Personality Development Tips

Today I want to talk about charisma.

Do you want to be the kind of person that everybody likes? That everybody around you just cannot get enough of? That everybody wants to spend time with, to date, or to hang out with?

I think everybody should answer those questions with a yes. Right? All of us want to feel like we are desirable, whether it’s on a personal, professional, romantic or just a platonic level with our friends, all of us want to be liked. And all of us want to be appreciated, feel like people enjoy being around us, and that we bring a value to being in other people’s lives.

Today I want to break down how you can attain that by leveling up your charisma. Still with me? Let’s get into it.

Now there are three primary components to the trait that I consider charisma:

1. Your ability and willingness to talk about yourself and things that make you feel a little self-conscious,
2. The second quality is your sense of humour. Now, not everybody has to be a comedian. You don’t have to be really funny if it’s not natural for you. You can even just have a dry, or self-deprecating sense of humour. Just something to break the ice and make people feel at ease around you goes a long way towards developing that connection. It makes people feel like “this person is fun and easy going, and a little bit like me. I like them.”
3. And the third one is showing that you care about other people. It’s about going out of your way to ask about how others are doing and what their long-term goals are. Things like what they want to do with their major when they’re done with school, or what they want to do in their career, or how it’s going with their family, or even do they see themselves parenting in the future. Whatever the specific issue that may be on their mind, and going out of your way to ask questions and follow up on it. This also means doing your best to remember not only names and faces, but to remember a little bit about their lives so if you run into them again at work or school you already have that connection. When they see you and see that you’re engaged in their life and remember something about them that made an impact on you, it leaves a lasting positive impression on them.

You can use these skills to draw people to you and make them like you in a way that will allow them to open up to you and also be vulnerable. They’ll feel like developing a friendship or relationship with you is easy.

These three traits are going to take you far in terms of being able to bring people around you to build alliances, friendships, romantic relationships, and even business partnerships. It will make it easier for you to talk to people, and for them to be responsive to you. It makes it easy to talk with people and give them a level of respect. It can even happen completely naturally for you if you just try to put yourself in the other person’s position. It will unconsciously help people feel like you care about them, which triggers their willingness to turn around and care about you in return.

The second way is to reveal your own vulnerability. This one is counterintuitive, but a really good way to break the ice with someone you want to influence is to share vulnerable parts of yourself that are relevant to the conversation. This doesn’t necessarily make you look great, but they other person will be drawn to you when you open yourself up like this and share your insecurities a little bit. It shows your confidence, and pulls at them to connect with you and also reveal their own insecurities.

Moments like this can elicit a little bit of laughter and are often going to make people feel like there’s no judgement on what they say to you because you opened up first. You’ll be surprised that when you hit on a particular topic for someone, they can just open up so much that they are like a waterfall, and their whole story just comes out. That’s how you make a connection that’s deep and emotional. You just open up a little bit, and then empathize with them when they tell you their story. It’s such a potent technique that makes people feel you really care and there’s a certain relationship that can develop, whether it’s platonic and romantic or otherwise.

Don’t forget the humour though. This isn’t supposed to be a deep soul-searching conversation. Humour helps keep it light and fun. Remember though, you don’t necessarily need to be very funny, you just need a light tone. This is more often about good timing, and just using your vulnerability and empathy to connect with people in a way that gets a little bit of laughter to take away all the tension.

Think of an overweight comedian as an example. The good ones find a way to poke fun at themselves, and break the tension. It shows you that they don’t take themselves too seriously, and that they are open to talking about any topic. You don’t even have to be overweight yourself to laugh, you can still find the concept funny and relatable. And it makes them instantly likeable. You can use this same formula to unlock that same sense of familiarity and relatability with other people. It can be as simple as just talking about your own life experiences in a way that shows you have similar struggles to their own.

So to bring this all together, charisma boils down to three primary concepts and using them in different orders, in different ways, and with different people. Those three traits are vulnerability, empathy and a sense of humour. (But a sense of humour that doesn’t cross the line into being cocky.)

So it is vulnerability which allows you to open up a little bit and admit truths about yourself that are similar and relevant to the people that you’re talking to. A sense of empathy that allows you to put yourself in somebody else’s shoes and identify where they’re coming from. And the sense of humour that allows you to connect with the other person, break the ice, and break through any sense of potential judgment that’s coming their way.

How do you put all of these together? Like any other skill, you exercise it over and over and over again in different scenarios, and you will get better over time. Plus you can watch people that seem inherently charismatic, and start to notice exactly how they do it. Look at the people that you like, people in society that you find funny, that you find likeable or relatable, and watch how they do it. See how they put it all together. But also break it down and focus on little bits and pieces of one conversation or interaction to dig deep into what they may be doing that you could try. Apply these things in your own life one person at a time, one work relationship at a time, one romantic relationship at a time. You will start to develop a sense of connection with people that will draw them to you and make you a more likeable person. This will push yourself out of your shell and increase your confidence in a huge way.

These skills are all learnable. They’re portable skills that can be used in every single area and stage of your life. You can be president of the United States, and it’s going to be just as useful as if you’re a school teacher, or a nurse, a business owner, or an executive.

Your new level of charisma and likeability will make people feel comfortable around you and want to connect with you. All of these skills are incredibly useful in every single profession and will make all the difference in the world in each and every interaction throughout your life. So whether you are a student, a rep, a doctor or a clerk, I hope you use these skills for good and put them to full use in your life.