5 Best Tips to Overcome Presentation Fear

Glossophobia (Speech Anxiety)

Glossophobia or speech anxiety is the fear of public speaking or speaking in general. The word glossophobia comes from the Greek meaning tongue, and phobos, fear or dread. Many people only have this fear, while others may also have social phobia or social anxiety disorder.

Here are some tips to overcome presentation fear:

1. You might think you already know everything there is to know about breathing, and if you're a professional singer you probably do. If you want to talk (or sing, act, etc. ), you have to breathe. This won't always come naturally, and you'll probably need to practice. But everybody else, be sure to take a look at the breathing material. And if you want to do these things calmly, you'll need to breathe diaphragmatically.

2. If you allow yourself to work with the anxiety, not against it, you'll be able to calm down and proceed. Expect, and accept, that you will feel anxious, especially at first. If you resist the anxiety, you'll make more trouble for yourself. 

3. Don't try to "hold it down". Take the emotions and passion you feel for your subject or artistic expression and channel it into your performance. Express it! If you try to suppress it, it will work against you.

4. If you are giving a talk, your focus should be your material and the audience reaction to it, because your task is to inform or persuade them. You therefore want to be aware of how they are responding, so that you can connect with them in various ways.

5. While your natural instinct will probably be to avoid the audience as much as possible, just like the reviewer cited above, you will actually feel less anxiety once you get the audience involved with you. Establish contact with the audience through eye contact and talking directly to them i.e. , How many of you here have ever had this experience... Ask them questions to get them involved in your talk.