People with thick skin were not actually strong-minded

I used to think that "mentally strong people" were born that way

Every time I saw someone who was composed and unflappable, I thought, "That person must be strong-minded by nature." I get rattled easily and feel nervous in front of others. So, I had half-given up, believing that having thick skin was just a difference in innate personality. However, as long as I held that premise, I couldn't shake the feeling that "I am a weak person," and I would lose my nerve every time I tried to take on a challenge. Reading "Yakuza-Style Psychology for Living with Thick Skin" by Masafumi Mukaiya shook that assumption to its core.

You can read "Yakuza-Style Psychology for Living with Thick Skin" by Masafumi Mukaiya here.

Thick skin was a technique of "presentation"

The definition this book presents at the beginning is that a person with thick skin is not someone who is mentally strong, but someone who makes themselves look strong. In other words, thick skin is not a personality trait, but a technique. The author has spent a long time interviewing professionals in interpersonal relationships—such as yakuza, hosts, hostesses, politicians, and top salespeople—and has organized forty-three techniques on how they make themselves look bigger, command respect from others, and get through crises. It is not about innate courage, but the accumulation of "appearing unruffled" through facial expressions, timing, and word choice. How to keep a mindset that doesn't dwell on things, behavior that makes you look bigger, how to handle yourself to command respect, and conversational techniques to win negotiations—the book lists these techniques by situation. None of them are special talents; they are all things anyone can try if they are conscious of them. That said, one reader frankly points out that if you only operate on superficial bluffing, the other party might see through you, thinking "this guy is a pushover," and end up taking advantage of you. It is a calm perspective that the technique of presentation and the genuine caliber that builds up behind it are two different things. Where does the performance end and genuine confidence begin? I encourage you to check that line for yourself in this book.

Just by "looking strong," reality shifted a little

Before I knew this way of thinking, in tense situations, I would try to fix my inner self by telling myself, "Calm down, calm down," and I would usually fail. But after reading it, I changed the order: I decided to keep my inner self as it is, but first adjust my posture and the volume of my voice. When speaking in a meeting, I straighten my back and pause for a beat before I start talking. Just by doing that, I felt the other person's reaction come back more calmly than before. Instead of waiting for my mind to become strong first, I change how I present myself first. Then, strangely, my feelings gradually catch up afterward. I realize in small daily situations that the order was reversed. Of course, I haven't forgotten the reader's point that if you only have the presentation without the substance, you will eventually be found out. That is why I now approach things with a two-stage strategy: first, use my posture to buy time, and during that time, organize the substance of what I really need to convey. Since I started doing this, the number of times I get tongue-tied due to lack of confidence has visibly decreased.

To the me who was shrinking away, blaming my personality

If I hadn't read this book, I think I would have continued to believe that thick skin was an innate talent and would have kept classifying myself as being on the weak side. The author, Masafumi Mukaiya, is a writer who became a journalist for a weekly magazine and has long covered the yakuza and the underworld, and he also holds the position of a monk in the Jodo Shinshu Hongwanji-ha sect. His perspective, having seen people in the field where things are not sugar-coated, supports the persuasiveness of this book. It is a book that serves as a trigger for people who are shrinking away, blaming their personality for their mental weakness, to rethink it as a technique.

You can read "Yakuza-Style Psychology for Living with Thick Skin" by Masafumi Mukaiya here.