Eye Contact Question...

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I have trouble with eye contact, but its not always the same. For example, when a person is 3 feet away looking them in the eye can be down right painful. I literally have pain if I look someone in the eyes. Unfortunately, people think it is odd if you do not make eye contact with them. I try to look people in the eyes- and I find Im a lot better. But a friend told me my eye contact is still not normal.

I was wondering if this may cost me in job interviews and such. Because I seem to look down or not directly at someone.

The problem is, most people read body language, and for me I'm more about vocal tonality. So I listen to more the tone of voice to communuicate. I rarely pick up on body language cues.

I can look someone in the eye if they are 50 feet away or something. That isn't an issue. But up close its hard. I wonder what I can do to learn to look people in the eye without being overwhelmed by it.

Hm. I hadn't thought about my eye contact based on distance.

Yes, I avoid eye contact more if the other individual is closer to me. Ten feet is about when I start my avoidance routine (look, look away; look, look away).

Interesting idea. Thanks for the post!

In my job interviews I stare at their forehead or the bridge of their nose. So at least I'm not looking away.

I've improved my level of eye contact with conscious effort. I've never had physical pain from it, but it is intense and often gives me a little shock of adrenalin. However, I've also found that it's easier to meet a person's gaze if they're farther away and/or if it's momentary. Something I've found helpful is using "soft focus". That is, looking ahead and around normally, but putting your attention primarily on your peripheral vision rather than focusing on its center point. If I look at someone's eyes without focusing intently on them, it allows me to make eye contact without me (or them) feeling that it's too intense.

During conversations, I direct my gaze towards the mouth area. I do feel a bit ?uncomfortable? when the other person is in close proximity (say 3? away or less). So, I typically will move away to create additional space.

I gave up caring about that (being odd) a while back.

I can make eye contact with my siblings, my ex-girlfriend, my autistic friends, and my tech supervisor. Aside, I can't really do it.

I can make partial eye contact with certain friends, but never fully.

I have this physical pain of a laser pointer in my eyes and I feel like vomiting.

For my family eye contact is not a problem unless they stand to close, in which case, that is a problem in itself.

With people I know casually I can make eye contact for a short time after which I begin watching their mouth or look over their head.

With people I don't like, I can't look at their eyes at all and, in some cases, can't even look at their face. I just look down or to the side. With strangers, it varies at looking at faces or looking down.

I've been thinking about this today - I don't really do eye contact much at all - I'm not bothered by it, I look up occasionally when I remember. But what I was thinking was that I am very poor at remembering faces, I was wondering if that had something to do with my lack of eye contact.

The closer, the more intense. Try focusing on the nasal bridge right between their eyes, but not for too long as the other person could feel stared down.

I guess the closer it is the more intimate it but what interactions are you really having with people 50+ feet away?

i can fake it pretty decently, indeed, the nosebridge is a good place to aim your gaze onto.

at the moment, there is only one person that i can make real eye-contact with: my girlfriend. although even with her it's a bit uncomfortable, but at least it's not straight-up painful

I think the essential factor is that you really can't make out details in the eye at that range.... so no prob.

I find looking people in the eye is very important to them and you can get a lot of information about them from the muscular activity around the eyes and within the eye.
I have a problem with this, but only if I think about it. I was trained to work around out so long ago that I don't think about it much until it suddenly goes into uncomfortable territory and I flee from this in panic.

The therapist who worked with me on this way back in the mid 1970s taught me to look around the eye, then look away. So I would look at the eyebrow or temple or the bridge of the nose for a second or so, then look away for a bit, then back in, etc. Then she taught me to look at the muscles to see if they were signaling something and taught me about how the pupil dilates in response to various emotional and environmental stimuli. In asking me to make notes about muscle contractions and pupilary dilation, she was training me to use focused attention to specific detail to reduce the overwhelming feeling I got when looking at people's eyes.

I don't recall this ever suddenly "working" but it evidently made a big difference over time.

I hope you find effective ways of dealing with this.

It's an effort for me to look people in the eye--but I try to do so. I seem, usually, to avert my eye in some way, though.

My natural inclination is to turn my head whenever eye contact is appropriate.

I tend to watch people mouths when they're talking, not look them in the eyes.

I've found that some don't notice I do this and if I consciously un-focus my eyes then most don't get that I do this.

I only like to look at the mouth of somebody I'm attracted to.

Otherwise, I think "potential bad breath."

Close up, I seem to not know how long to look for, when to look away and am very aware that I am not 'doing it properly', so to speak. I hate looking at mouths so that is not an option for me, i can look at eyes if people are not looking at me, or from a distance, but close up, no. I cannot even look in my mother's eyes. And it feels so unnatural if I try and force myself to look at eyes. Oddly, I have no issue with eyes when they are on actors on the screen either.