The Art of Seeing — Beneath The Surface
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Let me ask you something. When was the last time you felt truly seen? I'm not talking about surface level scene that's about admiring someone or complimenting someone. I'm talking about the kind of scene that goes beneath the surface where someone sees you, they feel you, they recognize your depth, your pain, your possibility. They're not looking through you or past you. They are with you. And as we know, that feeling is rare. But I believe that feeling

is one of the deepest human needs we all carry. To feel seen, and in the world today, that has become a forgotten language, but it may be the most important language we ever learn to speak, because attention transforms people. So today's episode is about the lost art of seeing and why it matters.

We're also going to discuss how it connects to leadership, parenting, and love, and how to begin practicing it everywhere because no one is truly invisible. We've just stopped looking. So it's time to dive in where we see each other and give each one the deepest gift we can.

Welcome to Beneath the Surface. I'm Sean Delaney. This series is a space where I bring you the ideas I'm sitting with most, the ones I can't let go of, the ones I return to again and again in my own life, and the ones that show up constantly in the conversations behind closed doors with high performers, creatives, leaders, and people who are on the path like you, not just to do more, but to feel more alive while doing it. These episodes aren't about giving you another strategy or chasing another version of success.

They're about going a level deeper, getting quiet enough to hear what's underneath the noise and remembering what actually matters. So if you're looking for a place to slow down, think deeply and reconnect to the part of you that most of the world forgets to speak to, you're in the right place. Let's begin. Let's go beneath the surface. Here's this truth we rarely think about, that no matter how successful you've become, no matter what you've accomplished, what you've done, no matter how far you've traveled,

At your core, there is a deep ache that you want to be seen. You want to be acknowledged. Not for your resume or your image, but for your heart, for your humanness, for what Jardine called and referred to as the incommunicable singularity that each of us possess. That thing that's deep inside where we feel we are connected to someone else. That is one of the most important things in our lives. The ability to see and be seen.

When is the last time you felt that? When is the last time you gave someone else the gift of being seen like that? Because this is one of the strongest forces in the world. It's at the core we're all searching for, a place where we belong, a place where we matter, a place where we are seen. And there is a huge difference between being looked at and being seen. And I hope at the end of this conversation, we can start changing the way that most of us are seeing. And just think for a moment.

What that looks like on the other end when we're not seeing people, you know, the pain of being unseen, not misunderstood, not rejected, but just not acknowledged, overlooked, dismissed, made to feel like you don't really matter, made to feel like you don't really matter, like you're invisible. And too often today, the pain most people are feeling doesn't come from cruelty. It comes from indifference, from distraction, from absence.

David Brooks wrote, no crueler punishment can be devised than to not see someone, to render them unimportant or invisible. Man, that line hits hard because most of us have felt that.

We've been in the room and just still feel completely and utterly alone. It's those times when we're speaking, but you know no one's listening, no one is hearing. It's when we've shown up and been met with those blank stares. And that is when invisibility starts to settle in. You begin to shrink, to silence parts of yourself, to wonder if who you are is not enough. And so what do you do?

You begin to compensate. You armor up. You know, you put on roles instead of expressing who you are. That's what being unseen does to the soul. And whether we realize it or not, we all have a hand in this dynamic every single day. And I want to bring to light more of what David Brooks wrote. And he describes two types of people in the world. You have diminishers and you have illuminators.

Diminishers are those people that make you feel small. And this isn't always intentional. They might just do it through distraction, through busyness. They don't make room, essentially, for other people's light. They don't make room for other people's light. I'm sure you know exactly who those people are in your life. But Brooks also describes illuminators that do something different.

They don't try to impress you. They just try to see you. They try to see you. They shine brightness on people. And in doing so, what ends up happening? They make people feel bigger, deeper, more human. When you're with an illuminator, you know it, right? You find yourself standing a little bit taller. You seem more relaxed. You're speaking a little freer. You feel more like you because illuminators create space for your voice, for your pain, even for your potential, even more.

If you've forgotten how to see yourself, they do a great job of doing that. And here's the thing. I don't want you to think this is some personality trait. It's not reserved for extroverts or coaches or empaths. It's about presence. It's about who you choose to be when another human being is in front of you. Let me say that again. It's about who you choose to be when another human being is in front of you.

So ask yourself, right now in your life, are you an illuminator or a diminisher? How are people walking away from time with you? Think about how this shows up in your own life. I want you thinking about what is it like for someone when they walk away from time with you? Do they feel more seen or are they small? Do they feel more lit up or overlooked?

I'm not doing this as a guilt trip. It's a wake-up call for all of us because the world doesn't need more diminishers. It needs more people willing to witness each other, to name what's good in someone else right before it disappears, before they become invisible, both to the world and to themselves. This is a special kind of attention. The kind of attention that says, I'm not here to fix you. I'm here to honor you. Makes me think of the yogi term namaste.

I bow to the divine in you. That's how we heal people. That's how we build trust. That's how we become the kind of person that others feel safe around. And when they feel safe, they start to grow. They start to expand. So who are you being today? Because in every interaction you have, you are either diminishing the light or you're helping it shine. Seeing someone. Seeing someone.

That is so critical. It is an art form. This type of seeing is alchemical. It transforms people. It bursts aliveness. It makes me think of the line by Simone Weil in her wisdom. She wrote, attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity.

She captures the essence of what it means to be human. To give someone your full, undivided attention is to give them love in its purest form. But this kind of seeing, this art of attention, it doesn't come easily, especially in our distracted, looking down world. It requires us to slow down, to put down the phones, to look up and out beyond ourselves and open our hearts to the presence of others.

It makes me think of this great Zulu greeting. It's called Sawubona. Now, it's a greeting, but it's not your typical hello.

It really is a powerful acknowledgement of another person's humanity. So when you say sawubona, you're essentially saying, we see you. We see you. Not just one person seeing another, but the entire ancestral line seeing you as well. It's not seeing with a physical eye. No, not at all. It is seeing their entire presence. When you see someone's entire presence,

That brings a largeness to that other person's being all of a sudden you're acknowledging their past their present their future and that Becomes an invitation to connect at a soul level where you are acknowledging the inherent dignity and worth of each Individual how many of us when we see someone or say hello or greet them? Put that level of heart into it. But why wouldn't we and believe me? I'm just as guilty as

You know, I'll blow by people. I won't acknowledge them correctly. But just think for a second, how amazing would that feel? And does it feel when people greet you with that level of warmth, with that level of heart? It makes me think of the line by Morikami when he says, what happens when people open their hearts? They get better. They get better. When you open your heart, other people get better. You get better.

And along the lines of this, someone who's had a profound impact on me and would have enjoyed the reading of Sawabona was Carl Rogers. Carl Rogers was one of the founders of the humanistic psychology and one of the most influential psychologists of all time.

Now, Roger's work truly transformed people, but he had such a simple practice in his belief, which I'm in agreement with was this. Humans, they require acceptance. And when they're given acceptance, they move towards self-actualization. Essentially, when someone is seen, truly seen, and a space is created for them just to be, what happens?

they grow. They have a natural inclination towards self-actualization. Essentially, when we create the soil around people, right, and give them a little sun, a little water, a little nutrients, they grow, they bloom. And in one of his books, A Way of Being, Rogers wrote this beautiful page that I'm going to share with you now. It's a little bit long, but I hope it hits you the way it hits me. And he wrote this.

Almost always when a person realizes he has been deeply heard, his eyes moisten. Almost always when a person realizes he has been deeply heard, his eyes moisten. I think in some real sense he is weeping for joy. It is as though he were saying, thank God somebody heard me. Someone knows what it's like to be me.

In such moments, I have had the fantasy of a prisoner in a dungeon tapping out day after day a Morse code message. Does anybody hear me? Is anybody there? And finally, one day, he hears some faint tappings which spell out, yes. By that one simple response, he is released from his loneliness. He has become a human being again.

There are many, many people living in private dungeons today, people who give no evidence of it whatsoever on the outside, where you have to listen very sharply to hear the faint messages from the dungeon. Let that just marinate in your soul for a second. So are we listening deeply to that faint Morse code message? Everyone, and I mean everyone, is tapping out in hopes that someone hears it.

It makes me think of the Jose Ortega Gassiet line. The point is not to see through one another, but to see into one another. Not to see through, but to see into one another. This is the type of seeing I'm talking about. This is the type of seeing, the type of being I invite you to begin taking part in. Now I had a really transformative experience a few years ago that to me brings this idea and this powerful message to light.

So I went to go see someone for the last time. They were all in their deathbed. They'd been battling dementia and Alzheimer's for years. And they'd essentially been incommunicable for years. The nurses hadn't seen them really react to any type of conversation or human in a while. And I just got the sense that people had almost given up on this person. They stopped seeing this person because they thought they couldn't be seen.

But for a few hours, the final few hours I was going to spend time with this person, all I did was try to make them feel seen, to hold them, to let them know, even if they couldn't sense it, that there was another human here for them. And you might wonder what happened. What happened was this. The person who had been described when I walked in that day as being in a vegetative state all of a sudden came to life.

the flower started to bloom. I'm not saying we had a fluid conversation, but she started to hum her favorite songs. She started to laugh. She started bringing up memories and stories that she loved. I saw a smile for over an hour on this woman's face. I witnessed what seeing someone can do. Seeing someone is one of the greatest alchemies there are. Now, serendipitously, this morning, I came across this passage from Maria Popova, and she wrote this.

Narrow the aperture of your attention enough to take in any one thing fully, and it becomes a portal to everything. Anneal that attention enough so that you see whatever and whoever is before you free from expectation, unfiltered through your fantasies or needs, and it becomes love.

Come to see anything or anyone this clearly, a falcon or a mountain or a patch of moss, and you will find yourself loving the world more deeply. I have felt that. Anytime I place my attention fully, I find a deeper love for the world coming to life. Ecstasy is attention at its fullest.

It makes me think of this wonderful little children's book by Komi Yamada called Noticing. The whole thing is beautiful, but there's a particular line I love. And Kobe wrote this, the miraculous is everywhere and in everything waiting for us to notice it, waiting for us to appreciate it, waiting for us to love it. Think about how much is just waiting for us.

What would your closest relationships look like if you started to reach out to meet this waiting? Because what happens when you see someone clearly without judgment? You start to fall in love with their humanity. You begin to witness the complexity, the fragility, the wonder of being alive. And you notice how everyone, everyone is going through the same silent struggles. And this type of witnessing allows acceptance. And from acceptance, what happens?

growth takes place. And then something else happens. The more deeply you see someone, the more deeply you fall in love with the world. It opens you. It changes the way you move through the day. Suddenly, you start to slow down. You're not rushing past people. You're not treating conversations as transactions. Finally, you're present. And presence is what transforms.

That's the power of attention. This isn't just about intimate relationships either. This extends beyond those types of relationships into our work life. I'll bring another line by David Brooks. He said, there is one skill that lies at the heart of any healthy person, family, school, community, organization, or society.

It's this, the ability to see someone else deeply and make them feel seen, to accurately know another person, to let them feel valued, heard, and understood. So if you are a leader, if you want your team, your business, your community to be healthy and grow, you need to see them. You need to let them feel valued, heard, and understood. We can go back to another great business titan, Mary Kay Ash.

What did she say? She says everyone has an invisible sign hanging from their neck saying, make me feel important. And though we may not see these signs, they are there hanging from every person's heart. And each sign might carry a slightly different message, you know, a silent plea, hear me, listen to me, be here for me. At the bottom, they are all saying, see me.

This isn't rocket science, but we just overlook it. We push people, we press them, thinking that if we just add more pressure, we're going to get more out of them, right? But I have found the opposite to be true. Can we see them? And in that seeing, they come alive. It makes me think of one of my favorite people on the planet. His name is Benjamin Zander. He's the conductor, and he's the current director of the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra.

Xander has a wonderful TED talk. I recommend you go in to watch. 25 million people have done it. I also featured him on What Got You There.

And Zander mentions this. He says, when I was 45 years old, I'd been conducting for 20 years, and suddenly I had the realization for the first time that the conductor of an orchestra doesn't make a sound. You know, he's the one who gets all the recognition, who's on the cover of the CD. But the conductor doesn't actually make a sound. He depends for his power on his ability to make other people powerful.

And this is when Ben had his epiphany and he realized that his job was to awaken possibility in other people. And then he said, now the real question becomes, was I doing it? And do you know how you find out if you're awakening possibility in other people? You look in their eyes and if their eyes are shining, you know you're doing it. And if the eyes are not shining, you get to ask the question. And this is the question.

Who am I being that my players' eyes are not shining? What type of parent am I being that my children's eyes are not shining? What type of leader am I being that my team's eyes are not shining? You can apply this anywhere. Are you awakening the possibility in other people by letting them be seen? This is a deep attunement with other people. It makes me think of one of the most impactful stories I've ever heard from Benjamin.

Now he talks about up in Boston at the Holocaust Memorial at Quincy Market, there's a number of pillars and they tell different tales from the Holocaust. And on one of the pillars, there's a story about a girl named Ilza. Now Ilza has a childhood friend named Gerda. Now they're in Auschwitz together. And when Ilza was about six years old, she found a single raspberry in the middle of the concentration camp.

and Ilse wrapped this up in a leaf. She protected it in her pocket and carried it around all day. And that evening, with her eyes shining in happiness as Xander describes it, she presented that single raspberry to her friend Gerda on a leaf. "Imagine a world," Gerda writes, "in which your entire possession is one raspberry and you give it to your friend." That type of story never comes to life unless someone is thinking so deeply

about the other person. So you might be wondering, how do we develop and cultivate this instinct to truly see someone, right? To start helping and foster their natural growth. And I'll be honest, it takes discipline, especially in today's world. And the first thing to do this

is presence. And I'm not just talking about physical presence. When I say presence, I mean emotional, mental, energetic presence, being here, not elsewhere, not checking your phone, not planning what you're going to do next, but choosing to arrive in this moment with another person. And then presence becomes a doorway. I always tell my clients, all positive changes come downstream of presence because nothing meaningful happens without presence.

Presence, but presence alone is not enough for this. We also need attunement. Attunement.

is about tuning into the emotional landscape of another person. When I say emotional landscape, I don't just mean their words, but their tone, their pauses, their body language. It is a form of deep listening. Attunement cannot rush. It doesn't push for resolution. It is just patient, patient enough to pick up on what other people might be feeling, even if they don't know how to say it yet. And when we're doing this, the next step, and maybe most importantly,

is self-forgetfulness. Seeing requires self-forgetfulness. That means letting go of your need to be the expert, the need to be right, the need to be impressive, the need to be helpful. Helen Keller said it best, there is joy in self-forgetfulness. The light in others' eyes, my son. The music in other ears, my symphony. The smile on others' lips, my happiness.

When you stop trying to be the center, you create space for others to come alive in your presence. And there, oh, there is real joy in that. Another essential part of seeing is what I call generous stillness.

And this is the part a lot of us struggle with. This is the discipline of not needing to interrupt, not needing to fill the silence, not rushing to fix what feels uncomfortable. Generous stillness is the willingness to sit someone exactly where they are and then to hold space without trying to hijack it. Sometimes the most loving thing you can say is nothing, but let your whole presence say, I'm with you. Take your time. I'm going nowhere.

That is how we start seeing people. But what has to happen for all of those things to transpire? Well, I want to share a piece that Peter Kaufman articulated so simply and so powerfully. And those who don't know Peter Kaufman, Peter is the CEO of the company Glenair. He was a dear friend of Charlie Munger and Warren Buffett. And Charlie Munger believed Peter is one of the best CEOs.

And this is what he said. He said, all you have to do if you want everything in life from everybody else is first pay attention, listen to them, show them respect, give them meaning, satisfaction, and fulfillment. Convey to them that they matter to you and show you love them. But you have to go first.

And what are you going to get back? Mirrored reciprocation. See how we tie all this together? The world's so damn simple. It's not complicated at all. Every person on this planet is looking for the same thing. Now why is it that we don't act on these very simple things? So Peter said...

Go first. That's it. Go first. You become the one who pauses, the one who looks up, the one who listens without trying to fix, the one who sees the sacredness in other people, even if they don't see it in themselves. And when you do that, you invite others in.

to do the same, you start a ripple effect. You start changing rooms by the way you enter them. You start changing lives of the people because of how you see them, how you show up for them. This is not some strategy. This is not manipulation. This is not a technique. This is humanity at its core. And it's the beginning of everything good.

So as you move through the rest of the day, just pause. Slow down enough to look again at the barista, at the colleague, at your children, at your partner, at the stranger sitting in silence and offer them this. I see you. You matter. You belong.

And when you do that, you will be amazed at what awakens in people when they feel truly seen. And maybe even more amazing is what will awaken in you. Because every time you see someone clearly, you start falling in love with the world again. Not the curated version, but the raw, honest, fragile, beautiful world that exists right here beneath the surface. Because in the end, the deepest gift you can give someone isn't advice, isn't help or even love.

It's to look them in the eye without distraction or agenda and let your whole presence say, I see you. Until next time. If this episode resonated with you, if it stirred something, opened something up, or even challenged something, I'd love to hear about it. You can connect with me directly at whatgotyouthere.com. That's where you'll find my writing, my books, more about my executive coaching work I do with the people who want to live and lead from a deeper place.

And if this episode made you think of someone, a friend, a teammate, a partner, someone who's been in the grind and might need to hear this, send it to them. Because sometimes all it takes is a single conversation to shift the direction we're heading in. Again, it's whatgotyouthere.com. You can reach out, learn more, or just say hi. I always love hearing from people walking this path. Thanks for listening, and until next time.