How to See

Much of my job is to observe, to see. As a consultant, coach, and facilitator, people pay me to see what they may not, to help them navigate through challenges differently, to move a group forward in new directions.

I was feeling pretty good about this role, until I read a quote by Mark Nepo: “Are you teaching those around you how to see or to see what you see?”

Ugh. I wish I knew this idea when I was a manager. When I was supervising young staff, I thought my job as a leader was to show them the way. They would come into my office with their latest operational challenge, and I would help them see a path forward. But instead of helping them to see what I saw, what if I instead showed them how to see for themselves?

Back when my son was young, I thought it was my job to teach him the ways of the world. Dear Duncan: Welcome to the planet. This works this way, and that works that way. I was zeroed in on teaching him the values and principles of being a human being that I thought were right. But now that he is 23, I recognize that as much as I tried otherwise, he is his own person with his own ideas that are sometimes diametrically opposed to how I see things.

When he was 15, he and I were in the driveway once unloading a trailer. He was grumbling about helping and suddenly grabbed a loose bungee cord and started whipping it around in the air.

Phooom phoom phooom, giant circles with his arm.

“Hey,” I had said, backing away, “I don’t think that’s very smart.”

I distinctly remember from the First Aid manual a disturbing photograph of a hand with a fish hook caught in its fleshy palm.

Phoooom phooom phoooom. He looked toward me, puzzled.

“You could take your eye out,” I pointed out, hooking my finger toward my cheek to demonstrate. “I don’t think that’s a smart thing to do,” I said again.

“Well,” he said, phoom phoooom phooming again, “We think different things.”

Ha! Didn’t I know it.

He saw the world differently. A bungee cord was not for strapping things down—it was about fun.

That was the beginning of the upending of all my ideas about teaching my child to see what I see. So what does it look like to truly teach others how to see?

One way is to play with perspectives. We might see the world in a particular way and think that’s the only way there is. But when I’m coaching, I challenge clients to consider: what is another perspective on this that is also true? And another? And another? Playing with different perspectives opens different paths forward.

For example, a client was describing how she can’t leave her toxic work environment because she is the sole breadwinner in her house. Her steady paycheck is giving them security. But meanwhile, her workplace was becoming more and more dysfunctional and unhealthy. As she unwound what being in that environment meant to her, she realized that the toxic environment could be her least secure path forward.

Another way to help others see is through visioning. What do you want to create? What do you envision for your future? What does your organization see as possible 10 years down the road for your community? What can you imagine that is not real yet? That’s another way to teach people how to see.

Our personal or organizational values can serve as another set of bifocals to help us see. They can help guide our decisions, help us take action, or help us be in alignment with who we are. They can help us see where we are living—or perhaps, where we are not.

Back to my kid: Now that he’s older and there is not so much pressure on getting it right in raising him, I can loosen my grip. He’s the Millennial, the Gen Z. That generation came in cable ready. They have some things to teach us about how to see. As for me, I can’t wait to see what that is.