Change in Body language can change your life
Reading body language is a known topic that we all have read and talked about. I write this article to bring to light a different side of Body Language.
Change in Body language can change your life.
In all my training sessions on Body language, I ask participants to slouch their shoulders, drag their feet and walk slowly looking down for 30 sec to 1 minute.
After 1 minute I ask them, how they feel ???????
And words that come out, are ‘Drowsy’, ‘Lazy’, ‘Sleepy’ etc.
After their feedback, I ask them to change their posture from slouch to straight, chin parallel to the ground and walk for 30 secs to 1 min.
And then after a minute I ask them how they feel and words that come out-
Ready to go for a party, energetic, active etc.
Such a change, lift in the mood that happens just by changing body language.
I always heard that our mood is a slave of our hormones.
But what I was starting to also witness is that, our body language can affect our hormones and as result, our mood.
I spent time digging deeper on my findings and what landed were some fantastic discoveries.
According to a study by researchers from Columbia and Harvard Universities, body language symbolizing power can actually affect our decision-making, subconsciously. The researchers measured the appetite for risk of participants in either expansive, powerful poses, or constricted poses (occupying minimal space, keeping limbs close to the body). Those in the powerful poses not only felt more powerful and in control, but were 45% more likely to take a risky bet. Plus, the study used saliva samples to prove that expansive postures actually altered the participants' hormone levels—decreasing cortisol (C) and increasing testosterone (T):
Another study by Dr. Carney et al. Power posing: brief nonverbal displays affect neuroendocrine levels and risk tolerance, discovered that power posture positions in an office setting, changed neuro endocrine functions by elevating testosterone and decreasing cortisol, posture also changed behaviors.
Amy Cuddy (American social psychologist, author and speaker) from Harvard University has done research on how body language impacts hormones. One of her studies show how levels of salivary testosterone and cortisol are impacted when someone is in an upright posture vs. when someone is in a slouched over posture.
Cortisol is commonly known as the “stress hormone”, is secreted by the adrenal glands during stressful events. It is very important that after a stressful event, that cortisol go back to normal levels. Unfortunately, in a society where stress is not an acute but a chronic event, cortisol levels can rise and stay elevated for a prolonged period. This has been shown to have negative effects such as impaired cognitive function, sleep disturbance, lower immune function, higher blood pressure and increased abdominal fat to again name but a few!
Change in Body language can change your life.
In all my training sessions on Body language, I ask participants to slouch their shoulders, drag their feet and walk slowly looking down for 30 sec to 1 minute.
After 1 minute I ask them, how they feel ???????
And words that come out, are ‘Drowsy’, ‘Lazy’, ‘Sleepy’ etc.
After their feedback, I ask them to change their posture from slouch to straight, chin parallel to the ground and walk for 30 secs to 1 min.
And then after a minute I ask them how they feel and words that come out-
Ready to go for a party, energetic, active etc.
Such a change, lift in the mood that happens just by changing body language.
I always heard that our mood is a slave of our hormones.
But what I was starting to also witness is that, our body language can affect our hormones and as result, our mood.
I spent time digging deeper on my findings and what landed were some fantastic discoveries.
According to a study by researchers from Columbia and Harvard Universities, body language symbolizing power can actually affect our decision-making, subconsciously. The researchers measured the appetite for risk of participants in either expansive, powerful poses, or constricted poses (occupying minimal space, keeping limbs close to the body). Those in the powerful poses not only felt more powerful and in control, but were 45% more likely to take a risky bet. Plus, the study used saliva samples to prove that expansive postures actually altered the participants' hormone levels—decreasing cortisol (C) and increasing testosterone (T):
Another study by Dr. Carney et al. Power posing: brief nonverbal displays affect neuroendocrine levels and risk tolerance, discovered that power posture positions in an office setting, changed neuro endocrine functions by elevating testosterone and decreasing cortisol, posture also changed behaviors.
Amy Cuddy (American social psychologist, author and speaker) from Harvard University has done research on how body language impacts hormones. One of her studies show how levels of salivary testosterone and cortisol are impacted when someone is in an upright posture vs. when someone is in a slouched over posture.
Cortisol is commonly known as the “stress hormone”, is secreted by the adrenal glands during stressful events. It is very important that after a stressful event, that cortisol go back to normal levels. Unfortunately, in a society where stress is not an acute but a chronic event, cortisol levels can rise and stay elevated for a prolonged period. This has been shown to have negative effects such as impaired cognitive function, sleep disturbance, lower immune function, higher blood pressure and increased abdominal fat to again name but a few!
High-power vs. Low-power Poses
In Cuddy’s study, the levels of salivary cortisol and testosterone were measured when participants held (for two minutes) an upright “high-power” pose vs. a slouched over “low- power” pose. The results showed an increase in testosterone and a decrease in cortisol in the “high-power” pose and a decrease in testosterone levels and an increase in cortisol levels in a “lower- power” pose.
In a nutshell……………..
There are two types of Hormones who work opposite to each other
Testosterone and Cortisol.
Testosterone increases adrenaline rush in our body leading to alertness, activeness, leadership abilities, risk taking etc.
Cortisol, on the other hand, does the opposite it relaxes and brings down the adrenaline effects.
Now how does this help in understanding Body Language.
All this while, we thought our mind is affecting our body language but it is the other way round too, and the beauty is that we can use this learning to our advantage.
WHO IS THE BOSS HERE - MIND OR BODY
IT’S LIKE ASKING WHAT CAME FIRST - EGG OR HEN
We enjoy eating eggs also and chicken also. Let’s use both learnings for our advantage to achieve our objectives and uncover many magical moments and treasures of our lives
It’s not always the most beautiful person in the room that gets all the attention, nor does the tallest one. What most people are attracted to is someone who is calm and carries a confident body language which sends the message. “I’m in charge of myself”.
Change in Body language can change your life. I say Change your body language to charge up your life.
