Did you know that Glossophobia is the fear of public speaking? This fear is widely known to hold people hostage in their own lives. It is a fear that affects males and females, all age groups, and all socio-economic standings. In our quest to offer you strategies to alleviate your Glossophobia we found some amazing tips. The good news is that speaking in public is a learnable skill. As such, you can use the following strategies to become a better speaker and presenter.
Dale Carnegie is widely revered as one of the leading authorities on superb communication skills. In his book “The Quick and Easy Way to Effective Speaking”, it can be summed up with three main principles.
Be prepared: you can't talk intelligently about any topic, if you don't understand it.
Try to speak to your interests: the more you care about something, the more interesting your speech will be.
Remember your audience: in order to get the attention of the audience and hold it, you have to talk about what is of interest to them. Do your research up front to determine what type of audience you will be speaking to, and tailor your presentation accordingly.
Next, consider joining the international organization of Toastmasters. If you are serious about enriching your skills, join as soon as possible. They offer many courses that will arm you with impressive skills, and there will be plenty of practice with helpful feedback. The group agrees with the aforementioned three Carnegie principles and includes them in their top 10 tips for effective speaking. These next seven tips will help build more confidence. (http://www.toastmasters.org/)
Know the room. Arrive early, walk around the speaking area and practice using the microphone and any visual aids.
Relax. Begin by addressing the audience. It buys you time and calms your nerves. Pause, smile, and count to three before saying anything. ("One one-thousand, two one-thousand, three one-thousand. Pause. Begin.) Transform nervous energy into enthusiasm.
Visualize yourself giving your speech. Imagine yourself speaking, your voice loud, clear and confident. Visualize the audience clapping-- it will boost your confidence.
Realize that people want you to succeed. Audiences want you to be interesting, stimulating, informative, and entertaining. They’re rooting for you.
Don’t apologize for any nervousness or problem, the audience probably never noticed it.
Concentrate on the message – not the medium. Focus your attention away from your own anxieties and concentrate on your message and your audience.
Gain experience. Mainly, your speech should represent you as an authority and as a person. Experience builds confidence, which is the key to effective speaking. A Toastmasters club can provide the experience you need in a safe and friendly environment.
As for relaxing by addressing and pausing, this may not be enough. You may need to heed the advice of the anxiety coach, Dr. Carbell. In his practice, he trains many anxiety ridden patients with a method called floating. He explains that the way to regain a sense of calm is to go along with the sensations of anxiety and panic, rather than oppose them. As with floating in a pool, if you struggle, you will sink. Learning to “Float” through anxiety requires practice. It begins with deep belly breathing the minute your anxiety begins to build and take over. Dr. Carbell goes further by saying “What I like best about the notion of floating is that it avoids two common misunderstandings about overcoming anxiety. The first one is the idea that you have to struggle against anxiety, fight it, and overcome it. And the second, related to the first, is that you have to arm yourself with all kinds of techniques and objects in order to enter the fray and confront anxiety. In reality, you'll make much better progress when you let yourself float through the anxiety, not striving to overcome anything and not struggling to employ techniques, but simply allowing the sensations to pass over time. The best kind of help, in my opinion, is the floating kind. It's help that assists you to rediscover your own natural abilities to cope with whatever comes, rather than arming you against potential adversity." (http://www.anxietycoach.com/)
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