Body language is extremely significant in today’s world. One may not know it but body language is a representation of who you are. Imagine yourself sitting in a coffee shop, observing others around you. Do you automatically judge a person by the way they hold themselves? Now think about a time you met someone new for the first time. Did their handshake affect your first impression of them?
Amy Cuddy, a social psychologist, has pointed out that people clearly use body language to determine how we think and feel about others. But she has also brought attention to a very important question: “*Can our nonverbals govern how we think and feel about ourselves?*” In other words, can our body language manipulate how we perceive ourselves? In today’s society, what matters most is if an individual is powerful or not. You can tell if a person is powerful through their body language. Much like animals, humans physically expand or open up when they’re feeling dominant. For us humans, we tend to expand our arms during a moment of power.
When we don’t feel powerful, instead of expanding, we close up.
So this is how others can tell if we have any power but can we fool ourselves into thinking that we do? Based on studies Amy Cuddy has executed, it is possible. She has researched that by doing power poses for at least two minutes before a certain stressful situation; one can come off more confident and ultimately start feeling more powerful. In the same event if someone were to do the low power poses, they begin feeling less confident about themselves.
So although some people may be born with “power” due to their status, it is not a hereditary gene. Power is something that can be gained simply by changing our body language, which may ultimately change our path in life. As Amy Cuddy once said, “*Our bodies change our minds and our minds change our behavior and our behavior changes our outcomes.*”