How To Fix Your Fear of Public Speaking (What I Actually Do!)

I used to be so petrified of public speaking that it felt like my necklace was bouncing off of my chest because my heart was beating that fast and loud. My palms were as Eminem said sweaty and I felt sick and I could hardly remember my name let alone what I wanted to say.

The likely hood of me being able to be brilliant and say something that would be useful and get people wanting to talk to me was highly unlikely since I felt so bad.

But now I ADORE public speaking. I love to be asked to speak and I could do it for hours!

So I know first hand what that fear feels like and I also know how to fix it.

Here is an example of how I do that;

My fabulous business woman client has achieved such monumental levels of success and had been asked to deliver a short talk, but she knew that she did her best throughout her career to wrangle her way out of it every time. And now she realised that if she wanted to reach the next stage in her career she was going to have to deal with this fear, because potentially it had the ability to be an obstacle to her success and as we know, who wants one of those?

So we had a coaching session, the contents of which are private but I would like to share the analogy that really helped.

I asked her if she felt like she was on a path and that up ahead was a big brick wall blocking the path and that was her fear of public speaking. She agreed. With this analogy I was able to help her see that this one talk was not the be all and end all. It would not define her career and her success forever. It was part of the process it was not the end destination.

I was able to help her appreciate that in actual fact she did not have a fear of public speaking she had a fear of people getting the wrong impression of her. I did this by asking her how it would feel talking to 1000 school children instead of 200 of her peers and she could see that was something she could do and possibly enjoy. This helped her appreciate that it was inner belief about her ability, why she had been asked to deliver this talk and why she was quite frankly blooming awesome!
Reinforcing this enabled this wonderful business woman to see that this was not the defining moment in her career but in fact it was just one step in the continual pathway of her growing success and career.

I asked her to think about that pathway again and I said to her, is that in actual fact an obstacle in the road or as we get closer are you able to see it is just an illusion and we can walk right through it?

By this stage (Just over an hour and 20 minutes later) this fabulous business woman with the help of an action plan that included some physical things to do, some practical advice and all the amazing facts she had to remind herself to keep the positive image that I see of her to the fore front of her mind, she was able to see public speaking in a different light.

Now she was actually quite excited to do it and was already planning on when and where she could do it again!

That fabulous business women is what I will do for you!

This client knows that if she gets nervous before hand (and let’s be honest nerves are good, they say I’m about to do something I don’t normally do and I want to perform well and do my best.) she can text, phone, FB or Tweet me and I will be there to remind her how awesome she is and what she is truly capable of.

Because I will leave this as your last thought today, your brain is just a muscle like any other and if you do not exercise it regularly then it will get lazy. And when your brain gets lazy it slops into bad habits and into negativity. The great thing about this though is that it means it’s just a case of constantly reinforcing that you are amazing, you have achieved truly brilliant things and that you will continue to learn and go on to do even more brilliance. Cool right?

On the 22nd November I will be hosting a master class for business women on public speaking at The BWN and my co presenter will be a successful actress who has appeared on shows like Spooks, Eastenders and Hollywood films who will be sharing some great techniques to remain grounded and focussed on what you want to achieve. It is going to be awesome so do join us and there is plenty of time to talk about your business (since you will have dealt with your fear of public speaking!) and network too!

Here is the link to come along http://thebusinesswomansnetwork.co.uk/event/speak-up-public-speaking-for-the-nervous-and-terrified/