Overcoming The Fear Of Public Speaking

Overcoming the fear of public speaking is the number one task you need to undertake. Failing which, your fear will stifle your presentation and the content of your speech will not be delivered effectively to your audience.

The fear of public speaking has been listed as one of the greatest fear of many people. I have taught as a school teacher for twenty over years until my resignation. I have lectured to groups of 100 over students and tutored classes of size from 20 to 30 students, day in and day out, year after year. Did I feel nervous when I stood before my students? No, may be for the first time when I was lecturing, but only for the first time.

In that very first lecture I gave in my life, I tried very quickly to dispel that uneasy feeling as quickly as I could. I tried to be who I was instead of trying to perform as someone else that I was not. So how did I overcome my fear of public speaking, the fear of standing before an audience? Before an audience of over a hundred students while lecturing in a lecture group. Before an audience of around a thousand students while giving announcement during school assembly. And for you, how are you going to overcome your fear of public speaking.

The Source Of Fear Of Public Speaking

What causes fear in public speaking? These are a few possible roots of your fear.

• I am afraid to stand in front of a crowd, especially big crowd, well … even if it is a small crowd.
• What will the audience think of me?
• How will they judge me?
• They will laugh at my mistakes and inadequacies.

I have come across far too many times the suggestion to take deep breath to overcome your fear.  I do not believe in taking deep breath will overcome your fear of public speaking or any other fear. Taking deep breath only seeks to suppress your fear but it is still inside you. It has never worked for me and I do not believe that it will for anyone. If those thoughts are still in your mind and those emotions are still in your heart, your fear is a monster that lies deep within your heart and mind waiting to burst out or swallow you up from within. It is uncertainty that causes fear and your uncertainty is with the audience and your self-confidence. Address the roots of the problem, not your breathing.

I have the following suggestions for you to overcome your fear of public speaking. These pointers are based on reflections on why I had never felt nervous nor fearful each time I had to speak in front of my students, and other people. They are addressed at your self-confidence and your obsession with your audience.

Overcome Fear By Getting Friendly With Your Audience

Ask yourself this question, “Do I get nervous speaking to a group of friends?” I believe that your answer should be “No!” Otherwise, you are a nervous wreck and is suffering from a nervous breakdown. I also believe that you have spoken to a big group of friends occasionally. Do you remember those days when you speak in front of all your classmates and your class size was anything from 20 to 40?

I am referring to speaking to your classmates at the front of your class on informal matters and discussion on class matters, not a class presentation that your teacher assigned you to carry out. In a class presentation you are afraid of getting judged on your performance, both by your teacher and your classmates. So why aren’t you nervous when you are speaking to a group of friends? Was there any fear that you need to overcome in order for you to speak to your friends? The answers are because

• you are comfortable or at ease with them;
• they are friendly towards you;
• they are not judgemental nor are they critical of you.

Even if you ever got into an argument with your friends, you were not nervous nor fearful despite the fact that they were not that friendly towards you during those moments.

As I have mentioned earlier, some of the causes of your fear of public speaking are your unfamiliarity with your audience and you are fearful of how they would judge you. So the first thing you should do when you get in front of your audience is to make friends with them as soon as possible. If you are an inexperienced speaker, a silent audience can be very scary.

Break the silence by soliciting responses from your audience by asking them questions. My secret weapon is to make my audience laugh by saying something funny and behaving lighthearted. You can try to do something funny without becoming a clown. There is a difference between a comedian and a clown. Do not become a clown and demean yourself before your audience.

The moment there is laughter, you break the tense atmosphere. When people laugh, they become receptive of you. Very soon your speech will just be like a casual conversation you have with your friends instead of a formal speech before an unfamiliar, critical and judgemental crowd. You might even enjoy the moment so much that you want to go on and on, and not let your speech ends.

Overcome Fear By Looking For Friendly Faces

An important aspect of public speaking is to engage your audience and look them in the eye. You need not make eye contact with every single audience and that is impossible anyway. As soon as you stood before your audience, begin scanning through those faces nearer to you for a friendly looking face. There are some people in this world who have smiley faces. Target these people and engage them during your speech.

Well, you probably ask, “What if I cannot find a friendly face?” Then look for someone that you already know. If you are such an inexperienced speaker, you better plan ahead and bring some friends along with you and plant them in your audience, seated right at the front row. If you are confident enough, move towards them and touch them on the shoulder. That is a more advanced move. I would normally do that to people I am familiar with in the audience.

So if the unfamiliar audience is the source of your fear, then focus your attention on a friend or a friendly face during your speech. You might want to plant a few friends and have them seated apart from each other. Then you would not be seen to be looking at one person all the time throughout your speech. Of course you can just look into the crowd and not necessarily be seen to be looking at a specific person at all. Try looking at the space between two persons but you must pretend and put on some facial expressions as if you are connecting with someone really there when you are not. However, looking at a friendly face will encourage you greatly.

Overcome Fear By Being Good At What You Are Speaking About

Another cause of your fear would be your concern over your performance. This can be overcome by doing a good preparation for your speech ahead of your presentation. If you know the content of your speech well, you need not worry about your performance.

When I was teaching, I had put in many hours of preparation into the content that I was going to teach. Particularly in the subject of Mathematics that I was teaching, there are many intricate details and a whole string of logic, one fact leading to another. I had all these facts gone through in my mind and they were rehearsed in my head in great details during my preparation. The content that I needed to deliver simply pour out from my mouth naturally especially after many repetitions, class after class and year after year. I was confident of my content and I knew what I was saying (teaching). There was nothing to fear.

You only need to fear if you do not know the content of your speech and you are afraid that your audience will notice your ignorance and catch your mistakes. In short, do your homework and know your stuff.

Focus On Your Content And Not The Audience Behaviour

There are 3 components that make up a speech.

1. The content of your speech.
2. The delivery of your speech.
3. Your audience who are the recipients of your speech.

How well is your message received by your audience depends on the quality of, and the skilful delivery of your message. In the process of public speaking, there is nothing you can do to control the quality of your audience. 

They have been predetermined. You can only control your content (what you are saying) and the speech delivery (how you are saying).

As we are addressing the subject on fear of public speaking, we will not touch on speech delivery techniques. So besides your speech delivery techniques, you should be focusing on what you are saying. A good public speaker does not read from a script even though he/she may have a script to remind him of what he/she has to say. Before he/she deliver his/her speech, he/she should have rehearsed the content in his/her head thoroughly and organised them systematically.

During the speech delivery, the speaker’s focus is on his/her content, NOT the audience. Only a teacher needs to look out for how his/her students are behaving and slow down or address doubts and misunderstandings if he/she senses that his/her students display facial expressions that they are not understanding the content. On the contrary, a public speech in general, you only answer your audience’s queries during a Question-and-Answer session. You do not stop your speech even if someone falls asleep or is inattentive.

Now what does this have to do with overcoming your fear of public speaking. If you are focusing on your content, you will not be focusing on your audience that causes you to think what the audience is thinking about you and your speech. Focusing on your content takes your mind off the audience and takes your focus off your fear.

Do Not Compete And Do Not Compare Yourself With Others

Focus on your strength. Each and everyone of us has our own strengths and weaknesses. That is what makes us unique and none of us are perfect. Some food are sweet and some others sour, but they are all delicious in their own unique way. Not all our favourite food tastes the same. We cannot help it if different people have different taste, after all, one man’s meat is another’s poison.

I have come across a number of great speakers and their speech deliveries are so impressive. There is so much that I can learn from them. However, they have different strength and different styles, but the fundamentals are the same. If you are good and experienced, you might just notice their weaknesses. However, they have mastered the art of public speaking that their strength has simply overshadowed their weaknesses.

Develop your own strength. Develop your own style. You can learn from others their strength and develop them as your own and personalise them into a style of your own. You need not put yourself down just because you are not as good as another speaker. Remember that primarily a good speech is the content, not the style. A good listener can tell whether a speech is full of substance or full of fluff.

At Toastmasters, we teach you the fundamental techniques of public speaking skills and offer you the platform to practice your public speaking. So at a toastmasters club chapter meeting, we focus and guide you on your public speaking skills, overlooking and not judging you on the content of your speech. However, out there in the real world, you have to deliver real solid content to your audience. The delivery style is only the vessel to carry the content of your speech, which is the substance. In the real world, what we want is substance and not just the form.

Being overly conscious of yourself and over-judging yourself, while at the same time comparing yourself with others simply make you feel inadequate and inferior unnecessarily. You become self-conscious and self absorbed that will only hinder yourself even when you are actually alright. That will only stir up your fear of public speaking.

Do Not Desperately Try To Please Your Audience

Do not be desperate in trying to please your audience but be confident of yourself. There will always be negative and critical people out there in the world, and definitely they will be in your audience. It is their attitude. It is their problem. They are problems unto themselves (they do not know it and they do not want to acknowledge it) and they are definitely problems unto others.

Know that you cannot please everyone in the world and you are not there to please everyone. If your content is good and correct, and your speech delivery is clear and comprehensible to your audience, you have done your job. Forget about pleasing the wrong people. The devil is always out there to make you unhappy and to make your life miserable.

Do not bother to bring yourself down and stoop so low as to please other people who are not worthy of your attention. Give your best to those who need it, those who deserve it and those who appreciate it. To those who do not, it is their own loss. Focusing on the wrong people in your audience merely hinders you in your doing well in your public speaking.