Getting Past the Terror of Public Speaking

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Like most people, I was terrified of public speaking. All those eyes on me, giving me their full attention, judging, and waiting for me to humiliate myself.

The opportunity for disaster was too great ever to risk it. As a result, I used to help my husband write speeches and toasts and sit by as he delivered them. If some of my words came out of his mouth, it was just fine with me.

Then, eight years ago, my son and daughter-in-law asked me to speak at their wedding. I felt I couldn’t refuse but quaked at the thought. Writing the speech wasn’t the problem. I loved my future daughter-in-law; we’d planned the wedding together (a perilous undertaking, if there ever was one) and had fun doing it. I planned to enumerate the many reasons that I could find nothing about this marriage to worry about despite being a first-class worrier. If only my husband could deliver it for me.

In the weeks running up to the wedding, I felt faint whenever the speech came to mind. Rehearsing didn’t help. Every night I fell asleep only to wake up a few hours later in a cold sweat. I couldn’t even say what I was afraid of. That I’d open my mouth, and nothing would come out? That I’d shake uncontrollably? That I’d throw up on my shoes?

Eventually, the day came. Not a cloud in the sky. All of the 200 friends and family present were as happy as we were and raring to celebrate.

The setting was the lawn alongside our house. I would be facing the most supportive audience possible in the least threatening venue possible. So why was I such a wreck? My imagination fed my dread. As FDR said, I had only my fear to fear. But that was enough!

Why do so many of us dread public speaking?

It’s a vicious circle. Most of us are anxious about public speaking precisely because we are afraid of appearing anxious. This is not entirely off base: fear can make hearts race, bodies shake, and mouths go dry. When the number of people listening is more than we’re used to, we suddenly become self-conscious, feel we’re performing, and get stage fright. It’s only natural to be anxious about something we haven’t done before.

But none of these reasons justifies not taking the plunge. We never get the chance to see that our fear is exaggerated if we avoid public speaking. We can never get used to it, let alone good at it. Whatever the origin of our fear–a schoolroom humiliation, a belittling teacher, a disapproving parent–defying the terror is the only way to defuse it. I’m reminded of a summer I spent trying to get myself to dive into a pool headfirst when the solution to my paralysis was just doing it!

I can't claim courage at the wedding; I was pushed. Waiting to walk my son down the aisle, I was more frightened than ever before in my life. When my turn in the ceremony came, my feet carried me to the mic, and I read the speech. I didn’t try anything fancy, like memorizing lines in order to make eye contact with the audience. I just read it and sat down again, thinking only, “I survived.”

But later, when my husband and I gave a toast together, I found myself fear-free. Was it that the worst was over? That we’d all had quite a bit to drink? Or—that I’d crossed a threshold?

Over the years, I've needed to make other speeches in smaller settings, and it got easier. Once, I mindlessly wore an outfit that was too tight and could barely breathe; I didn’t faint even then. Eventually, instead of thinking that the audience was waiting for me to screw up, I started to feel they just wanted to hear what I had to say.

As I write this, I realize that I’d happened upon a good method for eroding the fear:

• Start small (ideally, much smaller than my wedding initiation), in a friendly setting.
• Keep it simple.
• Repeat (slowly upping the challenge).
• Repeat.
• Repeat.

I’m proof that it works.

There were unexpected benefits.

Bursting the public speaking fear bubble has given me a different sense of myself. I no longer watch speakers on a podium and think, “I could never do that!” I know it’s just another thing you can learn to do, not a matter of those who can and those who can’t.

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Breaking through this one fear has made me more inclined to rise to other challenges and to not avoid what I might later see as a missed opportunity. It has made me more likely to risk speaking the whole truth. I’m OK now with the idea that not everyone will like what I say—or what I write.

I’m still amazed to realize that public speaking is no longer a problem. At my daughter and son-in-law’s wedding, I actually looked forward to speaking.

And most recently, I went even further: I asked to speak at the funeral of a dear cousin, before an enormous crowd of people I mostly didn’t know, in a huge, magnificent chapel. The judges who want to put me in my place have gone away and taken my terror with them. If I have something to say, I want the words to come from me. And I don’t want to live my life regretting not having said them.

Take the plunge. It may take you to a place you can’t even imagine now.