Art Of Great Speaking » stage fright

Public Speaking Fear Exercises

admin — Sun, 20 Feb 2011 13:31:37 +0000

My final post is a list of exercises to try to help manage and beat public speaking fear. The more you put into them the more you will get out of them. Don’t hold back to build your confidence and speak with confidence.

The Public Speaking Fear Drills

On your own, or with a couple of other people in front of an audience or group of friends do the following exercises,:
With an imaginary ax, chop wood although calling to the audience, “Timber, timber, timber!” Repeat.

While churning energetically with an old-fashioned churn,shout, “Watch the butter fly! Watch the butter fly Watch the .
butter fly!” Repeat, opening the eyes as wide as achievable whilst you talk

Pretend you are ship-wrecked at sea. Although you are fighting sharks with one
hand, wave to another ship and cry, “Ship ahoy! Ship ahoy! Ship ahoy!”

Wave to a friend a block away. He can’t hear you so start waving and loudly calling, “Hello, there”

With an imaginary swatter move all around the platform saying vigorously, “Swat that fly! Swat that fly!” Swat as you
exclaim, and keep the exercise up for a full half minute.

Imagine honey bees inside your hair. brush them out with your hands as you jump around crying, “Take ‘em away!” Keep this up for twenty seconds. Repeat should you still have the energy.

Deliver a two minute “I Am the Greatest!” speech. Brag about anything you please, but actually brag. In this drill see how obnoxious and egotistical it is possible to be.

Count to fifty with spirit. Again count to fifty , this time as an angry or a happy man would count.Exaggerate this.

Imitate a few of of the following characters (in speech and manner):
a. Loud-mouthed Charlie Bratton.
b. A baseball umpire proud of his position.
c. An angry basketball player.
d. An excited fan at a basketball game.
e. A talkative intoxicated man.
f. A giggling school-girl.
g. A gossiping old woman
h. A grumpy old man

Make a spirited talk for 45 seconds on this topic: Men are far better
drivers than , or, women are much better drivers than men.

Talk for a minute about some of the following terms:
thingamajig
sidewinder
monkey-business
skullduggery
abracadabra
razzle dazzle
white elephant
heebie jeebies
raspberries
snoop
wolves
bigamy
snobbishness
puppy
yo-yos
idiosyncrasy

These drills can help anyone with public speaking fear that is not acute. When you have something more please see a qualified specialist.

Public Speaking Fear Summary

Public speaking fear is a common fear. Many of the confident speakers today have suffered from this fear. With some understanding, application of speech drill like the above or other simple techniques they have built their confidence up. If others have beaten their public speaking fear than you can to. Keep at it, trying different things, practicing and giving speeches and presentations you will beat your public speaking fear to be able to speak with confidence to any size audience

The Easy Way To Beat Public Speaking Anxiety

admin — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 11:39:59 +0000

Overcoming public speaking anxiety is not an easy task. Your knees shake, your hands sweat, and your heart pumps even faster than you can count; but if you have the determination to succeed on stage, overcoming public speaking anxiety is a breeze.

There are a lot of reasons why your fear is triggered when you speak in public. These are some of the reasons why overcoming public speaking anxiety can be challenging at first:

? You feel that you may commit errors in grammar or provide invalid information along the way. ? You feel the people around you are judging you wrongly. ? You feel insecure about the topic of discussion. ? You feel the audience doesn’t like you as their speaker. ? You feel the audience doesn’t understand your point.

Treat your audience as a friend by giving them the benefit of the doubt about how they feel and think about you. Instead of feeling like they don’t like you, assume that they do and you’ve taken the important first step to overcoming public speaking anxiety.

Keep your audience awake by being provocative. Ask some questions and maintain eye contact for a couple of seconds to as many people as you can inside the room. Change your voice tone when there’s a need to emphasize things.

The center stage is not the most comfortable place in the world, and public speaking has been known to top the list of fears for most people. Your body reacts to the pressure you’re going through while in front of your audience.

Don’t worry because the feeling is absolutely normal. When all that adrenalin reacts to how you feel, overcoming public speaking anxiety can become easy. You may model other successful public speakers but remember to put your own unique style in your speech delivery.

Michael Lee has prepared a FREE anxiety-busting and panic-fighting course that reveals secrets on effectively treating panic disorders and anxiety at http://www.20daypersuasion.com/panic-secret.htm

Can I Overcome Stage Fright and Public Speaking Fear?

admin — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 20:17:59 +0000

The majority of people suffer from some form of stage fright, dread of public speaking, or even speaking phobia. Can a person reach a point where they never have these fears and feelings?

Let’s study experienced speakers for a moment. Do they suffer from nervousness and speaking fear?

Yes and no. Most look forward to speaking and don’t dread it. However, the majority do experience some nervousness, adrenaline rush, and a shot of fear before going on stage.

Why would a speaker with over 600 engagements feel this? Here are a couple reasons.

First, your body senses the big event and pours adrenaline into your system. This can cause the shaky knees, sweat, etc.

Second, no matter how many times a person has spoke in public, a speaking event still has the possibility for major failure. We could mess up, the audience may be hostile, or our voice starts to shake.

This of course causes your body to pour more adrenaline into your system.

You may be thinking, “If the experienced speakers still have some nervousness, how do they speak with such confidence and calmness?”

Or you may be asking, “Is there anyway I can cure my speaking fear?”

There is hope! Don’t get discouraged.

Experienced speakers have learned how to control their feelings and fear. They may feel nervousness and fear before going on stage. However, it does not effect their presentation, because they know the secrets to saying no to fear and yes to confidence.

Learn these secrets and you can conquer speaking fear and speak with confidence every time.

Do you dread or fear public speaking? Get a Free Video & Special report on how to reduce speaking fear. http://www.Fear2Confidence.com

Arlen Busenitz is the creator of “Speak with Confidence: How to Conquer Public Speaking Fear with 4 Simple Steps” Learn more on how to overcome speaking fear.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Arlen_Busenitz

Public Speaking Training on How to Prevent Stage Fright

admin — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 20:08:59 +0000

At the core, stage fright is fear of rejection and fear of being judged harshly.

That takes various forms like being afraid to make a mistake or fear of not knowing how to handle a question or fear of tripping over your own feet and so on. But all of that is really fear of rejection and fear of being judged harshly.

Doing public speaking or seminars is a terrific way to promote yourself, generate more business, and make sales of your product or service but you’ll never do it unless you deal with the problem of stage fright.

So if stage fright is the panic and fear that hits people when they’re already speaking, what can be done to prevent it?

There is an easy solution I’m going to share with you here.

You see, people manage to “create” stage fright in a number of ways, but a very common way is to look out over an audience, and feel the eyes of a bunch of staring strangers burning a hole in them.

Who wouldn’t feel uncomfortable with all those eyes burning holes in them?

Here’s how to prevent stage fright from ever happening to you: arrive early before your talk, and make time to walk around and meet some of the audience members.

Introduce yourself as the speaker and thank them for coming, ask them some targeted questions about what they’re hoping to hear about.

Be genuinely friendly & curious – it will feel good to talk to these people. Remember this old saying: “strangers are just friends you haven’t met yet” – so make some new friends by meeting some people in your audience.

Then, when you’re “on stage”, be sure to make eye contact with ‘your new friends” consistently.

And if it’s a small group, you may even be able to meet everyone before you start your talk.

Summary:
By meeting people and being friendly before you start your talk means these people are not strangers boring holes in you with their eyes during your presentation; they’re your new friends.

David Portney is the author of “129 Seminar Speaking Success Tips” and the founder of the Academy of Public Speaking located in Redondo Beach, California where he personally conducts specialized workshops and public speaking trainings.
http://www.bestpublicspeakingtraining.com

Doing Something About Public Speaking Anxiety

admin — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 01:01:59 +0000

Let us face the fact—it is impossible for anyone first entering the field of public speaking not to make some mistakes due to nervousness. Bernard Shaw once said, I became a good speaker as other men become good skaters— by making a fool of myself until I got used to it.
There isn’t any need to go as far as that, because there is a main cause for public speaking anxiety, which can be cured. Before going into this, however, here are some of the ways in which a speaker can do something about his jitters.

(a) Use notes correctly. This will be dealt with fully later, but let me say now that the in correct use of notes adds to tension.
(b) When nervous, look at a member of the audience and speak to him as if you were having a conversation with him.
(c) If you forget a part of your speech and you haven’t any notes, recapitulate. Generally, the forgotten passage will come to your mind
when you do this.

Do Keep this In Mind

Every speaker feels nervous before a speech. We call it nervous excitement and this can actually help the speaker. It is only when public speaking anxiety causes dryness of the mouth, which makes speaking so difficult that it results in a person mumbling and stuttering, that it must be dealt with. I am mentioning this because, even when you are rid you of your nerves, you will still feel that excited feeling before a speech.