Quick check: how are you sitting right now? Are you making yourself smaller than you need to? Did you choose that - or did you just absorb it?

In Episode 3, Hema and Mike bring the gender conditioning conversation into the physical: how we were taught to exist in our bodies differently based on our gender, what that’s actually costing us, and how to start disrupting the default without performing anything you don’t feel.

In this episode, you’ll discover:

•       What girls and women are taught (to shrink: legs together, no hands on hips, constant smiling) vs. what boys and men are taught (to expand: spread out, take up room, hold eye contact)

•       How none of this was said out loud - it was absorbed through watching, correction, and learning what version of yourself made others comfortable

•       How body language affects how others perceive you: open posture reads as confident; contracted posture reads as uncertain or subordinate

•       The double standard: expansive body language rewarded in men, labeled “aggressive” or “intimidating” in women

•       How posture affects how you perceive yourself: contracting signals to your nervous system “I’m not safe here” - and when it becomes habit, you stop noticing

•       The workplace pattern: who gets interrupted, who takes the head of the table, who apologizes before speaking - none of it is random

•       For women - reclaiming physical space intentionally: noticing the habit first, occupying your full chair, stopping the over-smile as a social apology

•       For executive women - the double bind: told to be more assertive, penalized when you are, and why leading undeniably is the answer rather than shrinking back down

•       For men - what to notice and unlearn: when physical space becomes an unconscious dominance cue, and what inclusive physical presence actually signals

You don’t have to fold yourself up to make others comfortable. Tune in now.

Perfect for: Anyone who has ever made themselves smaller to make others comfortable, executive women navigating the assertiveness double bind, men who want to understand the dynamics they’re part of, and anyone who’s never stopped to ask where their body language actually came from.