What Are Social Dynamics, Anyway?
Posted by: bflorez in StarterSeries, Prologue, Download on
Dec 28, 2008
Executive Summary: Learning how to improve your social skills is one of the most effective things you can do to ultimately improve your life. When you're great socially, your career, love life, and friendships create a virtuous circle and enhance your life tremendously.
Well, with any luck you now hopefully have had a chance to sit down and start reading the Prologue. If you're like most people, you probably at least made it through the story about Joe, and hopefully got through the next section about "The Way Things Are Supposed To Be." (To get your free copy of the Prologue: An Introduction to Social Dynamics, sign up for our free CharmingChatter newsletter)
The next section in the Prologue is entitled "What Do You Mean, 'Social Dynamics'?" and helps define the area Social Charm specializes in. From the Prologue:
"Within the past five years the term [Social Dynamics] has grown to encompass studying and understanding the interactions of people within society, covering everything from how we communicate, judge each other, work together in groups, form friendships and romantic relationships, influence each other, and a host of other activities that involve interacting with or even just observing other people.
The study of social dynamics draws upon a wide variety of disciplines - neuroscience, evolutionary biology, influence theory, psychology, anthropology, information theory, and more - but it is far from being a useless academic discipline.
Instead it is perhaps the most intimately personal field of study, because it focuses precisely on something you deal with each and every day: other people.It is also perhaps the most practical one, as its findings and theories often lend themselves to knowledge and skills that you can use immediately to improve your understanding of humanity and improve your relationships with friends, co-workers, professional acquaintances, and romantic interests.
It can guide you to understand yourself better and help you be more popular, more powerful, more charismatic, more empathetic, better liked, better understood, and better able to navigate though any endeavor you seek to undertake which relies upon your relationships with other people."
Thus, when we use the term "social dynamics", we mean anything that happens when one human interacts with each other in any way. By understanding how people interact and thus influence one another's thoughts, feelings, and behavior, we can not only gain more understanding of others, but of ourselves as well.
Can you think of anything more important than learning how to deal effectively with other people?
Ask five people "What's the most important thing for people to have to feel fulfilled in life?"
Most people will probably say "Family" or "Friends", indicating that on some level they know this is true (even if their actions don't reflect this belief). All well and good, you say, but let's get real: everyone knows that other things are practically just as (if not more) important. Consider some other things they might say:
Money. Who makes more money, the engineer or the engineer's manager? The accountant or the salesman? The physicist or the entrepreneur? The answer is simple: all else being equal, being able to effectively manage people and sell (i.e. generate revenue) are the skills required in the highest paid professions in the world. Bill Gates? He had to sell a then-crazy idea to IBM that his little program called 'Windows' would be worthwhile. Jack Welch? He has said numerous times that his #1 priority and time commitment was managing and developing his people. Actors, actresses, or musicians? They have to sell themselves and their image to the masses every day - they sell movie tickets, CDs, and concerts tickets by commanding our attention. Though you might make a very good living through your technical competence or industry expertise, the fact of the matter is that for most people, being able to interact effectively in social situations is what most directly leads to monetary success.
Intelligence. Study after study has shown that - beyond a basic baseline of intellect - EQ (or Emotional Intelligence) is a far better predictor of long term success and happiness than is IQ. And what is EQ? This means to be able to understand and effectively manage the emotions within yourself and others. It is no surprise that this is exactly what the study of Social Dynamics teaches.
Health. Numerous studies have indicated a link between higher social status (i.e. having more friends, better relationships, among other things which we'll cover) and improved health and longevity.
Power. Power is the ability to make what you want happen. How else could you possibly do this other than through your relationships with and influence on people? Many of the most powerful men in history were nearly paupers - they derived their strength through their ability to move the masses.
Sex, Love, or Friendship. These things - by definition- require other people.
No matter how you think about it, improving your ability to relate to others is the single most important thing you will ever do to improve the quality of your life. Over the next few weeks as you go through life, think about what might be possible if you suddenly had the ability to effortlessly interact with others in a way that helped you get what you wanted.
To understand the secret to doing this, you must begin by understanding human nature on it's most basic level. In doing so, we'll discuss the two fundamental purposes that every person on this planet has in common: survival and replication. We'll cover this in more detail tomorrow.
Until Then,
The Social Charm Team
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