Involving emotions
let's get sentimental, you in?!
He had tattoos on both his arms. His ears pierced, round silver earrings shining on his lobes. He was bald. He had a dark thick moustache that grew big enough to connect to his finely trimmed sideburns. He wore shorts and a sleeveless t-shirt which exposed his biceps, tight muscles from vigorous workouts, it looked like. To be honest, if this was someone I had met in the streets at night, I would have been tempted to run. But all of my anxious nerves melted away when he said, “You remind me of my daughter.”
I think that is one the ways we unlock very meaningful conversations and create ease within spaces. Tapping onto what makes us human, little things, and maybe sentimental. If you ever find yourself in spaces where the conversation feels stale, robotic, systematic, then you might want to try a different approach. It’s something that helps me look at people through an eye of much more depth where I may see them for who they are, in their beautiful raw being as humans.
Involving someone’s emotions. I understand this does not come easy with everyone and even not always convenient. But if it ever happens to be a space where you feel safe to try, don’t hold back. For example if someone says they like a certain food, you could ask when they first tasted it, who introduced it to them, does it remind them of something or someone special? I know. It can be crazy, intimidating and even vulnerable. But what if he never said that I reminded him of his daughter? Then maybe I would never have learned he was a father, and he would never have shared how he thinks parents should be holding close their kids’ pencil drawings of stick-figures. “Frame it, put it on top of their office tables, stick-figures, visible and proud. That way they’ll know you care.” he said. So if you only try to touch on the sentiments sometimes, then you are really getting to know a person.
If the first option is hard for you, then just create that space in your head. Don’t just look at people within boundaries of their names and titles, but who they become without them. Generate questions in your mind like what could this person’s Spotify playlist look like, do they have any sticky notes on the mirrors of their bathrooms and if so what do they say? Is it a Bible verse? An affirmation to heal them from the past or to help them love their body or to conquer stage fright? Do the frown on their face make them look more like their father? Does this adult secretly misses going home and eating a meal prepared by their mom, just how they like it?
So if you only try to touch on the sentiments sometimes, then you are really getting to know a person.
You see, there are a million of details about a person, and it’s within these details where most meaning is found. I started this practice especially when I looked at people in power, like presidents and ministers and heads of different institutions. Just when you think there’s chance that this person might still be keeping a good luck charm necklace given them by their grandparent when they were younger, then they become small again. No power, no title, just human. Broken and beautiful poetry.