Читать книгу The Charisma Code - Robin Sol Lieberman - Страница 13
ОглавлениеCHARISMA FACT
Not everyone is going to like you.
Face it: Who you are is a bold expression of life. Escargot wrapped in pepperoni is not for everyone.
What you are about to read is not designed to be nice. It is designed to call to your attention the importance of being yourself.
CHARISMA: THE CURRENCY OF CONNECTION
Charisma’s power stems from an inner confidence. This confidence magnetizes you, drawing people and opportunities irresistibly toward you. It creates the optimal environment for connection to occur. We are meant to be charismatic, to share the most authentic and valuable parts of ourselves; to communicate what Greek poet Evangelos Alexandreou called “the jewelry of the human soul.” Unfortunately, like all coins, the Charisma Coin has a dark flipside . . .
FEAR: THE CURRENCY OF SEPARATION
The flipside of charisma is fear. Fear leads us to doubt we have anything valuable to share, convincing us our human gold is cheap brass. As a result, we resist opportunities to expose ourselves. The worst part is, when we deny the world our gifts, people and opportunities leave us, like animals fleeing a dry watering hole.
So what is charisma?
Charisma is a language beyond words. It “speaks” from the corners of eyes and tone of voice, position of foot and energy of handshake. Charisma helps communicate who you are. But charisma doesn’t stop at your skin. It’s a tool to bring others on your ride. Anyone can wield charisma. This book shows you how to harness the power of charisma so you can draw people together around a common goal, reveal gifts, and set souls on fire! Charisma is a choice. The choice between spending the currency of connection or spending the currency of separation. When you choose to spend the currency of connection, you know your value, show your value, and see others’ value. When you choose to spend the currency of separation, you forget your value, hide your value, and ignore others’ value. The latter choice says, “I can’t risk putting myself out there. What if they don’t like me or tell me I’m as unworthy as I secretly believe I am?” These thoughts hold you back from sharing your “soul’s jewelry.” You then vacate the premises before the premises can vacate you. Problem is, the premises will vacate anyway. You haven’t left them anything to hang out with.
On the flip side, a person who has charisma is a person you want to spend time with. Someone whose hand you would fight to touch through a screaming crowd of fans. It’s the quality that makes you want to date someone or vote them into office. The Beatles had it. Gandhi had it. Marilyn Monroe had it dripping off her eyelashes. It’s what makes us feel connected to a person, even if we’ve never met them.
Nowadays, our pop-culture understanding of charisma is that it’s an elusive, unnamable quality possessed by a handful of “special people.” This belief is obvious on shows like The X-Factor, in which a panel of judges vote off most contestants because they don’t measure up. Charisma is marketed as something either you have—or you don’t. This belief is no accident. Charisma scarcity is manufactured by the entertainment business to make you value those “special people” more. It keeps a whole industry running, and it sells a lot of magazines.
But is charisma really a rare quality? Is it something that can only be possessed by a select few? I am here to tell you: it is not.
No matter what you grow up believing about yourself, you can cultivate charisma. In fact, you must. Finding your inner confidence is a necessary prerequisite to cultivating your magnetism, and magnetism is essential for making connections. Your ability to connect is the end-goal of this book, the key to getting laid and paid, and quite possibly the salvation of our planet. But just like building a bank account full of money, building a charisma currency account takes work. The work is not always easy, but it is simple, and I will guide you every step of the way. In the following chapters, I will walk you through charisma’s three core constituents: confidence, magnetism, and connection. Prepare to be amazed. You have no idea what you are capable of.
STONE SOUP
Before we begin, you may ask, “Why is connection so important?”
Do you remember the story “Stone Soup”? It’s an old fable about a village going through some pretty hard times. The starving villagers hoarded each bit of food for themselves, hiding alone behind closed doors. The people were secretive and suspicious, hungry and miserable.
One day, a stranger passing through town started a pot of boiling water in the town square. There was nothing in it but a stone. One curious villager asked him what he was making, and the stranger replied:
“Why, stone soup, of course! I’d be happy to share it with you, but it needs a parsnip.”
The villager, who just happened to have a parsnip, exclaimed, “I’ve got a parsnip!” and ran home to get it. Then, one by one, each villager came to contribute one small thing to the pot: a potato, a carrot, a bit of salt, a dash of paprika. Before long, there was enough nourishing soup for the entire village. All it took was a little willingness to transform isolation and hoarding into collaboration and community.
After 3.8 billion years of evolutionary growth and pruning, nature is abundant with thriving, living systems. Nothing and nobody is wasted in the drive to survive. Every living thing is interconnected, contributing to the endurance and continuation of life on the planet. As UN Messenger of Peace Dr. Jane Goodall says, “Every individual matters and has a role to play in this life on earth.”1
We tend to think of nature as “survival of the fittest,” “red in tooth and claw.” But it is also incredibly collaborative, with every being contributing in a vital way. As the Stone Soup fable illustrates, humanity is no exception. Our social nature requires us to make alliances with one another in order to survive. Some of us have carrots, and some have paprika. The point is, whatever you’ve got, we need it. Not convinced? Meet Dr. Tamsin Woolley-Barker.
Dr. Woolley-Barker is an evolutionary biologist. I met Tamsin in the jungles of Mexico. We bonded while trying to free a baby scorpion that had crawled into our tent. What were we doing way out there? We were studying nature, learning to mimic its 3.8 billion years of tried and true strategies for cool new inventions and ways of thinking. This process of mimicking nature’s genius is called “biomimicry.”
As Dr. Woolley-Barker explained to me, biomimics have figured out a basic rule of thumb concerning natural systems: nature supports systems that create conditions conducive to the flourishing of life.
It’s as simple as that. Every cool adaptation in nature, be it flying squirrels or plants that eat bugs, has a role to play in our ecosystem. No trait exists in a vacuum. Every way of life creates opportunities (and problems) for the creatures around it. In fact, you can think of an organism’s features less as “features” and more as nodes of interaction.
Of course, there are also animals that use what biologists call “cheater strategies.” These species are commonly referred to as “parasites” and appear to take from their environment without giving back. But you know what? Parasites don’t last long in large numbers. They have a high moment of glory, an explosion or a sprint, but over time, they (and their prey) must coadapt to a more harmonious equilibrium in order to survive. Think about it: if a parasite wipes out its free ride, it can kiss that way of life goodbye. Nature strikes a balance.
When I despair, I remember that all through history the ways of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants, and murderers, and for a time they can seem invincible, but in the end they always fall. Think of it—always.
MOHANDAS K. GANDHI
Our inquiry into parasites mixed with Gandhi makes for an appropriate cocktail to sip on during this early stage of our charisma exploration. The bitters provoke the question “Can charisma be used for hurt?” Why, yes, it can. The Charisma Code teaches you how to spark alive your charisma power. It does not, however, tell you what to do with the stuff once you’re aglow. That part is up to you. So let’s ask now, “What would you like to use your charisma power for?” As you consider the many ways, count on this: if charisma, like all of nature, is used to support the flourishing of life, it will last longer and ultimately outlive the charisma that’s used to take from life.
The most successful species are those in which individuals work together and gift their abundance to one another. When we study these special creatures’ survival strategies we find that, to them, gifting is synonymous with life.
So as members of this planetary party, we need each other. By the same logic, the world needs us. This is true of all species, but what about humans in particular? Oh boy, you guys and gals, it’s about to get good!
THE SUPERORGANISM
You know ants? Of course you do. Well, the planetary biomass of ants is about the same as humans. That means if you rounded up all the ants that are alive right now, they would weigh about as much as all living human beings, and scientists estimate the worldwide population of termites may be twenty-seven times higher than that. What do termites and ants have in common? Along with a few other insects, they are extraordinary collaborators. The members of their colonies are so entwined, science has coined a term for them: “superorganisms.”
A superorganism is a group of creatures so unified in purpose that they function as one.aa Each individual plays a role in helping the superorganism function. For example, bees have a queen, the only one who gets to reproduce, while the soldiers and workers create a living situation favorable for the brood. Voilà! All these guys working together result in a superorganism called the hive. The hive wouldn’t function if everybody did the exact same job. Imagine a thousand queens! Instead each individual acts out his or her innate gift. Thus, the hive thrives.
The term “superorganism” is most often used to describe a social unit of eusocial animals, in which division of labor is highly specialized and individuals are not able to survive by themselves for extended periods of time. Eusociality is considered the most complex social structure in the animal kingdom, defined by the following characteristics: cooperative brood care (including brood care of offspring from other individuals), overlapping generations within a colony of adults, and a division of labor into reproductive and nonreproductive groups.
Guess who else is part of a superorganism? I’ll give you a hint:
Our hunting-gathering groups acted as one great forager, scouring its range for a variety of food types, a viable niche even in the midst of professional carnivorous competitors like lions.
ANDREW WHITEN
Aw, yeah, you’re sitting in one of their bodies. We humans are a superorganism too! This occurs very rarely outside insect colonies. Though Dr. Woolley-Barker suspects a few others (like some dolphins, including orcas), the only other mammal that we know for sure lives in a superorganism society is the naked mole rat. Once a year, the naked queen gives birth to as many as twenty-eight babies. She’s the only one who gets to breed. The queen nurses her furless cuties for the first month, after which the other colony members feed them feces until they are old enough to forage for their own food. More than just feeding the babies these scrumptious feasts, these colony members collaborate to make sure the queen’s kiddos are well groomed, accounted for, and kept warm. Naked mole rats are the longest living rodent (on average, thirty-one years) and do not get cancer. So basically, humans belong to a select group of incredible species that have evolved specifically to join forces with one another as a means of survival. Whoa.
Once you know this, it’s kind of obvious. First of all, how in the world could humans’ naked, furless, clawless bodies compete with the many furry, fangy, claw-clad beasts of the wild? I mean really, compared to a lion or jaguar, the human is a wimpy little ol’ thing. I can hear you ask, “But what about fish? Don’t fish cluster together in schools as a means of survival? Why aren’t you calling that silver-bodied, singular direction a superorganism?” I’m glad I heard you ask about the fish, as this marks an important distinction: schools of fish are not superorganisms, because their roles are all interchangeable. A superorganism species requires its members to each contribute his or her unique, specialized gift, or shall we say, a superorganism species requires its members to each contribute his or her special spice to the stew.
Conclusion: Our species’ overwhelming success means there are other survival strategies at work. The fact that we’re a superorganism species is one of the biggies. We see modern examples of our superorganism finesse in team sports, government, and putting on a play. Also, every corporation exists because of its ability to work as a superorganism. Seeing a company act as one body through its aligned purpose and vision is nothing short of thrilling. The corporate environment is one of my primary venues for teaching the principles in The Charisma Code. One of the strongest factors I use to predict a company’s long-term success or demise is whether or not its employees work as a collaborative superorganism, a necessary skill for an organization whose name, “corporation,” can be defined as “a group of people acting as one body.”
The way we take care of one another also shows our superorganism nature. Did you know that dolphins are the only species with menopausal females besides us? This is biologically significant. In nature, life forms die quickly once they are no longer reproductive. But in the case of humans and certain types of dolphins, nature considers the grandmas valuable enough to stick around. The reason? When we’re done making babies, we still support conditions conducive to life. We provide care for our babies’ babies (dolphin grandmothers even lactate!), care for other members of our community, and the gift of wisdom from a life well lived. Superorganism in effect! When we’re not blinded by our obsession with youth and fertility, biology shows us that elders are a necessary part of a functioning human superorganism. If this were not true, the females would die after menopause.
If you live in a fast-paced, advertisement-encrusted, dog-eat-dog kind of reality, it may be hard to see humanity’s superorganism potential, but I promise you that under less stressful conditions, this life-conducive practice is thriving. Here’s an example: I was sixteen, on a bus in Kenya, watching a man with his baby in one arm and groceries in the other. It was obviously hard to hold his bag and his priceless, cooing cargo. Riding on a standing-room-only bus, he had nowhere to put down his groceries. To my amazement, I watched as he handed his baby to a complete stranger. There were no words exchanged, just smiles. When that passenger got off, he just handed the man’s baby to someone else. Again, when that man got off the bus, he handed the baby to yet another stranger. A baby needed to be held, and for a little while, her father couldn’t do the holding. There were no questions asked, no “Please” or “This is why.” Just an unspoken availability to be of use to another human.
There is one essential ingredient that allowed the scene above to play out: Trust. All high-functioning superorganism societies require it. I need you to perform your function for my survival, and you need me to perform my function for yours. When we share the same goal, we trust our “teammates” to do everything they can to make it happen. Their success is our success. If we choose not to cooperate, we lose our hive or it gets sick. Everyone must contribute or everyone suffers.
Have you ever been stranded on the side of the road and had someone pull over to ask if you’re okay? Next thing you feel are tears welling up because you are so touched that this perfect stranger is caring for you? It’s why Jack Canfield’s book series, Chicken Soup for the Soul, is such a smashing success. It reminds us, in its own words, that we are part of a superorganism. Humans are deeply interlocked and interwoven. What we do to ourselves, we do to one another. Although we often get confused about who we are, the way we feel when we are cared for by a stranger quickly reminds us.
The way our superorganism society works, we can’t even turn on a light without hundreds or thousands of others, each one playing a crucial role: manufacture the bulb, package it, ship it, ring it up at the counter, wire our homes for electricity, run the power plant, et cetera. All this to bring us light. Think about that the next time you flip a switch.
Bottom line, on a purely evolutionary level, humans are designed to connect. Without connection, there’s no light, no team, no soup. You are part of this tasty broth, and no one in the world is quite the vegetable that you are. You must gift your gifts!
While giving often seems counterproductive in the short term, it is productive in the long term. Relationships take time to develop enough to provide value we can see. Rest assured, each time you act as a giver, you are also giving to yourself. In his book Give and Take, Wharton professor Adam Grant explains how “givers” (those who help others without selfish motivation), “takers” (those who take without giving in return), and “matchers” (those who strive for equal trades) can affect our success—both as individuals and at the corporate level. Here’s one tidbit: Evidence suggests that in sales, givers begin with 6 percent lower revenue than takers and matchers. But by the year’s end, givers finish with a gargantuan 68 percent higher revenue!2
WHAT IF . . .?
So we, some bugs, and those cool naked mole rats share this superorganism thing, but do we humans have anything that is unique to us? You know, the anteater is best at eating ants, the cactus is best at living in the desert. What are we best at? What is our “superpower?”
Some say that humans are separate from nature. This is simply not true. Look around you. Everything you see is part of nature. This includes plastic Barbies and Budweiser caps, which, however processed or far removed from the source, did in fact come from nature: just like us! But there is something else unique about us. As Dr. Woolley-Barker puts it, “We influence our evolution more than any other species by asking, ‘What if . . .?’”
That’s right. You don’t see ants practicing biomimicry. Only humans do that. Why? The answer is quite specific. Humans have a genetic basis for understanding time in a sequential, narrative way. We tell stories. As storytellers we choose what we want to create and grow into. We time-travel in our minds. When we ask, “What if . . .?” we’re imagining how things might be different in an alternate reality. You know, different from right now. Religion, inventions, stories, promises: these things all come from the ability to imagine parallel realities. Our species’ ability to ask “What if . . .?” opens us to an infinity of choice. It is this question-asking ability that allows us to influence our evolution.
What if . . . I cut my hair?
What if . . . I could end world hunger?
What if . . . I could get out of debt?
What if . . . I could be happier?
What if . . . there’s a better way?
What if . . . I could get charisma?
What if . . . I could climb the castle wall like a gecko?
I like to think “whatiferousness” is our superpower, the magic wand into infinite possibility. Unfortunately, it often hurts us as well, by keeping us constantly going around in “what if” circles.
What if . . . I’m late?
What if . . . they don’t like me?
What if . . . I make a mistake?
We spend a lot of time using “What if?” to cultivate fear. It’s not difficult to see that humans, as a species, are suffering as a result. Even first-world countries (mostly them!) register sky-high levels of depression. Author Brendon Burchard points directly to this epidemic in his book The Charge. “Face it: the emotional energy of the world has flatlined. Over the past forty years, across almost every developed country in the world, the diagnosis of clinical depression has grown nearly tenfold.”3 Like the superhero burned before he learns to master his superpower, so it is with our mental time machine. As long as we use our power for fear and separation instead of love and connection, we will suffer. We must choose our questions with care. As soon as you ask a question, your mind starts grinding away to crank out an answer. You can’t help it; it’s what your human brain is made to do. But you can fabricate a lasso for that magnificent mind of yours and reel it in when you notice your question-asking cycles teetering on the edge of destruction.
How? Stop asking questions that hurt! Critical thinking and debate can be illuminating. I am not suggesting you stop asking the hard questions of yourself and others. I am, however, suggesting you stop asking the questions that encourage verbal self-flagellation. If you’ve been asking “what-if-I-f—ed up” type questions for a good portion of your life, putting down the whip may be harder than you think. We will explore this process more deeply in the next chapter. But go ahead and start using your whatiferousness superpower for love and connection right now by asking the question “What if I never feel the urge to ask another belittling question again?”
Let’s garner a better idea of how your whatiferousness works by taking a look at the question, “What if I could climb the castle wall like a gecko?”
Think about it for a minute. Ask yourself, “What if I could climb the castle wall like a gecko?”
Notice how your brain immediately starts wondering how the gecko climbs walls.
Are his feet sticky? Are they webbed? Could I create a pair of wall-climbing shoes that mimic the gecko’s castle-climbing capabilities?
The fancy word for this mimic-creation process is “reverse-engineering.” Whatever you put your human imagination to, your mind automatically tries to make so. Granted, climbing castle walls might not be number one on your bucket list, but I bet there are other things you would like to use your blood-pumping, full-breathed creative juices for. Maybe you want to solve the California drought. Maybe you want to date Paris Hilton. Maybe you want to learn how to get the spot out of your carpet. Your brain can’t tell the difference. They’re all questions to be considered, imagined, and turned into results. The mental magic starts with a question, and you get to pick which ones you ask.
As Jesus Christ, one of the first people in history to be called a “charismatic” leader4 said, “Ask and you shall receive.”5
Here’s the deal: Humans would not possess the ability to ask “What if?” unless it supported conditions conducive to life. Further, humans evolved to function as superorganisms, so whatiferousness must be a condition conducive to life. Riddle me this, Grasshopper: If only some of us were meant to manifest change, to influence our species; if only some of us were meant to create life-enhancing conditions; if only some of us were supposed to be charismatic rebels, how come we can all ask, “What if?”
WRAPPIN’ IT UP
Why is connection so important? Because our species literally needs your gifts to survive.
In addition to the survival component, connection is a prerequisite for safety, a necessity for collaboration, a cure for apathy, and a lubricant for joy. Trust me, you want it.
The next three chapters will guide you through the cultivation and spending of your charisma currency. I will share with you exercises to help build new patterns in your daily life, working towards the goal of connecting authentically with others.
Here’s a sneak preview into one of the ways it all works; charisma’s three powers will often interplay like this:
1. When you activate your confidence by knowing your value,
2. You show up to life in a way that magnetizes others to you, and
3. Once people are magnetized to you, you are in a prime position to use The Charisma Code’s global communication tools to establish powerful connection.
Charisma does not dictate what you will do with connection once you have it. You and the person with whom you are connecting decide that. Charisma simply opens the door for the connection to occur.
Once you are abundant with charismatic currency, The Charisma Code will show you how to spend it in the way that best serves your unique gifts and desires. Whether you are looking to get laid, paid, or start a revolution; whether you are more like Marilyn Monroe, the Dalai Lama, Einstein, Oprah, or Martin Luther King Jr. (you are more like one of them than you know!); you will be replete with charisma currency, and it will burn a hole in your pocket until you spend it well!
Charisma spending takes a little effort on your part, but once you get the hang of it, I guarantee you will find it challenging to stop. Each time you spend a little, you will infect someone else, and making someone or something light up is habit-forming.
This final step of The Charisma Code is rarely taught in charisma manuals or charm schools. It’s the real deal.
Let’s face it: Being attractive and refined is not really what you’re after. What you want is what comes from attracting engagement: the possibility of true love, a promotion, or, if you’re the Ché Guevara type, revolution. You will achieve none of the above if you attract but do not connect. To remedy that missed opportunity, let us see you, listen to you, love you, worship you, orbit around you. Then, when you’re ready, turn the tables a full 180 degrees and see us.
However, know this: the Charisma Coin is round for a reason. You can start by developing what this manual calls “Step One, Confidence: Know Your Value” or you can start by developing “Step Three, Connection: See Others’ Value.” Although it’s comforting to imagine you can follow three steps in order and 1 + 1 will equal 2, as you read The Charisma Code you will discover that more often, 1 + 1 equals 3. Logic is comforting but logic is rarely all there is.
Charismatic currency will rush into your bank account when you employ all three steps simultaneously. For some of you, the three steps to charisma will ignite into a burst of singularity when you start by activating charisma’s electric mixture with “Step One, Confidence: Know Your Value.” While for others of you, the spark will emit from your eyes when you begin developing your charisma by focusing on “Step Three, Connection: See Others’ Value.”
My suggestion: read this baby through and let it sink into your sinews. Then go out in the world and practice following your own lead with regards to which part of the Code to implement in any given circumstance. For many of us, knowing our value is the most heroic challenge we face. If that’s you, you can take the back door to confidence by training yourself to see others’ fabulousness first.
Don’t want to wait to finish this book before activating your charisma code? You’re my kind of Homo sapiens! The following figure goes out to you. It outlines a charisma hygiene practice that, as your charismologist, I recommend you perform daily—if not hourly. Follow the arrows like you are following the golden-brick road—you will not be disappointed.
a The term “superorganism” is most often used to describe a social unit of eusocial animals, in which division of labor is highly specialized and individuals are not able to survive by themselves for extended periods of time. Eusociality is considered the most complex social structure in the animal kingdom, defined by the following characteristics: cooperative brood care (including brood care of offspring from other individuals), overlapping generations within a colony of adults, and a division of labor into reproductive and nonreproductive groups.
