As Robert Burns famously (and with Scottish flair and inflection) put it: “O would some gift the Power gie us, to see ourselves as ithers see us”.
Only slightly less famously, two psychologists, Joseph Luft and Harry Ingham, developed their own tool for exploring the world of self-perception and perception by others. Taking the Brangelina form of their names, they called it the Johari Window, which they propose has 4 panes:
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Known to Self
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Not Known to Self |
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Known to Others
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Open
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Blind |
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Not Known to Others
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Hidden
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Unknown |
The Open Quadrant represents information that is readily seen or easily inferred about someone: for example, walking past a stranger you are able to make mostly accurate guesses about their gender, approximate age, likely original hair color, etc.
The Hidden Quadrant contains information that someone knows about themselves but that is not readily available to others; for example, their dreams and aspirations, family history, past triumphs and traumas, etc. Information moves from the Hidden Quadrant to the Open Quadrant through self-disclosure, as we choose to reveal aspects of ourselves to another.
The Unknown Quadrant represents information that is not known to either ourselves or to others. This is the area that therapy often works in, helping bring information into our conscious awareness through insight – for example, gaining understanding of our patterns of behavior, or recognizing some of our unconscious drivers and motivations. Through insight, the Unknown information becomes Hidden information, and we can then choose whether or not it becomes Open information.
The Blind Quadrant is the one Robbie Burns was talking about. It represents the blind spots we all have about ourselves, those things others see and identify in us that we ourselves are unaware of. Blind information becomes known to us through feedback, when people in our lives take the risk to speak to us instead of talking about us. We are constantly receiving this kind of feedback, but generally tend to discard it if it contradicts our own perceptions. So the man who feels like a “big fat loser” (as one of my clients eloquently put it) fails to notice the appreciative glances in his direction, and the overbearing office bully doesn’t realize that he is tolerated and avoided rather than respected.
In a future article we’ll look at how you can get better at hearing (and even soliciting?) feedback from others, and use that feedback to start to shedding some light on your blind spots.
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