: Yes, I would. Any analyst should.

MJ: Now, do you, in your personal life to you analyze, you know, people you

meet,

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or business contacts, or your own family?

SL: Well, I certainly analyzed my husband's writing before we ever went

out, and that helped me. Now, everybody has things that they need to make

adjustments on to have a successful relationship, and so having the

handwriting has certainly been a big help to me. I also look at my

children's handwriting from time to time. And I think that's been a help

too.

MJ: Does handwriting change? For instance, if one of your kids was going

through a difficult period in his life, would it change and then would it

revert back?

SL: Yes. There are temporary changes. Usually with moods we see a change in

size and slant. I know one of my children was going through a very

difficult period a few years ago, and the handwriting got so small it

practically disappeared off the page. And he was feeling very depressed.

But then later it got back to its normal size, after the situation was

over.

MJ: You've also analyzed a number of suicide notes. What do those typically

look like? What are characteristics of those?

SL: Well, I don't know that there is a typical suicide note. A lot of them

you would never know. Somebody who's depressed is generally going to write

with a downhill slant, and especially words at the end of a line might fall

down; they're leaning down, or running off the edge of the page. But many

times a suicide will feel sort of happy and relaxed after they've made the

decision, and so we might see the opposite; the handwriting may be going

up, you don't see any signs of depression. I'm currently... well, I'm about

to launch into a study with an Israeli doctor who is a colleague of mine,

on depression. We're going to be comparing handwritings of

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normal people and depressed people to one of the established psychological

tests.

MJ: Do you ever analyze your children's boyfriends or girlfriends for them?

SL: Of course. They always bring them to me. Sometimes I wish they didn't.

MJ: How do you charge for your services? This is obviously your

profession, do you charge a different rate for personal or corporate or

government clients?

SL: Yes. Well, there are differences in the type of analyses. And I charge

a flat rate. For personal analysis, personality profile is $75, brings out

the high points of the personality. An in depth analysis is $150, and they

come with a consultation, a telephone consultation for any questions. In

the business analyses, the one that most people use, the personality

profile, is $95. They can actually get one for $45, it's just a checklist

of traits, and a summary paragraph. And it goes all the way up to $250 for

an executive report, on higher level positions.

MJ: Those are the basic categories.

SL: Yeah, well, I do compatibility reports, and vocational.

MJ: What is a compatibility report?

SL: What is the cost?

MJ: What is it?

SL: It's... Compatibility is, when somebody, for instance, wants to get

married, and they want to know what they need to know about the person. And

so I do a personality profile on each of the handwritings, and then a

report to bring them

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together, and show what the potentials are, and where there may be

potential problems. I don't tell them they should or shouldn't get

married, but at least it helps them to see more clearly.

MJ: So they can see if this would be a good match, or a bad match.

SL: Yeah. I have one lady that stands out the most in my mind, because it

was not a good idea at all, and I made it very clear, even though I didn't

say, "Don't do it." But she went ahead and married the guy, and about three

years later, she wrote to me and said, "I wish I'd listened to the

analysis, because I lost my home and all my money and I'm running for my

life." And I've had other people say, "I wish I had listened," but usually

they'll do what they want to do anyway.

MJ: Do different personality types write in different ways? For instance, a

person who's very angry, will they write a certain way? A person who's very

happy, sad, and so on down the line?

SL: Yes, absolutely. Because handwriting is like a mirror image of who you

are inside. You may act differently on the outside, but who you are is

reflected in your handwriting. So an angry person for instance might

have... Oh, let me first say that nothing means anything by itself, no one

thing. It's how everything looks in the whole picture. But an an angry

person is probably going to have a lot of angles in their writing, sharp

points, heavy pressure, and possibly a strong right slant.

MJ: What about a happy person?

SL: Then you're going to have more rounded writing, maybe an uphill slant,

and right slanted loops.

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MJ: A sad person.

SL: Smaller, less pressure, downhill. Those are just some of the features.

MJ: We had a presidential candidate in the U.S. several years ago, Gary

Hart, who at one point in his life, completely changed his autograph.

SL: Yes.

MJ: What does... Does that indicate... What does that indicate, when

somebody changes their autograph very obviously?

SL: They want to change their public image. I have a couple of signatures.

The first one... of the same person. The first one is completely

illegible. And it has a big circle around it, which shows a self

protectedness. The illegibility is a sign that he has something to hide.

And then with the circle around it, he's really hiding. It's like doing

this... protective. This... you can see the change in the second signature.

It's completely clear, and it's Jimmy Swaggart, who was found... you know,

is a minister on t.v., an evangelist, who was found with a prostitute. So

he had something to hide, but after it all came out, he didn't have to hide

anymore. So his signature opened up.

MJ: Can you tell us something about your personal life, and how you came to

this country?

SL: I came into this country from England, first when I was ten, then we

went back, and then when I was fourteen. My father felt that he could make

a better life here. And, gee, what can I tell you? My parents separated,

divorced when I was fourteen, and I grew up with my mother and my brother,

and we lived in southern California

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all that time.

MJ: Was there something in your background, you think, that interested you

in your work?

SL: I think it's being a Scorpio. I like to look at the hidden things. I've

always been interested in human nature and graphology gives you the key to

open the secrets.

MJ: Can this knowledge that you have, you know, be misused by somebody

potentially?

SL: It can, and that's why we would like to have some kind of government

standards or controls on it, because when you're doing an analysis, you

have somebody's psyche in your hands, and if you're not careful... you

know, it can be very fragile. I think it's important for all handwriting

analysts to have their handwriting analyzed so that they know how it feels.

I was just writing an article in my newsletter that somebody had an

experience where this man came to a class she was teaching, and he came up

to her at the break, and he drew a particular form on the blackboard, and

he said, "What does this mean?" And she said, "Well, why do you ask?" And

he said, "Well, somebody told me... my wife died ten years ago, and a

handwriting analyst told me that this meant I was a homosexual. So I never

looked for another woman." And so this woman that he was talking to

explained to him all the good things in his handwriting, and she said he

turned around, and tears were streaming down his face. That happens. People

can be very careless and hurt rather than help.

MJ: What sorts of projects are you involved in now?

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SL: One of my main focuses is to raise the professionalism of graphologists

in the United States. And last year I came up with a code of ethics, a

global... It's not attached to any organization, but for people to commit

to a particular standard. I give an annual conference for handwriting

professionals, and I have a newsletter for this group, it's called the

Vanguard. And it's not an organization, but it's a network of handwriting

professionals in this country and in Canada and any other country who would

like to subscribe. I have subscribers in England. And also the big project

now is a CD-ROM that is going on the market, and there are two products,

one for home use, called, it's called the Sheila Lowe's Personal

Handwriting Analyzer, and the other one is for business, called Sheila

Lowe's Professional Handwriting Analyzer, and this CD has a list of

handwriting characteristics, like for instance, size, slant, margins, and

for each one of these characteristics, there are several screens giving

different examples, and what you would do, is take the handwriting that you

are looking at, and compare it to the screens, and click on the one that's

most like the writing. And when you've gone through the whole list, or as

many as you want to do, click on "Finish," and you get a report and a

graph.

MJ: What are your goals for the future? Where would you like to see the

whole... graphology go in terms of the way it's viewed?

SL: Well, I would like it to be seen as attached to and related to

psychology, with the same kind of licensing requirements and schooling.

There really are no schools for credit that are set up, and so it's mostly

taught by correspondence or by private teachers like myself, so it would be

my goal to see it accepted as one of the professions.

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MJ: Thanks for joining us today.

SL: Thank you.