I stumbled onto a unique Youtube video this week. The title was “Why Jimmy Fallon Seems Fake“. Frankly, that topic was actually buried (it was his seeming fake laugh if you’re curious). But the video spent most of the time talking about why people love Jimmy Fallon. I found it fascinating.
The narrator shared four things that make people love Jimmy Fallon, but it made me think about three things that we should withhold in order to gain real influence. See what you think about these.
1. Your accolades.
Part of what makes us love Jimmy Fallon so much is that he’s surprisingly good at a lot of things. But we don’t know that when we first look at him. It appears he’s just a comedian. Then it turns out he can sing, slay at games, and many other things. Accolades are best discovered, not flaunted.
If you want to be influential, don’t flaunt everything that makes you great. Let some mystery linger.
2. Your political views.
This one wasn’t in the video, but it’s definitely caused me to stop listening to people quickly. It’s not so much that you don’t want people to disagree with you. But whenever you show your political views, you quickly align yourself with an agenda. That makes it tough to believe things you say.
You’ll see this quickly in Facebook links. The language they use in the headlines already often tells you what the writer believes, and it shows their agenda. You can be sure that the article will be biased and probably only half-truthful.
3. Your self-interest.
This one was another Fallon-ism. One thing we love about him is that he genuinely gets excited about every story a guest tells. Rather than playing it cool, he matches their enthusiasm and brings the spotlight to them. Withhold self-interest and aloofness, and people will start to listen to you.
You’ll notice these three things are often where most of us find our identity. So what does that leave to share with people when you first meet them? To make a first impression?
It leave them. It means putting aside your own identity and investing into the identity of the other person. We shouldn’t be shocked. Paul told us this nearly two-thousand years ago in his book to the Philippians.
In humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.
The key to influence is to put others first. Profound. Impossible to master. But we can all do our part to do better at it.