How-to-overcome-your-fear-of-public-speaking-dr-aziz.pdf

How to Overcome Your Fear of Public Speaking The 3 Steps to Speaking Confidence Dr. Aziz Gazipura

Introduction If you are reading this book, then you know how uncomfortable it can be to speak in front of a group of people. You know how much fear it can create, and how much you avoid doing it. But if you are taking the time to read this, then my hunch is you also know what not being able to speak is costing you. Perhaps you notice it at work—you don’t speak up in meetings, you silence yourself in group discussions, and you aren’t getting the promotions and leadership opportunities you deserve. Perhaps you notice it in your personal life—you silence yourself in your community, in your kids’ PTA meetings, and any other place where could share with a group. You might even miss out on giving a toast at a good friend’s wedding because getting up there just seems too terrifying. The three steps described below will give you a roadmap to overcome the fears that are holding you back. They will teach you the principles you need to know in order to free yourself to share in front of a group of any size—from two people to 200 people. As you read this book, I strongly suggest you have a sheet of paper or a document file open on your computer to take notes with. After a decade of helping people overcome their fears—whether it’s social fears around dating and relationships or public speaking—I have never seen someone liberate themselves from passively reading or watching something. Some part of us hopes that just by reading something and learning a little more, we will miraculously become free of our fear. The reality is we do not really transform until we take action and get fully engaged. We will discuss what getting engaged looks like in the steps below (especially Step 3), but for now I suggest you get engaged by taking notes as you read. Write down anything that stands out to, any new distinction or realization that you have as you read. This will help you take these ideas on the page and convert them into action in your life, which will get you the results you truly want.

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In addition, before you get further into this book I suggest you take a moment to turn off anything that might distract as you read. This includes email, text messages, your phone—anything that might pull your attention away. This book is short and to the point, and it won’t take long to read and do the exercises within. After doing this work for so long, I have seen one thing that is universal for humans when dealing with fear—avoidance. When something is scary, it is uncomfortable and we do not like to experience it. The more scared we are, the more we tend to avoid something. I have seen this unfold in my own life dozens of times, and with each person I have worked with. As you start to approach your fears around public speaking, some part of your brain might realize that you will eventually start speaking more in front of people. This part might not want you to do something that could bring on so much fear. It might pop up and find someway to get your mind off this book and onto something else. Of course, you would not just think: Ooh, that sounds scary, I think we should avoid that. No, that’s too obvious. Instead it happens like this: You are reading the steps below and get to the section about uncovering what scares you so that you can overcome it. Then, all of sudden, you realize that you absolutely have to send an email to Jim right now. Your whole job (and life) depends on it. I want to warn you about this tendency to avoid because I believe you have found this book for a reason. If you are reading this, there is a part of you that is sick and tired of being scared of speaking and is ready to do what it takes to go to the next level. I don’t know specifically why you want to make this change. Maybe it will change things at work for you.

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If you can speak confidently in front of a group, perhaps you will get noticed more, gain more respect, and ultimately earn a higher salary and have more exciting opportunities. Maybe you want to influence people at work to follow your ideas and suggestions, or maybe you want to influence people to buy your services or products. Maybe you want to impact your community, social group, or religious organization. Perhaps you want to have the pride and self-esteem that come from knowing that you can address a large group of people in any setting and make them laugh, think, learn, and enjoy themselves. Maybe you want to break free and share who you are with the world. What are your reasons? Why do you want to overcome your fear of public speaking? If you do not have compelling reasons, if you are doing it because it is just another thing you think you should do, then you are going to find it hard to stay motivated long enough to overcome your fears. In order to break through any fear, especially a fear as intense as public speaking, we must have strong, clear, compelling reasons why we must break through starting now. Take a moment to write down your primary reasons for overcoming your fear of public speaking. Why is it something you must do? What will it give you to be able to speak confidently in front of a group? What will it allow you to do? How will it make you feel to do this? Focus on the most compelling and inspiring reasons why you must take the necessary steps to break free now. Now that you have your reasons, something to take notes with, and all your distractions off, let’s get to the 3 Steps.

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Table Of Contents Step1 – Identify The Real Fear

• How to Overcome Your Fear of Disapproval  Be On Your Own Side  Know Your Value  Let Go Of Perfection

Step 2 – Change The Meaning

Step 3 – Move Towards It

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Step 1

Identify The Real Fear Public speaking is an anxiety-provoking situation for most people. In polls about what people fear, public speaking is generally among the top three. We all know it’s scary, but what about it is so frightening? Why are we so scared to speak in front of a group? To discover this, imagine you are about to give a talk. In five minutes, you are going to walk onto a stage and speak to a group of 150 people about a topic of your choice. If you are into biking, you can talk about bike maintenance, or how to get the most out of your ride. Take a moment to really imagine this scenario, as if you were about to speak in front of a group of this size. Imagine peaking your head around the side of the stage and looking out at the audience. There they are, settling into their seats, talking amongst themselves, and waiting to hear from you. If you are vividly imagining this scenario, you might start to feel some of the telltale signs of anxiety—shortness of breath, tightening in your chest, your heart beating faster. These are the physical sensations, but what are the thoughts that race through your mind? What specific phrases or images go through your mind? Here are some of the most common fears of public speaking:        

I’m going to make a mistake. I’m going to mess it all up. I’m going to make a fool of myself. I’m going to look like an idiot up there. I’m going to get up there, rattle on, and not make any sense. People aren’t going to understand what I’m saying. I’m not going to be able to communicate very well. I’m going to totally freeze and go blank.

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 I will think I did a good job, but people will think I didn’t know what I was talking about.  I’m going to have nothing to say. I’m just going to stare at the audience while they stare back at me and it’s going to be so awkward that I’ll want to sink into a hole in the ground. Can you relate? Have you had any of these thoughts before giving a talk? All of these thoughts, and many others, can rapidly race through your mind before giving a talk. This cloud of fears can be so big, and loom so large, that even the thought of speaking is overwhelming. But underneath all of these fears is one primary fear— the fear of being embarrassed. All the fears are some version of “I am going to do something in front of this group, and they are going to judge me for it, and I will feel horribly embarrassed.” That leads to the question: what is embarrassment? This is a great question to investigate, if you have never done so. What is embarrassment? Embarrassment is nothing more than the perception of being judged negatively by others. This is so important, it is worth repeating. Embarrassment is nothing more than thinking that other people are judging us negatively, usually for something we’ve done. In other words, we are afraid of being disapproved of. The real fear underneath all public speaking fears is this: I am afraid of the disapproval of one or more people in the audience. All of the specific fears listed above, and all of the dozens of other fears we can come up with, all come down to this one underlying fear of disapproval. Learning how to overcome our fear of disapproval is the key to overcoming our public speaking fear.

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Three Ways To Overcome Your Fear Of Disapproval 1. Be On Your Own Side The practice of “being on your own side” is fundamental to the work I do with anyone who wants to overcome social anxiety and develop social confidence. Being on your own side means being your own friend, treating yourself well, talking to yourself with respect, supporting and encouraging yourself, and liking who you are. Being on your own side is in contrast to being at odds with yourself, which involves being critical, disapproving, and judgmental of yourself. It involves regularly focusing on where you are falling short and finding the ways you are not measuring up and not good enough. When this is happening, you are not on your side, you are on the opposite side of yourself. You are your own enemy. Judging yourself for not being good enough doesn’t magically make you better or perfect, so you just feel stuck and bad about yourself. It is absolutely essential to learn how to be on your own side. Not just to overcome your fear of public speaking, but to overcome any social fear and to enhance your sense of inner peace and well-being. There are dozens of ways to change the way you relate to yourself. I will share one powerful strategy below. If you would like more strategies to make this shift, I suggest reading The Solution to Social Anxiety (www.SocialAnxietySolution.com), or investing in Confidence Unleashed (www.ConfidenceUnleashedNow.com), an intensive video coaching program that will help you radically transform your level of confidence, including how you treat yourself. One way to start being on your own side is to consciously commit to treating yourself with compassion and understanding, no matter what. Unfortunately, when we are struggling we typically treat ourselves with judgment and impatience. Have you ever had the experience of feeling pretty good all day, and then all of a sudden something small happens and you are overwhelmed by feelings of sadness, anger, or anxiety? In those moments, the typical response is often, Oh God, this again? Come on, I don’t have time for this right now. What is wrong with me?

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Instead, when we are committed to being on our own side, we consciously choose to respond differently to ourselves. Instead of “what’s wrong with me?” we can become curious and compassionate about our inner experience. What am I feeling right now? Oh, I’m feeling ashamed, I’m feeling embarrassed, I’m feeling scared. Okay, that makes sense. Of course I’m feeling scared. My boss just told me he wants to meet with me this afternoon. Many people would feel scared in my shoes. This is tough. I’m sorry you’re feeling nervous. Wait a minute, you want me to talk to myself? The first time people hear this concept, they often say it sounds a little crazy. My response is always, “yes, it does sound strange, but aren’t you doing it already?” The reality is we are all talking to ourselves all of the time. We have a part of ourselves that is constantly watching what we do and commenting on it. It determines if what we are doing is good or bad, impressive or embarrassing, sufficient or inadequate. When you fall short, fail, or experience a setback, doesn’t a part of your mind start saying: Man that was pathetic. You are such a loser. Why can’t you do anything right? We are already talking to ourselves. We can say it’s strange and deny it is happening, but then the process just runs itself and our critic keeps determining how we feel. The key is to take control of this process so we can radically change the way we relate to ourselves in our daily lives. As you read this, you might be thinking—what does all this have to do with public speaking? Nothing exposes us to potential disapproval like getting up in front of a group and giving a talk or performance. If we are in the habit of treating ourselves harshly, of finding our mistakes and flaws and beating ourselves up for them, then it will be very hard to manage any disapproval coming from the audience. If someone even looks slightly disinterested, our critic can pick that as evidence that we are terrible and that we should never speak again.

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Before you give a talk, take a moment to just notice the critic’s inner rant: I’m going to mess up. What if my mind goes blank? I don’t know what I’m doing. Why am I giving this talk? I’m not qualified enough to do this. I’m an idiot. I’m going to fail. I’m going to lose my job. When this happens, we have to consciously move towards treating ourselves with compassion and understanding. What does that look like? What does that sound like? It involves consciously choosing to say something different to ourselves, something more calming, supportive, and soothing: Hey, Aziz, of course you’re scared. No one likes public speaking. This is scary. It’s okay to be nervous. I’m sorry that you’re nervous right now, that’s unpleasant, but most people would be in your shoes. You got this. You’ve done way harder stuff than this and succeeded. This way of relating to yourself might be completely different than how you usually talk to yourself. It is using a tone of empathy, compassion, and understanding. This is how you might speak with a good friend who is going through a hard time. How do you imagine speaking to yourself in this way will affect your anxiety before giving a talk? Is it likely to increase it or decrease it? In psychological literature, this way of relating to yourself is called “self-soothing.” Imagine you had a six your old son. If he came home from school one day and he was visibly shaken, upset, and crying, how would you respond? How would it affect him if you sat down with him, asked him what happened, and then replied “Wow, that sounds scary. That is painful and scary when people say things like that to you.” What if you sighed, looked down at him and said “God, you’re such a wimp, what’s wrong with you?” It can be a little jarring to imagine talking to your child that way, but this is how we treat ourselves all the time. To start developing your ability to be on your own side, I strongly encourage you to regularly speak to yourself throughout the day. You can do it out loud if no one’s around, and in your mind if you’re in public. Explore different tones, phrases, and statements that provide you with a sense of encouragement and support. Try offering yourself empathy and compassion as many times throughout the day as you can. In this way, you will build the muscle of self-compassion that will help you when you take on bigger challenges, such as public speaking.

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2. Know Your Value Knowing your value involves being aware of:  Your strengths  What you have to offer  What is good about you  What people like about you  What you’ve accomplished or achieved  What you are capable of  Your gifts, talents, and abilities When we get scared, experience a setback, or feel rejected, it can be very easy to forget everything listed above. It’s all still there—we still have strengths and things about us that are great—but we completely lose site of them. All we see are our flaws, failings, and shortcomings. All of a sudden, I’m not an intelligent, capable, articulate, funny, loving, kind person. I’m just some idiot up there, some “waste of space.” When this happens, it’s as if we are just looking at a tiny piece of ourselves through a microscope and we are blind to the rest of ourselves. In order to overcome our fear of disapproval and our fear of public speaking, we must remain connected to our value. One way to remain more connected to your value is to identify your strengths. If you have never done this process before, it can be very powerful. Even if you have done something like this, if you don’t feel associated to them, if they don’t feel true to you, then reminding yourself of your strengths is essential. Take a moment to ask yourself, what are my top three strengths? What’s good about you? What do you have to offer? What do people like about you? Are you intelligent, funny or creative? Are you kind, compassionate, empathic, or understanding? Are you driven, determined, passionate, or excitable? What are your strengths? Take a moment to reflect and really find those strengths. They could be in any area of your life, personal or professional. Maybe one of your strengths is that you take very good care of your body, and this is a source of motivation, pride, and strength for you.

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Do you have three? When you do, write them out on a sheet of paper or on your computer. As you write them, put them into a sentence starting with “I am.” I am creative. I am highly motivated. I am a funny person and I make people laugh all the time. There is something powerful about using the phrase “I am” that links the strength to your identity. This will make your awareness of your value stay more strongly in the face of disapproval coming from the outside. Once you have identified your strengths, it is important to frequently remind yourself of them over the days and weeks to come. Make a practice of regularly repeating the phrases you just wrote down. You can say them to yourself as you drive, walk down the street, or go to lunch. It is especially important to repeat these strengths to yourself before you do something challenging or anxiety provoking. In this way you will condition your mind to remain more aware of your strengths, no matter what setbacks you experience.

3. Let Go of Perfection In order to overcome our fear of disapproval, and our fear of speaking, we will eventually have to let go of the need to be perfect. In order to master public speaking, or enjoy our lives for that matter, we must let go of this expectation of ourselves. As long as we are driven to be perfect, we are never satisfied, are we? I know this experience well. I spent many years of my life doing this, achieving highly academically, socially, and in my career. In spite of these achievements, deep down I still did not feel good about myself. It always seemed to be just not quite good enough. I think this is a curse of many high achieving people—we are able to do incredible things, but somehow find a way to remain unsatisfied so we are propelled to do more, to be better, to be “enough.”

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When I was trapped in my quest for perfection, my public speaking was never good enough. As I began to develop my skills and give much better presentations, I started getting more and more positive feedback. People would come up to me after a talk and say, “that was incredible, I got so much out of what you were saying!” While I outwardly expressed gratitude, inwardly I was discounting what they were saying. I thought to myself: Yeah, that was all right, but it could have been better. Some people in the audience looked bored at times and that guy in the back seemed to reject most of what I was saying. In other words, it wasn’t perfect yet. While this quest drove me on to more and more achievements, it never gave me what I really wanted. We might think we want to be an amazing speaker, to have a certain job or position in the company, or to make ten million dollars, but I don’t think we really do. What we really want is to feel satisfied, happy, fulfilled, excited, and alive. We imagine that reaching our goals will give us those feelings, which is what we are really after. Why do we need to be perfect in the first place? It comes from the belief that we will not be respected, valued, approved of, or loved if we have flaws or shortcomings. It comes from a pattern of rejecting the parts of ourselves that we see as unlikable, unattractive, and unlovable. When it comes to speaking, it means when we get up in front of a group of people, we cannot let them see we are anxious. We can’t be nervous, make a mistake, stumble on our words, blush, sweat, or have a quaver in our voice. We must deliver the material with clarity, wit, humor, and spontaneity. Every single person in the audience must be compelled, moved, and inspired by our words. In other words, it must go perfectly, and then we will be loved and approved of by all. Anything less than this is a total failure, a total zero. One client I worked with told me something I’ll never forget about striving for perfection. He said when he was a young child his dad would help him with his math homework. While my client was very intelligent and often did well, his dad would continually encourage him to study and improve at math. His dad believed that if a math test had 100 questions on it, and you get 100 correct, then you have succeeded on the test. If you missed one problem, then you did not pass the test. 99 out of a hundred is a failure, just like 79 or 39 – it didn’t matter.

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Based on this philosophy, can you imagine how my client felt about his level of success in life? As you read this, you might be thinking, all this perfection stuff seems pretty deep and psychological – does it really have that much to do with public speaking? If you want a few tips and tricks on how to improve your speaking ability, you can easily find those on the internet. You will find suggestions like:  Prepare for your speech ahead of time.  Practice several times out loud.  Visualize success. While these are useful tips, and I encourage people I work with to do each of them, they will not truly help you overcome your fear of speaking. They will help you “get through” your talk. But I imagine you want something more than that. You want to truly overcome this fear, defeating it at the root, so you are more free in front of others. More free to speak, express yourself, share your voice, and ultimately gain the respect and influence you deserve. In order to do that, you must look at this underlying fear of disapproval and the need for perfection. Until you are free of this, you will never be free in front of a group. I had a mentor who gave me some powerful advice on this subject when I was in my mid-twenties. He repeated this advice many times, mostly because I didn’t fully believe him at first. He saw me striving for perfection in every area of my life – I was going to have the best body, the healthiest diet, incredible academic achievements, and an impressive career. I was going to be such an amazing, attractive man that women would be lining up to date me. My mentor saw me striving in all these ways and he pulled me aside and said, “Aziz, if you are perfect, it’s true that people will be more drawn to you. They might even admire you. But they are not going to love you, because it’s hard to connect with someone we see as perfect. When we see someone as perfect and we know that we are not, we tend to feel uncomfortable, inferior, or even critical of them. What people really connect with is someone who is like them. Someone who is courageous enough to put themselves out there, despite all of their flaws and imperfections.”

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While his advice was meant for all areas of life, it specifically applies to public speaking. If you can make a mistake while speaking in front of a group and make a joke out of it, or just keep going with conviction and passion in your voice, people don’t care. They might not even notice the mistake as much as you do. The more authentic and transparent you are about not being perfect, the more people can love you. In other words, let yourself be human. Let yourself be nervous, make mistakes, say the wrong thing or stumble over your words. Let yourself be human in your public speaking presentations and in your life. You can allow yourself to have low moods, draw a blank, or sometimes say the wrong thing to your partner or a close friend. This is all part of allowing yourself to be imperfect. The next time you notice harsh self-criticism, remind yourself: It’s okay to not be perfect. I’m letting myself be more human. Then treat yourself with compassion and understanding. This practice lays the groundwork for the fundamental confidence shift that will allow you to speak freely in front of a group of any size.

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Step 2

Change The Meaning In order to overcome your fear of speaking, you must uncover the meanings your mind makes about mistakes. In every situation—public speaking included—our minds come up with a story about what things mean. Let me explain further. Let’s say you were going to give that spontaneous speech to a group of people you don’t know. Remember, it’s about a topic of your choice. You pick your topic, come up with a few main points, and walk onto the stage. “Um, uh, hello everyone…I’m, uh, (your name).” Let’s say you start with a slow, lurching, awkward intro. You are nervous about all the eyes on you, your hands are shaking, and your mind gets a little scrambled. What were my points again? Oh man that’s a lot of people. Oh boy. This is going terribly. Think of something to say! What is your story about this scenario? In other words, what does it mean? For most people, the default meanings are something along the lines of:  I made a fool out of myself.  I looked stupid.  I sounded anxious and that’s pathetic and unattractive.  People out there either feel sorry for me or think I’m pathetic.  They are questioning why they would even care what someone like me has to say. The list could go on, but you get the point. What a story we create from just a few moments in our lives! We are doing this all of the time, and this story has a profound effect on how we feel and what we do.

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When it comes to public speaking, you, me, all of us have a specific set of stories we tell ourselves. These stories have the following formula: If ______ happens, then it means ______. For example: If I stumble on my words, then it means people think I’m pathetic. We might have dozens of meanings just like this in our heads. The more meanings we have that go unexamined, the worse we are going to feel before, during and after a public talk. What are some of your meanings? What are the scenarios from the “fear cloud” earlier that you are worried will happen when you give a talk? Take a moment to recall several of those now. Are you worried about your mind going blank, your boss scrutinizing you as you talk, or sounding unintelligent and uninformed? For each fear, write out the meaning you give it. Let’s say your mind goes blank— what does that mean? What is so bad about that? What will happen as a result? You might have several meanings for the same event. For example: If my mind goes blank I will ruin my entire presentation AND my boss will think I’m a fool and fire me on the spot. Take a moment to write out your top 10 meanings now. Do you have a list? If you do not, it will be very difficult to truly change these meanings. They are generally automatic, and often unconscious. Until you have taken the time to uncover them it is very difficult to make a lasting change in them, which makes it hard to overcome your fear of speaking.

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Here are some of the most common disempowering meanings from public speaking:  If my mind goes blank, then I will never recover and the whole presentation will be ruined.  If I stumble on my words, then people will think I am stupid, inarticulate, or foolish.  If I misspeak, then people will think I’m a fraud who doesn’t know what he’s talking about.  If people see that I’m nervous, then they will discount me and my message completely.  If I blush, sweat, or tremble, then everyone will think I’m pathetic and pity me.  If someone looks down while I’m talking, then it means they aren’t interested and I’m boring.  If someone looks confused, then it means I’m being unclear and doing a terrible job.  If no one has any questions, then it means everyone was totally bored and I’m an awful speaker. Can you see how each of these meanings sets us up for failure? If we believe these, then any time someone looks down, we feel terrible. Any time we display a sign of nervousness, we feel harshly judged for being pathetic or weak. This makes us very easily discouraged and frightened while speaking. In order to break free, you must uncover these toxic meanings and discover new, empowering meanings about speaking. Go through each meaning in your list and take a moment to think of a more realistic conclusion about what it means when the situation happens. For example: If my mind goes blank, then it means I’m a little nervous. If my mind goes blank, it’s no big deal, I can easily recover from that. If my mind goes blank, then it means I need to take a deep breath and send myself compassion an understanding.

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You can go one step further and imagine constructive ways of handling the situation: If my mind goes blank, then I will take a moment to recollect myself and continue. If my mind goes blank, I will make a playful joke about my mind going blank. If my mind goes blank, I’ll calmly say, “I had a thought there, but lost it. Moving on…” Do you see how there are dozens of new conclusions, new meanings, and new stories we can create for each feared situation? A great way to start this process is to ask yourself: “What does it really mean?” Imagine you are hanging out with a friend and he tells you something you don’t quite believe. “You see that guy talking on his cell phone over there? You know why he’s bobbing his head up and down as he talks?” You pause and look at your friend expectantly, “no, what?” “It means he just lost his job. Whenever someone talks like that and bobs their head in that way, it means they are being laid off.” “What?” you exclaim. “Come on, what does it really mean?” In what tone would you ask that last question? You would be incredulous—you wouldn’t quite believe what he was saying. That’s exactly the tone you want to question each of these stories with. Ask the question out loud and come up with three alternative meanings off the top of your head. Even if they aren’t very good at first, you will start to get the hang of challenging your old stories. If someone looks down it means I’m boring. What? Come on, what does it really mean? If someone looks down it means they are thinking about something I said on a deeper level. It means they are distracted and thinking about something pressing or urgent in their life. It means they really want to pay attention to what I’m saying so they are looking down to hear me better.

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Maybe it means they are distracted or not interested. That one person. It does not apply to the whole audience, to everyone, everywhere. Do you get the idea? In order to transform how you feel about public speaking, you must first transform the stories you have about what things mean. Take the time to go through your list and come up with at least three other things each situation could mean. It may take a few minutes, but it will lead to a radical shift in how you feel in front of a group.

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Step 3

Move Towards It I love Step 3. When I am working with someone to overcome their fear of public speaking, the whole first part of our work together is preparation for this step. The third step is when the true shifts happen, when the transformation and liberation happen. Put simply, the third step is to move towards what you fear. In this case, move towards public speaking. Now this can be very hard to do if you haven’t done Steps 1 and 2. If you are paralyzed by the fear of disapproval and don’t have ways to overcome this, then it’s nearly impossible to just “get out there and do it.” Similarly, if you have incredibly toxic and disempowering stories about speaking, then each time you give a talk you will feel like a failure. Thus the preparatory work is absolutely necessary as a foundation for Step 3. I strongly encourage you to regularly practice the techniques from Steps 1 and 2 in your daily life. The more skillfully you can treat yourself with compassion and change disempowering meanings, the more you will be able to move towards what scares you with courage and boldness. How can you move towards what scares you? The most obvious answer in this scenario is to find more opportunities to speak in front of a group. If we were talking in person, this is the most likely moment for a groan. Oh God. I know I need to, but isn’t there another way. That sounds so horribly uncomfortable. This is the primary obstacle to Step 3—our desire to avoid what is uncomfortable to us. We all do this, and it’s a natural human desire to move away from what hurts. But in this case, can you see the discomfort as a good thing? It is like the burn you feel in your muscles when you are working out. It’s not comfortable, but it means you are growing your muscles and getting more fit.

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It feels bad, but it is good. The same goes for the discomfort you feel when you are talking in front of a group. Find a way to convince yourself that this discomfort is in fact good for you, and you want to seek it out for your health and growth—like going for a run or eating some raw kale. Once you have decided you are truly ready to overcome your fear and are willing to be uncomfortable, you can start with small opportunities. I wouldn’t suggest starting with a keynote speech to 500 people. That is most likely too overwhelming. Look for less intimidating opportunities to practice. For example in your team at work, you can volunteer to research something and then fill everyone in during the next meeting. You can take a position in a meeting as a note-taker, which forces you to share the minutes from the previous meeting. You can even spontaneously speak up more in meetings. Instead of being the wallflower that remains silent, try putting your ideas out into the group more. In your personal life, notice if you tend to hold back when you are with a group of friends or acquaintances. You can take the small risk of speaking up in each of these situations. While they are not the same as public speaking, they still build your speaking muscles. They help you get over your fear of disapproval and give you a great opportunity to notice and change disempowering meanings. In therapy, we call this “gradual exposure.” This means you expose yourself to what you are scared of until it no longer scares you as much. You start with something mildly anxiety provoking (i.e. speaking up in a small meeting at work), and do this many times. Eventually it will not seem like such a big deal. Then you can move on to something slightly more anxiety provoking (i.e. researching something and reporting back to your team at work). You can also seek out supportive environments in which to practice public speaking. If you are not familiar with Toastmasters, I strongly encourage you to look them up on the internet. They are an international club that offers thousands of people great opportunities to practice speaking. There are hundreds of chapters all over world, and most likely half a dozen in your city. If you go to something like that once per week, that is the kind of investment of your time that gets significant results quickly.

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At this point I often here the objection, “That sounds great, but I’ve already done that. I had a job where I had to give one talk a month for six months, and they never got any better. It was terrible.” This is a common and legitimate concern. My first response is to explore with the person how much they were employing Steps 1 and 2. If you are demanding perfection of yourself, interpreting everything as meaning you are failure, and relentlessly criticizing yourself, then you can give 500 talks and still feel scared and miserable. Secondly, the amount of exposure we need is often much higher than we realize (or prefer). In this example, this person gave one talk per month for six months. Is that enough? What is enough? Imagine you played basketball and wanted to improve your three-point game. You decided you were going to go out each Saturday and shoot three pointers. You step out to your back yard, line up on the three-point line and take a shot. You miss. You do this five more times and then call it day. Then you go out next Saturday and repeat the process. How long until you get really good at making threes? Probably never! In order to truly overcome a fear in some area, we must consistently and gradually expose ourselves to that situation again and again and again and… A common question is, “Well, how much do I have to do it?” My answer is, “however long it takes.” It really depends on each person. In the area of dating and relationships, I had a tremendous fear about walking up to an attractive woman I did not know and starting a conversation with her. I was so scared of getting rejected that I avoided it for years. Once I learned the principles you are learning now, I decided to overcome my fear in this area. I started practicing going up to strangers and starting conversations. I started with people I thought would be less likely to reject me, such as a friendly, elderly woman at the supermarket. Eventually, I started making conversations with women I found compelling and attractive.

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In order to overcome my fear to the point where I could approach any woman I wanted to, I had to practice over 50-70 times. Perhaps more. There is a story about Albert Ellis—the founder of Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy and a brilliant therapist—who decided he wanted to overcome his fear of asking women out. He decided to walk around Manhattan and expose himself to his fear. In one day, he asked 200 women if they would go out with him. Even after 50-70 times, I was not completely anxiety free. No matter how many times I did it, I still felt a charge of fear. But after practicing so much, the fear no longer held me back. In fact, a little fear can feel exciting, like the fear you feel as a roller coaster is ticking upwards to that initial drop. What about public speaking? I personally have practiced quite a bit of speaking— starting with practicing at Toastmasters, then moving on to giving presentations, teaching college courses, and facilitating seminars, workshops and confidence trainings. I estimate it took me 80 to 100 experiences over the course of two years before I started to get really comfortable speaking in front of a group. However, just like the dating example, I still feel a rush of fear before giving a talk. The difference is now I use it. I no longer immediately conclude that I’m boring or that people will judge me. I’ve changed many of those meanings. As a result, that fear is not threatening. It becomes part of the excitement and thrill of working with so many people at once. How long will it take for you to overcome your fear of public speaking? The answer is personal, and it is different for each one of us. It might be more than 80, or significantly less. If you are not interested in speaking mastery, and just would like to be slightly more confident in front of a group, you might achieve this after practicing just 10-15 times. One thing I am certain of—if you regularly practice Steps 1 and 2 in your daily life and consistently find opportunities to speak, then overcoming your fear is inevitable. Remember, the goal here is not to become the “perfect speaker.” The goal is to become liberated, to do what you are meant to do, and to create more opportunities in your life. It is to share passionately with others to influence them, teach them, and share yourself with them.

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It is to share your message and impact your community, to make a difference, and to feel the pride and joy that come along with this ability. In order to get to this point, you must be willing to experience discomfort and move towards what scares you again and again. Keep in mind that it is a process and it progresses at its own rate. If you give five talks in several months and you don’t feel any less anxiety, just stick with it. Keep practicing Steps 1 and 2—treat yourself well, be on your own side, change your meanings—and you will overcome this fear. It is simply a matter of time and dedication. I hope this book has helped you on your path towards greater freedom—the freedom to express yourself with ease and clarity in front of a group of your peers, friends, and family. I can’t wait until I am in an audience and I get a chance to hear you speak. May you have the courage to be who you are.

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