OVERCOMING MY FEAR OF PUBLIC SPEAKING

Daniel Patterson  IT  Manager aged 35

The idea of speaking at a wedding made me nervous. John, my best friend of 20 years, asked me to be best man at his wedding, which was a huge honour. But instead of feeling proud I was terrified – I knew I had to deliver a speech and had a phobia of public speaking. The fear I had of letting down my best friend was just as big though – so I knew I had to do something to deal with the situation.

I have always been a very shy person – I was teased at school for wearing glasses, and this made me so shy that I hated socializing and would be nervous about speaking in a group situation. The situation never got better as I got older – in fact, I think it got worse.

Alix made me realize that I was defining myself by something that happened way in the past and that I didn’t have to believe in the old label of being ‘shy’ any more. It was up to me to retrain my brain to overcome these old patterns of thinking. I never realized how easily we are shaped in childhood or how quick it is to change these old patterns if we’re smart enough to challenge them.

The help Alix gave me made a huge difference for me as best man at John’s wedding. I’m pleased to say that not only did the speech go well, it boosted my confidence in public speaking but more importantly and for the first time in my life I felt comfortable mixing socially and meeting new people. To top it all off, a number of people actually congratulated me on my speech! Wow!

This has been a huge boost to my confidence – and I intend to keep building on upon this experience for the future.

Alix's comments

Fear of public speaking is a common problem with many of my clients . It is usually due to a lack of confidence and self esteem. Most people rarely speak in front of a group but when a person is getting married or being the best man, being able to    speak confidently to a group is essential. At work though, simply by being able to speak fluently and without nervousness in front of a group of people brings obvious advantages. And it’s surprising how many of us find it difficult to speak confidently. Often the reason for this lack of confidence can be traced back to childhood, to being bullied or ridiculed and those feelings of shame become internalised. So when required to speak in public, very high levels of anxiety are experienced. Research has shown some people fear public speaking more than death. It really can be that difficult.

Using hypnotherapy it is possible to trace back the root causes of the fear and to resolve the issues. In this case, I used creative visualisation to re-programme the mind, so old negative memories which may still have an emotional charge, are cleared.

A new positive programme can then be installed into the mind with visions of confidence, self esteem, enthusiasm and success and speaking to a group feels less daunting and more of a possibility.  This kind of reprogramming is remarkably effective – it normally takes me just three sessions to find the cause and change patterns to such an extent that someone who thinks they are poor at public speaking can become confident enough in front of a group to deliver a speech.