Fear of public speaking is one of the Top Ten Fears that people have. The technical term is Glossophobia. In some lists it is number two after the fear of flying, though more often than not people will state they fear public speaking more than death. Now that is saying something!
So what is it that makes people fear public speaking so much? In many cases it is the fear of the unknown – it is something they don’t do very often so they don’t know what to expect. It is often a fear of making a fool of oneself – they lack confidence and feel that people won’t want to listen to them. There is the fear that they will forget what they are going to say – that they will be there in the spotlight mouth open and nothing coming out.
The symptoms of this fear range from sweaty hands, heart racing, shaking legs, red face, nausea and even in extreme cases tongue tied – physically not able to get a word out.
A little bit of nervous tension is good for the public speaker. That nervous tension can be turned into adrenalin which gets the heart pumping and helps to add that charisma, that oomph, the extra sparkle to a speech. Good speakers have learned how to control their fears and nerves.
What can be done to turn your fear of public speaking into energy to add sparkle to your next speech?
Firstly work on your attitude, bring a positive attitude to your speaking. Instead of believing that the people are going to laugh at you and that you will make a fool of yourself, think to yourself “I am excited, I can do this, I am confident”. Mentally have a stop sign that you see every time you start to get nervous. See your stop sign and say to yourself “I am not nervous, I am excited. I will be great and I am confident.” This will short circuit that downward spiral that is caused by the fear.
Next, give yourself every opportunity to speak, take away that fear of the unknown. The more you speak the more experience you gain, the more you know what to expect and the more confident you then become. Start small, step forward when asked to introduce someone at a meeting, step forward when asked to give a vote of thanks. Every time you get up to speak you break down that barrier of the unknown.
Practice, practice, practice and prepare, prepare, prepare. The more you practise and prepare the less opportunity there is for Murphy’s Law to kick in. When you know your subject you are more confident in yourself. Don’t worry about notes, if you need them use them. Just learn to use them unobtrusively so that they assist you instead of becoming a barrier between you and the audience.
Finally, find a training organisation near you. Attend a workshop read some books on public speaking. Always take the opportunity to put into practice what you learn because you can’t learn public speaking without actually doing it!
These are all practical ideas that work – how do I know this because I have been there and done it. I too had a fear of public speaking, whilst it wasn’t my top fear it was at least one that I could do something about. So if I can get to a point where I now love speaking – then you can do it too. All you have to do is take the first step.
There are many more tips and tricks you can apply and for these resources and more you can log onto www.trischel.com.au. These will give you the basics and a start to becoming a public speaker – an organisation like Toastmasters International will give you the opportunity to hone and practise your skills.
Oh, what is my top fear? It is the fear of heights, which I might add is not as easy as the fear of public speaking is to overcome. I am still working on this one!
Filed under Speaking Tips, Speech Tips by on Dec 17th, 2010. Comment. 
According to ‘The Book of Lists’, the fear of public speaking ranks number one in the minds of the majority of people. Far above the fear of death and disease, comes the fear of standing in front of a crowd.
Public speaking is a common source of stress. Many of us would like to avoid this problem entirely, but that is nearly impossible. Whatever our work eventually we will need to speak in public to get certain tasks accomplished. And if we want to be leaders or achieve anything meaningful in our lives, we will often have to speak to groups, large and small, to become successful.
But instead of appropriate levels of adrenalin and excitement to optimize our performance, we get a fear response like we are being attacked by a wild animal.
Everything in our body and mind screams “run away”! But we can’t, we have to ignore our ‘fight or flight’ response and stay put. And what’s more, we are supposed to sound eloquent and informed at the same time. Not an easy task.
The reason most people get anxious when required to speak to a group is that they are afraid of looking foolish or stupid in front of others. The fear that their lack of speaking skills might lower the opinion others have of them becomes overwhelming.
The fear of public speaking often results from painful experiences during school days when we failed in class and were teased by the other children. Being humiliated can destroy a person’s ego and confidence for a long time and a short experience followed by humiliation can result in this life long fear of public speaking.
The brain links the negative feelings associated with that experience to other similar experiences. Attaching emotions to situations is one of the primary ways that humans learn. But sometimes we get the wiring wrong. Many people suffering from fear of public speaking believe they are alone in feeling so frightened, when in fact this fear is shared by millions even though nobody likes to talk about it.
If you can adopt the following sentence: “I stopped worrying about what people would think about me, when I realized how seldom people think about anyone but themselves” you have got it made.
There is no real trick to public speaking, there is only confidence. And confidence is gained by practice and experience. Of course good preparation and relaxation techniques before giving a speech help but practice will make you a master.
To gain experience outside those scary live performances in front of your peers, joining a local Toastmasters Club is a great idea. Or get yourself a Public Speaking or Speech Coach. In both cases you will get the chance to practice and hone your skills in a friendly environment. And you will get valuable feedback.
Overcoming fear by actively and consciously facing it in the least painful way has proven to be extremely effective – also in this all encompassing fear of public speaking. So go out and speak! Finding your voice in public will be the most freeing experience you can imagine.
Filed under Toastmasters International by on Dec 23rd, 2010. Comment.
www.justbewell.com The fear of public speaking is said to be the most common phobia in the world. Whether this is true or not, it is certainly possible to overcome public speaking phobia with help from hypnotherapy (hypnosis) and NLP (neuro-linguistic programming). Public speaking fears hold people back in meetings and they prevent people from being their best when doing presentations. It isnt just work life thats affected. Most people have to stand up and say a few words in front of other at some point in their lives, when they get married, for example. Hypnotherapy and NLP are so effective in dealing with the fear of public speaking because they tackle the problem directly. This is not therapy or counselling, this is practical training and reconditioning and the techniques have been proven with thousands of people through the years. It does not matter where your phobia started, and you certainly werent born with public speaking anxiety, you learned it along the way. We arent going to talk with you about how difficult your life has been, we are just going to get on with helping you to change these horrible limiting fears. Now getting rid of this phobia does not instantly give you Obama like eloquence, but it when you feel confident and comfortable speaking to groups of people you are obviously going to come across better. So whether it is for a best mans speech, for a business or college presentation, in fact whatever its for, you can change this, and you can change it …
Filed under Howto by on Dec 25th, 2010. 19 Comments.
www.changingtools.com PREP is a technique that you can use to give your speech structure. Public Speaking is an art you can learn.
Filed under Education by on Dec 26th, 2010. 3 Comments.