“I want you to think about what is your biggest challenge? When you think about your professional life, what are the situations you approach with a sense of dread? That you execute with anxiety?” Ms Cuddy told the crowd.

“In those moments, you’re not thinking about what’s actually being said, you’re thinking about what they think of you, you’re thinking about what you should've said a minute ago, what’s going to be the consequence if you don’t do it well. You’re not present, you leave and you want this do-over. You leave with a sense of regret.

“... When you think about these different stages, you’re not present in any of them. So dread is about borrowing trouble from the future. You’ve already decided that it’s going to go badly so you set yourself up for failure. In that moment you’re not there and afterwards you’re doing that post-event processing.”

Ms Cuddy posed the question of how attendees could approach those situations with composure, and execute them with calm confidence, enabling them to leave satisfied with the interaction.

“That satisfaction is key because when you leave with satisfaction you can accept the outcome, even if it’s not the desired one, because you know that you did all you could do, you know that you connected with people, and you know that you showed people who you are. If they don’t hire you, maybe there was someone better for the job or maybe it was that they weren’t paying attention but at least you feel like you were,” she said.

“So, how can you be present? Presence, as I define it, is not a permanent state you get to at the end of your life when you’ve done enough meditation retreats and yoga. No one ever reaches a permanent state of presence, it’s not humanly possible. Everyone is distracted every 5–10 minutes, none of you will be present for the entire time here and that is ok.

“Presence is about these moments. We’re present in the moments where the stakes are lower. We’re present with our friends and family and when we feel safe but we really need to be present in these challenging moments, that’s when we most need to be present.

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“The ability to be in tune to and be able to access and comfortably express your authentic best self [is key]. Authentic best self is a really popular term but let me be clear, for me authenticity is not about your unfiltered self. That’s fine for some situations but not all the time, it’s about being the person you are in the best moments of your life. So if you think back to the last five years and think of a moment which really filled you with joy, where you felt satisfied, connected, you felt that you were seen, you felt that you were seeing the people you were with. It might’ve been at a family get together, but think about that moment. That’s the stuff I’m talking about. How do you bring that person forward? The person you’re most proud of.”

Another key is to “believe your story”, according to Ms Cuddy, who used the example of a person attempting to sell something to someone, but giving off the impression that they themselves wouldn’t buy it.

“Think about the show Shark Tank. It’s so much about what’s being conveyed. Who’s present and who’s super distracted? Sometimes people come on strong and it’s all scripted and it sounds good but there’s a lack of believability – you know the person doesn’t buy what they’re selling and that there’s something off about them,” she said.

“When you see the sharks response, the people that do well may not be perfectly poised and smooth, but they deeply believe in what they’re doing and that comes across.”

Tied into this, Ms Cuddy said maintaining a level of confidence, without arrogance, is vital.

“Confidence and arrogance are not the same thing, they could not be more different. Confidence is a tool, it’s real, it invites people in, people want to be around confidence,” she explained.

“Arrogance is a weapon, it’s what we use when we’re not confident. It’s a wall we put up to prevent other people from challenging us so we accuse them instead of letting them accuse us. Arrogance is not helping, it’s not grounded in true confidence so don’t get them confused. Don’t think you can use arrogance to replace confidence, it doesn’t go well.”

The last key in conveying active presence and authenticity is to communicate harmoniously, so that your words match your body language, Ms Cuddy said.

“When we’re telling a story, we’re conveying emotion not just through the words but also through our body language, through the tone of our voice, through how much vocal range we have, through our facial expressions, through our non-verbal lower body language – all of those things are universal expressions,” she said.

“The other thing I think is so important to keep in mind is its not just about us. It’s about the people we interact with. You want to show people not just who you are, you want to see who they are, you want to invite them in. Presence begets presence. When you’re present with people, when you’re authentic and open and paying attention, you are liberating them to be present with you.

“Think about a moment when you were interacting with somebody who wasn’t paying attention or was distracted by their phone, or they were looking over your shoulder waiting for someone more important to come in, in their minds. You’re not going to be fully present with them. How can you trust them? You don’t really know who they are, they’re not giving you their own attention, so when you’re working with people or with your children, be present with them. Know that it creates value for everyone when you can bring that out in them as well.”

There are usually three things that stop people being present, according to Ms Cuddy.

“You get obsessed with the outcome and neglect the process,” she said. 

“The second is we’re obsessing about what others think of us, how they’re judging us and we’re usually wrong about that so that’s just a waste of a time.  We have to manage the impression we’re making on ourselves, not the impression we’re making on others.

“The last is that we feel powerless and we consent to that feeling ... Power as a cognitive, emotional state is something that we ignore when we study wellbeing. What we think about is happiness and lack of stress. I think people are starting to focus on sense of purpose – all important things. But think about if you wanted to see a society thrive, what would you want to increase? You’d want happiness, to decrease stress, you’d want to increase sense of purpose, but what if you had all those things but at the end of the day felt like you had no self-advocacy? No power to actually get these things done, to change your life, to improve your life or your family’s life or my society’s life? Power matters. Feeling powerful is good and it’s ok.”

Relativity Fest also heard from Steptoe & Johnson’s Anna Frye and Ryan Flinspach on the ‘the plight of the lawyer technologist’. For a recap on the mega-conference click here.