By Ellen Egan
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When people speak with me about their public speaking fear, we will discuss the many techniques for ridding themselves of the nervousness they feel before stepping up on stage. For people whose nervousness feels so profound that they can’t even get near the stage, the question of hypnosis often comes up as a potential “magic pill” cure for their public speaking fear.
At the same time that people will broach this topic with me to see if I support it, they may have an image of the stereotypical stage hypnotist who makes people do silly things on stage while they are hypnotized. This stereotype of hypnosis is not the type of hypnosis that will help rid you of your fear of public speaking.
Public speaking and presentations are really all about effective communication. The real goal we all have is to improve our speaking skills to the point where we are able to easily and effectively get our message across to an audience. If you have a fear of public speaking, this is a real hurdle to your being able to stand up in front of people and get your message across. Your nervousness causes other reactions like shaking hands, inability to find the right words, perspiration, mumbling, etc. which all get in the way of you feeling relaxed and your audience receiving your information. So, the real key is to find a way to diminish the nervousness or find a way to relax.
This is where hypnosis can fit in. You can consider hypnosis as a relaxation method. If your brain tends to go down the path of nervousness when you consider an upcoming presentation, hypnosis simply provides another path. Hypnosis is really just deep relaxation. When you are really relaxed it is easier for you brain to create new paths or new options for you to use in various situations. You can create the option to be comfortable and confident when you step in front of an audience instead of feeling scared.
Hypnosis is not a magic pill that you can take which will rid you of all of your problems. But, it is a tool you can use to increase the choices you have available to you when you are in a public speaking situation. You can choose to be calm, confident and relaxed.
There is no need to feel trapped by your fear of public speaking. With a short hypnosis session, you can learn to let go of the fear and move into confidence.
Click Here! for a hypnosis programme that really works.
To your success,
Ellen
By: Ellen Egan
Are you a mind reader? Do you know what people are actually thinking when they are talking with you? Have you ever been surprised after having a conversation with someone that the “pictures” in their mind about the topic were completely different from the words that you were hearing?
An important thing to remember when you are preparing your presentation is that your audience cannot read your mind. They may hear the words that you are speaking very clearly, but they may not get your message completely. If you want to help ensure that your audience gets your message, give them some images to link with your words.
Studies have shown that when we get information through several sensory avenues, we are more likely to retain the information. So, If someone describes the yearly sales figures for us AND shows us a graph of the figures, we are more likely to understand and retain the information. Now, if we take this a step further, and actually attach meaning to the words and images, we have a huge increase in the chance that our audience will retain the information. By attaching meaning, I mean that we appeal to the audiences interests, concerns, dreams, etc through our words and images. When images are attached to information, it can actually tap into our emotions.
There is an excellent video from a TED University talk by Tom Wujec about how the brain attached meaning to images. He actually shows you how the brain processes images and makes them meaningful by
1. Making ideas clear by visualixing them
2. Making them interactive
3. Making them persistent
TED University – Tom Wujec
It is clear that we will be much more successful in getting our message across if we use both words and images. And, if we then attach meaning to the words and images, our message will come across even more powerfully.
Public speaking is at its heart all about communication. We can be much more effective communicators if we include images along with our words.
How will you incorporate images into your next presentation?
To your success,
Ellen
By Ellen Egan
In public speaking, we often use data to support our main points. This is good, right? No. Data is boring. Data is something that “experts” who don’t like talking in front of other people use as a prop to hide behind. Think of it. Who likes to listen to an hour of data,data,data. I fall asleep just thinking of it. But wait, what if I’m delivering a presentation that has to use data to support the main points? What do I do then?
Data is interesting for the people who went through the trouble to gather the data. Not to your audience. Your audience wants to hear a story. Your audience needs number that tell a story. That is intruiging.
I just read a story about water in San Francisco. The tap water in San Francisco comes from a nearby national park and is so clean the city is not required to filter it. As a result, tap water costs approximately .0021 cents per ounce compared to 7.9 cents per ounce for bottled water purchased at the store. The data shows a big difference in cost, no? But, when you hear that you could take a bottle and fill it from the tap once a day, every day for 10 years, 5 months and 21 days before it cost the same as one bottle of water from the store – now you have a story that sticks in someones mind.
If you want your data to have an effect on your audience, you need to use it to tell a story. You need to use it to create an image that is within the audience’s grasp of understanding. Use your data to tell a story and it will breathe life into your presentations.
To your success
Ellen
miscellaneous, public speaking fear | sparkler | 
October 8, 2010 11:48 am | 
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