Cult of Personality
Written by Lee Schneider, founder of DocuCinema
I went to yoga the other night. The room was filled with so many acolytes their yoga mats were about a micron apart. It was like boarding the subway in NYC during rush hour and getting an intimate view of your neighbor’s armpit. Only in yoga it’s more exciting because the people are half naked and their sweat flies on you when they flail. That class lasted about 45 seconds for me. I had to leave. I don’t do flailing.
After suffering from downward dog withdrawal and getting a $61 parking ticket (“And things were going so well!”) I had plenty of time to reflect on the valuable lessons learned. This is kind of a game we play, trying to extract a valuable life lesson from every event no matter how annoying. (“A bee stung me on the ass. What valuable lesson can be extracted from that?”)
Why was I annoyed enough to bail out of that class? Well, for one thing, I have issues
with sweaty strangers violating my personal space. But I also don’t like cults of personality.
Some people actually come to a yoga class for the yoga, but a male teacher can become popular and female students will don the appropriate Lululemon yoga gear and crowd into his classes, never admitting out loud that they have a crush on him. Movie stars get people to buy tickets, usually not directors or scripts. Cults of personality. Charisma is king. 
But Arnold Schwarzenegger’s charisma isn’t enough to run this state, and charismatic people like Tony Robbins or Suze Orman can seem to me to be style over substance.
Let’s face it, though, charisma is a powerful force – maybe even a hit of life force. It can draw people in, pay the bills, get your message across and your cause followed.
I don’t care to belong to a club that accepts people like me as members.
–Groucho Marx
Groucho aside, most people want to be members of something. They like leaders to help them join the tribe. Yoga people are their own tribe, and Vegas gamblers, and Michael Jackson fans. In Seth Godin’s book Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us, he describes how connecting with others is a powerful tool for shaping consumer desire and even changing the world. He and others have pointed out that your tribe has nothing to do with geography, your religion or blood type. It can be fellow Facebook users, Syrah lovers, devotees of Nike running shoes or iPods. In a fragmented world we look to tribal leaders. Charismatic leaders, like Steve Jobs of Apple, can really drive a consumer brand into becoming a movement. There’s that word again: charisma. Maybe it’s the mojo in leadership. Maybe, despite myself, I’m going to extract a lesson out of that crowded subway car of a yoga class.
Thing is, there’s more yoga being done because of charismatic teachers. Apple has inspired a generation of designs that matter. Charismatic social entrepreneurs like Jacqueline Novogratz fund the businesses of the poor by first listening and then building supportive communities around local entrepreneurs. Charisma, backed up with a plan, can really change the world. Ok, I get it. Just stay out of my space in yoga class.
