How To Dissolve Social Anxiety And Connect With Anyone

So today is a very exciting day because someone who I consider to be one of the most charismatic people in the world, Russell Brand himself, has made a video on how to be charismatic. And this can always be very interesting when you're learning from someone who seems to get it naturally. I don't know all of Russell's story, but he did come up as an actor, he was a comedian, and so he might have internalized a lot of the traits that make someone charismatic. So it'll be very interesting to see if we have commonalities in how we see charisma. My suspicion is that he, like many people who seems to just get it, might boil it down to just be yourself, but I'm not totally sure we're gonna see if that's the case. And here we go.

Now. I reckon that the secret to charisma is being able to be present. In fact, people speak frequently, don't they, of presence? This person has a real presence.

A couple things here, I definitely agree with him in that at the deepest and perhaps, perhaps the highest levels of charisma, what you do want to fall back on is be yourself, be present in the moment. That enables you to react authentically and spontaneously to everything that comes up without needing canned lines. Part of the problem is that telling someone to be present or to just be themselves, it's kind of like asking someone to hop over a 20 foot wall their first day trying gymnastics. It tends to be very, very difficult to people. I do think that the way to get there is with intermediate, easier steps. So I'm curious if he will talk at all about that.

Not all of us will find the same people charismatic the same way. As we don't all have good sexual chemistry or good convivial friendship type chemistry between one another, there are certain ways that we interlock.

This is actually something that I think is very important. People will ask questions of me and then they'll want to know what is wrong with the way that they're presenting themselves. Do they have a core charisma issue? And the question that I always ask them is, is this something that has happened once or twice or is this a consistent thing in your life? Because to Russell's point, no matter what you do, if you are the most charismatic person on the planet, you're not going to be everyone's cup of tea. One of the best tips I ever heard about charisma comes from Russell and it was when I saw him on the Logan Paul podcast.

It happens now when I arrive here and I see this place like, even wordlessly, my emotions inform me, oh, what's it gonna be like? Is everyone gonna like me? What's gonna happen to me? Who are these men? What's happening here? Like, all of this stuff starts happening. And then another part of me goes, you've got nothing to get. No one can give you anything. You're all right. You don't have to be afraid. All you're ever able to do is be of service to other people. And if you get distracted from that objective and start thinking that your life is about getting things, you know, pain is coming. Cause I've experienced it many, many times.

When you're entering into communion, you know, you're talking to other people, you're having a dialogue with them. Don't go into it thinking that they have something to give you, whether it's you could get a date, get a job, etc. Though that might always be in the back of your mind. If you recognize that they, at some fundamental level, cannot make you happy, the pressure comes off of that interaction. It becomes much more fun and easier to be your authentic self.

Or if I'm in a social situation and I still do suffer from some social anxiety, one of the ways I overcome it is by making a decision to really genuinely listen to the person that I'm communicating with and let go absolutely of the idea of getting something from that exchange.

So this match is actually what I've seen from Russell because I've covered a lot of people and they go on the talk show tours and they tell the same story in the same way over and over and over again. And Russell is perhaps the only person that I don't see do that. He has spontaneous laugh out loud funny jokes in almost every interview that I've ever seen him do. That's not something that comes natural to many people. It's something that needs to be trained if you want to have that sort of communicative style.

Hello, how are you? I feel very well today, thank you.

So this is a very normal first interaction that you'll have in your life. Someone says, hi, how are you? You're into this sort of routine pleasantries exchange. Up until now, nothing crazy. Oh, good. I'm so glad this is your first time here and I'm happy to have you here.

I'm very honored to be here in this chair.

Oh, really?

Yeah, I really like it. Oh, good.

So what he's already started to do is to deviate from that normal path. He says instead of I'm happy to be here, he focuses on the chair says how he really likes it now he's completely. He has no idea where he's gonn and he is being present. But I want to show you some of the habits that he has really internalized. Watch what he does next. You can come sit in this chair anytime you want. Think what you would say. Someone said, you can come to my house anytime you want. You'd probably say, oh, my gosh, thank you. That's so kind of you. What you wouldn't do usually is to misinterpret purposely what they said and take it literally. But that is exactly what Russell does because it's a staple of comedy. Taking something literally that is not meant to be taken literally.

Do you think there will be times when it's impractical if someone's in it, for example?

Yes. Depends on who's in it. They may enjoy you sitting on their lap.

It may lift the interview.

So now he's sort of developing and he's moved on into another principle of comedy, which is say yes and continue to build the world Again, if you want to work on this stuff. Improv comedy, when it opens back up is a fantastic way to practice these sorts of techniques and ideas. But he's now building a world. And this is something that you'll see friends do with each other when they feel really comfortable. And in 30 seconds, Russell goes from hello to doing that with Ellen. Take a look. And she knows what she's doing. She plays right along.

They could be here and then suddenly I'll be perched on their lap. They'll have to crane round you, but it may induce a kind of sexual energy, perhaps.

Let's try it someday. She. Yes. Ends him.

Any of your guests.

He continues with the yes ending.

You can select one at random from a ha and then I'll just come and perch on their knees. Or if we feel very adventurous, further along towards the groin.

I did want to say for Russell, I actually think it's true, the most important thing for him to do in an interaction is to be present, listen, and connect to the other person. But if you don't have that same base of deep internalized understanding habits and charisma skills, you might need to work on those first. And weirdly enough, it's not actually about being present when you're trying to build new habits. Yes, you're going to remain present as much as you can, but there's a part of you that is in your head thinking, I want to work on this particular thing, on this realm, on.

This plane, in this moment, in this time, if you can be uncluttered from your own mental state, if you can focus on another person, if you cannot be dominated by your own fears, this essentially means that you need to spend time being working on yourself, ensuring that you deal with your own neurosis, psychosis.

This is huge. So a lot of people come to me with charisma, questions of all of all different kinds. The question that they ask is often the presenting surface problem. And the real issue is underneath, they can't stop blushing and they want to know how to stop blushing. The deeper problem and they go layers and layers down. But of course is why do you feel so unsafe, nervous, exposed, when you are speaking in front of a group, what is it that you think could happen that would impact you negatively? And we can always say, oh, I could lose my job or somebody wouldn't like me. But deep down, as Russell probably has commented before, there tends to be a fear that you will be cast out, that you won't be included, that you don't belong and that people won't love you. This problem is worth coming at both from that presenting problem of oh my gosh, I'm blushing. What should I do in that case? Take deep breaths. That's one of the things that can help the fastest because it is a flush to your face, but also not just the symptom. You want to go to that core problem. So if you're working on meditation, if you're doing any sort of thing to help your emotional body sort of heal and improve, I think that is the way that I have seen is most effective.

Surely there are more subtle forms of energy than air and water that are interrupted and disrupted when a person comes into a room, when a person conveys.

Their energy, the idea that there is an energy when someone walks into a room that we haven't quite been able to measure, it kind of matches my own experience. And it seems to go beyond just looking at the person, hearing the person. There is, I don't know, maybe when you look at them you feel something that butterflies in your heart or the hairs on your arm go up. But there are people, when they enter a room that seem to have a literal feel and perhaps we all do, but just can't tap into it quite as much. Now I have to admit, as regarding spirituality, for many years I thought that it was completely useless, lacking in practicality, woo woo, nonsense. But I will say that there were two big things that really helped me get into it and find tremendous value in it. And they are both from Eckhart Tolle it is A New Earth as well as the Power of Now. Now both of them still have sentences that I read or hear and I just they. They make me cringe with the pseudoscience. But there are deep nuggets of wisdom in both of those. Power of now is mostly about the power of getting present in the moment. It's a simple concept, but a very deep one can take a lifetime to start to master. A New Earth is a bit more complex and particularly the idea of the pain body, the way that our egos get triggered was very, very, very useful in my life and something I continue to come back to. So if you haven't gotten much value out of spirituality and you're listening to Russell, you think there might be something there. I highly recommend Eckhart Tolle as a bridge and you can check out either of those titles for free courtesy of this video's sponsor, Audible. When you join using the link audible.com Charisma or if you text Charisma to 500 500. It comes with one free audiobook right out of the gate and either by Eckhart is great, but A New Earth is my favorite of the two that I mentioned. If you stay after the free trial period for $14.95 you get an audiobook per month with access to a huge library of audiobooks, podcasts, and more for your ears. A lot of people say that they don't have time to feed their brains, they're too busy. But when you're listening, there's no excuse. So if you want to check out A New Earth, you can do it while you exercise. You're sitting in traffic or Best for Eckhart Tolle by far, just taking a slow, leisurely walk. And if you think that spirituality is hippie mumbo jumbo, I even more highly recommend these titles. They were really, really for me and there are sentences that are pseudoscience y, but I think you'll really dig it. So if you want to check one of those out today for free, you can do so@Audible.com Charisma or by texting Charisma to 500 500. Either way, I hope that you guys have enjoyed this video. I will be doing a lot more of this style. Let me know what I can improve on. It helps a ton and I look forward to seeing you in the next video. Cheers Sam.