An Idea about Charisma relating to consciousness
 

Hey everybody, I had an idea on charisma that I wanted to ask you guys' opinion on. My hypothesis is that people who are very charismatic are those who are living at a higher level of consciousness. I bet if Jesus or Buddha or an extremely enlightened person walked into the room, they would have an extremely high amount of charisma.

To go along this line of thinking, I can imagine that people are naturally attracted to those at a high level of consciousness, and will follow them, because on some level they feel as if it is the right thing to do. This would explain why people today still follow what Jesus or Buddha said. Their level of consciousness was so high that they are still attracting people today to follow them.

Thoughts/Comments?

Erock

Hmmm...that's a hard claim to justify. Charismatic but amoral leaders have been common throughout history. Recent examples include Hitler and Jim Jones. I don't think you can say that charisma is either a determiner or an effect of the expansion of consciousness; it is a separate line of development.

As a student of both charisma and consciousness, I have to somewhat agree with yourself and with AndyMartin.

I see being charismatic as a great way to get what you want via other people, enhance everyday interactions with everyone, and increase personal confidence. I do not believe an expansion of consciousness is required; just a desire to manipulate others for personal gain (if you want to look at it that way). From what I understand, Hitler was very charismatic, which was how he mobilized an entire nation to war. It doesn't matter that he is viewed as a monster today; that's irrelevant.

On the other hand, I can see how a highly-conscious individual could be charismatic as well. Imagine having a conversation with an individual at the conscious level of 'love' or higher. They will likely be very empathetic, confident, and understanding. These just so happen to be three attributes of a charismatic individual. How about that? :)

So...yes, highly conscious individuals could be considered charismatic. But so could lesser-conscious individuals. Good question!

Tom

Great response -- I think you articulated it very well.

Along the same lines as what the last few posters, I think that it certainly is not a coincedence that highly conscious people have the characteristics of a charismatic leader. But to me, that's the way that the correlation flows -- from consciousness to charisma.

I don't see it as working the other way around. The example of Hitler is a good one -- he was certainly charismatic, but I'm not sure about his level of consciousness. Then again, if our universe is based in Subjective Reality, then Hitler is a projection of our greater consciousness, which means that he had some greater purpose to serve in the big picture, and... hm... my brain hurts... it's too late in the week to finish that line of thought! ;)

Seriously, though, I wonder if there are different types of charisma? Those who are highly conscious draw people to them in large part because of their level of consciousness -- because they function on or above the level of love, as Tom indicated. Are there other types of charismae that function differently based on different levels of consciousness? Just thinking out loud.

One last thought, and I'm not sure how helpful it is, but I'm surprised this thread has lasted this long without someone mentioning Max Weber's sociological theory of Charismatic Leadership. I haven't looked into it for a long time, but maybe someone who is more familiar with Weber than I am could add something Weberian to the discussion? (obligatory wikipedia link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charismatic_authority )