Presence Bringing Your Boldest Self to Your Biggest Challenges Presence Attuned + Expressing Your Power

Brian Johnson’s PhilosophersNotesTM More Wisdom in Less Time

Self-Affirmation Theory Gosh darnit, you’re awesome!

Priming + Nudges To build your personal power. “The opposite of powerlessness must be power, right? In a sense, that’s true, but it’s not quite that simple. The research I’ve been doing for years now joins a large Expand Your Body To expand your power. body of inquiry into a quality I call presence. Presence stems from believing in and trusting yourself—your real, honest feelings, values, and abilities. That’s important, iHunch How’s yours? because if you don’t trust yourself, how can others trust you? Whether we are “I’m Excited!” talking in front of two people or five thousand, interviewing for a job, negotiating You? for a raise, or pitching a business idea to potential investors, speaking up for Boldest Version of You ourselves or speaking up for someone else, we all face daunting moments that Move like that. Today. must be met with poise if we want to feel good about ourselves and make progress in our lives. Presence gives us the power to rise to these moments.”

~ Amy Cuddy from Presence

Amy Cuddy is awesome.

Her TED talk on “Your Body Shapes Who You Are” is the second-most-watched TED talk in history. If you haven’t watched it yet, check it out.

(#1 = Sir Ken Robinson’s on Creativity. Check that out + Note on The Element!)

This book is *really* *really* good.

It’s packed with a ton of fascinating research studies proving the power of creating presence via mind and body practices along with some uber-inspiring stories of people who have put the “But if power reveals, then wisdom to use and changed their lives in the process. we can only know the truly It’s also one of those books you read and say to yourself, “This author is a really good person.” powerful, because they are bold enough to show who All of which is a fantastic combo. I HIGHLY recommend it. (Get a copy here.) they are without subterfuge I’m excited to explore some of my favorite Big Ideas and help you apply them to your life NOW and without apology. They so let’s jump straight in! have the courage and the confidence to open PRESENCE themselves to the gaze of “Presence, as I mean it throughout these pages, is the state of being attuned to and able to others. In that way, the path comfortably express our true thoughts, feelings, values, and potential. That’s it. It is not to personal power is also the a permanent, transcendent mode of being. It comes and goes. It is a moment-to-moment path to presence. It’s how phenomenon. we, and others, discover and Presence emerges when we feel personally powerful, which allows us to be acutely attuned to our set free who we truly are.” most sincere selves. In this psychological state, we are able to maintain presence even in the very ~ Amy Cuddy stressful situations that typically make us feel distracted and powerless. When we feel present, our speech, facial expressions, postures, and movements align. They synchronize and focus. And that internal convergence, that harmony, is palpable and resonant—because it’s real. It’s what makes us compelling. We are no longer fighting ourselves; we are being ourselves. Our search for

1 PhilosophersNotes | Presence presence isn’t about finding charisma or extraversion or carefully managing the impression we’re making on other people. It’s about the honest, powerful connection that we create internally, with ourselves.

Presence = “the state of being attuned to and able to comfortably express our true thoughts, feelings, values, and potential.”

Note: That’s not a *permanent* state of nirvanic bliss. It’s a moment-to-moment experience in which “We are no longer fighting ourselves; we are being ourselves.”

The trick is learning how to experience more and more of those moments more and more consistently. And, of course, helping us do that is what this book is all about.

Let’s explore some of my favorite Ideas on how to go about making that happen!

SELF-AFFIRMATION THEORY “The kind of self-affirmation I’m talking about—the kind whose effects Steele and others have “The strongest predictors studied—doesn’t have anything to do with reciting generic one-liners in the mirror, nor does it of [the entrepreneurs] involve boasting or self-aggrandizement. Instead it’s about reminding ourselves what matters who got the money [from most to us and, by extension, who we are. In effect, it’s a way of grounding ourselves in the truth venture capitalists] were of our own stories. It makes us feel less dependent on the approval of others and even more these traits: confidence, comfortable with their disapproval, if that’s what we get.” comfort level, and passionate Self-affirmation is a Big Idea. enthusiasm. Those who succeeded did not spend But not, as Cuddy tells us, in the Stuart Smalley cheesy “I’m good enough, I’m smart enough, their precious moments in and, doggone it, people like me!” kinda way.

the spotlight worrying about Get this: Social psychologists have created a little test to stress you out and then measure your how they were doing or what response. It’s called the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST). others thought of them.” Imagine being asked to give an impromptu 5-minute speech in front of a panel of judges who ~ Amy Cuddy are told to simply look at you sternly and offer no positive feedback. THEN, while still in front of those judges, you need to count backwards from 2,083 by 13 with the judges telling you to go faster. (Hah!)

Enough to stress you out just thinking about it, eh?

Well, here’s what’s fascinating: Usually, when people go through that experience, their cortisol levels spike. BUT, if they first reflect on a core value that is very important to them and write a brief description of WHY it’s important to them, they can go through that stress test WITHOUT the typical spikes in cortisol.

That’s awesome. It’s the power of Self-Affirmation Theory. When we are aware of and living consistent with our values, we’re more powerful.

Which, of course, begs the question: What are your core values?

Cuddy tells us that one way to arrive at that is to ask ourselves what three words best describe us.

So, what three words best describe YOU?

Think about that for a moment. And capture it.

These three words best describe me:

1. ______

2. ______

3. ______

2 PhilosophersNotes | Presence Now, which one is most essential to who you are? Briefly reflect on WHY it’s important to you and a specific time in which you demonstrated that value.

______

Fantastic.

(Gosh darnit, you’re awesome! In a scientifically rigorous way, of course! :)

PRIMING, NUDGES AND YOUR PERSONAL POWER

“That’s how it works. In “Recall a moment when you felt personally powerful. A time when you felt fully in control of each challenging situation, your own psychological state—when you had the confidence to act based on your boldest, most we nudge ourselves: we sincere self, with the sense that your actions would be effective. Maybe it was at work, at school, at home, or in some other part of your life. Take a few minutes right now to remember and encourage ourselves to feel reflect on that experience of your personal power, on how it felt. a little more courageous, to act a bit more boldly— It felt good, right? Whether you know it or not, you’ve just been primed. Thanks to that little to step outside the walls exercise, your psychological state was, and likely still is, infused with feelings of confidence and of our own fear, anxiety strength. I could just have easily asked you to remember a time when you felt powerless and and powerlessness. To be stress-ridden, but of course I don’t want to bring you down. Had you done that, however, it, too, would have changed your psychological state, at least temporarily—for the worse. That unhappy a bit more present. And sensation of being at someone’s mercy would have come flooding back into the hidden recesses incrementally, over time, we of your brain.” end up where we want to be... even if we couldn’t have First, know this: We can be either powerful or powerless.

said where that was when we When we’re powerful we APPROACH challenges. We dare to express our BOLDEST selves. started.” When we’re powerless, we *avoid* challenges. We shrink from life and fail to dare greatly. ~ Amy Cuddy Power is an essential component to presence. And, helping us more and more consistently cultivate our personal power is a huge part of what this book is all about.

Now, let’s talk about priming.

Did you know that researchers can quickly prime you to be either more or less powerful and then watch you perform either more or less powerfully?

It’s nuts. Little things like having us recall a powerful (or powerless) moment or assigning us to a role of either boss or employee or even flashing words associated with power (control, authority) vs. those without (obey, yield) elicit more or less power from us in subsequent behaviors.

Short story: When you’re primed into a state of powerlessness you significantly underperform those who are primed into power. On basically every test imaginable.

Most importantly: We need to know that we’re priming and nudging OURSELVES all day every day. The good news is that we can become master primers and cultivate our power via little “self- nudges”—via both our mind and our bodies.

Mindset-wise: How do YOU prime yourself all day long? Are you reminding yourself of all the times you were powerfully awesome or all the times you were powerless?

Science says: IT MATTERS.

Focus on your values to create more power.

Recall your greatest moments if you want to create more of them.

PhilosophersNotes | Presence 3 EXPAND YOUR BODY TO EXPAND YOUR POWER

“Taking control of your body “As scientists, the first thing we needed was a clear hypothesis. language is not just about This was our thinking: if nonverbal expressions of power are so hardwired that we instinctively posing in a powerful way. throw our arms up in a V when we win a race—regardless of cultural background, gender, or It’s also about the fact that whether we’ve seen anyone else do it—and if William James was right that our emotions are we pose in a powerless way as much a result as they are a cause of our physical expressions, then what would happen if we much more often than we adopt expansive postures even when we are feeling powerless? Since we naturally expand our think—and we need to change bodies when we feel powerful, do we also naturally feel powerful when we expand our bodies?” that.” In the first part of the book, Cuddy shares mindset nudges we can use to boost our power + ~ Amy Cuddy presence. In the second half of the book she walks us through the FASCINATING research on how to use our *bodies* to boost our power and thereby boost our presence.

We’ll start with her primary investigative question: “Since we naturally expand our bodies when we feel powerful, do we also naturally feel powerful when we expand our bodies?”

Spoiler alert: YES!

The relationship is what researchers call “bidirectional.” When you feel powerful, you tend to expand. AND, when you expand, you tend to feel more powerful. In short: Simply holding your body in an expansive, powerful way actually MAKES you feel more powerful.

Get this: In one study, individuals were split into two groups. One group assumed “low-power” poses in which they, essentially, took up less space (sitting = slouching + hands close to body; standing = legs close together, arms close to body and head down). The other group assumed “high-power” poses in which they EXPANDED and took up more space (sitting in a relaxed, confident manner with legs out and hands behind head; standing like Wonder Woman with hands on hips, chin up and feet wide apart).

After only TWO minutes of posing, here’s what happened: “In our sample of women and men, “The way you carry yourself the high-power posers showed a 19 percent increase in testosterone and a 25 percent decrease in is a source of personal cortisol. Low-power posers showed the opposite pattern—a 10 percent decrease in testosterone power—the kind of power and a 17 percent increase in cortisol, the exact pattern we predicted.”

that is the key to presence. That pattern is known as the dual hormone hypothesis. High testosterone + low cortisol = HIGH It’s the key that allows power. Low testosterone + high cortisol = LOW power. you to unlock yourself— Think about that: Two minutes of posing produced those dramatic shifts in biology. Simply your abilities, your creativity, moving our bodies in a more expansive way significantly boosts our confidence and power. your courage, and even your generosity. It doesn’t give you Got something challenging coming up? Strike a power pose before rockin’ it! skills or talents you don’t P.S. Imagine winning an important event (or even watching your favorite sports team win). How have; it helps you to share do you respond? If you’re like most people, odds are you EXPAND—perhaps into the universal the ones you do have. expression of victory with your arms up in a triumphant V, your head high w/chin up and a big It doesn’t make you smarter “YES!” throughout your being. THAT’s a power pose. (btw: Did you know blind athletes—who or better informed; it makes have never seen anyone do that move—expand in precisely that way when they win?) you more resilient and open. P.P.S. Have you ever heard of the All Blacks? Cuddy uses the New Zealand rugby team’s “haka” It doesn’t change who you as an example of cultivating power. Check out this video. (Wow.) And, remember: They’re not are; it allows you to be who just psyching out their opponents, they’re (literally!) building their own power! #powerpose you are.” iHUNCHING ~ Amy Cuddy “As expected, device size significantly affected whether subjects felt comfortable seeking out the experimenter. In the ten minutes before the experimenter returned, only 50 percent of the smartphone users came out to tell experimenters they wanted to leave.

4 PhilosophersNotes | Presence By contrast, 94 percent of the desktop users went to fetch the experimenter. ... the bigger the device, the more likely subjects were to assert themselves. In fact, not only were the big-device users more likely to interrupt, those who did interrupt did so sooner. We concluded that the smaller the device, the more we must contract our bodies to use it, and the more time we spend in these shrunken, inward postures, the more powerless we feel.

Our findings uncover a cruel irony: while many of us spend hours ever day working on small mobile devices, often with the goal of increasing our productivity and efficiency, interacting with these tiny objects, even for short periods of time, might reduce assertiveness, potentially undermining our productivity and efficiency.

If you must spend long stretches in front of a screen, which many of us do, be sure to choose a device carefully and configure your space to allow for the most upright and expansive posture.”

We’ve talked about the iPhone effect before—research that reveals the fact that simply having your iPhone in sight while hanging out with someone diminishes the quality of that interaction Now, it’s time for the iHunch effect. All that hunching over a tiny screen is diminishing your power! (D’oh!)

Want to reduce your ability to connect with people? Have your iPhone out and visible in interactions. Want to reduce your effectiveness in general? Crumple into a little ball as you poke away at your tiny device all day long. (Hah.) Otherwise, put the phone away more often, expand and be present!

I’M EXCITED! YOU? “As most of us know, stage fright can feel like a paralyzing overdose of anxiety. And what do “The link between anxiety people tell us to do when we’re anxious? They tell us, with good intentions, to calm down. and self-absorption is As it turns out, that might just be the very worst thing they can say. You see, anxiety is what bidirectional; they cause each psychologists describe as a high-arousal emotion. As I’ve explained, when we’re anxious, we other. In a review of more occupy a heightened state of psychological vigilance. We’re hyperalert. Our hearts race, we than two hundred studies, break out into a sweat, our cortisol may spike—all of these reactions are controlled automatically researchers concluded that by our nervous system. And it’s virtually impossible for most people to shut off that kind of the more self-focused we automatic arousal, to abruptly de-escalate it. Not only can we not calm it down, but when someone tells us to calm down, it also reminds us of how calm we are not, which stokes our are, the more anxious—and anxiety even more. also the more depressed and generally negative—we become.” But there’s another high-arousal emotion that’s not so negative. In fact, it’s quite positive—

~ Amy Cuddy excitement. Brooks predicted that we may not be able to extinguish arousal, but we should be able to change the way we interpret it. So rather than fruitlessly trying to change the arousal level of our emotional states from high to low, what if we try to change them from negative to positive? From anxiety to excitement?”

This is one of my favorite Ideas EVER. As a guy who used to get anxious about pretty much *everything* (I laugh now but it’s painfully true!), I really wish I’d heard about this decades ago. But, alas, here we are. :)

So, Cuddy’s office at Harvard is about 20 yards away from another brilliant researcher named Alison Wood Brooks. Brooks conducted the research we talked about in our Notes on Kelly McGonigal’s The Upside of Stress. In short: When you feel yourself getting all stressed out before doing something, research says you’re MUCH better off saying to yourself, “I’m excited!!” rather than “Calm down, calm down, calm down!” :)

As Cuddy brilliantly advises, don’t try to change your arousal state from super high to super low. Instead, change your *experience* of that arousal from negative (“Oh, no! Something’s wrong.”) to positive (“Yayuh! My body’s giving me all the resources I need to crush it. I’m EXCITED! Let’s do this!” :)

PhilosophersNotes | Presence 5 So... What do YOU say to yourself when your heart starts racing before doing something that matters to you? (Me? “I’m excited!”)

MOVE LIKE THE BEST, BOLDEST VERSION OF YOU “In the first month after my TED talk posted, I heard from an Olympic swimming coach who “Stand up straight and realize explained how he’d been using a power posing-type strategy—with great success—for years: who you are, that you tower encouraging some of his swimmers, beginning on the morning of the race, to physically over circumstances.” behave as if they’d won their events. Swimmers, as he pointed out, are notorious for their use ~ Maya Angelou of dominant body language in the moments before races, not only to signal their power to their competitors but also to loosen their muscles and pump themselves up. Sometimes they will literally pound their chests, like gorillas. But the approach this coach used—encouraging swimmers to adopt ‘alpha’ nonverbal postures from the minute they wake up on race days—was most helpful to swimmers who’d been thrown off by a poor performance or who were feeling a wave of insecurity and self-doubt.”

I love that. Imagine a swimmer on the morning of her event acting as if she’d already won (and getting the benefit of all that extra power).

As Cuddy tells us: We need to fake it until we become it. Not to manipulate others and gain power over them but to slightly trick ourselves for the moment so we can gain personal power to express the best, boldest, most authentic version of ourselves.

But why limit it to the day of a swimming event?

How does the best, boldest, most authentic version of YOU think and breathe and walk and talk?

Let’s bring that wonderfully bold version of ourselves to our lives TODAY!

Brian Johnson, Chief Philosopher

If you liked this Note, About the Author of “Presence” you’ll probably like… AMY CUDDY

The Upside of Stress Amy Cuddy is known around the world for her 2012 TED Talk, which is the Daring Greatly second-most viewed talk in TED’s history. A Harvard Business School professor Mindset and social psychologist, Cuddy studies how nonverbal behavior and snap judgments influence people. Her research has been published in top academic Self-theories journals and covered by NPR, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, The Economist, Wired, Fast Company, and more. Connect: amycuddy.com.

About the Author of This Note BRIAN JOHNSON

Brian Johnson loves helping people optimize their lives as he studies, embodies and teaches the fundamentals of optimal living—integrating ancient wisdom + modern science + common sense + virtue + mastery + fun. Learn more and optimize your life at brianjohnson.me.

6 PhilosophersNotes | Presence