sad eyes vs. dead eyes

Since I recently read a book about emotional intelligence, I have been trying to apply it in my life because it seems like a useful tool to be able to use. Learning something and not putting it to good use = a waste. Being self aware, one major aspect to emotional intelligence seems to be much easier than recognizing/managing emotions in other people.

An Asian woman got on the bus today accompanied by a huge trash bag full of some recyclable material. I often see these people going through the trash and recycling, in the hopes that a few pennies here and there will eventually add up to enough money to somehow sustain life. Previously, I had been kind of disgusted that people are that destitute, my first reactions were definitely not ones of giving a shit (I try to care about people even though other humans just compete with me over resources instead of making my life easier or better). In the past I have yelled, "Hey I called dibs on that garbage!" a funny saying I copied from somebody, but now feel bad about using.

The old woman watched me from across the train, I felt like 100% of her attention was fixated on me- how good my life must be, how attractive and happy I look, how I'm one of those people who has everything (but somehow remains forever unsatisfied). This grizzled, dirty old woman had piercing eyes, only they were dead inside. Her lids and area under her eyes were too pink, her eye sockets looked like chapped lips. There's a huge difference between looking at eyes, and looking into them. If you look into her eyes, all you can see is death, it was really creepy, and I wish I could remain disaffected but it was impossible! Those eyes watched me for more than 5 minutes, the whole time I tried to sit there listening to music, pretending like dead eyes weren't draining the life out me as well.

The only thing I don't like about emotional intelligence is how you have to feel other people's emotions. Trying to be empathetic leads me to more psychic vampires, and everybody already wants something from me.

A while ago Solitaire made a very astute observation, noting that if you look at Britney Spears eyes, even through the beginning and "golden days" of fame back in the day, she always has very sad eyes. It's almost as if you can read her emotions through her eyes, and see all the turmoil and bad feeling welling up inside her.

So that's the reason I never look at people in the eyes.