public speaking
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I found an old recording of the first time I spoke in public this week. Mouth dry as a desert and hands shaking like a leaf. Every drop of blood drained from my face. I remember wanting to die.
I found an old recording of the first time I spoke in public this week. Mouth dry as a desert and hands shaking like a leaf. Every drop of blood drained from my face. I remember wanting to die.
If you asked me while growing up what 10 things I’d be good at someday, public speaking would not be on the list. It wouldn’t even have made the top 100.
The interesting thing is that those physiological responses largely went away over time. Until a few years ago I used to do a lot of public speaking. In fact, I did some back-of-the-envelope math and can safely say it adds up to over 10,000 hours.
In the beginning I did weekly talks to high school students, then I taught leadership classes to young adults from areas such as Alexandria and Diepsloot. Eventually I spoke at business seminars and did talks to weekly groups of 500 adults or more.
It’s like James Clear says: “If you wish you would take something more seriously, do it publicly.” It doesn’t get more public than public speaking.
I read book after book on oratory, public speaking and presentation. I listened to and watched other good speakers and made mental notes of what they did. Then I tried out the ideas. Rinse and repeat.
The moral is don’t assume because something is scary and hard right now you can never be good at it!
If you asked me while growing up what 10 things I’d be good at someday, public speaking would not be on the list. It wouldn’t even have made the top 100.
The interesting thing is that those physiological responses largely went away over time. Until a few years ago I used to do a lot of public speaking. In fact, I did some back-of-the-envelope math and can safely say it adds up to over 10,000 hours.
In the beginning I did weekly talks to high school students, then I taught leadership classes to young adults from areas such as Alexandria and Diepsloot. Eventually I spoke at business seminars and did talks to weekly groups of 500 adults or more.
It’s like James Clear says: “If you wish you would take something more seriously, do it publicly.” It doesn’t get more public than public speaking.
I read book after book on oratory, public speaking and presentation. I listened to and watched other good speakers and made mental notes of what they did. Then I tried out the ideas. Rinse and repeat.
The moral is don’t assume because something is scary and hard right now you can never be good at it!