How to Make Eye Contact

Celebrate our shared humanity with eye contact.

Eye contact can be scary. Looking directly into another person's eyes is an intimate, intense experience, even if it's just for a brief moment while walking down the street. Getting comfortable with making eye contact takes practice, but it is a skill worth cultivating. Eye contact can convey many messages. It can assure a friend that you are listening intently, show a colleague that you mean business, tell a stranger that you aware of their presence, encourage a salesperson to give you exceptional service or let your lover know that you're in the mood for romance. Follow these tips and soon you'll be making eye contact with ease.

Instructions

1. Believe in your worth. People often fail to make eye contact because they are overcome by an attack of shyness. And people are often overcome by an attack of shyness because they fail to fully absorb the truth of their intrinsic worth. You deserve to look up. You will not appear stupid. You will not be rejected. You are valuable and worthy just as you are in this moment. You are loved and supported in a deep, divine way.

2. Become aware. Another reason people fail to make eye contact is that they lack a basic awareness of their surroundings. Our modern world encourages us to be perennial multitaskers. We order coffee while talking on the phone, digging for change and mentally balancing our checkbooks. In the end we fail to notice the sweet barista smiling before us.

3. Sink into the moment. I teach an indoor fitness cycling class once a week. While teaching, I sometimes notice participants' eyes darting around the room, a telltale sign that they are not working to their potential. When this happens, I encourage my students to fix their gaze forward. Upon following this cue, students' shoulders relax and their pedal strokes gain power. By focusing their eyes, they focus their mind on the moment and their workouts become more efficient and ultimately more enjoyable. It works the same way with interpersonal relationships. By looking directly at the people you talk to, you ground yourself into the present. As a result, your interactions become more connected and fulfilling.

4. Start small. Begin by making extended eye contact with loved ones. When you are comfortable, begin to include coworkers and new acquaintances. Eventually you'll be confident enough to stare into the eyes of that beautiful stranger across the room.

5. Linger longer. Challenge yourself not to move your eyes away until the other person does.

6. If you get nervous, breath. Sometimes eye contact can be unnerving, but a simple deep breath can do wonders to calm your anxiety.

7. Keep perspective. Remember, you aren't doing anything life threatening. It's just eye contact! Nothing bad can come of it.

Tips & Warnings

• Use eye contact to connect, not to creep people out. Connecting is about meeting another person, not forcing your desires onto another person. If you notice that somebody is obviously uncomfortable with your intensity of eye contact, you may want to tone it down.