Let's just say that oral presentations should be my forte, but they aren’t! It’s like every time I want to get up and speak, I become someone besides myself! I used to do plays and sing in a choir, and I feel less nervous doing those than speaking in front of a class, even if it’s for three minutes!
Today I had to do just that! I guess you can say it has been a while! In high school, I remember giving a 20-minute presentation and doing several other long presentations! Why is it all of a sudden a challenge?
I think I’ve figured it out! I will never forget the one piece of advice my director from high school, Todd, told me. He said: “When you give a presentation, you will only feel as comfortable as you make it.” Basically, he went on to say that if you feel comfortable sitting, then sit. Make the space yours.
Besides that fact, college is a whole new world. In high school, you have a long time to get to know everyone; especially in a small school! How can you make a space comfortable, if you don’t know everyone in the room? By the time you feel like you’re settling in, the semester is over and you are placed into a group of new people all over again! That’s why it’s so hard!
To me, public speaking is like doritos! Yes, I mean like the chips. You know when you feel like you are so loud when you crunch on your chips in a room full of people and it is just SO OVERWHELMINGLY the only thing you can think about? But, in reality, no one can hear it! Well, for presentations I get really shaky! I start to fidget and my heart pounds even just thinking about my name being called and imagining myself standing in front of an uninterested beady-eyed crowd.
After I get it all over with, I will usually ask someone for their opinion on how I did. Usually, they’ll give me the okay and say that I did just fine. So all that shaking was a delusion? No. It was just a sensory overload on my part. Maybe my hands were noticeable, but people only see the faults within themselves. Just like in theatre, the audience doesn’t know what to expect, and your mistake will only appear obvious, if you make it obvious!
One time for my chorus solo, I actually forgot my part! It was my nightmare that I ran through my mind and pre-prepared for over dozens of times. Instead of stopping, I just sang the same lines twice, and the only reason people found out was because of the dang chorus members who chose to laugh in my moment of failure. They weren’t making fun of me, but it was pretty silly!
The only thing I can say, is to keep going. You’ve got this!
