 Let's start with the first skill that we need to hone to grow our charisma and that is presence. If you get this one right, you'll be 90% plus ahead of the rest of the population. Why is that? Well, as we've talked about in so many previous episodes, our presence, our ability to be in the moment is being constantly obliterated by devices, distractions, notifications, the world environment going on around us. So your ability to hone into the present moment with the person or group of people you're talking to sets the tone for how charismatic you will be. Now, one of the things that we see in a lot of our clients who join us is they can't quite be present because they're so focused on themselves. In fact, they're inward facing, right, Johnny? Yes, and you mentioned all the extraneous activity and stimulus that is going on that forces us out of being present. And then when we go out and we go to a social engagement and a social event, we have now the added pressure of other people's thoughts and seeing other people's faces. And this will put us in a place of wanting to self soothe due to all of that stimuli. This forces us in our heads and going through whatever it might be that we need to feel comfortable in that moment. However, that takes us out of the present moment and a present consciousness to connect with other people. And one thing we see on video constantly with people who feel like they're stuck in their head or they're inward, is there's a degree of self judgment going on. Am I doing the right thing? Am I saying the right thing? How are people perceiving me? And even though that judgment is pointed towards yourself, when other people interact with you, they feel judged. They feel based on your body language and the way that you're self soothing, as Johnny said, closing yourself off to protect yourself, to feel more comfortable and deal with the self judgment you have, you're actually appearing, you're coming across like you're judging others, which makes you off-putting and uncharismatic. So what's the solution here? How do we actually break out of this inward tension that we're feeling and become more present in the moment with someone we're meeting for the first time? Well, the answer is empathy. Empathy means you're able to put yourself in another person's situation. Well, you can't put yourself in another person's situation if all you're doing is thinking about yourself in the current situation you're in. That requires you to actually learn something about the other person, to be curious about who this other person is. What has their journey been like? What destination are they heading towards in their life? It doesn't mean that you agree with them. It doesn't mean that you're agreeable AJ and say, yes, awesome, cool, totally to everything they say. But instead, you're trying to go a level deeper in conversation to really get to understand what makes this person tick? What has their experience been like that led them here? So this, a big part of empathy is something that we develop at around three to five years old and that is called theory of mind. That is my ability to get into AJ's head and figure out what he's thinking, right? I definitely need that for empathy. So the theory of mind thing is something that we learn as kids, we learn as adults, we improve, we get better and better at perspective taking as our own experience in life grows. Fun fact here that has nothing to do with science but one of the leading researchers in theory of mind is Simon Baron Cohen, the brother of Sasha Baron Cohen who's known for his work as Borat and Ali Ji. So that's something to be said about this thing but to break it down just a little for empathy, for theory of mind, you need to be able to take perspective. You need to be able to see the world through the eyes of someone else. So even if you're disagreeing with someone on something, maybe I disagree with AJ on the fact that Italian food is really great, right? That might be the case, but theory of mind, perspective taking empathy allows me to see the world through AJ's eyes and how I don't know what might give rise to his proclivity towards Italian food but by thinking on a different level about this, going a little stepping outside of my own head for a little bit and ask myself, what made AJ say that? What could I ask him to find out what made that happen? That is a level of empathy that we need to bring into the conversation. And at its core, this is what we call value, attention, approval and acceptance. When you bring those three As into any interaction by giving value to others, showcasing that you actually want to get to know them on a deeper level instead of just focusing on yourself and even worse, focusing inward on yourself and maybe not saying anything, you become more present in the interaction. And the best part is when you actually interact with someone who's charismatic, take note of how little it is that they talk about themselves and how much interest they express in you. That's the most amazing thing about charismatic people. They actually don't spend much time talking about themselves and instead they spend a lot of time getting to know you on a much deeper level. So we can use this presence to our advantage and bring empathy into the interaction to make that leap towards becoming more charismatic, to unlock your own inner charisma.