Clare Walker - Be the Life and Soul of the Party: Socialising for Success

Have you always wanted to be the life and soul of the party? Have you dreamt that the endless small talk could be transformed into a genuinely interesting event and that you could know, in your heart that it was you, at your very best that was holding everyones attention, rather than the quality of the canaps ? Better still, what would it be like if each party or event were an opportunity that led you one step further along the path that you really want to follow?

Or maybe youve always wondered how someone in your family or your workplace manages to know so many people or to get on in life so young, when you know far more than they do about your subject or have put in far more effort. Yet they are always talking, talking, talking, and succeeding. How do they do it?

The good news is, you can learn to be the life and perhaps even more importantly, an important part of the soul of every gathering from now on, if you choose to do so. It is a set of skills, a system, which is well within your grasp. Other people may, because of chance or circumstance, happen to use the right strategies naturally and, as a result, appear to be the life and soul of the party. The ideas in this book will enable you to approach all kinds of gatherings, from work events to weddings and dinners to dog-racing, with genuine confidence. Whats more, as you have more fun at these events (and show it) so will the people around you. In turn, your enjoyment will create the conditions in which interesting opportunities can be presented to you and so create an upward spiral of ease and success.

You could be forgiven for cynicism here. How can the toe-curling embarrassment of meeting strangers be something that inspires excitement rather than dread?

The important thing to remember is that every person is different . No two people in the world, even identical twins, share the same belief systems, the same map of reality. As the saying goes, one mans meat is another mans poison. Therefore, just because you currently hold a particular view of partying or going to a workplace do, Christmas with the in-laws or similar, this is not necessarily the same as someone elses. Some people out there actively enjoy socialising with a purpose and even relish it just as much as gatherings with their ordinary friends, because of the unique opportunities it presents. I know this, because, I confess, I am one of them.

More importantly, Ive bottled this skill into a form that Ive seen works for people, across the board. Ill be sharing the stories of many of these people as we go along but, first of all, for those of you who like this kind of thing, heres how it all got started.

For several years, I never even realised that socialising was a skill. I wandered around (quite often enjoying seminars and dinners much more than my actual job) and was blissfully unaware that my more technically competent colleagues would have given their eye teeth to know how to charm their way into the next opportunity. Little did I realise that I had unconsciously set in motion a snowball, where the effects of my technique gathered momentum at each successive event and often continued to be felt for weeks, months or even years, into the future.

It was only later when studying a branch of psychology that I became aware that getting on with other people and being the life and soul of the party, when appropriate, was a skill in itself. However, because it is a skill, it can be broken down into its component parts and taught to anyone else who wishes to learn. Skills are simply a combination of particular habits of thought, action and attitude, which, if they are linked together in a particular sequence, produce a desired result. This book will teach you to build and implement just such a sequence in relation to being the life and soul of the party.

Believe it or not, you have been learning such sequences throughout your life. Even when you learnt to walk, you needed a strategy. First, you grasped the furniture and stood. This taught you to balance but, even more importantly, it gave you the belief that you could balance. In turn, this gave you the confidence to make one tottering step, shift your weight on to that foot and step forward with the other foot. In that instant, you acquired the strategy for walking. Such was your unstoppable confidence after this mighty achievement (and the probable praise from your proud family) that the odd stumble, or even series of stumbles, did not then prevent you from perfecting the technique.

The only trouble is, you probably dont even remember that learning a new skill can and should be that simple. Most probably , as youve got older, youve suffered setbacks in certain situations that have led to nagging doubts, re-runs of previous embarrassing events and other self-criticism, which build up over time into a wall, needlessly holding you back. Therefore , this book explains the process of socialising from a much earlier stage than you might imagine. It begins with your beliefs, so that your self-confidence will be built upon a firm foundation.

Be the Life & Soul of the Party will then take you step-by-step through a process that will make the whole business of mingling with others at parties and social events more attractive. Specifically, the skills youll learn here are:

Whats more, the crucial follow-up phase that will ensure that your efforts (if you can really call something thats this much fun an effort) pave the way for future, as well as present, successes.

Whether you are aware of it at the moment or not, you already possess all the skills you need to be the life and soul of the party. All you need to do is link together the resources and abilities you already have, in the right order and in the context of parties and social events. If you need further evidence, think for a moment about your everyday life. Unless you have lived permanently on a desert island, it is likely that at some point, you have already used some of the skills that will enable you to get on with others easily. If you have ever told a bedtime story to children, chatted on the phone to a friend or listened to someone elses tale of woe while waiting in a bus queue, then you have already been using the skills of someone who is the life and soul of the party.