Amy Cuddy

Politicians are very experienced – maybe too experienced – at using body language to signal power and competence. But what these politicians are much more likely to struggle with, or just neglect to do altogether, is communicate warmth and trustworthiness.

Amy Cuddy

Power affects our thoughts, feelings, behaviors, and even physiology in fundamental ways that directly facilitate or obstruct our presence, our performance, and the very course of our lives.

Amy Cuddy

Power makes us fearless, independent, and less susceptible to outside pressures and expectations, allowing us to be more creative.

Amy Cuddy

Powerful people initiate speech more often, talk more overall, and make more eye contact while they’re speaking than powerless people do. When we feel powerful, we speak more slowly and take more time. We don’t rush. We’re not afraid to pause. We feel entitled to the time we’re using.

Amy Cuddy

Practice smiling by holding a pencil between your teeth for twenty minutes.

Amy Cuddy

Presence emerges when we feel personally powerful, which allows us to be acutely attuned to our most sincere selves.

Amy Cuddy

Presence isn’t about pretending to be competent; it’s about believing in and revealing the abilities you truly have. It’s about shedding whatever is blocking you from expressing who you are. It’s about tricking yourself into accepting that you are indeed capable.

Amy Cuddy

Research conducted over many years has shown that in terms of brain activity and behavioral effects, mental imagery of movement closely resembles actual physical movement.

Amy Cuddy

The strongest predictor of who got the money was not the person’s credentials or the content of the pitch. The strongest predictors of who got the money were these traits: confidence, comfort level, and passionate enthusiasm.

Amy Cuddy

There are plenty of reasons to put our cellphones down now and then, not least the fact that incessantly checking them takes us out of the present moment and disrupts family dinners around the globe.

Amy Cuddy