Take
Control
How Can I Control My Nerves When Presenting?
Stay
Calm
How Can I Control My Nerves When Presenting?
I control it by concentrating moment to moment and allowing the nerves to be not nerves that are going to take me away but channel the best work possible. Instead of fear, it’s excitement. The feeling is about the same but you’re making it… An example would be, this is my own example, a roller coaster. Why do people get on roller coasters, crazy rides? You can call it fear but it’s also excitement. It’s the same emotion, in a way, that makes you feel really alive at that moment. Why do people go to scary movies? They’re frightened but they’re also excited. It’s the same thing. It’s high emotion.
—Scot Crisp, Education Consultant, TESOL Instructor
Water; drink lots of water. Chocolate and some kind of protein like nuts or cheese. Those are three things I want with me. Cold, sparkling water. I visualize. I picture myself wherever the space is and I picture myself confident in doing it. If I’m really nervous I remind myself… For example, it’s 3:45 right now. Let’s say my presentation is from 4-4:30, I’ll say to myself in an hour I’ll be done. In two hours I’ll have been done for an hour. Then it’s like, ok,
it’s 30 minutes out of my life, it’s going to be fine. I’m going to be done in an hour. That always makes me feel better.
—Monica Berini, Academy of Art University, Graduate Major-Specific
Curriculum Coordinator
There’s a really interesting study that was done. If you google anxiety appraisal, it said basically they had two different groups. One group was, “I am so afraid of public speaking. I hate public speaking.” Another group reframed that fear and said, “I can’t wait to get out there and tell everyone my thoughts and opinions.” Actually their anxiety did lessen a little bit by just tricking themselves.
—Allison Goldberg, Performer, Writer, Host, Co-Creative Director of GoldJam Creative
Don’t forget to breathe. By breathe I mean take long, deep breaths. That really helps slow you down and helps you focus, just like in yoga or a sport. Breathing is one thing.
Practicing; that will help you so much. If you go in unprepared, you’re just going to be more nervous. If you practice as much as you can and anticipate things that can happen or possible issues you might have, you will feel a lot more confident going in to your presentation on the actual day.
Don’t take it too seriously, even if it’s important. We’re all human and we all mess up sometimes. So, if you stumble on a word or sentence, or you forget momentarily what you are trying to say, just take a deep breath, do your best and move on. Or you could even make a quick joke about it to your audience. That shows you are human. Just try to relax a little; have a sense of humor about it. It’s not a life or death situation. You’ll be fine; you’ll survive.
—Hilaire Fong, Academy of Art University, Undergraduate Curriculum Coordinator
A big part of it is trying to get outside of your head. I think a lot of the nerves are you have this person in your head telling you everyone is staring at you, what if you mess up, what if you forget your lines. So, getting yourself out of that is really important.
Also, just calming down your body. You have this fight or flight reaction where you’re body… Some people start to sweat a lot, some people shake, some people tense up. Your body has physical reactions to these things. Clearing your mind and relaxing your body are two really important things.
Clearing your mind; I know some speakers do a one-minute meditation app before they go on stage. I know others that direct their attention to other things; maybe they tell themselves why they are there, so they tell themselves, “I am here because I learned this really interesting insight and I want other people to know it.” Or just focusing on… There’s an exercise that an improv instructor told us about identifying things that you love in the space so that you are focused on other things and things that you love rather than what’s actually happening.
—Danielle Barnes, CEO of Women Talk Design
I try to be very friendly, make jokes, offer you drinks. Then, when I start presenting, I show enthusiasm; I’m moving my hands, I’m smiling a lot, I’m showing I’m excited. Because it builds this… They see that you’re excited, and they hear your voice being quite loud. I compensate with that; I show confidence and I talk quite fast and try to be a little bit humorous with it. I think that makes everyone in the room feel more at ease. It makes me feel less nervous.
Sometimes when I present I might be quite intense and thoughtful. But I think when it feels too much like a presentation and less like I am sharing something in a very open and enthusiastic way… I think of it as just sharing my ideas and not this kind of like, “Option 1: this.” I try not to make it seem like a presentation. That’s how to get over it.
—Tom Crabtree, Founder & Creative Director of Manual
