Daring Echo

Sometimes I feel uneasy when I have to talk in public, whilst when I have lots of something to say and questions to ask swirling around in my head. Has anyone else also had this experience? It’s not something I’m wondering about. Instead, that’s just rhetorical question to make me feel I’m not the only one who feels that way hahaha I believe many people out there are encountering this similar feeling. How can I know? Come on! I know I may not good at making friends but that doesn’t mean I don’t have any, lol. Some of my friends also have been struggling with such anxiousness when speaking in the public and it turns out, this is a common issue. With that being said, I’m questioning myself why that could happen.

“Is it definitely internal? OR external factor?"

Frankly speaking, I would say it depends. Each individual has a unique life story that spans from their childhood to the present day. That’s what shapes their character and habits. Hence, it’s not true either factor is contributing to such a situation. Rather, it’s a combination of both factors that leads to it. I believe it would be interesting to delve deeper into this matter.

Here I’ll mention what thing is categorized by either Internal or External factors. Let’s start off with the internal one!

• Internal

It should be clear by the word that it’s specifically bringing up about anything related to personal realm. According to what I used to experience and heard from anyone else who told me their story, there are several things contibuted in shaping into who we are today. Some of them are low self-esteem, past negative experiences, cognitive distortions, perfectionism, and so on. It can’t be denied that all of those factors influence the way we speak and even the way we respond to a conversation. Low self-esteem can make someone doubt with their abilities and fear negative judgement from others even if it’s actually a constructive feedback but someone who has this trait will consider it as the proof of their inability and it ends up with self-blaming. Such situation could potentially happen due to negative experiences and emotions from the past. On the other hands, unpleasant experience may cause someone fall into cognitive distortion such as overthinking about the worst possible outcome in the future. That makes even extremely harder for someone who wants to speak something with having distorted thinking pattern. It does make sense because before we speak, we think. If we’re unable to think clearly, our ability to speak effectively is compromised. Perhaps you’re beginning to wonder if those three things are interconnected in terms of cause and effect. I would say YES, those three create a plausible correlation with each other but may not a concrete assurance at some point.

Let’s move to another one. Probably, you might have heard about some people nowadays tend to completely blame their childhood memories to be responsible for their anxiousness while interacting with others. I’m not blaming them for them blaming their own childhood since I do acknowledge that childhood memories also contribute to this matter. However, what I regret is that this excuse seems to be frequently used and blamed to cover up the mistakes. Okay that sounds a bit offensive but that’s the reality I need to admit. Even myself, sometimes I blame myself for a mistake that I made and ask people to understand me like “THIS IS JUST WHO I AM!”, instead of taking responsibility for my actions. But after taking my time for a while, that’s not a wise approach. It’s important to forgive myself for my mistake and take the ownership of it without making an excuse for others to understand.

Also, someone who works for perfection will be a high potential target for this issue. The perfectionists often set high standards for themselves and fear making mistakes. The pressure to deliver a flawless result is made by theirselves which is constantly intimidating while doing his activity, particularly while speaking in public. That was what happened to me when I learned English even until now. I’ve been intimidated by the desire to be perfect at listening, speaking, writing and reading. Let’s say for speaking, I’ve been struggling to get myself out of the situation where I have so much to say in my mind but the words don’t come out of my mouth as I expected. Yep! I’ve been feeling that I get stuttered when I speak. No matter what language it is, even when I speak Indonesian, I remain struggling to compose word by word into a good sentence. It gets worse when I speak English, notably to arrange words into a good sentence since I keep forcing myself to do that without any grammatical error which gets extremely hard to achieve the perfection. As the result, it becomes like mumblings and incoherent. What an embarassing I was hahaha. But from now on, I’m feeling like I can handle it better bit by bit, it’s fine I’m still making progress 😉. I no longer really mind about grammatical error that I’ll make while talking, I’m just in the phase of accepting imperfection for this matter. It’s better to make mistake and learn from it rather than remaining stagnant.

• External

External factors originate from outside of a person’s control such as external environment, circumstance and the audience. It can significantly impact an individual’s fear of talking. For instance audience size, audience familiarity, supportive environment, etc. I’m pretty sure the audience size is the most weighty matter as the culprit playing a role in daunting someone while having a voice. Moreover, speaking in front of unfamiliar or high-status people can increase the anxiety because we may fear negative evaluation from those we perceive as important or authoritative. I used to be in a situation that I was giving a speech in front of lots of people which I didn’t know who they were and what they might think of me but I knew most of them were experienced engineers. The thing I was worried the most was being silently and negatively judged or scrutinized by those who are having more capabilities than me to bring up the topic, that was one of super terrifying feeling I’ve ever felt. Let alone, when I found few of them giggling like I was a joke to them. Phew, that was an invaluable experience yet energy-draining for me at the same time.

Some say “Don’t be afraid! just focus on your stuff on the stage. People are busy with their own business in their mind." You know what? That’s a lie hahaha 😂 Why? Perhaps I would agree if that situation was taking place in an online conference platform like Zoom, Google Meet, or even Youtube Livestream because we don’t see them in person, we see them virtually instead. In such circumstance, yes they probably be busy with their own business like scrolling down on social media, reading an online article, chatting with friends, or even just staring at the screen with doing and thinking nothing. But it’s totally a different atmosphere by having them in front of us in person and knowing the effort they need to take in order to attend the event, of course they come for a solid reason to gain more knowledge, engage more networks, and get more opportunity for career. Absolutely, most of them are well-prepared and ready to pay attention to anyone who give a speech. So the only thing that makes them busy while the topic is being served out, is paying attention to the speaker. They might have a question to verify their understandings when it comes to QnA session, they might have a different point of view, or even they might have a feedback which they wanted to convey to the speaker afterwards. In summary, when you are on the stage, the stage is yours and the challenge (read: pressure) is to get people attracted on what you will bring to the table.

However, it turns out, it’s a common thing, almost all people recognize that the larger audiences get, the more intimidating it becomes, except for those who have unwavering self-confidence and don’t let the fear take over them. In fact, even for someone who is used to speaking publicly may still feel worried right before having to perform in front of many people. I knew that from a public-speaking content creator in Instagram named @bicarapede, He admitted that he was nervous and feel intimidated by seeing so many people were looking at him at that moment. And a friend of mine who works as a master of ceremony acknowledged that’s completely true. He said “No matter how many times we gets used to handle certain problem, it doesn’t mean we no longer have fear regarding that anymore. But at least, we already knew the loophole to get out of there and we know the usual drill since we face it oftentimes. That sounds so general but I understand it does apply to many aspects in life, not only limited to public speaking.

It’s great if we have a proper environment where everyone is safe to show their cluelessness, inability, or disagreement. By having a supporting environment, I do believe that’s helpful to overcome low self-esteem and build a better self-confidence. The level of support and encouragement from peers or mentors can help to reduce the anxiety level since they must be a friendly audience for us. Positive reinforcement and a supportive atmosphere can help alleviate the fear for sure.

I think that’s pretty much it about the reason behind certain people are struggling with getting rid of their fear of expressing their mind in words verbally. Overcoming the fear of speaking often involves addressing some internal and external barriers through techniques such as building self-confidence, challenging negative thoughts, gradual exposure to speak in public and developing effective communication skills. Additionally, acquiring skills to adapt to different speaking environments and audiences can help individuals navigate all challenges mentioned earlier more effectively because we can’t expect everyone to be in the same shoes, that’s the inevitable condition and unfortunate. Overall, the key takeaway is focusing on what we can take over rather than worrying too much about what is out of our control. Oh darn! I know that sounds trite hahaha! but for sure that’s the most reasonable we can do, what else to try?.

Nevertheless, while external factors may be dominated by things we can’t control, we can manage our internal reactions and responses. This proactive approach empowers individuals to take charge of the fear and gradually become more comfortable when speaking in public. I want to emphasize that overcoming the fear of public speaking is a highly individualized process and what works for one person may not work for another. Again, people have different personalities, experiences, and comfort levels, so finding the most effective strategies often involves some trials and errors. It’s okay to start with taking a small step that works for you get stimulated. Remember once again, what works for one person may not work for another. Oh darn it! I talk like that as if I’m already an expert, even though I’m still struggling with all my shortcomings to have a better self-confidence.

Okay I think that’s really what I wanted to bring up and thank you so much for reading all these chatter! Hope anyone will find it beneficial. So until next time, byee 👋