reframing 'soft' skills as 'durable' skills creates a more powerful way of relating to them. Olivia Fox-Cabane's book is a great primer.
unfortunately, I've inherited an immoderate amount of charisma and that makes not being overbearing a full time job. maintaining any skills that even approach what strangers guess I can do is a consuming pursuit. setting expectations so people don't feel betrayed when it lands that I'm actually average or less in most meaningful ways is a constant battle. we demonize the 'halo-effect,' thinking people get unjust advantages, yet don't also reflect that projecting envy and putting people on pedastals and then knocking them off is pathological.
show me a charismatic person and I will show you someone who is used to being manipulated and embattled. if you have ever seen an intact male in a dog park, he's not the one starting the fights but somehow he's always in the middle of them. after a while the diplomacy reads as manipulative. I could be describing the experience of an attractive woman, as the dynamic is similar. there is a great deal of peril in being the object of envy.
reality is, I'm a mid technologist who writes and speaks persuasively and pursues difficult hobbies to justify it. is it bullshit? I work very hard for it not to be. if you happen to acquire charisma later in life, be warey of its pitfalls as well.
If you are already charismatic, don't hide your light under a bush. I often say, I'll be humble when I'm that great too.
I came to the complementary hmmm recently that, sorta contrary to what you mused above, charisma is correlated bi-modally with unusual physical attractiveness/unattractiveness in (young) men on one hand, and unimodally with unusual intelligence in women on the other.
Something to do with the accumulated volume vs usefulness of social feedback up till the point of observation, it seems.
Maybe we are indeed confusing charisma with social skills+selfawareness. Cabane makes sense-- charisma is magic because we don't see the prep.
Had you (and I?) been artists, not technologists, the charisma could have come much earlier
unfortunately, I've inherited an immoderate amount of charisma and that makes not being overbearing a full time job. maintaining any skills that even approach what strangers guess I can do is a consuming pursuit. setting expectations so people don't feel betrayed when it lands that I'm actually average or less in most meaningful ways is a constant battle. we demonize the 'halo-effect,' thinking people get unjust advantages, yet don't also reflect that projecting envy and putting people on pedastals and then knocking them off is pathological.
show me a charismatic person and I will show you someone who is used to being manipulated and embattled. if you have ever seen an intact male in a dog park, he's not the one starting the fights but somehow he's always in the middle of them. after a while the diplomacy reads as manipulative. I could be describing the experience of an attractive woman, as the dynamic is similar. there is a great deal of peril in being the object of envy.
reality is, I'm a mid technologist who writes and speaks persuasively and pursues difficult hobbies to justify it. is it bullshit? I work very hard for it not to be. if you happen to acquire charisma later in life, be warey of its pitfalls as well.
If you are already charismatic, don't hide your light under a bush. I often say, I'll be humble when I'm that great too.