By Lyndsay Wilson –
If you wanted to, you could wake up tomorrow and do something good for yourself – quit smoking, call your mom, eat something healthy for lunch. You could decide that come Monday, you’re signing up at the gym and taking up weight training, or doing an online course to improve some skill or other, or buying a new time management app for your phone so you can stop dawdling in the mornings before work. And it will most likely help.
But, without sounding like an infomercial, there is one single habit, one thing that you can do right now, and maybe every day for the rest of your life, that will vastly improve your life more than any of these things. It has nothing to do with setting goals or connecting with your spiritual side. It’s not about giving yourself a makeover or reading a book or buying some gadget. In fact, if I had only 5 seconds to give somebody the single best piece of advice I can think of, this would be it: connect.
That’s it. Connect, specifically, to other human beings. How? I don’t mean being more sociable or surface things like giving compliments and being good at conversations etc. I mean really, truly connecting.
How do you know when you have connected with someone? You will probably recognize the feeling because I am sure you have felt it before – often, it starts with eye contact. For a brief flash, you feel as if you and another person really know each other, as if you have a deep and simultaneously light affinity with them. It’s a joyful, bright moment. Whether you’re old friends or whether you simply smile at the cashier at the shop, you feel as if you “had something”. It makes you smile and feel warm and optimistic. Perhaps you shared a joke, or a kind word, or bonded over a brief moment that you shared. For that moment, all the differences between you and that person melted away and no longer seemed relevant. It’s difficult to explain, but you know it when you feel it – something in you recognizes something in them.
That brief spark may flicker out and disappear, but the feeling it leaves you with can linger for a long while after. Moments like these can brighten our days, turn around our moods. It’s why flirting feels good, why we feel better after someone has really, truly heard and understood us. It’s what makes some friends closer than others, what makes us feel like we’ve “clicked” with someone.
I believe this, more than anything else, is one way we can actively enrich our lives every day. No new skills are required, no real effort. When we connect with others we feel appreciated and in turn generous ourselves. For that moment, we know we are not alone in the world, and not alone in our experiences.
It bolsters our self esteem and makes us less judgmental. When we see others and look deeply into their humanity, we see our own, and the feeling is often more valuable than any amount of therapy or meditation or prayer. Humans are social creatures, and are validated in our lives through one another. No matter how well developed we may become as individuals, it’s only in connection with others that we get a deeper sense of our place in the world.
This one simple habit can change your life, and that’s no exaggeration.
Deliberately seek to engineer these moments for yourself. Be genuine in your interactions. Look people in the eye. Try, when you do, to really see them. Smile. Be warm. Open yourself to others, and have the faith that they will open themselves to you in return. Your relationships will run more smoothly, your work engagements will be less hostile and more authentic, even the slightest interaction with another person on the street promises to be something special.
Practice every day to become an expert at connection. Look past the details of the person’s age, gender, social status and all the rest, and into their essence as the human being they are. You will realize that a lot of what you think is important actually isn’t. That many of the behaviours people engage in with every second of their lives are really elaborate ways to recreate that magic connection.
If you can achieve this special moment with another person each day, I promise you will notice something radical shifting in your life. And even if you don’t manage it every day, the mere effort to put yourself out there with an open heart and mind will make you receptive to all sorts of new and enriching experiences.
Lyndsay Wilson
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