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For seven years I presented the news
on television and every thursday I was there in front of my camera
and I heard the director in my ear saying: Attention studio for life
5, 4, 3, ...
and every Thursday
I felt my heart racing. Every week, seven years...
Now I tell you this because there is this huge misunderstanding
that experienced speakers they are not nervous. When you see that speaker on
stage and you say like like: "Well they do it in a natural way"
No they don't. They are nervous. But the difference to me
between an experienced and inexperienced speaker is that experience people
know how to handle the nerves. I want to give you this insight because it
really helped me a lot
to deal with my nerves.
Because it all begins with the brain. That's where my explanation begins.
Because you have to look at your brain
as having these different antennas
Your brain really wants to protect yourself and it takes that job very seriously
So as soon as the antennas perceive a kind of danger
a button is pushed. It's a button somewhere here
in your head in your brain and it's called the amygdala. It has to shape
of an almond the color of an almond.
It is small as an almond It is a very important button
because as soon as the button is pushed that's what we call the fight or flight reaction
You have all these sensations in your body typically the things that you experience
when you are nervous
like a dry mouth
Legs shaking, your heart really beating very fast
your respiration is going faster and
this is something that actually is there to protect yourself because
as it is a fight or flight reaction imagine that there is this car
nearly racing into you when you when you cross a road. The fact that you have this
Heart beat that is faster, it actually prepares you
to react and to run actually
Now the thing is, when you stand in front of an audience
you cannot run. So the antennas they don't make a difference between
real danger and a danger in your head. So what happens is when you
in front of your audience you cannot run, you kind of freeze
but still you have these sensations so you want to protect yourself
now this is on a subconscious level
what happens on a conscious level is that actually
when you stand in front of your audience you want to protect yourselve
actually by doing this now this is overdoing it but
to some extent that's what speakers actually do in front of an audience
stand like that you really want to protect yourself looking down looking
very quickly from one person to another
Now what does an experienced speaker do? Exactly the opposite
They on a conscious level
They make themselves big in front of the audience you could say that they fake it
making yourself big what I mean with that is
having that posture in in front of your audience
that gives you a kind of a positive attitude. Now to know what that is
just watch television. You can really learn a lot from it
And I advise you to look especially at people for example presenting the news
but people standing because that's the most difficult thing to do have to stand
in front of that audience what to do with your arms what to do with your legs
just look at how they stand and imitate that
because this is a good neutral position same thing for the way you look
tips that I have there is that you actually look at your audience
as if you pour them a glass of wine because this will help you
to stay with one person you look at one
individual at the time. The time it takes
to pour them a glass of wine. To avoid that you would either look away
or look very nervously from one person to another
so the next time you experience these nerves
what I advise you to do is stand
and look it a conscious way just watch television
to know what that can be and watch Ted.com
because on that website you have all these presentations with PowerPoint
without PowerPoint
look at it without volume because it helps you to look how they stand
What I absolutely advise you to do is watch
Amy Cuddy she's an expert on body language
and this is exactly what she's talking about about faking it
to just have a look, imitate, integrate
and make it your own.
