How To Know a Person: The Art of Seeing Others Deeply and Being Deeply Seen
I’m going to put the end of this book at the front and work backwards.
Real wisdom, Brooks argues, is not geography or facts — it’s insight into people. I find books like this, where the author has changed his mind, to be deeply fascinating. How an idea we so tightly held on to, once released, allows us to see the world through a new lens. A shift in perspective.
Don’t rob us of our contradictions. Personal and contextual over generalisation.
“One of the commonest and most generally accepted delusions is that every man can be qualified in some particular way — said to be kind, wicked, stupid, energetic, apathetic, and so on. People are not like that. We may say of a man that he is more often kind than cruel, more often wise than stupid, more often energetic than apathetic or vice versa; but it could never be true to say of one man that he is kind or wise, and of another that he is wicked or stupid. Yet we are always classifying mankind in this way.”
— Leo Tolstoy, Resurrection
We can grow by looking past our preconceptions and seeing as if for the first time.
How do you treat others? How do you make them feel?
Truly seeing another person is a moral act. Not a skill to be deployed. A way of being.
Accompaniment. We don’t need to validate people, solve their problems or fix them when we can walk with them.
Our compelling narrative. A separation of the objective layer — what actually occurred — from the subjective layer — how the person interprets it, experiences it, perceives it. It’s never what happened. It’s what we do with what’s happened. That’s the interesting piece.
Three questions:
- How do you see this situation?
- What does this look like from where you’re standing?
- What experiences and beliefs cause you to see it this way?
To know someone is to know their social location — ideology, class, race, faith, identity. I am human, and nothing human is alien to me.
Consider the context of the conversation — what is assumed and what is expected, and of course, the status of the individuals, the power dynamic.
What is said. What is unsaid. Some of which is seen, some of which is unseen, yet sensed.
Respect is like air. If it’s present no one notices. If it’s not, it’s all we think about.
When it goes south, refocus on the disputable point. Are we being open, curious and willing to learn? How do we want to be with each other?
If emotions are present — stay there, don’t go for logic. Explore the emotions.
Them/us, win/lose. This is a bad place to be. The illusion of agreement is also critical. Our perception of the world is not how it is, but how it is for us.
What do our physical, emotional, financial and social capabilities allow us to do in this situation? How do I fit into this situation? What can I do here? What possibilities does this situation afford? How do you see this?
Exercises in how to know someone.
This is your life — written through the eyes of your partner. Their challenges and how they overcame them.
Uncovering values:
- In our family, the one thing you must never do is…
- In our family, the one thing you must do above all else is…
Filling in the calendar — what was year 6 like in school, for example?
What is culture? A shared symbolic landscape that we use to construct our reality. We are, Brooks argues, an expression of our history.
Insights into people — that’s wisdom. A wise person comes up with a way of helping you see yourself, your past, and the world around you in a different way. Perspective.
Receptivity. To receive what you are giving them. The ability to create a space for us to wrestle with the ambiguities and contradictions that exist in our lives. To offer an atmosphere of hospitality, an acceptance of weakness, in order to confront ourselves. To show your true self. To be encouraged to be honest with yourself.
Every epistemology implies an ethic. Every way of knowing is a way of living. Your epistemology — how you determine truth — dictates your ethic — how you act in the world — because what you believe to be real and valid directly shapes what you prioritise, how you treat others, and the moral weight you assign to your actions.
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