Earlier this week I was introduced to this thing call the “Five-Foot-Ten-Foot Rule”. It says that if you’re ten-six feet away from a person that you make eye contact with them and acknowledge them (usually with a faint smile or a head nod) and if you’re five feet or less away from a person, you make eye contact and greet them verbally (usually with a ‘Hello’ or ‘Good morning/afternoon’). The idea of the rule is to create small positive interactions between people, which will in turn create a positive atmosphere. Normally, I do speak to people or acknowledge them at least in most scenarios, but after hearing about this rule, it made me pay more attention to when and how I do it. Understanding that the idea is to create positivity, I noticed that I wouldn’t follow the rule whenever I was in a down mood or had a lot on my mind and it would take for someone to speak to me first for me to start following the rule. I decided then that I would do my best to follow the rule as much as possible because you never know what a person is going through, and sometimes all it takes is a gesture as simple as smiling and saying, “Hello” to lifts someone’s spirit.
Spoken Art 