How to Speak With Confidence
10 Secrets to Speaking Confidently And that's why
stories are so powerful. If you want to get a message across, you change
your audience's state.
I am standing next to the Bethesda Fountain in a
central park in New York City. Hi, my name is Grace Lee and I'm the
host of the Career: The revisionist podcast where I help savvy
professionals to build careers of significance and expand that into living
a fulfilling life. Today I want to talk to you about speaking
confidently and I'm going to give you 10 secrets on how to speak
confidently in any Endeavor.
So come with me for a walk in central park and
let's get to it.
Is to know that this is a skill that you can
learn.
There's no such a thing as being born with it. In fact, if you
talk to any of the best speakers out there, they weren't born with
it. They had struggled with it, and they had to overcome their
challenges. They had to develop their confidence, and they had to develop
the skill. So it is a skill like any other skill that can be developed.
Let me give you an example.
Have you ever seen the movie King's Speech by
Colin Firth? Colin Firth played England's, Prince Albert. He was, in
history, Prince Albert was to be on the throne to become the next King
George the sixth. And he needed to speak in front of the nations
here, to speak to England and to all the people, all the citizens that
were following him. But he had a speech impediment. This is a true
story. So King's speech is based on the true story of his life. So,
Prince. Albert's wife hired a leader, hired a coach to help him overcome
that speech impediment. And later on, he could develop into the leader I
know him to be.
So you see speech being good at speech, being a
confident public speaker is not an innate trait. You aren't born with
it. The prominent leaders aren't born with it. They work at it, and they
develop the skill.
So what can you do to develop that skill? Well,
let me tell you what I did.
I'll share with you what I did. English was not
my first language. My first language was Cantonese because I'm originally
from Hong Kong. And so I struggled with learning English. I had to learn
vocabulary; I had to learn grammar, and I had to learn speech because
I used to speak with an accent, and so I had to study phonics, I had to
study English pronunciation and what I did when I wanted to expand my
vocabulary was I read the dictionary, not just any dictionary, but the
Oxford dictionary of hard words.
Now I'm not saying you have to read the
dictionary from A to Z in order to become a confident speaker, that's not
what I'm saying. I'm saying that if you want to become a confident speaker
and develop your skills somewhere. then you need to expand your
vocabulary and the words to focus on are the words. That will help you
express yourself. These are words that are emotional of nature. When you
express yourself from human to human, whether you are speaking one-to-one
or one too many, you need to learn to express yourself. So learn some
vocabulary, expand your vocabulary around emotions and get real and
get authentic with expressing yourself. And in that way, when you learn a
lot more emotional words, you can also learn to express your ideas.
Is to make it about your audience.
Have you
heard the term that the number One fear that people have is stage fright?
I mean comment below.
Do you have stage fright? Have you
experienced going on stage and becoming like a deer in the headlights and
being nervous? Right before a performance? I mean comment below if you
experienced that; I mean it is the number one fear but the reason you
experienced stage fright, the reason stage fright is so common is that you
are making it about you. When you are fearful, when you are nervous on
there, it's because you are so concerned about how other people think of
you. You are so concerned about what they're thinking about, how
you're looking about how you appear and that is making it about you. So
make it about them instead, because you are speaking for a reason. You are
speaking to be heard. Yes, but the major reason, the real reason you are talking
to, the real reason you are engaging in.
Public speaking is because you want to get a
message out there. You have a message that other people want to hear and
maybe other people when they're hearing what you have to say, that's
something they needed to hear for the longest time. So make it about them,
right? So make it about them and when you make it about them, you are
no longer focused on yourself and that is how you overcome stage fright.
Is to visualize yourself as a confident speaker.
If you're not a confident speaker, if you've not
experienced it, chances are is because you can't see it. You can't see
yourself as a confident speaker. So practice that. Just imagine, use
your imagination and ask yourself, what do I want to look like? Ask
yourself, what do I look like? And imagine yourself speaking from the
stage. You want to be as detailed as possible.
What are you wearing?
How big is the audience?
Where is the stage that you are speaking?
What is the event and how are you dressed?
What is your posture?
How are you showing up?
What does your voice sound like?
And when you project your voice, when you
deliver your message and you look around in the audience.
What are they doing? Are they making eye contact
with you?
Are they nodding their heads? Are they smiling?
Are they writing notes?
Are they in agreement with you? Are they
connecting with you?
Visualize that complete experience because if you
haven't experienced the
Confidence that you want to experience on the
stage, It's because you haven't been able to see it yet. You aren't seeing
yourself as a confident speaker, so instead of waiting for yourself
to get there before you see yourself that way, already start seeing
yourself that way and then your actions that you would take will get you
there.
Is to know your stuff.
Whether you are speaking to one person or to a
stage of hundreds or thousands of people, you have to know what you're talking
about. Knowing what you're talking about does two things.
First and foremost, it gives you confidence
because when you know your stuff; you know that whether there's going to
be an interruption from the audience, if people ask you questions or if
they object to what you're saying, you're not going to get sidetracked
because you know your stuff. You know it inside out and backward. And
competence, the competency in which you know your stuff is going to give
you confidence.
The second thing that it is going to do is it's
going to give the audience confidence because they want to know that at
the time they're investing, listening to you is worthwhile. They want to
know that it's time well spent. So if you know your stuff, you're going to
come across as confident. You're going to deliver your materials well,
and objections or questions will not sidetrack you. And so that gives
the audience confidence and when they're confident in you and they feel
that "Oh, this is very worth my time," then they will connect
with you more. They will resonate with you more and they will also learn
your material. They'll take in what you have to say a lot better.
So know your stuff, practice in and out,
know your stuff. And it doesn't matter what your goal is. It doesn't
matter if you're there to entertain or just to inform or if you're there
to express your ideas or to tell your story, you still have to know your
stuff.
Is to learn how to tell stories.
Stories connect people, and it's also what
allows you to build rapport with your audience. So when you're on
stage, when you're in front of a group of people or when you are
speaking with one other person, learn to tell stories because when they
hear a story around it and you wrap your message around a story, your
audience will remember it better. And it gives you confidence because when
they are engaged in your story, you can see it because you can feel that
connection that they have with you. And when you're building rapport with
them through a story, it also helps to build your confidence when you are
about to tell the message.
So learn to tell stories and remember when you
are telling stories to incorporate emotions into it.
So it does: back to the first secret is expanding
your vocabulary, learning how to express yourself so that you can tell
better stories. I'm standing next to the conservatory water in Central
Park and look what I came across,
Hans Christian Andersen. Now, who is Hans
Christian Andersen? If you haven't heard of him, you might have heard of
his stories. Hans was a Danish author, and he's best known for his fairy
tales. So you might've heard of his stories, The Little Mermaid,
Frozen, which is super popular right now. A lot of his very tales
have since been turned into stories have since been turned into movies.
So why do we remember them so much is because
movies connect? Movies get us to feel an emotion. Movies get us to
remember something that happened to us in our lives, in our childhoods.
And that's why stories are so powerful.
If you want to get a message across, you change
your audience's state. So what am I meaning by that? You changed their
state. You get them to experience. What you experienced when you were
telling your story.
Now, when I was a little girl, my mom didn't
speak English, and I didn't speak English very well, but she gave me an
education and she wanted me to learn English. So she couldn't read me
bedtime stories, so instead, she had I read them to her. And so when I was
young, what I did was every night before bed, I would read her a bedtime
story. And the first bedtime story that I read was a book called the book
of nonsense.
There were mini-stories all gathered into one.
Edward Lear. wrote it He was an author back in the day as well. And he
wrote phenomenal stories. And every time I read each story, it was one
story a night. I would read these stories to her and she would
listen. She would listen, and she would learn English in the process as
well. And I would improve my pronunciation. And those were my
earliest, my earliest childhood memories were bedtime stories with my
mother, I was reading to her. These days most parents read to their
kids, but my experience was the opposite. I read to my mum, and that
was the earliest childhood memories that I had. And I remember those so
well because I wrapped them in the story.
So the same is true with you. If you want more
confidence, you want to connect with your audience. If you want to
communicate effectively and make sure that your audience understands and
hears what you have to say, give them an experience and you give them an
experience by telling them a story.
Is to dress confidently.
You want to give yourself the best chances of
feeling confident. And when you feel you look good, when you're
confident in how you look, then you will come across confident. So
design for yourself how you want to appear on stage. Design that outcome.
And it starts with the way you dress, it starts with the way you present
yourself. So dressing, yes it is clothing, it is accessories; it is how
your outer appearance looks, but dressing also affects your posture. So
how do you want to present yourself? How do you want to show up when you
go on stage, what is the posture that you want to have and these
things when taken together, it elevates your confidence!
Is that practice makes permanent;
Practice makes permanent. So what do I mean by
that? When you do the same thing repeatedly, that action, that thing
that you're doing becomes ingrained in you and overtime as you
keep repeatedly doing it you keep practicing it; it becomes a
habit. So that's how habits are formed because you do them so often and
every day and repeated the same way that you develop unconscious
competence in doing it. You don't even have to think about it. You just
know how to do it. So that's also how bad habits are formed. Good habits
and bad habits are formed the same way, by repeatedly doing the same
actions again and again until it becomes routine. Until you become so good
at it, it becomes like a reflex to you and you don't even have to think
about it. So practice makes permanent. With public speaking, you want
to be practicing the right thing, right? Cause if you are forming bad
habits, it's because you are practicing the wrong thing.
So practice the right thing, and how do you know
what the right thing is? That's why it's important to get feedback, get
feedback from yourself, get feedback from a trusted mentor. Get
feedback from someone who has achieved the confidence from the stage that
you want, the success of public speaking that you desire for yourself,
right? And in order to get feedback for yourself. First, what you can
do is record yourself talking. If you are starting small, if you are
starting in a small group or maybe a meetup group or small stages, make
sure that you have someone record that for you. And note for yourself, how
do you look from the stage, right when you are watching yourself
perform. When you are watching you speak, are you bored by what you're
saying? Are you captivated by what you're saying is how you are
delivering it, the words that you are using, how you're
expressing yourself and your ideas, is it interesting? Is it getting
the message across? Is it clear? Is it engaging?
So that is one thing you can do to get feedback
is to look at yourself with an honest eye, without judgment, without
criticism, and with a beginner's mind. So that is the seventh secret, and
that is that practice makes permanent.
Is to know your audience.
This is where you want to do some
research. Just a little of recon work here. Think about your
audience, and who are they? What are the challenges that they're
facing? What are the problems that they have that they're trying
to solve in their life? What are they looking for? What language do
they use when they're describing their problems? What language do they use
on a day-to-day basis? And where are they currently searching for their
results? Where are they searching for answers, solutions to their problem,
and what results are they looking for, right? But when you have that
clarity about your audience, you're able to plan your message better
and it gives you more confidence because you can design what the outcome
that you want to have in your communication. When you deliver your
message, what outcome are you trying to have? Are you trying to inform
someone of something? Are you trying to show them and to sell them a
solution? Are you trying to entertain them or what is that
outcome? When you know your audience, you're able to design an
outcome that the audience is going to receive when they attend your
presentation or when they attend your communication or your keynote
address.
So know your audience and when you know your
audience and you will build rapport with them better, connect with
them better than well and use the right language that will resonate with
them and that will all, when taken together, will raise your confidence.
Is don't dwell on your mistakes.
When you are giving a talk, when you are
presenting, when you are delivering your message, telling your
stories, you're going to stumble and you might even use filler
words. So filler words are those Ums and Ahs that people try so hard to
avoid. But it might happen because if you've had the habit of using filler
words, is that something you always go to? Chances are when you are
delivering your message, you're gonna use filler words. You're going to
stumble, you're going to make mistakes. Don't dwell on them. Simply just
move on. Act as if you meant to say that. Act as if it didn't happen.
Because if you don't draw attention to it, your audience will not draw
attention to it. It's when you say, "Oh, I'm sorry, or excuse
me, or I didn't mean to say that" you're drawing attention to that
mistake and then that draws the audience's attention to that mistake. Because
if you've done everything well until now and you make a mistake, they're
more concerned about what you're saying. They're more concerned about how
you made them feel than picking out every minor mistake that you made and
the thing is, we are the worst judgment of ourselves. We are the
worst of doing that and so we pick up every a single mistake we make, but
chances are your audience will not do that. They're there to listen to
you. They're not there to see you fail. They don't hope that you're going
to fall on your face. They want to see you succeed. They want to see you
do a fantastic job, so don't dwell on your own mistakes and your audience
won't as well.
Is to change your physiology.
When you are having stage fright, when you
are nervous, when you are stumbling when that happens, your body is giving
a physiological response. Did you know that if you are experiencing stage
fright, that experience, you know a lot, many people describe that
experience as, oh my heart rates going up, I'm sweating, this cold sweat.
My palms are getting sweaty, it may dilate my pupils. I'm scared, right?
That physiological response is not that much
different from being held at gunpoint. It's not that much different from a
life or death response. You see your body, your body's reaction, the
physiological reaction, can not tell the difference. Fear is fear. So when
you change your physiology, it means that you move. You are
moving. You are assuming a posture of confidence. Think about a time
where you were confident. What was your posture? Chances are it rolled
your shoulders back, it held your head up high. Your eyes were looking
forward. You know, not down. And look at your posture. Think about your
posture. When you're not feeling confident, chances are it slightly
hunched you over. Your eyes looking down. Your head is lowered, right? So
your physiology makes a tremendous difference. You can change your
physiology simply by changing your posture. So change your posture, change
your physiology, and that will help you be more confident.
