Steepling

You might remember the childhood rhyme, spoken while you performed a hand pantomime:

“Here is the church. Here is the steeple. Open the doors and see all the people.” 

There are hand gestures to go along with it to up the dexterity ante: Face hands toward each other. Lock fingers together facing down. Hold both index fingers straight up against each other.

Well, the secret, of course, was the interlinking fingers. When you turned your hands over to open the church, the fingers were the ‘people’.

But I’m not here to tell you that. My mission today is to give you one of the easiest confidence boosters to master: steepling.

Steepling is a powerful nonverbal behavior which occurs when the fingers are pressed towards the sky in an almost church-like steeple or prayer position. An example of when you may see the steepling gesture is when somebody believes they have the right answer as steepling tends to be associated with a sign of confidence.

Here’s what the trick is: you might not be feeling super confident (when in an interview or answering difficult questions), but putting your hands together makes you appear to be confident to others. That instills their confidence in you.

Besides, the position of your hands will seem like you are poised in prayer.

(And, just so we’re singing from the same hymn sheet, note that the steepling movement brings the two sides of your energy – left hemisphere and right hemisphere – into alignment. In other words, you complete the electrical circuitry of your body, and become One.)

Amen.