Chris Do argues charisma comes from self-acceptance, not invention. Your core identity forms between ages five and nine, and unresolved childhood trauma shapes adult habits and anxiety. He credits a long-time business coach for transforming his professional life and says seeking mentors is a shortcut to growth.
You want to be that charismatic person in a room, in a podcast, at dinner. You have to learn to be aware of who you are and to accept that. To me, self-acceptance is the most beautiful makeup you can wear.
I feel like if you're not constantly re-underwriting yourself, then you start to lose yourself because you're not in control of your story anymore.
Is that a financial term? Underwriting?
Yeah.
Yeah. You're re—
you can say reevaluating.
Reevaluating. Hmm. So, I think who you are has been established already for a long time. And it's just we forget who we are. So, when I teach story and personal branding, it's not a product of invention. It's a product of memory, remembering who you are. So, there's some debate about this, but I think anywhere between the ages of 5 and 9, who you are for the rest of your life has already been formed.
Hmm.
Okay? Your brain is forming, and you're seeing things that both good and bad start to shape your beliefs and your actions moving forward. So if you had said something inappropriately because you thought it was funny, and you were reprimanded by your mom, by your dad, by a teacher, you may develop a stuttering problem from that point forward. And it comes to that childhood trauma that's unresolved. And now you're going to develop a speech impediment, or you're going to be much more introverted. You're afraid to speak your mind, and you don't make eye contact with people. So Things are shaping for you because your mind is so malleable at that point that any positive and negative stimuli can change how you think. So now, as an adult, you're not even sure what you're responding to. So when somebody speaks loudly, you'll tell them, be quiet. Why is that? You're echoing what you learned when you're 5 years old. And that person triggers you in the way that you're really annoyed by them because you're annoyed by yourself. But no one's really annoyed by themselves. They're just parenting themselves the way they were parented. Dr. Firestone writes about this in the book Overcoming Your Inner Critical Dialogue or something like that. Right. And it's, it's quite interesting that once we go back in time, we uncover that point and we'll look at it like the sacred timeline split between who you could have been and who you are. And we, we can heal that part. We can rediscover who the heck we were.
I want to switch gears to talk about— and this will be the last part— but you talked about finding in one of your videos, finding the right coach and mentor. What does that look like to you and what kind of impact have you seen from that?
Yeah, I think more of us would be better in life if we just sought out coaches or teachers, instructors for the things that we want to improve in. That's how I want to say it, because the label of coach, teacher, Therapist, whatever. It kind of has a different connotation to different people. So if I say to you, I'm seeing a therapist, you're like, ooh, something's wrong with Chris. No, a physical therapist. Oh, you're fine. You know, it's kind of weird how we look at it like that, right? I'm seeing a coach for tennis. Makes sense. I'm seeing a business coach. Oh, you don't know how to run a business. I don't get it. If you need help with something, it's wise for you to take some kind of shortcut by working with someone who can help you get there faster with less pain and less wasted resources. And so I was very lucky. I found my business coach just a few years out of starting my business. I think about 5 or 6 years in, he transformed me and then therefore transformed my business. And I worked with him for 13 years. He's since passed away.
Hmm.
But he was probably the single greatest influence and impact on my life outside of my parents and my family. My professional life, 100%. My, my, my, my, my sense of self, not 100%. It's with my parents and other people. But, and then here we are, we see people and I have friends like this. They're just constantly grinding away at it. And because they were not raised in a culture where it was okay to ask for help, Hmm. or they just think, you know, the best way is to do it the hard way. If that's your way of life, then go be successful doing what you do. But I'm telling you right now, if somebody knows how to do something or can help you do it in your way but faster, it's worth its weight in gold because we can make more money. We can never make more time.
