This week I've been planning my “talk”. Yes after avoiding speaking in public for many years I'm finally going to give it a stab!! Now don't get me wrong – speaking on a 1 to 1 basis is perfectly fine, but put me in a room where I have to address more than a couple of people and I become a gibbering wreck!! I guess it's just a deep rooted fear as to why would a group of people be interested in what I have to say. In a blog or in fact anything you write online you can hide behind the laptop and yes you may get cricism but it's not face to face so I can live with that but the thought of having people staring at me with glazed over expressions is something else!
I was at a business breakfast a few weeks back as a guest and when I arrived I got told that I'd need to stand up and say a few words!! Eeek I thought – there's at least 40 folks here and I've had no time to prepare anything – <note for anyone else they tend to do that sort of thing at business breakfasts ;0) > But what I found reassuring at that breakfast is that although many folks stood up, spoke seemingly off the cuff and were humorous and interesting there will also quite a few who read from notes and didn't really engage with the audience. Hooray – I wasn't the only one with nerves!!
I then met with Angus Business Connections the following week with whom I'm doing the “Show & Tell” talk and it was refreshing to hear them say the same thing – folks are nervous and it's not as easy as it looks. As individuals many of us look at others and think they make it look so easy and they must be full of confidence, whereas is reality they can be just as nervous as we are they can just hide it better.
As Lady Gaga once said during the early days of her career (by which time she'd already had 8 hits):
"When I wake up in the morning, I feel like any other insecure 24-year-old girl. Then I say, 'Bitch, you're Lady Gaga, you get up and walk the walk today.”
So I guess if Lady Gaga can wake up every day and feel insecure then it's something we should treasure about ourselves. Yes we maybe scared doing something we don't like doing but remember we're not alone at feeling like that.
So that's it, I have 3 minutes to speak for and whilst that may not sound a lot that's 180 seconds of people looking for me to say something meaningful!! I'd better get practicing.....