A while ago, I was the opening guest speaker at a business retreat for salon owners. All the attendees received a copy of my book, Delight in the Limelight, and over the two days, many of them approached me to get their books signed and share with me their speaking stories.
One of the attendees was slated to give a presentation the second day and hoped I could give her some tips for calming public speaking nerves.
She said she always felt nervous at the start of a presentation. Once she got going, a few minutes in, she was okay, but, oh, those first pesky minutes! She’d stand up to speak and her heart would race and she’d be out of breath.
Maybe you, too, have this experience? You know you can present with confidence but only once you’ve settled into your talk.
I asked the woman if she’d like to feel as good at the beginning of her presentations as she did once she’d got going.
“I’d LOVE that,” she said.
And so I taught her how to calm her nerves before speaking engagements using one simple exercise…
How to calm your nerves before speaking engagements
Here’s what I told her to do:
“Connect with how you feel when you’re feeling the way you want to, the way you love, the way you feel once you’ve hit your stride.”
“Then envision yourself feeling that way as you pick up the microphone and open your mouth to say the first words of your presentation. Practice this throughout today and tomorrow.”
The next day, I watched her walk up to the front of the room and pick up the microphone. When she spoke, I was surprised by what she said:
“I was telling Linda how I always feel nervous when I start to speak. She told me to envision over and over picking up this mic and feeling how I want to feel… And I want to say, it worked. I’m feeling pretty good.”
Amazing! She had learned how to calm her own nerves before speaking on stage.
How to use this technique to calm your own nerves
The technique I taught this salon owner is sometimes called mental rehearsal or visualization.
Top athletes use it to calm their nerves before matches and races, and you can use it to calm your nerves before you speak on stage, at a networking event, in an interview, in a livestream, and anywhere else you experience those pesky pre-speaking jitters.
I use mental rehearsal as part of my own pre-performance rituals, as do many other public speakers who have overcome speaking anxiety.
Try it for yourself using my Public Speaking Empowerment Kit. It contains three free audio recordings that you can use to guide your own mental rehearsal process ahead of your next speaking engagement. Click the image below to get your copy.
You can also join me for a masterclass where I will teach you my tried and true preparation rituals for speaking confidence, a powerful presence, and even peak experience.
The next time you speak in public, make sure you use mental rehearsal to calm your nerves before you step on stage. You will feel so much more grounded and confident!
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