The eyes have it

Currently in NZ it’s like we’re heading into a rugby world cup. There’s a couple of odds-on fav’s, the blue and the red jerseys, then a bunch of smaller aspirational teams eager at the sideline to join the big league. Competition is king.

The closer we get to the voting booth, the faster we dance around the maypole as the media lead us down the microscope to see who’s blood we’ve got between the glass slides today.

Fun times ! Our own reality show - walk the plank bitches.

Now swim, and good luck with the sharks.

But we already intuitively know how we’ll vote, who we’d like as our national leader, the group and the package that they bring with them.

It’s built into our nature and nurture, it's our own personal story, a lifetime in the making.

As a justified paid up member of the What’s in it For Me party, I think we’re done here.

These leaders debates, little mini-sessions of life in the parliamentary house, scrapping, making shit up on the fly, construing half-truths to wrestle power and control … Look away brethren.

I’ve been conducting my own research poll. I can’t do it over the phone, or via media. It’s got to be in the flesh and it’ll still be running after the election.

When I’m out n’ about I enjoy making eye contact with randoms.

Could be walking down the street, on the bus, a corporate workplace.

I’ve got a toolkit of gazes.

There’s the glimpser, just a sneak and you’re off, hopefully moved off their eyeline b4 their glimpser catches yours. If it does then at that moment of capture you’re gone. Never happened, didn’t clock you, promise. Nothing to see here.

There’s the gleamer, a longer smile into the face of a stranger, still in passing but with a deliberateness. Like I see you and I am giving you the good vibe as hail fellow well met. But no words.

This ones like fishing, my reward sometimes being a return gleamer – from a stranger … bonus !

On a good day when I’m feeling energized and upbeat, I can catch my quota pretty quick, and spurred on by success I can become quite a greedy smiler.

And then there’s the goner, a full combo deal.

It may begin with an introduction of some sort, and you hold the eyes for a fraction longer than is etiquette and Bam ! – they’re stuck. Instantly you’re in love.

I fall in love everytime this happens. Guy/girl young old, we’ve got it going on.

Happened to me yesterday, the goner.

A woman that hired me for some work a few mths back - pass in the foyer, how’s it going ? She’s talking to me and she’s doing it to me, the goner.  

Bastard. Held my eyes in a deep set for at least 10 secs, looked into me, through me, out the other side. Talking all the time, never skipped a beat.

I felt beautifully violated.

No I’m not after a shag, and it’s not really flirting.

I’m on a different take, building my personal catchbag of human connection, happy to wear the less cordial responses …  why is he looking at me ?

Every possible interplay I can wring out of a day, each momentary glimpse and gleam with strangers, builds my data base. Are you at peace? Are you king of the mountain, on a roll ? – cool, let me piggyback on that for a second.

Are you scared, anxious ? Are you feeling alone and vulnerable ? Ok, let me offer you a warm glimpse in return, feel free to piggyback on that for a second.

One of my hero’s is a guy in his 20’s, blind since birth.  Fate has deprived him of glimpsing and gleaming. Jono is a glass half-full beer drinking miracle with the voice of a bellbird.

As a street singer, his ears collect the data.

He said to me “Baz I see everything you do, I just don’t use my eyes.”

Different tools, same process.

For me, the eyes have it. My own evidence based data collection provides barometric readings on vibe. Vibe is everything. Vibe is fragile. Vibe can turn. Good to keep an eye on the indicators.

OK so long as we individually have a revenue stream, for now we can go it alone materially, supermarket food, gas at the pump, rent/mortgage sorted, keypad on the gate. 

But don’t count on that as an ongoing scenario, this disco is heating up and the bearings on the mirror ball are squeaking. Monitor the vibe.

Us and them is bullshit. 

Come up from the media microscope for a minute. 

We’re looking at trees when it’s the forest we could be seeing. Smell the actual, recognize the echo chamber - both trust and challenge intuition.

I look to the day when adversarial process, like we’re seeing in our runup to the election, is done.  We’re all in this together and we could do well to collaborate rather than compete.  

It's a big ask and we're fighting polarities ... our ideal world and our MadMax wiring.

But think about it.  

Competition is yesterdays C word.  I've got some better ones, but that's another blog.