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The famous writer and public speaker, Mark Twain, once said that "There are two kinds
of public speakers. 1. Those who get nervous, and 2. Liars. Getting nervous
before and during your presentations are completely common and you don't have to
let it affect your performance. So in this video we're going to talk about
some mindsets and realizations that you should have going into presenting and
also some practical tips to help manage that nervousness. Coming up.
Let's talk about some realizations and then some practical tips. The first realization is
that you do not look as nervous as you feel. I was recently coaching some
presenters and one of the speakers finishes she said, Oh my gosh, I was so
nervous. Now, she has done a good job. I didn't realize she was nervous. So, I said to
her on a scale of 1 to 10 how nervous were you? And she said 10 out of 10! I was
freaking out. And I asked the people watching, the other participants, how
nervous she looked and they said about a 2. So she felt 10 out of 10. Top of the
scale in nerves. But we couldn't tell. She looked totally composed and normal. She
did a great job. So just this one realization alone I think is really
powerful is that you do not look anywhere near as nervous as you may feel
on the inside. And that alone should I think relax you. Second realization is
just because you're nervous, it doesn't mean you're not doing a great job in
that moment. So another presenter said after on a recent recent coaching
session she said, Oh my gosh. I blacked out. I totally don't remember even what I
did. I don't know if she actually blacked out but that's how she described it. She was
detached from what was happening. Even though she felt detached, she did a great
job. Total home run, did the best I've ever seen her. So just because you feel nerves,
they may be getting the best of you, it doesn't mean that you're not actually performing
excellently. Keep that in mind. The third realization is that nervousness and
excitement are really two sides of the same coin. Bruce Springsteen, a famous
musician, talked about early on he'd get very nervous, a lot of stage fright
before would perform and he realized, wait a minute, this is like excitement.
This is the same thing as I'm excited to go play music for a huge crowd
It gets me going. And so public speaking is a lot like that. You should be a little
excited you don't have to, it doesn't have to be thought of in your mind as I'm really
nervous. You know, you could say, Hey you know what? I'm excited. So you can even take a
little control over your thoughts in that way. So those are some realizations.
Let's get down to some practical tips. The first practical tip is to practice like
crazy and here's why. In my experience, and I've been coaching professional
speakers and coaching college students to do presentations for about
20 years now, 95% of the results you get during your
presentation are worked out during your practice time. So if you practice like
crazy and really prepare well, that presentation is most likely going to go
very well about ninety-five percent of of that is all worked out. So even if
you're nervous either was a couple little things go wrong, it's almost
always going to come out pretty much the way you practiced it. so that's a great
understanding of the process, that, you know, hard work does pay off and you can get
and so you should make that practice as realistic as possible. Maybe even have
a couple of distractions in there, that's fine. If you make a mistake, don't start
over. Push through it. If you feel nervous, don't rehearse talking about to yourself
or out loud how nervous you are because then you might do that during the
presentation that usually makes things worse. So work that out through practice.
The second concrete tip is as you are preparing you want to focus everything
on your audience and your message. If you're all focused on yourself that's
going to spike your nerves. So a comedian is trying to get people to laugh. They're
working on their joke. They not think about how they come across. they're working for
their outcome. They're working for the good performance. If you're trying to
train people you should be focused on getting them up to speed so they really
do know how to do this. If you're trying to share a message focus on saying it in
a way that's going to land and it's going to stick so that everybody gets
the most benefit. Anytime we start thinking about how am I coming across? Do
I look professional? Do look nervous? Or, are people going to judge me? It's going
to lead in the wrong direction. You have to totally flip it and think about your
audience and you message. the next tip is to visualize
yourself doing it well, especially the opening moments that first 10 to 20
seconds. Now when I say visualization, I don't mean anything weird or
experimental or new-agey. I mean it the way athletes do it. In other words, before
a batter comes up to swing. That batter is going to put himself in the right
state of mind so that he visualizes himself hitting the ball well. Adam
Vinatieri is, used to be a kicker for the New England Patriots and in the 2001
Super Bowl against the St. Louis Rams the clock was running down. They're tied 17 to 17.
This is like high pressure situation for a kicker. And he successfully kicked
a 48-yard field goal with two seconds left on the clock. The clock was running.
There was no time outs, it was running. And he did it and they won the game and
after the game people said, you know how did you do it? You know, the most pressure
that any kicker has been under ever. And he said, I have made that kick a thousand
times. And he meant it in his life, you know, in his mind. In a kicker's
life, that is the moment they live for. And he had visualized himself doing it
successfully a thousand times. So that in that moment it felt like he was just
doing it one more time. So when you're picturing yourself in the room setting
up your visual aids, getting ready and that first 10 or 20 seconds of the
presentation you're picturing it happening successfully, picturing the
steps it takes to get there, and you're going to be set up for success so those
are the tips I have for not being as nervous. I recommend you use them your
next presentation. Look for to your comment below. I look forward to seeing
you in the next video. God bless.
