The power of posture
The body as a window into our emotional world
A side effect of getting married recently has been that I’ve looked at a lot of photos of myself in the last few weeks. The professional ones, that make me look flawless like a movie star, and the candid ones, taken by friends, which are often a bit wonky, taken from unflattering angles and capturing aspects of myself that I don’t necessarily see when I look in the mirror.
It has been confronting.
One of the things I notice about those unchosen images of myself is what I am (affectionately) calling my saggy middle-aged posture.
I have the posture of a woman trying to make herself look invisible is what I think as I scroll through these images.
Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t hate my body or my appearance, despite how we are indoctrinated as women in the West. I’ve made a lot of peace with who I am through my five decades on the planet. But it leads me to some deep reflection.
It leads me to wonder about how I show up in the world and the energy I give off, and about what this creates (or doesn’t) in my life. There’s a feeling of don’t look at me, nothing to see here in the drape of my shoulders and the sag of my spine. I’m jolted into an awareness that I have not been fully taking up my space in the world.
And it gets me pondering how differently I might experience the world if I strolled through it with head held high, shoulders back, chest open, in a stance that says more Here I am, world.
I have struggled with feeling invisible in many situations in my life, particularly in groups and workplace settings – could this be part of the reason why?
Research in the field of Social Psychology has shown that contractive body postures – those that draw the body inwards and occupy less physical space – reduce subjective feelings of confidence and power.1
Perhaps not surprisingly, women tend to adopt these postures more frequently, while men often adopt more expansive postures – those that open the body and take up more space. A casual ride on the London Underground (or likely any subway system in the world) can testify to this. These gender differences have been identified as young as 4 years of age.2
I’ve learned from my years of training and practicing yoga that we can create a big shift in our mental, emotional, and energetic states by working with the body, shifting posture and alignment. I draw on this often – taking back-bends and chest-openers in my office when my mid-afternoon energy starts to slump, resting into forward folds when I need to calm and settle, shaking my body to release anxiety or awaken vitality in my cells and organs.
I like to play with this in therapy sessions too. Inviting clients to inhabit different shapes as a doorway to inhabiting different aspects of themselves. Inviting people to pendulate back and forth between shapes to notice the subtle and profound transformations this creates. We can access different feelings, different stories, different beliefs - different corners of our psyche - when we inhabit our embodied form in different ways.
This is one of the threads we explore in Somatic Psychology, looking at the ways that old life experiences, particularly traumas, can become locked into place by the way we hold our bodies in patterns of tension and bracing. This can cut us off from our vital life force energy, keeping us trapped in the past, replaying old scripts and reliving old experiences. It can unconsciously limit the possibilities for how we show up in the world, even many years after the original traumatic events. The traumatised parts of the brain do not recognise linear time, and continue to act as though the events of the past are happening in the present, long after the actual threat has passed, often leading us to hold defensive or ready-for-action postures (an expression of the fight or flight response), without recognising our present moment safety. Signals travel from brain to body and from body back to brain, creating a self-reinforcing loop and embedding these states.
By slowing ourselves down and increasing embodied awareness, we can start to recognise our signature shapes, and begin to unwind holding patterns that may be decades old. We can start to try on new possibilities, and inhabit these in very concrete, accessible ways.
I’m playing with my own posture this week. I’m playing with engaging my core and imagining an invisible thread drawing up from the roots of my pelvis and out through the crown of my head. A sense of lift, elevation, separating the vertebrae of my spine. I’m playing with softly drawing my shoulders back, leading with my heart as I walk through the world. And as I invite my rib cage to open, I instantly notice a fuller, deeper breath arise. I instantly feel more energised, more awake, more present in the world.
It feels alien.
It feels enlivening.
It feels spacious.
Neuroscientists tell us that repetition is key to wiring a new pathway in our neural networks, so I’m practicing little and often.
Look out world, here I come.
As always, I would love to hear your thoughts and comments on this. Have you experienced your body as a window into your internal state? Have you noticed how shifting your posture can influence your mood? How do you make use of this in your own life?
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With deep gratitude,
Elkjær, E., Mikkelsen, M. B., Michalak, J., Mennin, D. S., & O’Toole, M. S. (2022). Expansive and Contractive Postures and Movement: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of the Effect of Motor Displays on Affective and Behavioral Responses. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 17(1), 276-304. https://doi.org/10.1177/1745691620919358
Research cited by Social Psychologist, Amy Cuddy in her 2017 interview with TED.com
I love this topic so much, Vicki. Until I began practicing yoga in my mid-late-20s, I walked around bent in on myself. Would literally walk around with head nodded down. Yoga changed that for me, but when I’m around my family (only once a year or so), I feel as though I’m standing too straight, putting on airs, making myself too visible. I have this same experience when I’m interacting with (most) men, but in that case I can often notice my reaction and still maintain my posture. With my family, I feel guilty and bad for them - as though, by standing upright, I’m shaming them.
I have become more aware of my posture since taking up yoga many moons ago. However, it wasn't until recently, that my intermittent lower back pain began to be more persistent. My hips and pelvis were sore all the time, my knee would give way unexpectedly, I couldn't sit for long..I realised all was not well with my core. Somehow, my brain had lost contact with my core. I sought the help of an osteopath. I was also processing some personal issues.
I am even more aware now how important that part of my body is, and how a misaligned pelvis, diagnosed by my osteopath, affects how I stand, walk, sit and move. It is the cause of my knee problem. I had also become depressed, trying to process birth family issues ...something I've struggled with since childhood.
Looking into it more deeply and spiritually, I discovered that area of the body is where unprocessed negative emotions are stored. For a woman that part of the body holds onto the trauma of childbirth. I'm intrigued by the influence of the chakras and meridians on the human body. In my case the second chakra.
Discovering this about my 5 feet self has empowered me to stand tall, and shed psychic weight. Realigning my pelvis has enabled a huge emotional release and has been extremely powerful in terms of how I now stand up for myself and not crumple. I'm a true believer in the interconnectedness of the mind, body, spirit and what is in the macro is in the micro. In the end, life is about becoming whole.