What is charisma? I get asked that question a lot, by speakers who want more of it, and by audience members who want to know how the magic happens. Let’s start by talking about what it is not. It’s not something you are born with. It is not something that some people are gifted by the Fates and others are not – a matter of luck. And it’s not something that comes from exactly the same place in every human who does have it.
It is the expression of strong emotion, emotion directed outward, not inward. It is focus – focused emotional meaning. It is awareness of your audience, not obliviousness to it. And it is energy in service to the moment, the message, and the audience in front of you.
It comes from understanding that great presentations aren’t about you, the speaker. They’re about the audience. Good public speaking begins with respecting the audience. Great public speaking results from realizing that you, the speaker, are in service to the message and to the people sitting in front of you.
Charisma is not an unalloyed good, necessarily. Charismatic speakers can be evil. By all accounts Senator Joe McCarthy was charismatic, though he seems oleaginous to me when I look at newsreels of the day. Hitler was charismatic, in an-over-the-top, ranting, weird way. But he was a good example of how strong emotion can be riveting, even if you are revolted by what is being said.
From that same era, of course, we have a number of examples of the great and good who were charismatic – President Roosevelt, Prime Minister Churchill, to name only two – and on the right side of history.
A review of historical speakers like these does leave the impression that part of charisma is rooted in the time – it is in the eye and ear of the contemporaneous beholder. But perhaps that’s just because we can’t feel the import of the message quite as powerfully as someone who is present at the time, caught up in the historical moment, without the benefit of Wikipedia to tell them how it is all going to turn out.
So charisma is about a message, and a moment. But mostly it is about the ability of the speaker to eliminate all the distractions from his or her mind, and speak on a compelling theme, one with lots at stake, one with a strong emotional sub-current, and one which he or she delivers to the audience in front of him or her as if there was no past or no future, but only that instant, an instant that everyone present believes could last forever.
So you must be focused, you must eliminate that to-do list from your head, and you must feel the importance of your message deeply. To make the audience believe that everything is at stake, you must believe it first.
‘Free at last, free at last, Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!’ Quoting from a spiritual, The Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. ended one of the most charismatic speeches of my lifetime, one I go back to again and again for the lessons and the inspiration it gives. King and his speechwriter worked on it until the early hours of the day it was delivered. The speech was a mix of prepared remarks and ad-libbed, soaring rhetoric, that gave us “I have a dream,” in the inspiration of the moment. The audience numbered more than 300,000, and the setting was spectacular. It only remained for the orator to rise to the occasion. And he did, with words that still seem magical today. The man, the message, the audience, and a great human need all came together that hot afternoon in Washington D.C.
Ultimately, you can practice your emotional focus, you can eliminate distractions from your mind, and you can know your subject thoroughly. But when the moment comes, will you be able to rise to the occasion, to be inspired yourself so that you can inspire others?
This is a good description of certain perspectives of Charisma. The book Charisma Myth by Olivia Fox Caabane, covers many interesting aspects of Charisma , I was lucky to have read it before I saw her presentation at the Museum of Science, several years ago. Presence by Amy Fox Cuddy, seems to be another version of Charisma, both are great treatments of the subject. There does seem to be something more , that is involved . To say that Trump’s ability to Mesmerize and cultify Millions and Obama’s ability to stage a miracle and get elected and reelected is the same thing, doesn’t fit. There should be more ways to describe these phenomena.
Thanks, Dale — we’re still a long way from fully understanding charisma, certainly. And charisma is, to a certain extent, in the eye/ear of the beholder. But note that doesn’t mean that Trump and Obama aren’t related in some way in their charisma. It’s not a thought that makes a partisan of either man comfortable, but ruminating about what they have in common might indeed lead to an understanding that transcends politics and tribes.