In August 2008 Marc Hogan was bet £1 that he couldn’t become a stand up comic in less than 12 months and perform a one man comedy show at the Edinburgh Comedy Festival in August 2009 for 21 nights. He won the bet!
After years of presenting to tens of thousands of people, presenting to a comedy audience is still the scariest thing I’ve ever had to do. I tried lots of things: deep breathing, visualisation, even alcohol -which unfortunately leads to blurry visualisation…
While practice remains the best way to overcome stage fright, I did find this exercise very useful.
Can you remember your best holiday? Recent scientific research shows that remembering a pleasurable or horrible experience has a physical effect on the body. Don’t believe me? Well try this, remember the last time you saw a rat / big spider/ a big bowl of maggots/ Peter Mandelson. Did your skin just crawl?
To begin the exercise you need to clear your mind (it shouldn’t be too hard, it’s Monday morning!).
Now think of a time when you felt confident and focused. As you access that memory, see what you saw at the time, hear what you heard, feel how confident and good you felt. Now, take a moment to locate where these good feelings are in your body (I know it’s a little weird but stick with me). Where in your body do they start? Do they start in your stomach, in your head, or perhaps in your fingertips? Now that you’ve found them, take another moment to feel where they move to. This might feel strange at the start, but as you take that moment you will realise that feelings don’t stay still, they are always moving in one direction or another. Once you realise they are moving and can feel which direction they are travelling, then you can start to control where and how they move.
Start to amplify the intensity of the confident feeling by spinning it faster within your body. It doesn’t matter if you spin it clockwise or anticlockwise, if you spin it from the top of your head to the soles of your feet or if you spin it round your stomach or chest. There is no correct method. The key is spinning the feeling to intensify the good feelings inside you.
The next step is to imagine that you are getting ready to get on stage. Imagine you are entering the room waiting to be announced, then imagine walking on stage, as you do so, continue to spin the confident feelings in your body. Imagine the feelings of confidence amplifying as you begin your speech.
Imagine being on the stage. Let your body adopt the posture you will use. Now, imagine presenting passionately, engaging with the audience, and continue to spin the feeling as you present with confidence.
Keep the feeling spinning; keep the confidence levels amplified throughout your speech, even if you get asked an unexpected question. Imagine this happening but imagine yourself responding with confidence and clarity as you keep the feeling spinning through your body.
Imagine your presentation ending, and the crowd applauding. Imagine leaving stage with confidence, knowing you’ve performed to your best and continued to spin those feelings.
Now take a moment to consider how that felt. How confident and clear did you feel? Just think how strong those confident feelings could get with practice? All you need to do is to practice this process over and over again before your speech.
Now, obviously nothing beats actual physical practice and I know for some of you your “Editor” has already decided that this is a stupid idea, but this exercise takes less than 5 minutes and can be practiced anywhere so surely it’s worth giving it a go?
Click here to watch Marc’s showreel. If you would like to find out more about Marc, visit www.marchoganlive.com or to book him for a speaking event please contact your favourite speaker bureau.
