STAGE PRESENCE

I was picking up my lovely daughter from her job at an outdoor mall yesterday. Walking on the sidewalk I could see in the distance 3 young kids (around 14 yo) on their bikes, terrorizing all the shoppers. They were driving straight at them, pushing them around, making them side step and scream in panic. It was easy to see they were laughing and totally enjoying themselves. They were still about 30 feet away from me. I was not buying what they were selling. I was still very relaxed and calm but I had that look on my face and a body attitude that screamed “Honey, I am not moving out of your way, you try and you will be sorry”. I never changed my path, I just kept on walking toward my objective. The first one looked at me and skidded sideways (he actually fell off his bike doing so), apologizing. The next one stopped in front of me and quickly moved to the side “Sorry mam. Let me get out of your way.” The last one went WAY out of my way and said “How are you doing today mam?”. Wise decisions on their part.
I displayed “stage presence”. Even being young and unschooled they could immediately recognized the fact that messing with me was a bad idea.
This is the kind of attitude you need to develop and display. It’ not about acting like a bad ass or like you are better than anyone else. It’s about acting like you have confidence in yourself. It’s that calmness and peacefulness that shines through not only your face but your body, your walk, every one of your movements. Now this does not mean you should walk that way toward danger thinking you are invincible.
Observe people walking around, actors on TV, see which ones have that stage presence, see which ones definitely don’t. See which ones are begging to get picked on. Same stage presence works in every area of your life as well. Who gets hired for the job? Who gets rejected for asking someone out? Stage presence can be very subtle but people can definitely feel it, see it.

People will see you as you see yourself.

You don’t want to be a victim, you will greatly reduce your chances by not looking and acting like one.