Too Much of These 3 Remarkable Traits Might Leave You Charmless
In a social context.
Listicles of remarkable traits of a successful person are great. It gives us a guideline of what to change to be better. However, what they forgot to tell us is that those traits are usually good only if you define success as making it big in terms of your career or business.
In business, if you make a poor decision, you learn from it and try again.
However, it’s different in personal relationships because it involves trust and feelings.
When you’re unable to charm the person you’re trying to connect with, they won’t be willing to give you their trust, and connection will stay as a wish.
You go home and think, “What did I do wrong?” while mostly focusing on the negative side that you might unintentionally show.
Sadly, a lot of people don't realize that sometimes, the traits that make them charmless are not those with negative connotations, but positive ones.
To avoid that from happening again, here are the three remarkable traits of successful people that might not be so remarkable!
1. Persistence
Persistence is good as it helps you when facing situations that make you feel like giving up. However, it has to be used in the right context and at the right time.
I decided to go on Tinder when I was 19 to make friends. It wasn’t ideal, but better than nothing.
During my first ever Tinder date, the night was going alright until he persistently asked me about whether women masturbate and how frequently I do it!
Uhm- I’m open to talking about those topics, but not about my personal experience to someone I only met once and almost zero connection with.
But he wouldn’t let it rest even when I tried shifting the topic to something else. Thankfully, the movie time was kicking us in our asses to hurry cos it’s starting.
I’m happy that he wanted to understand more about the topics that are still considered taboo in the country. However, persistence, when the other side is uncomfortable about it, is always a no-no.
And, if you’re wondering, there wasn’t a second date.
2. Optimism
We are always encouraged to be an optimist. They tell us we must believe in what we’re doing, hoping everything will turn out well, or look at the bright side.
But there is also a dark side of optimism. Positivity can:
- Blind you from how serious a problem actually is.
- Invalidate someone’s feelings.
- Encourage bottling things up.
- Inflict shame for being negative and feeling negative emotions.
- Diminish one’s experience.
I had been a jerk to a few of my friends. They would tell me stories about their life problems, and I would answer them with “It’ll be fine” or “At least you’re learning something from it.” without acknowledging that their feeling was valid.
What I realized is most of my friends I brushed off with that kind of positivity stopped telling me about their problems.
Telling stories to someone is a way to share the burden and to gain support. However, when you reply to someone the way I did, it’s like saying,
“Hey, thanks for sharing, but I don’t want to share your burden. Therefore, I’m returning it to you.”
3. Following routines
A lot of self-improvement articles love to preach to us about following routines like it’s the gospel. Although the reasons are justified and routines are comfortable, it gets boring in relationships.
Imagine going on dates every day in the same place, at the same time, eating and drinking similar things for months.
The person you’re going with might still make it fun, but eventually, you would want to go on little adventures and get to know each other more outside the context of eating and drinking in a small space.
Routines are great, but shake it up once in a while.
Final Thoughts
Self-improvement articles are the “It” right now. Everyone’s trying to be their best selves. But always take the advice with a grain of salt.
Remarkable traits are well — remarkable. But too much of them, especially when applied in the “wrong” context, will not do you any good.
Just because they’re remarkable for a career, doesn’t mean it will be good for relationships and vice versa.
And remember that what works for someone else may not work for you.
Read me!