David’s Reviews > How to Know a Person: The Art of Seeing Others Deeply and Being Deeply Seen > Status Update

Looking at "life tasks," ie how are we trying to focus our efforts as we move through life? Such as Integrity vs Despair, Generative, Career Consolidation, Interpersonal, Imperial.

This was ch 13, about personality - "what energy do you bring into the room?" Started with GW Bush and extroversion, described various other personality types from the Big Five traits (and dissed Myers-Briggs as having "no scientific validity.").

How are we shaped by our sufferings?
In this book's form of using the Illuminator model, we focus on seeing the suffering and needs of others, eg Phil Connors has discovered the needs of most of the people around him so he must have seen them via some conversations we don't see onscreen.

Looking at empathy skills, and how people are affected by their experiences as infants and toddlers. Especially appreciated the statements about anger on p141.

Ch 7 "The Right Questions"
Too many good examples to recall of open-ended or detail questions to give people permission to talk about themselves (ex: tell about the last time you grocery shopped after 11 pm). Interesting point near the end about how people get more pleasure from talking about themselves than from having money.

Ch 6 "Good Talks"
Good ideas about how to improve conversations, including pointing out things we think are making us good conversationalists that aren't, like telling unrequested stories or jokes (ouch). My takeaway is it's mostly about focusing on the other, trying to understand their experience.

"What is a person?" chapter 5. Moving story of vacationers experiencing a tsunami and supporting each other and others they'd just met in the aftermath, which allowed one (at least) to step out of his own head and into the minds of others and connect with them in ways he hadn't before.

Accompaniment. "90% of life is just going about your business.... You're just doing stuff together...." p. 45

Qualities of accompaniment:
patience (trust is built slowly);
playfulness (play isn't an activity; it's a state of mind);
other-centeredness (when you're accompanying someone, you're signing on to the other person's plan - think of pianist with singer);
presence (literally showing up).

Illumination. "A person looking for beauty is likely to find wonders, while a person looking for threats will find danger." P. 30.

"I ask you to assume that the person in front of you [has] ...infinite value and dignity." P. 31

Another chapter with a list of features we may want to emulate: tenderness, receptivity, active curiosity, affection, generosity, holistic attitude.