Grab Your Flirtivation Now!

Chapter 2: Being Your Inner Self

To be charismatic you need to have a strong inner sense of who you are, which creates a sense of trustworthiness in others. When you're in tune with your authentic inner self you are magnetic and compelling to others. You have to listen to yourself and really become open with others. This makes you accessible-but it also makes you difficult to sway from your own thoughts and feelings.

So who is your true, inner self? It's that person you become when you're safe and secure in yourself. Think about the times you've been around people in your life who would accept you no matter what. You can be silly or serious. You can be happy or sad. You can even have an explosion of temper. You can be who you are and these people will always accept you and always take you back. Whoever it is you can be around these people or this person? That's your inner self.

It's possible you haven't had the benefit of having someone like that in your life. It's possible there is someone like that in your life, but you've always worn your masks anyway, so you've never given yourself the experience of being your true, authentic, inner self. This can be hard. It can be hard to connect with that person, because we're always trying to account for who and what society wants us to be. Sometimes it's very easy to get caught up in a cycle of attempting to be the person that other people want or expect.

So let's talk about how to get to that inner self, and then we'll talk about what that inner self will accomplish for you. • Stop swallowing your feelings. Have you ever been in a situation where you felt angry, sad, or even joyful and you felt like you could not or should not express those feelings? Have you ever gotten to a point where you've told yourself what you "should" or "should not" feel? These things are barriers between you and your authentic self that are going to have to come down.

You have to acknowledge these feelings. You have the right to feel anything about anything. Write that down and post it somewhere: you have the right to feel anything about anything. Here's the thing-you don't have the right to respond to those feelings in just any old way. If you're angry you don't have the right to take a swing at someone else's nose. You do have the right to express yourself with dignity. You do have the right to be treated with dignity. You do have the right to insist on these things.

This can take some commitment to assertiveness. It also takes courage. It takes courage to stand up and tell people what you need. It takes courage to stop connecting agreement with other people liking you. It takes courage to stop running away from conflict. It takes courage to stop laughing on the outside when you're crying on the inside. It takes courage to stop standing by when other people are engaging in behaviors you don't approve of and don't appreciate.

It also takes the skills to be able to calmly and clearly state your point of view without robbing anyone else of dignity and without looking like you're too emotional to be taken seriously. You have to train yourself to speak in terms of how you think and feel rather than in accusatory terms that degrade the other person. You have to be willing to stand straight and keep your eyes on the other person. You need to speak in a level tone, and sometimes it helps to lean towards the other person. If this sounds like more NLP it's only because it is. When you start telling others, both verbally and non-verbally, that you are worthy of respect, they will respect you. It starts with respecting yourself enough to put that principle into practice.

• Be aware of what you intend. Sometimes we walk into situations and we have no idea what we're doing. We don't know what the consequences of our actions will be-we aren't even trying to bring about any consequences in particular. Sadly, every action has consequences anyway, so it's good to know what you intend for each and every situation.

This also covers what you want in your life. It's impossible to be your authentic self if you're refusing to go after your dreams. It's impossible to be your authentic self if you have not set yourself to a course of deciding what you want out of life and then moving forward to make those things happen. This isn't yet another "get out of that dead end job" statement-you need to know what you intend for that job to accomplish. Is it just to pay your bills so you can have fun? Is it a learning experience? A stepping stone to what you really want to do?