Public Speaking Phobia

Are you having this symptoms:

1. Sweating (hands, legs, forehead, any parts of your body or the entire body)
2. Shaking knees and hands
3. Quivering voice (as if you just came out from an ice room)
4. Flushing (in your head especially)
5. Rapid heartbeat (you even can hear it in your ears)
6. Nausea
7. Or any other similar symptoms to it;

when you are facing a number of audiences in various places; class, lab, stage, etc? Then, it's obvious you are having PSP. Nope, not that kind of game devices, it's my own abbreviation of Public Speaking Phobia.

Yes, let's admit it loud and clear. It's most unlikely for you, me and almost everyone for not to have this little stage of fear. Oh come on, you can speak to your bunch of frens all the time; if you talk unintentionally. But if you are given a speech, a title, a limit of time, a venue and a bunch of frens + strangers to speak beforehand,it will be of course; the horrible experience to encounter.

But we all speak, one day or another coming soon, we will have to speak in front of a lot, a lot of people. Come to think again, let's see, if you can avoid story-telling competition in primary school, no way you can take your exams without doing oral. Ok, you may be ok after the oral time, you might then think you can survive in college/university. Then you are loaded with all kinds of assignments which require you to talk; in front of the class, worst still, in front of classes. Sounds pretty scary right? Eventually when you are up into career, you will need to go for interview, and you won't be sounding assured if you talked with a lot of erms and ahhs in between of the session. By the time you are getting married, well, you still need to give toast to your wedding guests. So, instead of formin the best strategies to avoid it, deal with it.

1. Before the Speech Day
Prepare, prepare, prepare! There's no way you cannot go up to the stage, talked and yet din't prepare anything in your mind, paper, PC, etc. Start to prepare early; think about your message clearly; start with a crappy ideas, write down a simple draft, until you can start with an outline. Organize your speech in timeline order, or at least in sequence. You, and the audience will able to remember if everything in order. Because the one of the biggest fear in PSP is "the fear of going blank", according to the researchers at the University of Manitoba. Next, 'write your speech like a every great speech, with a beginning, middle and an end'. Practice then, make it perfect with not only practice, but also rehearsing. What's the difference? I will elaborate further in my next post. After that, you must visualize that you you can and will be succesful in delivering your speech.

2. On the Speech Day
Choose the professional-looking and comfy clothing for you. When you are comfortable with yourself, you can be comfortable with anyone. Avoid traffic jams and being late. You not only being rude to others, you are wasting their and your time. Then sit at a quiet place in a room where you can relax. Take deep breaths (it really helps!); and each time inhale about 8 seconds before releasing it. According to science study, it tooks that long for the maximum oxygen content to get into your brain. Then clench your fist and release it; clench again and then release for several times until you think your shoulders are relax. Be positive thinking, and never, ever tell your audiences that you are nervous right now. When you are telling them, "err..ahh, to be frank, i'm..a..kinda..haha, you know,...nervous. Oh opps, sorry!...Good morning, ladies and gentlemen,..er sorry; good evening, ladies and gentlemen...", you are then tend to a) tell them you are nervous b) you are telling yourself to be nervous. Good luck then; because once you tell them this, you will make them aware that a) you are nervous b) to notice where is your nervousness; hence causing yourself to be panic when people are really paying attention to you. Speak slowly, clearly, and don't eat your own words. When people are nervous, their mouths will be dried up 3 times faster (my own experiences) and later they have no enough of saliva to help them to speak clearly. So drink plenty of water enough for you; 3 min before speech. If you do it 15 min or beyond, you will go to the bathroom pretty soon.

3. After the horrible experience @ finishing the speech
Wheewwww! It was quite an experience right? Most probably you will be ended up like a roasted chicken (due to flushing) with cold hands and feets. Once you finish, some of you won't think any further, but then most of you will think what the audiences are thinking of you, what the lecturer is thinking of you, and what you are thinking about yourself. YOu will begin something like this: "Oh shoot, i forgot the most important line; awww, i praticed and practiced for so many times but yet i have forgotten to mention it!" or "What did that guy with the red cap thinking of me when i spoke about that? Was he bored? He looked really bored, or was it just me?" etc. But hey, if you did your best, you know you can do it better next time. Ask your audiences + frens' opinions; and think and device ways to help you to improve on it.

Have a great public speaking!


Sources: The article: The Fear of Public Speaking:20 Ways to get over it! by Joann M. Mc Cabe, ATM-S, page 18-21, Toastmaster Magazine, April 2006.


Liew Hui Qing, Jaime