Don't get confused - to attain charisma and influence, you need power first.

If you, like most people, would like to fit in, make friends easily, and project a magnetic personality, a natural place to turn is books like The Charisma Myth and How to Make Friends and Influence People.

If you read them, you'll get confused unless you notice that there's a pattern to their anecdotes. In all the success stories, the struggling main character has plenty of power and resources to achieve their goals. Their problem is that, somehow, they're not able to use that power to get others to do what they want.

Take the third chapter from How to Make Friends and Influence People. To save time, here's a summary of the ten main stories. You can skip and review them if you want; I provide them all mainly for completeness.

1. A story about a calf who wouldn't be manhandled to the barn, but came willingly when allowed to suck on the housemaid's thumb.
2. A story about how Andrew Carnegie offered a veiled bribe his sons-in-law to write a letter home to their worried mother.
3. A story of a father who made his son anticipate the first day of kindergarten by demonstrating all the fun activities he'd be able to do there.
4. A story of how the author convinced a hotel not to excessively raise the rates they'd been charging him to rent a lecture hall.
5. An example of how a shipping company could convince one of their customers to send in the freight early by pointing out that they'd get better and faster service that way.
6. A letter from an experienced bank worker convincing potential employers to give her an interview.
7. A salesman whose sheer enthusiasm for a new life insurance policy proved infectious and scored him a sale.
8. A salesman who convinced a gas station manager to clean up his station by giving him a tour of a nicer location, which made the manager want to match its quality.
9. A father who convinced his young son to eat his peas by telling him that he'd be able to beat up the bully who kept stealing his tricycle if he did. He also kept his son from wetting the bed by buying him his own pyjamas and his own bed.
10. A husband and wife who convinced their daughter to eat her breakfast by allowing her to make it and show off her cooking skills to her father.

In each situation, the person (or animal) the protagonist wanted to persuade had an "eager want," which the protagonist had the power to fulfill. They were only bottlenecked by not realizing what that "eager want" was, and making an attempt to link its fulfillment to the achievement of their own goal. A simple shift in perspective was all that was required to turn hours, days, or weeks of frustration into success.

Reading this, it might make you think that this is the main barrier to your own success, and perhaps it is. But you should first ask if the real problem is that you don't have the power or resources to fulfill the "eager want" of the person you're trying to persuade. Or alternatively, if you're worried that they might renege on the deal.

It's perfectly possible to have an "eager want" of your own that you can't fulfill because you simply don't have anything substantial to offer. That is a solvable problem. But it's important not to get confused thinking your problem is a lack of empathy and deal-making enthusiasm, rather than a lack of resources and power.