FOR PEOPLE WHO FEAR PUBLIC SPEAKING MORE THAN DEATH
Majority of us are so scared of public speaking . When asked to speak, we look for all possible ways to avoid it. When we are forced to speak, our legs get shaky, our voice shudder, our hands tremble. All of a sudden we get anxious, we experience breathing problem, our face turn pale and some even get our temperature raised. And for some of us, our hands get too cold.
All these have been felt and experienced by the majority of us right? Why do we fear public speaking? How to handle it cool? These are all the common doubts which we have in our mind. Let us get the answers for all these questions and let us rock the stage next time when we get to face our biggest fear: PUBLIC SPEAKING
WHY DO WE FEAR PUBLIC SPEAKING?
PHYSIOLOGY:
Our body is designed in such a way that it trigger feelings like fear and anxiety when subjected to any threats or uncertain things. Public speaking is one of those uncertain things. Since we don't like to deal with such feelings, we try to avoid activities evoking such feelings.
MINDSET:
We have to view speaking in public as one of the forms of communicating with others our opinions and ideas. If we put our focus on us getting evaluated instead of us being heard and understood, anxiety and fear step in and mess with our mind.
INEXPERIENCE:
With experience, we get more confidence. When we don't have enough experiences, we get tricked into questioning ourselves and our abilities.
AVOIDANCE:
We as humans prefer to be in our comfort zones and do things which don't require us to step outside that zone. We all know that public speaking certainly doesn't come within that zone. So, we almost all the time, avoid doing it. As we keep preventing ourselves from doing it, though it might escape us from stress, fear and anxiety in that particular instance, in the long run, it keeps building our fear and lowers our self-esteem and confidence. We let our fears control us rather than us control them.
SO, HOW TO HANDLE THE FEAR OF PUBLIC SPEAKING?
Actually, there are two ways of handling such fear. The first is how we usually handle and the second is the wise way .
USUAL WAY OF HANDLING PUBLIC SPEAKING FEAR:
Normally when we are asked to speak in front of a class or a group of people/audience, what do we do?
We don't look at the audience.
We just rush to end our speech by blabbering something.
We speak in a very low volume so that no one would be able to hear us.
If its a presentation, we put more slides so that we need not speak more.
If it is a group presentation, we ask our friends to do more talking and we just go and say two sentences just for namesake.
We keep moving our body to hide our body movements indicating we are scared or anxious.
We say we have a sore throat and speak in a voice that no one can understand or hear properly.
We clench our fists tightly.
These are some of the things we do to handle the fear, right?
We do these because we have been thinking this is the efficient way to hide our fears and handle the situations better. You would be surprised when we dig a little deeper about these things. Let us dig in!
RUSHING: When we rush to conclude our speech, we speak so fast. Speaking fast makes us breathe fast or sometimes makes us hold our breath and speak. Doing this gives us a sensation of uncomfortable breathing ( breathing problem). This in turn triggers more fear.
HURRYING: When you are scared and you just hurry to finish your speech, you don't give any time to realize how your speech i