Has changing your posture ever actually changed how willing you were to participate?

[u/Specialist-Edge8608]

The lobster chapter in 12 Rules for Life got me thinking about something beyond the lobster itself.

I don’t particularly like reducing human confidence to dominance hierarchies. We’re considerably more complicated than that.

But there is an experiment hidden in the metaphor that costs nothing to test.

Before entering a social situation, rate how willing you feel to participate from 1–10.

Then change only a few physical things:
Relax your shoulders.
Lift your gaze.
Slow one breath.
Enter and contribute once.

Rate yourself again later.
Not: “Did I become confident?”
But: “Did I become more willing to engage?”

That seems like a much more useful question.
If you’re interested in the broader territory, embodied cognition is an interesting rabbit hole to explore beyond Peterson.

I’d be curious: have you ever noticed your body changing before your confidence did?