As an ex-opera singer and someone who has suffered from performance anxiety in the past, and as someone who has now coached hundreds of clients in public speaking, here are some of the steps I would take to prepare myself for a high-pressure public-speaking event.
Extravagant Preparation
Could I still do this presentation if my laptop failed, and I lost all my notes and slides? Could I keep going and remember my place if someone threw a bucket of water in my face halfway through? That’s how well prepared I would now be for a big performance event. I will prepare every preparable factor; from the words, to how I hold a microphone, to the pauses, to the outfit details, to when I change a slide and what I say before I do. Clients sometimes tell me that they are surprised how much work and preparation goes into a performance event; yes! There is a lot of work to do, but it is so worth it when you stand up in front of an audience, know exactly what you are doing and absolutely smash the performance!
Joyful Affirmations
Experience has taught me that positive affirmations work for me and for most of my clients. Below are some that I use personally:
- ‘I know I’ve got what it takes to meet this challenge.’
- ‘I’m a confident speaker.’
- ‘I’m excited about this opportunity.’
I would repeat these daily in the lead up to the event, ideally from around 2 weeks before the performance.
It can be powerful to create your own affirmations that really resonate with you. If I were struggling to come up with these, I might think about what I would say to a best friend who told me they felt nervous about an event and use similar wording in the way that I speak to myself.
Real-human Run-Through
If this is an event I know will be particularly challenging for me, I will organize a practice performance. This means gathering a group of trusted friends and family to witness a run-through of the performance. The more I have run it in ‘performance mode’, the less alien it will feel to me when I come to perform it on the day.
Victorious Visualisations
There is a reason top athletes and performers use visualisation as part of their preparation. It works! I will try to find moments to imagine the performance from beginning to end going as well as I can possibly imagine. How would my voice be? My posture? My use of gestures? What would it be like if I absolutely knocked it out of the park? Doing the reverse of this, i.e. imagining things going badly I find, is probably one of the worst things I can do, so I try to turn negative visualisations/narratives into their positive version.
Breathing Practice
I would find a quiet place (a bathroom or even on public transport on the way to the event can be ideal if there is nowhere else) to carry out a very short breathing practice to help ground and calm myself. As an experienced voice coach I have my own practices that I know work for me, but if I was unsure I would use one of the calming breathing practices that can be found on YouTube and follow along via headphones.
Super-Symptoms
On the day of the event symptoms might appear, for example, my heart beating quickly, sweating, dry mouth, or shaking, etc. When these symptoms arrive, instead of pushing them away as I might have done in the past, I have learned to let them just be there. Fighting or fearing symptoms, I find, seems to make them even bigger, so I just let them be with me and carry on. Being nervous means, I care; it means that the performance is important to me and that’s a great thing. I remind myself it’s okay to feel nervous and to be experiencing the symptoms of those nerves.
The above list is by no means exhaustive, and I have found that, for my clients, managing performance anxiety requires a multi-faceted approach that is unique to each individual. A good coach will have an extensive toolkit and can help give you strategies that will work specifically for the challenges facing you.
What else helps you to feel confident when public speaking? Knowing the tools that work for us is key to building up a body of evidence and experience that shows we can do this!
If you want to become a Confident Public Speaker or use Confident English Pronunciation, book in a free consultation with me, and receive a tailored session plan to help you smash your communication goals.