The statisticians tell me that more people fear speaking in public than fear just about anything else. And then their are all the people who speak in public a lot, and who who have gotten used to the experience. Most of these people would testify that they actually enjoy being up in front of people sharing some idea, expressing some opinion, and communicating with a group.
I remember having stage fright, the jitters and the sweating that would overwhelm me as I prepared to speak. I think I was afraid of being judged, judged because of the mediocrity of what I would say, judged because of the inadequacy of my delivery.
It was sometime after I began regular public speaking as a teacher, and later as a student for the ministry that I discovered my mantra, which I present below. I used to say this to myself quite often, less now. It helped. In time I stopped thinking about what judgments the audience was making about me, and more about how I could sing my song with force and spirit.
I give you Maya Angelou who wrote:
"A bird doesn't sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song."
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