If you are facing a public speaking event or a presentation then I really hope you keep reading – so I can tell you about my experience with presenting and show you what I used to get over my fears.
Throughout my entire lifetime I’ve naturally been pretty shy and quiet, especially when I’m around a group of people I’m not familiar with. I’ve read that it’s a pretty common feature in people and that almost everyone (except for extremely charismatic people) really suffer when they have to do presentations in front of live audiences.
This was extremely true for me. I remember during grade school and all through high school being terrified of making even the smallest presentations. I would never raise my hand in class and I absolutely despised even going up to the chalk board to spell a word or do a math problem. I was so overcome with fear that I can still remember the agony of just thinking about being laughed at or made fun of if I tripped or did the problem wrong.
I always assumed that with practice, my fear of public speaking would get better and better – but that just wasn’t the case and during my years at college, it got worse.
During my senior year I had a big presentation due for English class. If I bombed the presentation I would undoubtedly fail and miss graduation, so the pressure was on. I spent weeks preparing. I would do the presentation over and over again. Then I’d rewrite it and do it again. I’d practice in front of a mirror to try and calm my nerves and make sure all the words were flowing together – I felt confident at points and the next minute I’d say to myself, “This is the worst presentation ever, you’re going to fail, and everyone (even the teacher) is going to be laughing at you!”
To make a long story short --- I failed that presentation. I took the podium like I’d always done before. Shaking, swaying and fidgeting, with buckets of sweat draining from my forehead and hands, I would fumble over the simplest of phrases (If I was lucky enough to get started) By the time I’d walked from my chair to the stage I’d already completely forgotten what I was going to say… Eventually I just walked off the stage and left the classroom - One of the most embarrassing days of my life.
Eventually I did make it through college, but things didn’t get any easier. In November ’07 I faced six or seven presentations for my job.
I started getting desperate in late September. I started thinking about getting on stage and bombing my presentations right in front of my colleagues and bosses. This presentation literally could make or break my career. I had to completely blow them away. So the first thing I did was start looking for some help.
Turns out, the first webpage I clicked on, turned out to be the same page that would COMPLETELY change my life!
It was called undoityouself.com I read through their sales process and was really blown away by the quality of their page. They had these video testimonials from some pretty prominent people and they were absolutely gorgeous. I read through all the features and figured to hell with it, if this product is guaranteed for life I may as well order it and see what it’s all about, even though my wife called me an “idiot” because she swore I was throwing my money into a scam.
Once I started the program (It’s called The Lefkoe Method) I became really psyched by the possibility that maybe this would be the ticket to overcoming my fears once and for all.
It’s hard to explain how it works… but what it does is seemingly force you to change how you think about speaking in public and interacting with people. I watched the DVD’s as I prepared for my presentation and found that I was more comfortable. I listened to the lady who was narrating throughout the program and she gave me the confidence to go deep inside my beliefs and truly find what was holding me back.
About a week later I did my first presentation to approximately 120 people and believe it or not, I actually enjoyed it. I did have a few rocky points in the beginning of my presentation but after about a minute I settled in and really started flowing through my speech. It was nice to actually succeed at standing and actually having people listen – instead of snicker and stare at how pathetic I was behind the podium.
Now I’m not one to approve or endorse a product, but I feel so strongly about The Lefkoe Method and what I did for my life and career that I think it would be wrong for other men/women like me who are struggling to stop their fear of presenting and have no where to turn.
You Can Visit UnDoItYourself.com and learn more about The Lefkoe Method By Clicking Here.
The best of luck to you,Glenn McDermid
