I met Tim at a mutual friend’s house warming party, and I immediately didn’t like him. He was friendly, but something about him put me ill at ease. That’s not an easy thing for me to acknowledge to myself (I’m supposed to be a paragon of non-judgement and connection, right!?). Forget being authentic in my communication about how I felt about Tim. I was stuck.
I spend a lot of time trying to “figure people out.” I love heart-centered connection which is why I spend my time facilitating and practicing authentic relating, but sometimes I just really want to know what makes someone tick, what their history is, what their hangs ups are. Sometimes I need to know to be a better coach for them, and sometimes I’m simply fascinated.
So I sat with the gross feeling about Tim, and continued to interact with him and the group we were with. Mid-munch on some ridiculously great humus, I caught myself in a pattern I hadn’t consciously recognized before:
I was trying to figure out what was wrong with Tim. The gears in my brain were diligently cranking away at the question I had asked myself without even realizing it:
“How can I justify my immediate dislike of this complete stranger?”
The epiphany hit me in the gut, and challenged my identity as an open, warm, and accepting person. I felt a heavy load on my heart, and a my belly ached like I was standing too close to the bass machine at a concert. I didn’t like it one bit.
And as swiftly as the realization came to me, the right question came to me as well, as if from outside my mind. The question I should’ve been asking all along, and the question I’ve been asking ever since that night at the party with Tim:
“What do I need to know to love this person more?”
That question has become my mantra for the year. When I meet someone new, even people who I immediately like, I want to know: How can I love this person more? What do I need to know that would make this person a hero in my eyes?
Everything changed after that question entered my mind. I took Tim aside and really listened to his story. I Heard about his struggles to fit in as a teenager. I felt him gush about a drum machine he’d recently been gifted, and saw the light in his eyes when he talked about his dog who was 15 years old and like a brother to him. I even found it in my heart to tell him what his story meant to me, and how I had judged him unfairly when I met him.
Tim is a warm and generous soul. He shifts around when he’s talking to me, and his eyes won’t stay still. I made a snap judgement about him, and then I spent the better part of the evening making him wrong for the story I made up in my head about him without even realizing it. I had spent my life playing out that pattern of disconnection and justification. It was a sad realization for me, but I thank my lucky stars I had it. All it took to break the spell was a simple mantra that has never failed me to this day:
“What do I need to know to love this person more?”