Knowing People—Incorporating Empathy into Our Interactions

I do not ask the wounded person how he feels,

I myself become the wounded person.

—Walt Whitman

How much time do you spend getting to know people? Not just what they did over the weekend and how their kids are doing, but really trying to get a feel for who they truly are and what drives them. Most interactions take place on a very surface level. We engage in small talk or interact on the basis of what we’re intending to accomplish, and the rest is often just minimal politeness. There’s nothing wrong with a pleasant passing of the time, but if we become closer with people, we might have deeper conversations and get to know them better. We can learn to guide our interactions based on that knowledge and those insights. However, unless we make a consistent effort to get to know people and incorporate that knowledge into our interactions with them, we aren’t taking advantage of opportunities for much more meaningful and rewarding relationships.

Seeing people underneath the surface

The way we converse with people often follows regular patterns. We might talk to our co-workers about sports, movies, or the weather, or we might talk about things that are frustrating or irritating us. When we’re at home with our families, we might talk about how our days went, our successes and failures, our challenges, or things we’re looking forward to. Our interactions with our friends may follow similar patterns. There’s nothing wrong with these kinds of interactions. They keep us connected as far as they go. Sometimes we may have heart-to-heart conversations where we dig deeper and talk about things that are upsetting us, scaring us, or making us anxious. If we’re lucky, we have some people in our lives who we connect with on a deeper level. But even in these relationships, we may not get beyond the issue at hand. To get to know people intimately, it’s important to try to look beyond the topics of the conversations and examine the people behind the stories—to get to know the identities of people at their core. The difference between having a conversation with someone (even a meaningful one) and getting to know them deeply is a matter of being open, observing, listening, reflecting, and remembering. It means developing an intimate knowledge of a person and recalling that knowledge each time we interact. Of course, we won’t do this all the time or with everyone, but we can incorporate aspects of this approach into all of our interactions.

How to get to know people

Getting to know someone deeply isn’t complicated, but it also isn’t easy. It requires focus, insight, and energy. It requires us to engage with people intentionally and remember the details of those engagements. It requires us to be fully present when we’re with people and be completely focused on the interaction. Some of the specific steps in getting to know someone better include the following:

• Be open. We all have ideas in our minds about who people are. To really get to know someone, we must be open to changes in our preconceived notions of what makes people tick. We must remove our own prejudices and filters and search for who people are deep down. We must also wipe the slate clean—we must forget about any conflicts or awkwardness we have had with the person in the past and be present in the moment.
• Observe. People change from moment to moment depending on what’s happening and what they’re thinking about. Some of these changes are drastic and some are subtle, but we can learn to recognize them and what they are telling us. They include changes in people’s moods, in their energy level, and in the rate of their breathing and pulse. Also take note of their posture—are they straight-backed with their head held high, or are they slumped down with a bowed head? Are they leaning back with arms crossed, or are they leaning forward in attention and interest? All of these send signals about what people are thinking and feeling.
• Listen. What people say (and what they don’t say) tells you a lot about their passions, their self-confidence, and their worldview. Pay attention to the words they use and how they start their sentences (e.g. “I think that…” versus “Here’s the deal…”). Pay attention to what they focus on and what they let pass by as indications of what they care about.
• Reflect. Once the interaction is over, take some time to think it through and reflect on the meaning behind the different elements. What may not have occurred to you in the conversation may become clear when you have time to think it through. What are the key points or messages you can take away from the interaction? What did you learn about the person?
• Remember. Finally, don’t lose all of these great insights. As you learn more and more about a person, take the time to remember them or write them down. Knowing someone can build over time, but it requires us to remember what we’ve learned from interaction to interaction, especially if it’s a person you don’t see that often. Don’t start from scratch each time you talk to someone.

Again, you won’t engage in these elements every time you talk to someone or with every person you talk to, but as you develop the habit of using these skills, it can be helpful to practice these steps with everyone you talk to. It’s also important to think about your approach. Build these elements into conversations naturally.

Getting out of your comfort zone

As I’m an introvert, this approach has been a particular challenge for me. Growing up, I never came by conversation easily, and even now, most conversations take me out of my comfort zone. But I’ve discovered that being out of my comfort zone is extremely rewarding. Always being comfortable having a conversation doesn’t mean that ability necessarily translates to meaningful interactions. Some good conversationalists can hold our attention, make us feel at ease, and make us laugh but never get too far under the surface of who we are. Others try to make the conversation meaningful and try to get to know the person they’re talking to, even if the conversation isn’t smooth or easy. Additionally, it’s important to be sensitive to the level of comfort of the person you’re talking to—if you’re always outside of your comfort zone with people, it may be uncomfortable for them, too. If someone is not comfortable talking to you, you are not very likely to get to know them well.

We can be thinking about getting to know the person we’re talking to, even when the conversation is all business or “just” small talk. If we develop these skills as habits, they will come naturally.

Take the time to really get to know the people in your life. There’s always more there than meets the eye.