I am thinking of going to public speaking class tomorrow

[charlieHungerford]

A few weeks ago I saw on the internet a public speaking group, some 50 miles away from where I live. I am glad for it being far away because if things go horribly wrong, at least I will never see people again.

I was really motivated to go at first but then my subconscious and negative side took over and said avoid it, don't do it!

But what with an upcoming training course at work where we have to do speaking out loud I feel I should really go to this session because I can develop my confidence and stop fearing this in a safe environment.

I have asked a few close friends what they think and they say I really should go, I have nothing to lose, if I can overcome this fear it will be amazing.

But I know I am going to be absolutely crapping myself - walking into a new place full of strangers where the whole reason for being there is to do public speaking.

Do you think I should go? Would anyone else contemplate doing this?

 

[appletree]

yes, you absolutly should go.
think about it, if you don't go you will almost definatly regret it right?
you might even hate yourself for not going.
of course it will be scary, i understand because i have had so many panic attacks due to speaking out in classes (I'm 19)
I felt very depressed (still do sometimes) but i think this will be really really good for you and like you said it's 50 miles away, really what is the worst thing that could happen?
I bet if you explain to the people in this group how you feel about speaking out and about anxiety etc you will get a warm response from them all.
If you decide to go let me know how it works out!
if you don't go though you just know you will regret it.
good luck whatever you decide to do
-mark

 

[charlieHungerford]

That is really nice, thanks for the encouragement, I really appreciate it!

You are right, although I will be really really anxious, I will indeed kick myself if I don't go and I kind of think it will make my fear worse, because if I avoid this then when my speaking out loud on a work's training course next week comes, I will be even more scared of that knowing I couldn't even go to a class where no one will be critical of me.

I kind of think there comes a point for us all where we really do have to push ourselves into something we really find so uncomfortable, but I do think the key is to do it in a safe place away from people you know. That way if the worst happens - which I guess is I am speaking and am so anxious that I cannot get my words out (which has happened to me in the past) I can experience this in a safe environment - i.e. everyone there is there because they know the fear of speaking and will not be thinking I am some really strange person and what is up with me.

I am going to attend it and think that the short term discomfort v long term gain is going to be so worth it.

This training course at work is the real motivation for me going - i.e. if I didn't have to do any speaking in front of groups of people any time in the near future I would just put this off and think there is no point. So I am going to give this a go. The class say that people do overcome their fears in the end. I just think wow, if I overcome this terrible fear then the doors it opens up will be incredible. If I can do public speaking I think I can do all my feared situations - which all relate around speaking when centre of attention, whether its going into an office and having to ask for something, training a new starter, meeting someone for the first time and having the confidence to speak in detail, interviews, public speaking, talking to women I don't know. My career would take off and just as important - I will not feel this sickening fear and anxiety at the thought of doing these sort of things.

I will do this, at least see what its like and give it a go. Nothing ventured nothing gained. I will let you know how I get on and I will give a totally fair and accurate assessment of whether I recommend it for others.

Thanks again for you words of encouragement!

 

[Statie]

Yes definitley go! The worst-case scenario is that you gain more experience in dealing with the discomfort. If you succeed, the rush will be incredible. You dont even have to succeed, if you just get through it you will feel incredible afterwards.
Go for it!! Good luck!!

 

[garnet]

Hi all!
I wholeheartedly agree with all these kind words of advice. I too have an awful fear of public speaking, and it has got to the stage where I'm fed up with it dictating my life. I have had opportunities where kind people around me, who have been trying to support me, have offered to let me do small presentations.However I always let the fear and automatic negative thought patterns dictate and turned down these opportunities. I regret this, although I am a great believer that we have always done or best in any given situation. So tomorrow I'm going to bite the bullet and do a short presentation for my therapist and perhaps a few others. I have a presentation coming up in a fortnight at work, so I need all the practice I can get. I wish you the best of luck...keep focused on the reward at the end of the process.

 

[charlieHungerford]

Thanks Statie and Garnet.

I have to say that I am starting to feel quite ill at the thought of this and am in two minds whether to do this. Its my ultimate fear, all I can think of is past presentations where I couldn't get my words out, university where I didn't attend any tutorials where we had to get up the front and speak, and when I had to do presentations I had to get drunk in order to do it and then at work, training courses I have had to go on public transport that day so I could drink plenty of alcohol first in order to feel I could manage the public speaking.

I have absolutely zero positive experience of public speaking. I feel ill with worry. I don't want to do it, but I know doing nothing is just going to keep my life on standstill - I am like you Garnet, this sort of fear controls my life.

If I do go, I don't want to go into this using alcohol or some sort of medication, because that will render the experience irrelevant. Trying to tackle my ultimate fear like that seems so daunting.

I wish I had someone to go with!

 

[Moonie]

I am in a public speaking class right now, and I dislike it. Let me first say, that I am required to take this class. I know that I am not good at public speaking, and the fact that this is for a grade really bothers me. The fact that I will only get a mediocre or barely making it grade really bothers me, too. This makes me dislike this class more than I already would.

That aside, I would maybe consider going to a public speaking class if it were up to me to decide when and where to take it. Since this is solely your idea, than I think you are already on a good start. I don't think I am ready for a public speaking class, especially since I have 3 other difficult courses that I am taking.

Don't let my first paragraph scare you, I think that you are courageous and lucky to be able to choose this class. I would feel much better if I could do the same. Is this class for a grade? Or are you doing this for your own self-improvement? I just don't like the idea of taking this class for a grade. I didn't do so well on my first presenation, so it sort of angered me. Though, when I saw my evaluation sheet, I was happy to see that I did some things well. I guess I just need to see how the next few speeches go.

 

[Moonie]

An after thought: I have drank a little before some presentations as well. Sometimes it wasn't too much, so I was a bit relaxed. But most of the time, I went overboard. I will never do this again, because if you go too far you will end up feeling really embarrassed about it afterward. I am glad to see that you want to do this without the aid of alcohol, etc.

 

[charlieHungerford]

Moonie, you are doing fantastic to manage to do these presentations, don't be hard on yourself, even if you don't get good grades, you should feel so fantastic that you are managing to cope and do it. I know from my past I had to drink a 300ml bottle of vodka before being able to do it. I remember once I had a 9am presentation at university. I had my alarm set for 5:30am so that I could start drinking vodka at 6am so that come the presentation I was absolutely right. Amazingly my presentation was graded the best, I was fantastic, but that was because the anxiety wasn't there.

A lot of people say you need anxiety, but they don't realise the sort of anxiety that you or I or other SA sufferers experience, its just crippling.

This public speaking class was my own idea, but mainly prompted because I knew I had a training course at work which involves speaking out loud, introducing yourself, role play, etc. Yuck!

It is not for any grade, I just know and realise that my life cannot progress until I sort out my complete and utter lack of confidence in speaking out loud in front of groups - especially career but also just progressing in life in general - i.e. not having the confidence to really go for things in life - whether its approaching a girl I like, finding myself in situations I don't feel I can cope and succeed in, etc, I hate it all.

Whereas all my old mates from school and college and now in good jobs, successful, in relationships, I am single, in a boring low scaled job, nothing happening in my life. I am and was just as intelligent as them all, but fear of public speaking meant there was no way on earth I was going to look for a job that requires public speaking. But I know that its nothing, I can speak, I have a brain, its just my mind seeing it so dangerous because of past humiliating and traumatising experiences. I just wish I could overcome this without having to put myself through the torture of actual public speaking situations.

 

[charlieHungerford]

I know this is really not good, but I really don't think I will be going now.

That's not to say I won't in weeks to come.

But what I have realised is that I fear the situations I do because I developed fears because of the fear of ridicule, being judged, etc in the past. However, I no longer have these fears that I am being judged or I will get ridiculed, but my mind recognises these situations as dangerous and I fear them simply because my mind has in the past recognised them as dangerous.

An example is public speaking - my fear came about as a teenager when I always got ridiculed for a speech impediment and I got so anxious about speaking out loud because I feared I would receive more insults, put downs, ridicule, etc. Nowadays I don't have a speech impediment and I do not fear ridicule for saying words wrong. But my mind has recognised the situation as a feared situation, but in reality the fear has become re-wired.

Its the same with most of my fears now. I fear a situation or task for a different reason from the reason I feared it so in effect, I fear it for no rational reason. i.e. I fear a situation because I don't believe I can cope because of the huge anxiety I suffer in that situation which only developed because I feared ridicule over a speech impediment. But now I don't fear ridicule, so I am left fearing the situation because I don't believe I can do it (because of the crippling anxiety) - but if I never feared ridicule I would have never feared the situation in the first place. Does that make sense?

In theory I have gone full circle. I never feared these situations believing I couldn't do it, I feared situations because I feared I would be ridiculed. The fear from the belief I would be ridiculed and laughed at has triggered a belief that I cannot do it because of the intense anxiety - the difficulty in getting my words out. The fear that I cannot do it has now made me fear the situation. Now I see the situation as fearful and dangerous. It seems like I need to unwind this circle and get the situation back to reality. I need my mind to recognise that its lost the plot and the fear has become mis-wired. Maybe I am being a coward by thinking this can be done by working on understanding my beliefs and sorting them out rather than aiming to put myself into these feared situations and trying to gain confidence in them, but I have successfully achieved so much by analysing beliefs and thoughts. I don't see why I cannot succeed in changing beliefs about feared situations as well. Afterall, hypnotherapy works by changing beliefs.

 

[Moonie]

Maybe you just need time to think it over. Why not give it a chance for a little bit? Perhaps go to one or two or more meetings and see if it's something you want to possibly tackle? Where would you take these classes? I am not exactly clear on where you found this class/group?

 

[Hoosier]

all of your fears are normal and to you, they are rational.
I had to take a speech class last year and I literally freaked out the first time I had to stand up and introduce myself.. sweaty palms, feeling sick to my stomach, face felt like it was on fire, etc. I got through the (15 second) introduction and at the end of class talked to my professor and told her what I was going through. I thought I was the only one, it turned out I wasn't alone. Two of the most useful things my prof told me is that when I was getting ready to speak is to (1) inhale deeply through my nose, hold it for a count of "2" then exhale slowly through my mouth and (2) find a focal point somewhere in the room (auditorium, what have you) and concentrate on that point as I spoke.

What this did is helped me to relax and I didn't have to look at anyone when I was trying to deliver my information. By not looking at people I didn't "feel" their eyes on me. I couldn't see their expression(s) and as a result I didn't feel as if I was being judged nor did I feel out of place or embarrassed (by this point, I was talking to a spot on the wall, or a marking on a tree outside, or anything other than the human factor)

I'm just commenting on what worked for me. By the end of the semester I had gained such confidence in myself that I turned a 12 minute speech into a 20+ minute lecture.

I do hope you can find the inner strength to confront what you fear and can learn to relax enough to have some fun and even poke fun of yourself to break the ice... no one ever said public speaking is easy, nor does it always have to be so darn serious!!

 

[charlieHungerford]

That is brilliant Hoosier, you have done amazing, I am really glad you have conquered this fear, its something that may sound not a big deal because we don't often have to do it, but in terms of career, well it really is a problem if you don't have the confidence to speak in front of groups of people.

Yes you are right my fear is real, but it is mis-wired. Its like a person fearing walking down a certain street because someone they are fearful of lives on that street - whether its some bully or someone they really are attracted to and go to jelly around them. The fear of this anxiety makes them a nervous wreck to the extent where they don't feel that they can cope with walking down that street. My fear is like that person who still fears walking down that same street even though the person who he feared has moved on from the street, but he fears he cannot cope with walking down the street because his mind recognises the street as danger and that he cannot do it. So the reality is that the fear now is that the person sees the street as a fear, because he feared walking down because he doesn't believe he can do it actually do it.

I guess what this shows is that the person needs to realise that the street isn't a fear at all, he needs to realise its not dangerous and that he can do it. He needs to change his image of this whole situation - he is looking at it so incredibly negatively, such a big deal, everything has gone wrong - because walking down a street is nothing, but with his current mindset he cannot see the reality and how trivial it is. He is caught up in negative thinking patterns and needs to escape them. Exposure would appear to be the best way to gain experience and realise in time that this fear is exaggerated and that he can do it. But I think it would take me many sessions to start feeling at ease with my fear. I do feel I will have to do exposure to gain confidence.
But at the same time, surely it must be possible to re-wire back the beliefs/fears of this - its not something I have yet attempted because public speaking is my ultimate fear and I have had other issues to tackle first. But if I can unwind the circle of fear and put the reality back into perspective, I would like to think the huge anxiety I suffer can fade. The reality is I can speak and I have a brain and that the situation is not dangerous. Its a matter of getting the subconscious mind to realise the reality and putting things back into perspective, to address the whole problem and see how wrong this sort of thinking is and I am making a mountain out of a molehill.. I am thinking how would I tell the man with the fear of walking down that street that he has nothing to fear. It must be possible.