Tuesday, March 24, 2009

Two recent viewpoints on overcoming fear and shyness

Last week two well-known speaking coaches discussed overcoming fear and shyness. Nick Morgan posted about The 5 best ways to conquer your fear of public speaking, which were:

1. Rehearse and practice
2. Engage in positive self-talk
3. Breathe deeply and slowly
4. Work on your unconscious
5. If all else fails, do what the musicians do: take beta blockers

I have discussed Nick’s advice on rehearsal twice previously here and here.

Sims Wyeth posted about Presentation skills for the shy. He discussed whether shyness was more by nature or nurture, and how it could be overcome. Somehow this post acquired a digital stutter. There are about sixty places where spaces between words are missing. Although it is still readable the missing spaces make novel compound words which resemble German more than English.

You can find more of Sims Wyeth’s posts under the Effective-Communication tag at Fast Company.

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