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.