Friday night at a seminar for women, I spoke about supporting parents.
Speaking in public has always been a big fear of mine. I hated speaking in front of the class in school and highschool was torture. I thought that was all behind me at university but then realised during the course we had to talk about cases in hospital and this was in front of EXPERTS. I often found myself stuttering, my voice shaking and my heart pounding in my chest and I was actually sweating.
I vowed I would never, if given the opportunity, ever ever ever speak in front of a group of people ever again. So what did I do?
Volunteer to talk in front of about 50 women! And these weren’t ordinary women, either. We’re talking likely the toughest crowd I could have ever encountered ie. Muslim women.
So I did it. Not well. But I did it. I faltered and mucked up lots of things, spoke altogether too much with my hands and I nearly started crying in the middle of it. The most telling thing of all is that apart from my sister in law and one aunt, no other family members told me I spoke well which can only mean I was atrocious!
But it’s done and I guess if I ever have to do it again (which is very likely since I am really passionate about helping parents) it won’t be half as bad. God willing.
I got to thinking about those people who happily speak in front of complete strangers AND TELEVISION CAMERAS. And never bat an eyelid. They speak confidently, audibly and make sense. They don’t use their hands, they don’t stutter and they certainly don’t get the chin wobble just before they are going to burst into tears.
RESPECT to all of you who can do it, who do do it and who do it so well.
Booya!
