# What is the best way to stop nervousness before speaking in public? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 26, 2001, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-best-way-to-stop-nervousness-before-speaking-in-public/89882 "2001-10-26T23:49:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![DPWhite](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d26b3c/32.png) [@DPWhite](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPWhite)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2001, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-best-way-to-stop-nervousness-before-speaking-in-public/89882/21 "2001-10-28T00:30:34Z")
If you aren’t nervous/excited, then the crowd will be bored. Think of it as enjoyable excitement like riding a roller coaster. It is a good sign. Remember, they are all pulling for you. ---
**Author:** ![Zyada](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zyada/32/3028_2.png) [@Zyada](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zyada)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2001, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-best-way-to-stop-nervousness-before-speaking-in-public/89882/22 "2001-10-28T03:28:44Z")
Be just as prepared as you can be! Stage fright is much better when you can feel confident about your presentation. One thing I do in addition to practicing is have a checksheet of everything that I need for a performance. Granted that giving a speech is not as complicated as performing a solo in full caberet attire, but it helps calm the jitters if you know that you remembered your notes. Realize that experience will help. Quite a bit of first time stage fright is that you are doing something completely unknown in front of other people. Recognize this and the second time won’t be nearly so bad. I have a friend who got stage fright so bad she doesn’t remember her first solo performance. Now she performs regularly at restaurants. Finally, an exercise that can help: Step 1: While standing, take deep breaths. Full body, as much as you can, pulling in air from your abdomen and lifting your rib cage then letting out as much as you can. Do this a couple of times to get the feel of it. Step 2: Continue the deep breathing. Raise your arms while breathing in, then lowering them while breathing out. Arms are raised and lowered out to the sides of the body, a la the Da Vinci drawing. Do this until the coordination of breathing and movement feels natural. Step 3: (Visualization) While breathing in and lifting your arms, imagine that you feel energy being drawn into your body from the ground by the movement. While breathing out and lowering your arms, imagine that you feel the tension and fear draining from your body into the ground. This final step takes concentration and practice. You will want to learn this exercise in private and well before your speech. Then when you go to make the speech, you can do your exercise somewhere that you can be private for a minute; or you can do the breathing and the visualization and that will work better than breathing alone. I find this exercise to be balancing, e.g. it is both calming and energizing. [sub]I must be an adrenaline junkie, because I love to perform[/sub] ---
**Author:** ![iadoraeudora](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/bbe5ce/32.png) [@iadoraeudora](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iadoraeudora)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2001, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-best-way-to-stop-nervousness-before-speaking-in-public/89882/23 "2001-10-28T03:40:26Z")
Just remember that everyone in the room is focused on you, is noticing the primple that started on your nose tonight, wishing you were going to enterain or enlighten, but still thinking you look like the kind of person they will want to run from the room to avoid listening to. And they plan to tell everyone they know you are a failure. So, for your own peace of mind, don’t do it! There’s no law that says you have to. Develop a case of laryngitis, or the one-day polio. Anything. Then take a cab to a cheap bar and buy the whole bottle of bar brand rye. ---
**Author:** ![Quasimodem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/e274bd/32.png) [@Quasimodem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quasimodem)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2001, 3:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-best-way-to-stop-nervousness-before-speaking-in-public/89882/24 "2001-10-28T03:52:37Z")
… **tell**'em you’re nervous! They would be in **your** shoes and it kinda breaks the ice if you admit to it. Of course, I agree with everyone else in this thread who said _“know your subject”_. I once told a group that I was so nervous I could thread running sewing machine needle, and before I knew it my presentation was over and I got a nice round of applause. Good luck Quasi ---
**Author:** ![Quasimodem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/e274bd/32.png) [@Quasimodem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quasimodem)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2001, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-best-way-to-stop-nervousness-before-speaking-in-public/89882/25 "2001-10-28T03:57:25Z")
“…thread **a** running sewing machine needle” , and to clarify further, after **that** little “joke”, I meant that the rest of the presentation ran so smoothly it was over before I knew it. ---
**Author:** ![iadoraeudora](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/bbe5ce/32.png) [@iadoraeudora](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iadoraeudora)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2001, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-best-way-to-stop-nervousness-before-speaking-in-public/89882/26 "2001-10-28T04:02:27Z")
Are you sure you solved the problem of public speaking? You seem to be stumbling over public posting. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Lodrain](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c4cdca/32.png) [@Lodrain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lodrain)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2001, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-best-way-to-stop-nervousness-before-speaking-in-public/89882/27 "2001-10-28T15:35:30Z")
I shut out all outside data, and concentrate on the task itself, or just let my mind wander as my mouth speaks. It works well - I recently did a well-commended performance in an improv play at my school. That wandering-mind bit served me well then, and I wasn’t a bit scared. It’s easy for me - my mind is a wandering drunkard [sub]sister mother atom heart phoenix machine teacher[/sub]… Where was I? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-best-way-to-stop-nervousness-before-speaking-in-public/89882.md?page=1)