Stand up, Shake hands and say How do you do?

"Stand Up, Shake Hands and Say How Do You Do?  was a book I borrowed once from Shirley about having good manners but now I think that book was also about making people around you feel welcome. 

Today Daniel and I attended a meeting for the 12 step program on addition recovery sponsored by the Church. In case you hadn't heard, because it has been all over the news, The President of the Philippines is trying to combat drug dealers and he is getting to the root of the problem by asking all drug users to surrender or else they will be killed. Yes, that is an order! so the Government has asked our Church to help people addicted to drugs to help with our 12 step program similar to alcoholic announimous. 

In this historic meeting the trainer explained that the most important thing in those meetings is that people feel welcome. People not only need to feel welcome but also they need to be in an environment where they can be anonymous so they are asked to not say their full name. Only their first name as they introduce themselves. People will come into those meeting  to share their inner most feelings and they need to feel welcome and comfortable so they will keep coming to the meetings. 

He asked this question: How do you make someone feel welcome? Here is the answer: You first make eye contact, next you extend your hand to shake his or her hand and simple say 'hello, my name is (say your first name)" and then say: "how do you do?" 

That is all it takes to break the ice. 

Hw asked our group: " Have you ever been in a situation where you feel like you don’t know anyone in the room, or you feel like the odd person out in a situation, or you are simply the new person on the scene?" He continued... I know I have. As a child, our family moved a lot – and I mean a lot! While I was growing up my family moved 14 times.  I was constantly the new kid who knew no one. I still remember those feelings of being the new kid and the odd person out. It was scary and intimidating every time we moved to a new place.

I don’t think it was until I became an adult first starting in the business world that I discovered something incredible. I was at a business event where I literally knew no one in the room. I felt totally out of place and uncomfortable. In my head I was thinking that everyone in the room was probably staring at me thinking, “Who is this guy and why does he think he is welcome here?”

Then something amazing happened. A total stranger came up to me and smiled and put out their hand to shake my hand and said hello. It was as if this person was a superhero sent there to save me from my feelings of absolute awkwardness. The person sat and talked to me for a minute or two and then moved on to say hi to the next person. I sat there for a moment and thought, “Wow! That was awesome of that person!” I wasn't bothered that they were talking to me. I was unbelievably grateful to them!

And there it was – the light went on in my head and I realized one of the most important lessons of my life: No one is ever going to be offended by having a stranger say hello to them. In fact, they will be grateful! Because nine times out of 10 everyone else in the room is feeling as awkward and uncomfortable as you are. Everyone wants to feel accepted and acknowledged, just like you do – so why not be the one to walk up to others and simply say hello. That is all it takes. Walk up to strangers in the room, make eye contact, smile, and just say hello. I promise you will change their world when you do that, just like the person in that meeting changed my world that day. From that day forward I have been willing to walk up to the people in a room that I don’t know and say hello. This new mantra has served me unbelievably well in my business life. It has opened doors and broken down walls and barriers in a moment. It has created bonds and friendships that have lasted for years.

All of us have an inherent need to belong, and all of us have the desire to be accepted and to feel included. Multiple studies have shown that the feelings of being included and accepted directly impact our psychological and our physical health, and that mental and health problems are more common among people who lack social attachments." 

A study titled “To Be Looked at as Though Air: Civil Attention Matters” published in Psychological Science in January of 2012 by psychology professor Eric D. Wesselmann and three of his colleagues at Purdue University states: “Because social connections are fundamental to survival, researchers argue that humans evolved systems to detect the slightest cues of inclusion or exclusion. For example, simple eye contact is sufficient to convey inclusion. In contrast, withholding eye contact can signal exclusion. ... Even though one person looks in the general direction of another, no eye contact is made, and the latter feels invisible."

As part of the study, they measured how people feel when the other people acknowledge them. To do this, they asked a college age woman to walk around a college campus with ~40,000 students. She randomly selected around 280 people and made one of three gestures – 1. She looked through them without making any eye contact, 2. She acknowledged them with eye contact, or 3. She acknowledged them with eye contact and a smile.

Following a little ways behind this woman was another person involved in this study. She would stop each person that the first girl had done one of the three gestures to, and without letting them know she was affiliated with the first girl, she would ask them two questions – 1. “Within the last minute, how disconnected do you feel from others, on a scale of 1-5?" and 2. "Within the last minute, have you experienced acknowledgment from a stranger, yes or no?”

 The people who got no eye contact felt the most disconnected. The people who had the eye contact with the smile felt the most connected – and isn’t it interesting that over half of them didn't even realize the eye contact with the first girl had occurred when they answered the question. This little study helps prove that our subconscious is picking up the positive acknowledgement received from others and it contributes to our feelings of acceptance and well-being. Now that is powerful!

Here is his advice: "Don’t wait for others to acknowledge you. Go out and acknowledge others, and watch the impact it has in your life. Watch the impact it has on your career. Then watch the impact it has on you. "

I took a lot of notes about the meetings such as: They need to be small about 10 to 15 people. The people there who comes to those meetings need to be ready to do the program. You don't want people who are not committed and they need to know that they are safe with you to say anything because whatever is said in those meetings stays in those meetings. I am grateful I got to attend this most historic meeting as this program is getting launched and hope it becomes a success and that many people who want to leave the life of drugs finds out about it so the missionary couples who are assign to work with them can do their service. Another interesting miracle is that the missionaries who were sent to do humanitarian work both couples have had extensive experience with addition recovery and they didn't know they were going to do that when they were called. This is a testimony to me that the Lord is clearly in charge. 

Love,

Vero