Power Posing (Week 2 Post 1)

Yesterday I had my very first interview for my summer internship. The only other interview I had ever done was over the phone, so I was very nervous about body language. When I was talking to my mentor, she talked about how important body language was in interviews, as well as in the workplace.
She directed me towards this Ted talk, spoken by Amy Cuddy, a Social Psychologist. Cuddy spoke about her belief that your body language can shape the way not only others perceive us, but also how we see ourselves.

If you force yourself to smile, you start to feel happy after a while. The same goes for Power Posing. Amy took 2 groups of people, one sitting in high power poses, and one sitting in low power poses. (High Power Posing: arms above your head, shoulders back, smiling. Low Power Posing: Hunched over your phone, slouching, arms crossed.)The findings of Amy's Power Posing experiment were that after 2 minutes of sitting in high power poses, those people's testosterone levels (the "dominance" hormone) were higher than those who were sitting in low power poses.

So for 2 minutes before my interview, I stood in the bathroom mirror and followed her advice. I "Power Posed". I will say it made me feel less nervous and more comfortable with my environment. Hopefully it improved how I interviewed, but only time will tell that.