Visualization

Visualization is one of the most useful things that I learned, not just for speech class, but for life in general. So often people are bombarded with more negative than positive influences in life. These really start to affect people and their ability to complete a task. I read once in a book called Quantum Learning that people receive 6 negative comments for every 1 positive comment on average. The ability to learn to look at the positive and place less emphases on the negative is important. So many times I have stumble doing one task or another, because I didn't have confidence and I let the negative get to me. Being able to see the end result and seeing myself completing the tasks I wish to accomplish helps assure me I will be successful. Knowing I will be successful helps me turn around my anxiety. It instead because a positive energy, excitement.

Unfamiliarity

When I think about public speaking, I immediately think about boardroom meetings, award ceremonies, and those other "boring" occasions. My next thought is, I don't need to know how to do these things. I will never have one of those occasions. However, this is just me covering for myself. I am really afraid to speak in public, but at the same time it excites me. I know that I need to learn to speak in front of audiences and I want to get better at and grow my skills. It is something that I would use for classes, ceremonies, toasts, and later in life to present any possible research I choose to share.

My apprehension towards public speaking, is that I want a perfect speech. I hate to do something and not have it done perfect. When I get in front of an audience I feel like I am being judged and graded. If I don't do the speech perfect I feel like I failed and everyone sees me as a failure.

The other thing that makes me nervous is the speech content. Typically, I could explain things that I am familiar with and have in depth knowledge on, such as how metabolism works. Things like opinions and topics typically found in a speech class I am unfamiliar with. This unfamiliarity makes me nervous because I really have to work hard to remember what I need to be talking about, and it is harder for me to pull from my head knowledge that will help the speech keep flowing if I get side tracked.

Otherwise, I could be really excited about speaking in front of others, mostly in a teaching format. I love to inform others about my discoveries and such.