Eye contact is way more intimate than words will ever be. – Faraaz Kazi
There is an interesting YouTube video showing an experiment done by Soul Pancake. In this video they asked various pairs of people to look into each other’s eyes for the duration of 4 minutes. The video demonstrates how looking into another’s eyes, uninterruptedly, and with no distraction, facilitates instant connection.
When watching the video, one can see that the pairs go through phases:
1. At first they are incredibly uncomfortable, they feel awkward and their body language are very guarded.
2. Then they start settling down – it is as if they let go a little. And they physically start to open up. Their body language become gentler, and they are visibly more at ease.
3. And then as the four minutes slowly come to an end, they clearly fall into a deep connection. Some of the pairs even move closer, they become tactile and they willingly enter each other’s space.
When watching the video, it is apparent that looking into each other’s eyes like that, hold the potential to activate connection.
***
Have you ever tried it before?
I want to encourage you to do so, as it can initiate a bond between you and the person you share that space with. A deep bond.
***
This process ultimately awakens a closeness which already exists between us, but which under normal circumstances we fail to be aware of. Unfortunately, we not give each other the time of day to really, deeply look at each other, we merely rush past to the next superficial thing that demands our attention. We might even be going out, looking for pseudo important things to be busy with, as an excuse to not look into the other’s eyes. Or to not allow someone to see the truth in ours.
Yes, our eyes deeply speak our truth. At any given moment our eyes show whether we are happy, whether we are sad, whether we are angry. It shows whether we feel insecure or genuinely confident, whether we are hurt or deeply touched. It even shows whether we are lying or telling the truth. Our eyes are seen as windows into our souls. Our eyes shine light onto the space where we very carefully store our secrets, or our insecurities, our dreams and even our pasts. And yes it is scary to share that with others if you don’t even have the courage to face all of it yourself.
However, if we refrain from really looking into another’s eyes, we also miss out on the significance it brings. As when we look into another’s eyes, but really look into their eyes, we tend to see a new side of that person. We tend to see their humanness, their vulnerability, their insecurities, their hurt. We also see their strengths, their heart and their true intentions. By the nature of this realization we feel closer to them, we feel we know them better, we see where they are coming from and we stop judging them as harshly. And as a result we gain the courage to look at the things we have been hiding for so long, as now we do not feel we are dealing with them alone anymore.
In other words, this process can transform the initial fear of not wanting to share our secrets, or not wanting to see someone else’s hurt, into deep and authentic connection. And in the event that both people candidly engages in this connection, it may even allow for both people’s insecurities and hurt to be converted, or even their strengths and intentions to become alive.
So next time when you engage with someone, when you walk past a work colleague, or you tell a family member about your day, truly look into their eyes.
Maybe even engage in the 4 minute experiment yourself – be open to connection.