“Take up more physical and acoustic space in meetings and interactions”: This piece of advice is sometimes offered to professional women and other historically marginalized people. The thinking is that we create self-designed psychological safety by allowing our bodies to take up more space―say by opening up the chest vs. hunching over, or by spreading out papers and laptops when needed vs. trying to maintain an overly tidy and restricted pile. Allowing our voices to resonate is also said to have similar psychological impact, as opposed to speaking fast and shutting up too soon.
When a person feels comfortable taking up space, you see them in their full technicolor. Psychological safety allows them to show up as their fuller selves; physically, verbally and emotionally. This in turn creates opportunities for connection, creativity and collaboration. A true win-win. When one feels uncomfortable taking up their appropriate amount of space, their collaborators (often unknowingly) lose that opportunity for engagement and partnership.
On the other extreme, there are times when we take up a lot of space. Sometimes even all the space without any regard for another. As if swallowing all the air, grabbing all available land, and laying claim to all resources while ignoring the needs of others; essentially snuffing them out in the process. These actions could be deliberate or ignorant but most paths leading to lack of care are infused with some sort of fear. Fear that we’ll get snuffed out later if we don’t take as much as we can now. When people and organizations behave this way, others obviously suffer. They feel treaded upon, lose engagement and motivation to truly connect, collaborate or problem solve.
These observations are from different angles but the final outcome seems to be the same: someone closes up.
We are always negotiating space with one another as lone humans and human collectives. If a fundamental desire of humanity is progress in its many forms, then taking up the right amount of space is a precursor to meaningful collaborations and for creating psychological safety in ourselves and others.
“Our angle of perception the only difference,
keeping them separate and dually named” ― Kurt Philip Behm
