Instantaneous Personal Magnetism: Combining an Absolutely New Method with the Best Established Teachings of the Past

by Edmund Shaftesbury

This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the original. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions that are true to the original work.

404 pages, Paperback

First published May 31, 1942

Reviews

[Teresa · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5.... if this topic is important to you (read: you're in sales, public speaker, or any other role that requires persuasion or magnetism.)

Obviously, the book is reflective of the time in which it was written so you have to kind of take some of the information with a grain of salt - but that doesn't mean there's no value here. Pick out what's useful and put the rest aside. However, there are some timeless universal principles in here with some exercises and habits that could definitely be of use to one who is seeking to increase their confidence and also to be able to read other individuals.
Lots of useful info on reading micro expressions in eyes, mouth & face tensions.

He starts out talking about eyes and some mumbo jumbo about eye color and magnetic properties... I though "oh oh, quack city". But once I got through those pages I did see the connection with eyes. Nothing to do with color, but with our eyes, we can process loads of information. You can look at a room, or you can really "see" a room and be able to recall loads of details from what may have been viewed for only seconds. That section of the book was very interesting and I definitely saw value in building the skills in the exercises.

Much of the book is a guide to what it takes to be someone with a commanding presence. Easy to pluck the timeless principles from what might be more "goofy" thoughts of that era.

It's not a "must read" but for those who are interested in the topic, it's at least worth a browse.

[Stevensanders · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting book that provides some insight into the "animal magnetism" model of psychology that was popular for a while in the early 1900's. Truth to tell, there's a lot of things in here that would probably work well at building personal confidence and appeal, just don't expect any of it to be explained by any models that we would recognize as valid or accurate today.

[Joshua]

People from 1926 (the year of my edition) were wacky.

[William Crosby · Rating 1 out of 5]

The word "instantaneous" should be removed from the title as all of the exercises involve extensive practice. Also, for somebody like me who has neurological issues, I found many of the exercises impossible to do (like holding still: I have tremors).

Much of this book's tone. words, and implied culture reminded me of early 20th century and seemed irrelevant to the 21st century. For example, the illustrations had men in suits/tie. (This edition is 1976; maybe later ones have updated illustrations.)