Maryland to get jumped.”
There was fear in her eyes. There is never fear in Twyla’s eyes. I waited a moment and wondered: Would we run out of there or eat our sought-after meat? I looked at Robin. Her eyes were more alive than I had ever seen them. She was smiling. The environment seemed to turn her on. She got us a waiter, and we sat down. The patrons continued to stare.
We looked like a microcosm of the United Nations on our way to Sunday school. Twyla named us “Salt, Pepper & Cayenne.” We ordered freedom-loving ocean fish with heads still attached, and our nervous laughter soon turned joyous as the karaoke music got really, really good. Twyla and Robin started grooving to it, shimmying their shoulders as if they’d been born in this hood. We took pictures of our fish heads and devoured our hot plates of frijoles autentico. The man at the next table reached over and told us in broken English how happy he was that we were there. Then his wife offered me a beer. People continued to stare, only now, they were smiling. We were speaking charisma code, showing others, by learning their language, that we valued them. In response, this “foreign” land welcomed us and began to feel like home.
From the pages of this extraordinary work of love, passion, tears, joy, inspiration, sweat, and countless sleepless nights, if you remember nothing else, remember this: “When you give people an experience of their Value, you live in their hearts forever.”
I will forever get to say that Robin and I met in the hallways of the Institute for Peace and Justice. It fits so well in the mythic story I am only just beginning to walk with her and The Charisma Code. Together, we are spinning a web of peace and justice to blanket the whole world. Peace and Justice is our revolution. As you learn to speak charisma code, you will create your own revolution, based on what matters the most to you. My wish for you, in Robin’s words, is that you let the desire to live as one of the Greats pump through your blood!
When Robin thanked me for inviting her to launch The Code at the Annual Power of Collaboration event at the United Nations, a global summit I co-created with IMPACT’s co-Founder, Constance J. Peak, my response to her was simple, “The Charisma Code is on a huge mission to drive change in how people value themselves and others. It needs an army to carry out this mission. As stubborn as I am, I’m also obedient, and I am honored to serve as one of your generals.”
Yours in the journey of a beautiful Vita,
Janet C. Salazar
CEO and co-Founder, IMPACT Leadership 21
FSUN Permanent Representative to the United Nations
At sixteen I left my American homeland for the continent of Africa. There I encountered the Kenyan culture, a culture completely alien from my Western upbringing. The food, dwellings, customs, and daily routines were all new. I didn’t even speak the language, and yet, a magical thing happened: Instead of my feeling confused and alone, my interactions with the Kenyan people felt incredibly meaningful. Much more so than what I was accustomed to in my own country. I asked myself, “How is this possible? I can’t even talk to them.”
This question led me on a global adventure to discover what makes people feel connected to one another. I have lived in the most remote regions of Nepal, Sumatra, Sulawesi, Bali, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Spain, Thailand, Brazil, Mexico, and Nicaragua. Although traveling as an anthropologist, I was not trying to organize some grand display of human taxonomy. Instead, my travels have had one essential goal: to develop meaningful relationships without knowing the local languages. I wanted to understand a language beyond words.
So much communication flows from our bodies, betrays our upbringing, and advertises our personalities. I mimicked the ways different cultures swung their hips and kissed. I paid extra attention to how my body felt when passing individuals on the street. I sang with holy men and danced the local dances. I relied on a few staple sentences: “Hi,” “Where’s the bathroom?” and “Thank you.”
With time, it occurred to me that there is already a word for what I was encountering: “charisma.” Charisma is a universal language beyond words. It adds meaning to our words and our walk with gestures, vocal tone, and energy, delivering otherwise unarticulated information around our passion, our purpose, and how we value ourselves and the world. Charisma “speaks” to connect. Otherwise, why have it? What other purpose could charisma possibly serve than to establish connection?
During my travels, I wanted to open literal doors, step into foreign homes, and participate in local lifestyles, rituals, and the universalities of the human heart. And I did. Though I didn’t know it at the time, I was using charisma to get in, and I learned a lot about culture.
Culture and charisma are closely linked: The people who are the best connectors are often the biggest influencers, and those who influence culture, change the world. Like charisma, culture speaks a language beyond words too. Culture invisibly transmits beliefs into your mind, like Wi-Fi talking to your smartphone. Culture is everything. It dictates whether we shoot the Big Bad Wolf in the woods or fall on our knees to praise his wildness. Culture tells you what to believe about yourself, informs the youth how to treat their elders, and governs how employees work together.
Culture is a democracy. We vote with our behavior, and cultures change quickly when one person communicates a behavior others deem valuable enough to want to copy. When you have charisma, others are likely to copy you. Charisma is both a personal and a cultural power.
On November 3, 2012 I went on all of my social media sites and posted the following picture of Bill Clinton, California Congressman Alan Lowenthal, and my mother.
In the caption I wrote:
So my mom was telling me that being next to Clinton was like being plugged into an electrical socket. Where does that kind of charisma come from? What are his practices? . . . the practices of the Stars . . .
From that point forward I became a charisma detective on a quest for said “electrical socket.” I wanted to find out where I—and anyone else willing and able to handle the current—could plug in, but try as I might, I could find no guide to cultivating this electromagnetic human charge. Did one exist?
In his article “Charm School,” Mark Oppenheimer writes, “What’s most striking about charisma studies is how few there are . . . . It’s just seen as too elusive to waste one’s time on.”1
Waste one’s time on?
For over two years I kept the company of my solitude, committed to making a shareable tool out of my rare life. I often writhed like a serpent in sand, searching for words and images that would hold relevance for you, my reader.
The result: this book.
In the final weeks of writing The Charisma Code, I was recruited to be president of a startup company called FreeCharging. Although I eventually declined the position, I learned quite a bit about alternative energy: by making electric-vehicle charging stations readily available, FreeCharging hopes to enable global sustainable transportation. By making charismatic principles readily available, The Charisma Code enables global transformation. Like electric vehicles, a charismatic person must plug in.
Question is: Plug into what?
People often associate charisma with a learned set of extroverted behaviors they must “put on” to be wanted. Nope. That is not how it works. The way you shake people’s hands at a job interview will undoubtedly change after reading this material, but not because I told you how long you should hold their hand or what pressure to use.
True charisma comes from knowing you are safe, knowing you have something great to give,