Techniques For Rehearsing Without Stress

The way most people rehearse makes stage fright WORSE. Here are three keys to getting it right. I talk a lot about how a great talk requires a ton of practice. But the way most beginner communicators practice delivery actually makes stage fright and anxiety worse...and delivery more clunky. 👇 Here are the three most common mistakes: ❌ 1️⃣ Attempting to make every single sentence sound perfect. → This will keep you ALL up in your head the entire time. → You'll be so distracted by trying not to mess up... that you will consistently mess up. → Vicious cycle. ❌ 2️⃣ Trying to remember every single granular sub-point. → Your audience doesn't know your outline. They won’t notice if you forget something. → If you feel like you need to nail every tiny detail, you’ll put so much pressure on yourself that you'll crumble. ❌ 3️⃣ Fixating on all the reasons people might not like you. → I've never met a beginner communicator who felt completely qualified. → We all get up there worried about the people who might agree with our secret fear that we don't deserve to be there. → But if your mind is on the haters, you'll feel even less confident and more insecure. ❌ This is a recipe for a massive bowl of stage fright. Deep breath. The more you practice with those three negative factors in place... the worse your delivery can get. What's the antidote? 👇 These three keys: ✅ 1️⃣ Give yourself permission to mess up. → If your content is great, your audience won't care. → Usually, they won’t even notice. → Remove the pressure to be perfect, and you'll end up making fewer mistakes anyway! ✅ 2️⃣ Imagine you’re talking to your biggest fan. → This will produce natural confidence... and win you more fans. → If you show up like you're talking to people who already like you, you'll be your most natural self without the pressure to pretend. → Which (unsurprisingly) will make people like you even more. ✅ 3️⃣ Focus on the big ideas, not the tiny details. → Practice by focusing on your big ideas, saying them in whatever way feels natural and intuitive. → Yes, use the basic metaphors, analogies, and stories you've created to support your points. → But just talk about them like you're chatting with a friend over coffee. Deep breath again. ✅ If you lean into these three things, your rehearsal will actually make you better. When your rehearsal starts feeling good, you're on the right track. That's the time to lean in, get the reps in, and build the muscle memory. You've got this!

Two things I do to get over nerves of a big presentation or a talk (like my first TEDx coming up) is to rehearse with photos of a crowd in front of me and to power through the entire presentation no matter what distractions happen. Before I had this little multi-monitor set up, I’d actually print photos of crowds and pin them up. There’s a strange but pretty realistic thing that happens when you do this. Like exposure therapy, this brings up very real emotions of what it actually feels like on stage. I’ve learned that I need a mix of photos: ✅ Central image of a crowd being a normal crowd right before you get started. It makes me take stock of the moment right before I start and my energy in the first 30 seconds. This makes or breaks whether people will engage with you. ✅ A side image of an engaged crowd. When I feel like I’m in rhythm, my eyes tend to go to this one more to simulate flow. ✅ A side image of a bored crowd. This one I glance at for two occasions. If I’m feeling lost or nervous, I’ll look at this image to practice getting back on track and back to the engaged audience. Or, if I’m still in a state of flow, I’ll practice NOT getting thrown off by people who appear disengaged. The second thing I do to improve my practice is that I complete my run through no matter what. 🟢 Kids knocking on my office door 🟢 Text message or phone going off 🟢 Dog barking at the Amazon delivery In every real presentation I’ve done, there is ALWAYS some unplanned distraction that comes up. You have to practice getting back on rhythm when sounds and movement distract you. A bonus tip: record yourself and then watch it back as if you were an audience member. Adopt the mindset of someone sitting in the audience and cue up their “What’s In It For Me?” moment. ➡️ I hope this is good ➡️ I need inspiration for ______ ➡️ The last speaker was great/not so great ➡️ A “dementia advocate” is speaking about the future and innovation? Why? The audience isn’t there for you. They are there for them (even when they’re there for you). Serve them. Speakers, what advice would you add for the week prior to your big engagement? Assuming you’ve got the rehearsal of content down, what’s your next focus and why? 👇🏼

You don’t need more time. You need more reps. I used to over-prepare for big meetings and speeches. Slide decks, talking points, mental run-throughs. But despite being ready, I would still stumble. Then, I received valuable advice: ❌ Stop practicing like it’s a rehearsal. ✅ Start practicing like it's the real deal. Now, before any significant presentation, here's what I do: 1️⃣ I take a walk and deliver my talk out loud while in motion. 2️⃣ No script, no notes - just my voice, breath, and the rhythm of the sidewalk. This technique is known as Level 2 training. You move enough to elevate your heart rate, but not so much that you can't hold a conversation. It's the perfect balance where nerves meet practice. When the spotlight is on and the room falls silent, you're not in a calm space; You're in a performance state. Your body senses it - heightened heart rate, shorter breath, increased pressure. So, train as if you're in the actual game. Teach your body to remain composed even when your heart is racing. That's when your words flow effortlessly, and your mind stays focused. While most people rehearse for clarity, the best rehearse for pressure. What's one method you've adopted to keep yourself sharp under stress?