Sally: “I can’t!”

Kevin: “It’s really hard!”

Mark: “I feel totally uncomfortable doing it.”

Mary: “I’m afraid people are going to think I’m weird.”

Phillip: “I don’t want to make people uncomfortable.”

I’m only giving you five examples, but I have hundreds, and probably 30 from just this week alone.

What terrible thing have I asked these people to do?

I’ve asked them to look others in the eye.

Not the kind of “I’m looking, but not really looking” look most people do.

But to look them in the eye and to really LOOK.

Lately, I’ve been coaching a lot of executives, leaders and people in leadership development programs. These are competent, capable, strong, courageous professionals with proven track records.

And they struggle with this.

It’s even tougher when I coach people who are young and early in career.

We could go off into a discussion about how the only thing we really look at is our phone and computer screens. We could even talk about the lockdown and how it isolated us.  But the reason doesn’t matter.

What matters is our ability to do it.

It’s an ability we are all born with. If you see a newly born child, and for a number of years after, you’ll see astoundingly perfect eye contact. Unembarrassed, unselfconscious, intensely direct, probing, intent on seeing, unstoppable eye contact.

Nothing escapes the direct gaze of a child.

For all of humanity this is natural.  Looking at others is natural.

We are systematically “taught” not to look at people. And then everything escapes us, because we’re not seeing it.  Not seeing them. I could do a whole article on exactly how that happens and why. The point is, it happens.

Teenagers have learned this lesson only too well, they’ve mastered the art of looking down and away.

And by the time people are adults, they glance, but don’t really look at others. 

Looking into the eyes of an adult is now completely different than into the eyes of a child who is really looking at you. And seeing everything.

Why is this important? Because if you lose that, you lose the primary means of deep human connection. And when you lose that, you lose one of the primary means of creating deep understanding. And when you lose that …

As a society, we’ve lost it.

But it’s very easy to regain.

Look people in the eye. Really look. I mean really look. I truly mean really look.

I’m repeating this many times because I know how hard it is to do by the time someone is an adult.  It’s so easy to be superficial and glib and not really do it, to glance but glance away. When I coach people to REALLY look, I initially get the comments at the top of this article. So don’t think it’s something that’s necessarily going to come easy right at first if you’re not used to doing it.

If you have those thoughts yourself, that it’s hard, get through them. Get to the other side. When you get to the other side, you’re going to find a whole new world of human connection.

People will love you for it.  People are starved for deep human connection.  I know because they tell me. I know because every day I see what happens when they finally have it – the relief and joy and gratitude that washes over them is overwhelming.  They’re starving.

I don’t know how many people I coached this past week, but it was a lot. And all of the ones that I coached started out glancing at people, hardly seeing them. Flitting over lightly. Not connecting.

This all changed very quickly during the coaching.

That ability they had as a child came flooding back to them.

When Sally connected to her audience by looking, and I mean really looking each person in her audience directly in the eye, and really seeing them, there was a surge of power that was tangible. Now that Sally’s tasted this, she’s never going to give it up.

When Kevin did it, he was riveting. He had a powerful message and it finally landed. I think at one point, the audience stopped breathing.

When Mark did it, you hung on his every word.

Mary had a sudden and remarkable poise, an executive presence that was unmistakable.

Philip was warm, powerful and compelling.

You felt each of their presence. You felt it strongly.  It felt good.

Don’t miss out on this.

Go for it. Look them in the eye. Really look. Regain that wonderful, that powerful ability you had as a child. Don’t be afraid to look.  Don’t glance. Look. See everything. Connect.

Do it all with an abundance of affinity for the other person. Because without affinity, you will terrify them. Affinity is a vital part of communication.

All that’s left is to enjoy the deep and satisfying human connections you create.  And to enjoy the mighty power you reclaim.

Be the cause!