PRESCENCE - Amy Cuddy
Bringing your BOLDEST SELF to your BIGGEST CHALLENGES
This book is a must-read book if you are someone who is looking forward to ace your presence in an interview or meeting or any social gathering. The first chapter explains what presence is, quoting different people's thoughts about the so-called 'presence' and how they perceive it.
''Presence, as I mean it throughout these pages, is the state of being attuned to and able to comfortably express our true thoughts, feelings, values, and potential. That’s it. It is not a permanent, transcendent mode of being. It comes and goes. It is a moment-to-moment phenomenon.''
This book also includes a lot of responses from people who wrote back to Amy Cuddy(author of this book) after listening to her TEDx talk about "Body Language". It is one of the most famous TEDx talks. She shares in her book that she decided to publish a book on body language after she realized how it impacted so many people from different social backgrounds to overcome their hurdles in life.
This book also explains about powerlessness and how it impacts us. Powerlessness impairs thoughts, makes us self absorbed, and also, how power can set us free. As in her TEDx talk, she explains how power postures help gain power and makes us tune into Presence.
Expanding your body causes you to think about yourself in a positive light and to trust in that self-concept. It also clears your head making space for creativity, cognitive persistence, and abstract thinking.
The book also explains how power affects our physiology and how power posing can stimulate the hormones 'Testosterone' and 'Cortisol', thereby, increasing our performance and Presence.
The strategies about power posing and how it has a positive effect are illustrated through the study that she and her colleagues conducted or are quoted from research done by eminent people.
Enacting certain expressions prompts corresponding emotions, hindering those expressions can block emotions.
Knowing that by changing your body pose just a few mins before a stressful situation can make you perform better and handle it well, is the key take away of this book. Also, the author talks about nudging, which helps in altering a habit, and how it is the most easiest and effective method to incorporate any change that you wish to bring in.
Also, this book has a lot of examples of how power posing has changed the lives of people or helped them in a difficult situation.
When your mind is racing, when something unexpected happens in a social situation, when you don't know what to do, you know you can calm yourself by controlling your breathing.
An informative read, backed with scientific explanation and authentic real-time examples of people who have been profited by it. If you are looking to beget "Presence" then don't wait to read this nudging book.
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