Societal Issues Targeted:
- Promoting human connection and understanding
- Creating world peace through greater connection
Everything I know about life and the universe is held inside of me. There is more, certainly, but I haven’t yet understood it, and so the entire universe I know is inside of me. When we look into the eyes of another, we are gazing into another’s entire universe.
– Public Happiness Andy
Intro
This gathering invites you to experience the magic of eye contact—a simple yet powerful act that dissolves barriers and unites us in our shared humanity. As you look into another’s eyes, you’ll find that the differences—race, age, gender, social status—fade away, revealing our shared journey in life. It’s a reminder that beneath the surface, we are all remarkably similar, navigating the same beautiful and complex world.
Background
The act of sharing eye contact as a means of deepening human connection has roots in ancient traditions and spiritual practices. Across various cultures, prolonged eye contact has been used in meditation, rituals, and social bonding exercises. In the modern era, the concept of intentional eye contact as an art form was popularized by Marina Abramović, a performance artist known for exploring human vulnerability and connection. in her 2010 piece, The Artist Is Present, at the Museum of Modern Art in New York she sat silently inviting strangers to share eye contact with her, to ‘create a profound, wordless dialogue’.
With special thanks to our Australian friend Peter Sharp of The Liberators International, who popularised this as a Public Happiness Activity anyone can do to promote and explore human connection. Pete’s World’s Biggest Eye Contact Experiment event brought together more than 90,000 people in more than 137 cities across 39 countries in 2015, encouraging them to pause, connect, and share a moment of silent understanding.
Their efforts have turned sharing one minute of eye contact in public into a simple yet powerful tool for fostering empathy and unity in an increasingly disconnected world.
Benefits
Studies show that eye contact brings forth positive effects in an individual’s cognitive processing. Scientists have postulated that eye contact initiates a heightened processing of stimuli in relation with the self, and that this leads to the enhancement of self-awareness, memory effects, activation of pro-social behaviour, and positive appraisals of others.
What Do I Need?
- A welcoming sign to invite people passing to share this unique experience with you (see examples).
- Comfortable seating—cushions, pillows, or a yoga mat will do!
- Optional: Soothing music to set the mood.
- A timer, so you can be fully present until the buzzer goes (phone timers work just fine).
Wet Weather Plan:
- Bring an umbrella
- Cushions won’t be needed! Standing together under an umbrella works equally as well.
How?
- Create welcoming signs to invite passers-by to sit with you and share one minute of eye contact.
- Set up a comfortable spot with seating options, slightly to the side of a place with good foot traffic passing-by.
- Wait patiently and invite those who show interest. Some may be curious but hesitant.
- Use a timer to ensure you can be totally focused on the eyes of your partner, and not wondering about the time. Having security in an agreed end point ensures the interaction is comfortable for both parties, as many people do find the interaction emotional.
- Calmly look into the eyes of the other person in front of you. Don’t expect anything, just relax and see what comes.
Pro-Tips:
- Use the opportunity to reflect internally upon yourself and whether people’s age, gender, and other determining factors would cause you to act a certain way around them. Should it?
- Consider the other person and reflect on what you can read about their character from their eyes.
- Imagine them as a young child or when they are elderly. The eyes are the same looking out on the world.
- Reflect on humanity and life itself.
- Try to quiet your mind.
- Match their breathing.
- Focus on kind wishes for the person you’re engaging with. Try to project these warm thoughts and feelings through your gaze. Afterward, consider sharing your experience with them and ask if they noticed a change in your expression when you held caring intentions.
- Expect to be a little tired by the end of the event. We often make plans for socialising after but everyone usually finds they are pleasantly exhausted from the intense eye contact shared during the gathering, so the socialising events are short.
Resources
- Example signs
- Countdown photos (thanks to Linda Donagan from Kind Ireland)
- Calming Background music
- How-to posters/guides
Legal Stuff (how it worked out for us)
It’s fairly normal that you might find yourself having a chat with the police. In the UK, you can apply for a free Temporary Events Notice, but personally, I think the right for the public to gather in a public space and enjoy a positive activity is (and certainly should be) a protected human right.