Would you like to kick your brain up a notch?
If the answer is yes (and who wouldn’t, right?) then lean back in your chair, stretch out, put your hands behind your head, and watch Harvard Business School professor Amy Cuddy give one of my favorite Ted Talks. Professor Cuddy’s research focuses on body language, and what she found is that not only does your body language mold other peoples’ perceptions of you, but you can use your own body language to literally change your brain chemistry in ways that will make you a more effective person.
In her TED talk, she talks about a free no-tech life hack that only requires that you change your posture for two minutes. People would be surprised what they communicate with their bodies when they’re not aware of their posture. Some make themselves smaller by hunching or wrapping your legs or holding onto your arms. Others spread out and are comfortable taking up more space. She found in her MBA classes, that many of the male students take up as much space as possible, but generally, the women work really hard to make themselves tiny. She started to wonder if people started to “fake” confidence both by participation and their body language, could it make a difference? What she found was that all you need to increase your status and power is your body, privacy and two minutes to significantly change the outcome of your life.
The changes in brain chemistry begin after holding a “power pose” for just two minutes – you’ll hear about a number of these poses, but I think my favorite is as simple as, you guessed it, leaning back in my chair, stretching out, and putting my hands behind my head. If you hold that pose throughout this clip, I think you’ll be amazed at how you feel afterwards. Watch her TED talk below:
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