Overcoming nerves - in public speaking and entertaining - part 1

Many people often assume that those of us who stand up to perform or take part in any form of public speaking are not troubled by nerves and that their own attempts would only be doomed to failure because of their feelings of nervousness and fear.

These thoughts only exacerbate the feelings. When they do attempt to speak, their mouth goes dry, the hands begin to sweat, the stomach churns and a feeling of nausea takes over. Very often they begin to tremble and the brain seems to stop working.

In this confused state they just ‘freeze’ and yet another negative experience is added to their memory banks, with the certain declaration of – “Never Again”.

First of all, we need to understand why we feel this nervousness. Let's face it, - we know we can speak; we’ve rehearsed and practiced well, the family thought the act or the tricks were great, or the speech was amusing, so there's really nothing to be afraid of there.

We've checked our 'flies', - so nothing to worry about in that respect. If you have prepared what you want to say and rehearsed your act well, then you should be 'home and dry' and it should be a breeze. I can assure you, if you have done the preparation, it will be a breeze, but you will still feel nervous.

During my entertaining days I suffered badly from nervousness prior to going on stage. As a matter of fact I still do to this day. My act always went down really well and I was inundated with bookings and re-bookings, so my confidence was always high. However, the nerves were always a nightmare prior to starting my act and I could never understand why.

An old experienced entertainer once told me that all good performers, whether in show business or sports performance or even academic or business performers, - feel nerves to varying degrees, and usually the higher standard of performance, - the greater the feeling of nerves and apprehension.

He explained that it's not the fear of not being able to perform, or of forgetting your lines, (or in the case of the sportsman, of not being able to run the race), it is actually the fear of not quite living up to your own high standards.

You see the good, conscientious performer sets his sights and standards as high as he possibly can, and so even as he improves, he keeps pushing his standards that little bit higher. You can therefore see why he will never free himself of these feelings of nerves and apprehension. It’s simply a concern that you will not live up to your own high standards.

So how do we overcome nerves? - Well, you don't. You simply learn to understand and nurture them as your friends and your guides, which help to ensure a really high standard of performance.

You could of course lower your sights, but this would surely lead to lowering your performance and eventually no performance at all. Yet, this is what most people do. They lower the standard of their performance, taking on only the easy stuff, the things they are confident they can do.

However, lowering the standard of your performance is not the way. It may just help decrease nerves, but it will eventually kill your performance completely. You see, when speakers or entertainers get a bad reception or "die", as we say, they very often never perform again. “Finished!”

You can become a "Public Speaking Superstar" - Just take a look at : "How To Conduct Effective Public Speaking"TODAY! at talktactics. co. uk.

Counting your lucky stars

Have you noticed how easy it is to forget the important things in life?

It's easy to get caught up on trivial matters or get into flustering over what else must get done.

But learning to live a holistic lifestyle almost certainly involves - at some point or other - a slowing down of life and a taking stock. When this happened to me there was one thing at the crux.

At the crux was a new understanding of how I interacted with the world. I began to understand something about my own energy - something I didn't understand before.

What do I mean?

What I mean is I became aware of when and how I lose and gain energy and how to tune the body system to become sensitive to situations so I could be at my most efficient, more of the time.

As we come to know our own energy our awareness grows. We note that some people and some situations drain us while others lift our spirits. When this happens, we can begin to alter life in a way that lightens our burden. This in turn means more pleasure and less pain and frustration. We can also become sensitive to the moment when energy drops in a conversation or meeting and know that it's either time to leave, protect yourself or transform the energy.

There are three elements to this:

1. Being aware of your own energy

2. Being sensitive to changes in your energy

3. Knowing how to change it

The first step is about knowing how you feel. Do you feel flat or abundant in energy or somewhere in between? If you feel abundant, then great, if you feel flat then you need to raise your energy (see the tips - below).

If your energy feels good and then you notice tiredness coming over you for no apparent reason, then you've probably maxed out in a situation (unless it's midnight or you had a late night). In which case it's time to change things.

For step three see the tips.

Of course, there are always situations that test us. My father has just been taken into hospital with cancer. The question I'm asking is how can I help, but not be effected by a situation like this.

Maybe the answer is to imagine myself in a pink bubble. Maybe it's to thank my lucky stars I'm not on the hospital ward. Maybe it's bringing a smile to people's faces in the beds. Maybe it's just sitting next to my father and appreciating some wonderful moments. Maybe it's all of the above.

When it comes down to it, work and money and the stuff money buys are all nice, yet they're trivial in comparison to human life.

Simple tips for raising your quickly:

1. Take a dozen really good deep breaths.

2. Get some fresh air

3. Listen to your favourite piece of music

4. Dance

5. Make your excuses - leave if necessary

6. What else do you enjoy doing? Make a list and use it to raise your energy when you need to.

With love and good wishes

Neil

Increasing persuasion with humor

Many people take for granted the powerful persuading influence of humor. Humor is often tossed off as sheer entertainment or mere speech filler. The truth is, when you engage an audience with humor, you are accomplishing much more than just getting a laugh out of them.

Humor disarms an audience, making them more likely to open up to you. Once your prospects feel comfortable with you, they will be more in tune to your message and more likely to remain attentive. Audience members usually like and are drawn to a person who can make them laugh, helping them become more receptive. And perhaps most powerful of all, in our fast-paced culture where most things are fleeting, they remember you and continue to hold you in a positive light long after the initial exchange. When you leverage the element of humor, any message coming from you receives more weight than one that comes from someone who has not created the audience rapport you have achieved. All people’s minds wander from time to time. Humor not only reels them back in but it also reenergizes their soul.

“It has always surprised me how little attention philosophers have paid to humor since it is a more significant process of mind than reason. Reason can only sort out perceptions, but the humor process is involved in changing them.” – Edward de Bono

The use of humor can divert your audience’s attention from negative thoughts or it can counter an argument that is playing in their minds. Humor can also distract your audience’s tendency to overanalyze your message. Humor can even win over and disarm your audience. Herbert Gardner said, “Once you’ve got people laughing, they’re listening and you can tell them almost anything.” Understand that you can have a serious message without having to make the entire presentation serious. People hope and expect to be entertained while they listen. If they are not listening, they are not going to be persuaded. Your audience, be it comprised of one or one hundred individuals, will appreciate a moment to smile or laugh in this serious world they live in.

The actor John Cleese once said, “If I can get you to laugh with me, you like me better, which makes you more open to my ideas. And if I can persuade you to laugh at the particular point I make, by laughing at it you acknowledge its truth.” Understanding the value of humor in a persuasive context gives you tremendous leverage. Your task is to not only realize humor’s profound influence but also to develop the skills necessary to be able to use humor in a powerful and ethical way. As you become more and more skilled at incorporating it into your presentations, you will discover that humor almost always has a place. It doesn’t matter if you’re talking to an audience of two hundred people or you’re having an intimate discussion with your spouse. It matters not if you’re seeking to sway the favor of corporate executives or trying to convince your well-meaning but shortsighted teenager. Consider the following uses of humor in everyday situations, for groups or an individual, in formal or informal situations.

Humor During Your Presentation…

• Eases Emotional Pain

• Creates a Positive Environment

• Generates Interest in What You Are Saying

• Helps Your Listeners Sense Your Goodwill

• Increases Participation

Humor Will Help Your Message…

• Reveal Important Truths

• Become More Memorable

• Make Difficult Topics More Accessible

• Bring Needed Entertainment

• Strike an Emotional Chord

Humor Will Help You Do the Following with Your Audience…

• Ease Their Tensions

• Put Them in a Good Mood

• Disarm Them

• Maintain Their Attention

• Enhance Their Receptivity

Humor Will Help You…

• Increase Your Likeability

• Establish Rapport

• Increase People’s Trust in You

• Enhance Your Image

• Strengthen Your Relationships

• Boost Your Own Confidence

Major obstacles to selling

One of the largest obstacles to selling is that the sales person is not living congruently with their cognitions. I have noticed many attributes that contribute to a successful sales person. I will outline good attributes to have and common areas that will cause you to lose the deal.

Powerful closers do all of the following:

-Accepts 100% responsibility for their results. They realize the importance of ownership.

-High levels of empathy and they really care about their customer

-Intensely goal oriented. Frequently sets goals and works to achieve them.

-Above average will power and determination to succeed

-Believe in themselves and in their company

-Always honest with themselves and with other people.

-Visualization - create a clear mental picture of the person you want to be and the goals you want to accomplish see yourself as confident and a good closer relaxed and see your prospects and how they will react and yourself enjoying all the rewards.

Beware of these common areas that will cause you to lose the deal.

1. Negative expectation or prejudging

•Takes all enthusiasm out of sales person

•Expectations

2. Lack of Sincerity

•More concerned with earning commission

•Concentrate on helping the customer

3. Different Wave Length

•Analytical Vs emotional

•Use tag team sales.

4. You can never sell to someone you don't like and vice versa

•People skills

•Learn to serve

5. Tell a prospect is wrong or arguing with them

Never argue with a prospect

A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still

6. Discussing personal subjects

•Politics

•Religion

7. Knocking the Competition

•Unprofessional

•Lose credibility

8. Making promises you can't keep

•Engage in overselling

•Never say something a product can't do

9. Not building the dream

•What are the benefits of your product

•WIIFM

10. Don't give up

•Close 5 times

•Persistence

Resolve to pay the price to succeed. Decide exactly what you want in life and determine the price you are going to have to pay to get it.

The 7 components of vision

When we hear about vision, we often hear the words purpose, dreams, calling, passion and gifts used synonymously. It’s time to clear this up once and for all! There are seven components to vision and understanding each one will help clarify your path.

First, let’s talk about this word “dream” that you have heard so much about and how it fits into vision. While a dream is an important part of the puzzle, it is just the beginning. Dreams open up your imagination and ability for your mind to “see” what it is that you can conceive for your life. Many of us model our dreams after the lives of others. While dreams open the doorway, there are 7 components of vision that are through the door that dreams assist you in opening. Dreams alone will not take you to your promised land. If you’ve been dreaming, it’s time to gain the clarity you need to truly manifest your vision.

Purpose. The first component of vision is purpose. Your purpose tells you the theme of your life; the reason you exist. To uncover your purpose, ask yourself, “If money and time were not an issue, what I would do and If I could make plenty of money any way I chose, what would I do?” Your purpose gives you a general idea and direction to move, but by itself, it is not the whole picture.

Desires of your heart. The second component of vision is the desires of your heart. The desires of your heart go beyond your surface-level dreams to those things you deeply long for, desire and are willing to work for. The desires of your heart compel you in a way that won’t let you go. What do you really want?

Scripture tells you that God will give you the desires of your heart if you put His Kingdom first. While dreams require nothing in particular and may or may not come to pass, desires of your heart require obedience and are part of God’s grace, mercy and blessings that He has in store for you.

Passion. Your passion consists of those things that bring you joy and fulfill you when you are doing them. When you are operating in your passion, you experience a flow and effortlessness that makes it easy to stay the course. When you are passionate you are excited, inspired, motivated, focused, fulfilled, and walking in your greatness. Within your passion lies the clues that will keep you going. What do you love doing? What are you passionate about?

Gifts and talents. The next aspects of vision to talk about are your gifts and talents. Your gifts are those things that just come naturally to you and are not actually taught, they were deposited in you from God. If you did go to school to learn more about them, you probably excelled in them or you were bored because it came so easily to you. Gifts are sometimes challenging to identify because they are such a part of you. What gifts have God bestowed upon you? Hidden in your gifts are the additional clues you need to understand the methods God has given you to make a difference in your area of purpose.

Yet, gifts are only half of this component. The other half of this component is your talent. Your talent consists of those things you are naturally good at, but need to practice developing to perfect. What are you good at, but need to be great at in order to effectively operate in your gifting? Together, your gifts and talents create an additional dimension to understanding your specific Kingdom assignment.

Area of service. Your area of service is the particular target audience or group of people you were put here to serve. Another way to think about your area of service is your special niche. You are a Shepard. When you are a Shepard, your sheep recognize and respond to your voice and call. God has created you to oversee a flock that can only hear your voice. Who is your flock? Are they scattered all over the hillsides waiting for you to live your vision? Are they not being taken care of because you are in fear or are they tied up tending to the daily obligations that fill your calendar, but are not God’s purpose for you? Who were you born to serve? What does your flock need?

Calling. I also refer to your calling as your altitude. Your calling or altitude is the scope of your Kingdom assignment (within your child’s school, the city, state, region, nation or world). Be careful not to confuse your calling with what you think it would be fun to do. Be careful not to covet someone else’s calling. If God did not drop that vision into your spirit, it is not for you. Focus on what God has shown you as your specific role. You will be completely fulfilled carrying out your calling even though others may be doing similar work on a broader scale.

Together, all the 7 components of vision should assist you in clarifying the full picture of what you were born to do. Please take some time to get clear about it because it holds the power to change the course of the rest of your life. With all 7 components, you now have all of the tools you need to take the steps toward making your vision a reality.

What everyone ought to know about obsessive compulsive disorder ocd

Do you always wash your hand after shaking hands with someone? Do you at least change clothes at least 10 times before you leave for work? Do you go to the doctor for a check up once a week?

You’d better be careful if your answers to my above questions are YES.

Have you ever heard about Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)? If you don’t, read the details below.

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) is a mental disease that triggers people to have unnecessary thoughts (obsessions) and to duplicate specific behaviors (compulsions) over and over again.

Please note that it is normal for people to have routines but if you overdo it, it can lead you to OCD.

Some researchers believe that OCD stems from behavior habits that you learn over time. Yet, no one has found a single, proven cause for OCD. Some studies show that it may have to do with chemicals in the brain that carry messages from one nerve cell to another.

There is also a chance for someone to develop OCD if he/she has parents or other family member with the disorder although researchers haven’t identified it yet.

Another factor is stress. If you react or retain to stress very strongly, you might also have a chance to develop OCD or any other disorder.

However, it can be cured with the right treatments which are psychotherapy and medications.

Psychotherapy involves step by step exposure to the object that you feel afraid of or to your obsessions.

One of the medications taken by OCD patients is antidepressant which can help increase levels of serotonin.

Yet, both treatments should be followed by big supports from friends and family. Also, joining a support group to share experiences with other patients is also a very good way to be speedily cured.

Your focus is your experience of life

Where you put your focus becomes your experience.

Don't think so? When I was a little girl, five or six, maybe, I watched the "Wizard of Oz" for the first time. My next younger sister watched, too, along with Mom and Dad. They thoroughly enjoyed the movie while I cried myself to sleep - afraid of the Wicked Witch of the West.

We were all in the same room, watching the same movie on the same TV set, eating the same popcorn. They had a great time and I was scarred for life. What was the difference?

Focus.

So, you want to drastically improve your experience of life?

Change your focus.

Automatically, your experience of life changes. Period. No exceptions.

Easy to do?

Not as I recall, no. And I have my own brand of relapses still today.

But my focus today is completely different than it has ever been and continues to change and evolve, and with it, so does my experience of life.

But, I'll give you this: I remember how hard it was to "take my mind off of" something or someone. Next to impossible, at least for me, for far too long a time.

Until my life screamed loudly enough at me to get my attention. Yes, there have been some "pivotal" moments in my life - everyone has those. What I'm talking about is bringing an end to a continuous slide down a very steep hill to hopelessness. That "thud" when you hit bottom. Nowhere to go but sideways or straight up, and sideways sucked.

So, I changed my focus. At first for only a few minutes at a time. That was all I could muster.

But...how is it we get good at things?

Practice.

On purpose.

You purposefully make time to pay attention to what you're thinking and if you find your nose burning at the stench of your thoughts, you change them...immediately. And you keep them changed, until one day it's not really work. You don't hunker down and think harder...you just are...and it's different.

And you realize...your experience of life has changed.

Deal with pornography addiction

What is the key cause for people to get addicted to pornography? Is it loneliness, or the want to be loved with passion? Does it begin with exploring, is it lust or is it the whetstone for a warped mind? Well different people have different views about watching too much of porn and strangely pornography is the largest on-line business with the most number of Internet searches going out to the porn industry.

Some people just think its time to pass, while on the other hand it is fun and exciting for some. And then there are those, who look for every opportunity to watch porn, whether in secrecy or in a blatantly unreserved manner.

Pornographic addiction can also be because of too much sex activities in ones life or the total lack of it. Pornography addiction is just like somebody craving to have a cigarette. Some people watch porn simply for the sake of watching; others do it to excite themselves. There are people addicted to pornography because they want to imitate every act in their own sexual lives and there are even those who do it because of depression.

Most of the people might not even know if they are addicted to it or not, because watching too much of porn becomes their habit and they feel as if their life revolves around it. However, such people do not realize that it can also become dangerous for them in a way. They might not realize that having such a kind of addiction can have negative consequences in their lives. They might just start to neglect their responsibilities towards their work, or might also land up in embarrassing situations at work or a college campus.

Pornography can also cause problems in relationships such as creating an emotional distance with the one you love. People may also lose a relationship due to this. But have you ever wondered is there a cure for it? Can people actually get out of this addiction or not? Yes there is a way of overcoming pornography addiction. People can make a list about the positives and negatives of watching too much of porn, and what are their views about it. What is it that is making them do this? They should start spending more time with their family and friends and not stay alone for a long time. Self-analysis is important to help you rid your inner evils. You can seek a more pleasurable and beautiful experience from a real relationship where sexual acts have a meaning.

Busy yourself with extracurricular activities like playing table tennis or may be go for a swim, basically trying to identify what can help them relax, and at the same time enjoy the activity and feel refreshed. Most important is to find a solution as to what makes them happy about life and think positive. If a person thinks positive and accepts the challenges of life he can overcome any kind of addiction provided you have the determination and the right attitude towards life. If you find it difficult to adhere to self help disclose your problem to a close one and let them guide you. Seeking medical as well as psychological help can sometimes be necessary.