Public Speaking Mastery: Tips, Best Practices and Experts Advice to Become a Great Public Speaker

1. Introduction to the Course: The current course in which we are going to be learning about public speaking skills that make a great public speaker, not an adverse public speaker, but a great public speaker in the current times, public speaking is a core essential skill which depicts or shows your potential level of success. Being able to stand in front of a crowd, to pass on a message, talk about a concept, a product, a project are respectively whether you are a student, whether you are a professional, whether you are a C executive, whether you are an entrepreneur, someone who wants to convey a specific message. Simply put a bunch of people in a specific context. In order to deliver a specific outcome. We're going to learn about the essential skills that make it public speaker grade. And how can you develop your own skills in order to transition from having no skills whatsoever, to becoming a great public speaker, to becoming a memorable public speaking. Well, let's get to the objectives of the current course in which we're going to map the trajectory of the course from point a to point Z. What are you going to expect? What are the things that we're going to be covering? What are the key pointers that you need to keep in mind as you go along encountering the various lectures that we have prepared for you in the current course. Now, the course objectives are as follows. First of all, we're going to understand the importance of public speaking skills and today's world, why is it a must-have skill? Why you need to acquire or possess such skills in order to heal, succeed in today's world, maybe in previous times, that, that wasn't something necessary. But in the current times, being a great public speaker, well, you don't have to be great, at least an average public speaker. You need to possess those skills in order to help the transition and grow. Whether at a professional contexts, whether a school with a university or respectively, you need to have those skills in order to help you take that step further and your own development. Then we're going to learn why public speaking is considered the number one fear. For many individuals. You wouldn't be surprised. Some people have, let's say, they're more afraid of public speaking compared to being afraid of heights, or afraid of snakes or spiders or sharks, or let's say, terrible situations. They tend to correlate or they have that level of fear which is similar to those situations. And that has been present over many, many years. There are multiple researchers on this multiple articles where people lived down there, phobias, or the most dreadful situations that they have. And you'll always find public speaking to be one of them. Now we're going to be learning why, why public speaking is such a fearful task. People that tend to avoid that task and they compared, or let's say, attributed to harmful situations. Harmful creatures are harmful circumstances of life simply because of the fact of standing in front of an audience and conveying your message. So we're going to learn or dig deeper to that part as well. Then we're going to analyze the skills that make a great public speaker. We're going to, let's say, paint the picture. We're going to list down some key important points that every single public speaker has. Should have these pointers at skills. They will help guide you from one point to the other in order to help paint that picture for you. And how can you fit yourself as part of that picture? What are the skills that you need to be working on? What are the skills that you don't have a need to acquire, but what are the skills? You're actually grayed out and you need to supplement yourself with additional skills. Then we're going to learn about the key concepts and best practices to master public speaking. So I'm going to walk you through from point a where let's assume, let's say you have no idea whatsoever about public speaking. You possess no skills whatsoever. You're not comfortable speaking to an audience. We're going to assume, let's say the worst-case scenario. I'm going to walk you through it from one point to the other. Paving the way for you, helping you paint that picture and transition from one scale to the other. With the hopes that towards the end of the course, you're becoming or you're going to transform into someone who has the potential and the skills needed to step in front of an audience and just simply talk and speak and pass on a message. Make sure that you join the current course and prepare yourself. Have an old path, have a notebook in order to take as much notes as you can, and let's get the journey started. 2. Your Project: Your project for the current course is quite simple, but yet not that simple because it will involve accumulating all of these skills, tips, practices, and pointers into one single public speaking event of your choosing. Feel free to pick up a topic. You're going to select five to ten individuals that you're going to be presenting to. Feel free to do whatever place that you feel comfortable with, whether the garden and a workshop at a cafe or respectively. You're going just simply pick up the topic. You're going together, 510 people that you're quite comfortable with in terms of communicating, then you're going to develop a systematic presentation and convey the message to them by the end of the presentation. This is a very crucial part. By the end of the event, you are going to speak to every single one of those individuals. Then ask them for their feedback. Ask them for the positives and the negatives of the current event that you have invited them to. I shouldn't be anything fancy. You're not going to have a webinar, I'm not going to have a workshop and just simply dive right in. We're going to go with, let's say baby steps. We're going to have a small group of people. You're going to present the specific subject of your choosing. I would prefer that you go for something that you're comfortable with, something that you have a lot of knowledge on. In order to help you get to that comfort level, we are able to share your knowledge and you avoid any circumstances with them, the presentation or the public speaking event, where you are simply caught off guard and you have no idea how to respond to specific question which could be the terminal to the efforts that you're putting in order to grow and develop those skills at the current level. So the whole point of your project is to put yourself out there for zones to the masses. Well, sort of 0.5 to ten individuals and get their feedback. And use that feedback to help you become better rather than stop you from becoming better. So that would be your projects for the current course. Now let's get to the material on the content of the course that will surely help you transform to a great public speaker. 3. What is Public Speaking: Now we're going to start off by, first of all, defining and introducing what is public speaking. What does the term public speaking that we come across almost everywhere. A webinar or a workshop at presentation on TV, on the radio when we hear a person, XYZ is basically a great public speaker. Or they're going to have a public speaking event to pass on a message about a product, etc. Now, there are multiple definitions for public speaking. But all of them, they agree or focus on the current point, which is a form of communication wherein the visual conveys a message and multiple individuals in an open and direct context. So one person is going to communicate to many individuals with the intent of passing a message, passing an idea, passing a product, passing a concept. And they're going to ensure that they're going to do so in the best way possible. So you have one person, he has a specific angle. Let's say you have a new product that you want to launch. You have key important points that you would like to talk about the product. You have your own idea about the product. And you want to pass on the message to a group of people, to an audience, help them understand that product the same way that you do. So in order to do so, you do have a person, you have masses, a group of people. It could be a stage, it couldn't be a webinar, or it could be an online event or offline event. You are going to provide and communicate using tools. Tone, verbal, physical, and intellectual. Presentational skills. Carry yourself in a certain way in order to deliver the message in the same way that you have planned to deliver. So you do have your own expectations of what wouldn't be the idea or the current concept that should be delivered to the audience. And you're going to try to communicate in the best way possible in order to pass on that message to those people in front of you with the hopes that at the end of the event, the understood, the true nature that you want them to understand that in the first place. Nothing is worse than talking about a car. And then your audience understands or assumes you're talking about a plane. You have your own idea, you have your own concept of mine. But due to the failure and communication, your audience has no idea what you're talking about. That could be one case. Or you are delivering the ideas about a specific project or a specific context to your audience. However, physically, intellectually, emotionally, you are passing on messages through audience that you have no idea what you're talking about. People pick up on cues. As we're going to see during the duration of the course. There's more to public speaking than just simply opening the mouth. I'm talking. Everything couldn't be a part of your communication. Every single attribute, your physical movement, your tone, the words that you choose, the visual presentation, An aids that you use. So all of these work together coherently in order to pass on a message. Think about it as a vessel. You have your own message inside of a box. And this box is basically made up of all of these skills in order to help you move it from one point to another in the best way possible. Now, being one-dimensional and your presentations or your public speaking demeanor is going to be the terminal to your efforts. And it could be counterproductive because you're not going to be able to deliver the message to the same way you have it in mind. So that's why public speaking could be quite elusive too many involves multiple facets, multiple aspects that many people lose focus on. And we're going to try to cover all of these sort of point and this current course such that you become a well-rounded public speaker. So we have clearly defined at this current point, which is the starting point. What is public speaking, which is a form of communication where individual conveys a message to multiple individuals in an open and direct context, you are going to talk to people, you are going to talk to the masses. And the clear open setting with the hopes that they understand your message the same way you want them to do. 4. Importance of Public Speaking: Now why public speaking is considered such an important thing, we're such an important skill that you should possess. I can just simply click the pause or the exit button. Just simply end the course and walk away with acquiring those skills. Well, here are a couple of reasons that will help you understand the importance of public speaking. Why you should focus on developing those skills? First of all, it will help you convey a message to the masses. Instead of talking to one person at a time. In order to deliver a message, you are going to have a group of people in front of you. And you're just simply going to project the message to all of them. Make sure that all of them, every single one of them gets the message. The way that you intended to. This will save you time. This will save you the effort, will surely help you reach your end goals faster. Whether you're trying to sell a product, whether you're trying to present your research paper, whether you're trying to apply for a job or whatever it is. If you communicate to more than one individual at the same time, you're going to cut distances quite short. Instead of going from point a to point Z. And 1,000 years, you're going to go from point a to point Z and just simply a matter of days. Because you are communicating to a mass of individuals, multiple individuals add the same. It's increasing the opportunities of someone getting the message the way you intended to. The second coupon would be to implement change at various scales within an organization. Let's say you are a C executive. You do have a company, you do have an organization. And you would like to pass on a message to staff, your employees, or you are a principal at a school, you are a Dean at the University. And you just simply, you want to pass on a specific message to your entity or the organization. Instead of just simply walking around one person at a time, telling them what you have in mind. You're going to gather all of these individuals, a certain place, a certain arena, a certain event, a workshop, a webinar, right? Online, offline. And then you are going to communicate to them and pass on your message. So it will help you go from a miniscule scale at a micro level to a macro scale at a large level where you can pass on your intended message to a bunch of people. And if you think about it, it's quite related to the first point. It's going to kill you and save you a lot of time along the way, instead of just simply trying to communicate to every single person at the same time. Now, the third key point, which is very important, often overlooked, but it's very, very important. It would reflect a sense of authority and confidence. Now, when someone has a public speaker, What's the first thing that pops to mind? If someone stepping on a stage in front of 1,000 individuals, they're going up a microphone and just simply talking to them as if they're talking to their best friend face-to-face, just simply communicating and talking and passing on the information as clearly and concisely as possible. What would that look like? Obviously, it will project a sense of authority that this person knows what they're talking about. That this person is qualified to actually communicate on such a subject because they're speaking openly and confidently. At the same time, it will project that level of confidence your audience needs in order to accept the message that you're trying to send to them. But let me give an example. Let's say you are the CEO of a company and you have a major breakthrough, you are going to launch a new product. This product is going to shatter the market. There's going to be a disruptive product first on one-of-a-kind. And it has a great benefits for its consumers. Now, you create a webinar or you just simply create an event. You ask the press to jump in to help you communicate and pass on your message. And then you step on the stage. But you have confidence and the product that you're trying to communicate about, even though it's a great product. But you have no skills whatsoever. The entitle you to step in front of the masses on top. Even though your message could be true, the product could be great. But because of you, the way that you're carrying yourself, the way that you're talking, presenting, communicating. You could be stressed out, mumbling, stuttering and all that stuff. And you lose focus, you'd get distracted. You're afraid, you're anxious during the presentation. You're sweating. You're just simply losing your thoughts. In front of all of these masters. How do you think it would look like? How would that reflect on your product or the service that you're providing? Obviously, it could be the best product and history, but because of the way that you have presented their products, obviously, you are not going to pass on the message the same way that you had in mind. And then your product is going to fail not because of the product, but because of the way that you have presented. So that's why the third point is very important, because authority and confidence, especially when you work on your public speaker, is crucial to establish that. Medium between you and your audience. When you talk to them, when you communicate to them, you are going to be as authentic as possible. And by being authentic, you are going to communicate to them in a confident way where you are going to be presented as the go-to person on that specific subject. You are going to be the authority on that specific subject. You are going to be the expert on that specific subject. As we are going to see during the course, one of the key important aspects of becoming a public speaker is becoming the most knowledgeable person on that specific subject compared to your audience. You have to be the go-to person. So this third point is very important. Now, the fourth and the final point are going to highlight really related to the importance of public speaking would be the indicator of success and career growth. Think about people that jump the, go through the ladder, at a corporate ladder quite quickly that get promotions. They tried to listen to get projects. They're able to pass on their business ideas. Products are research papers, projects to the management in a very comprehensible manner. They tend to succeed more. They tend to grow more at a company level. If you do have a great engineer, e.g. and they are technically the best. However, the fail at the communication level, then you ask them to present a specific product to the company as a whole. But because they're not prepared for it, they have no skills, no presentation of public speaking skills. They're not able to pass on their technical knowledge and the best way possible in order to help them acquire the opportunity which would be beneficial for them to go to the new level, get that job, get that promotion, grow, climbed the corporate ladder, e.g. and similarly, if you're an entrepreneur or someone who has her own company or you planning on launching your project. If you're not able to communicate to the masses, you're not able to stand in front of the people. Just simply talk about your project, your company, your idea. What services do you offer, why your project or your product is basically better than others? In a clear, concise manner and an authentic form and a competent matter where you are reflected as someone who's quite an expert in that specific field, then by all means, you're not going to grow and you're not going to succeed. Because the first thing that you're on is going to pick up on the way that you're communicating about your product, your company, or your service. Hence, public speaking is a great indicator for success and career growth. Most often or most commonly, and often the people that transition quite quickly within a corporate structure are the best presenters and public speakers because they are able to communicate their goals, their products or services, their achievements. And a great way. It's highlighted, adopt a great level within the organization. And if an opportunity pop pops up, they are the go-to person for that specific opportunity to convert to someone. Oh, could be the smartest person in the entire company. They possess a great wealth of knowledge about their poor communication. The opportunity could be right in front of them, but they will not be fitted with that opportunity because they're not able to communicate properly, whether at a personal level and organizational level and a public speaking level. So that's the terminal to their success and growth. Now, at this current point, a, you should develop that awareness that public speaking is really important. And you should possess those skills that will help you develop and grow and reach new goals. 5. What makes a Great Public Speaker: So what makes a great public speaker? Now, in order to become one of those memorable public speaking, you should be able to communicate at multiple levels. So what does that mean? Let's take a look at the summary that we have in front of us. Now we're going with them, we're going to elaborate the key points. Now, what makes a great public speaker is basically the ability to communicate to an audience, ensuring proper delivery of the acquired message, well-being, and sink physically, intellectually and emotionally. Now, this is basically the, let's say, the summative definition that I created and I came up with. Because if you take a look at multiple definitions or multiple insights, they provided bits and pieces and hence, but this current summary, and it can just simply feel free to code. It provides her with the complete picture of a great public speaker. Now, a great public speaker is someone who's communicating physically, mentally, emotionally, intellectually, passing on a specific direct message to the people in front of them. When you communicate, every single aspect of the way you are presenting yourself. It's considered to be part of the presentation. Your physical movements, your facial expressions, your voice tone, the slides or the visuals that you are going to be using as part of the presentation and your direct audience, the way you are engaging with them. All of these are considered to be crucial elements that should be combined in one person, a great public speaker. So when you want to become a great public speaker, you cannot just simply be someone who's quite intellectual and possesses a great set of knowledge with the failure to communicate that knowledge. Or someone who could communicate verbally. But physically, you just simply stagnant and they have no idea how to present themselves, how to stand, how to move, how to walk around. Or you could be both. You could make great presented verbally. You could be a great presented physically in terms of the way you carry yourself during your presentation. But yet your slides, the visuals and the stuff that you're using as part of the presentation there quite distracting. They're quite aligned with the overall goal of the presentation. So you understand that this current point, that a great public speaker as someone who has multiple facets that work together systematically. And they should be in sync in order to pass on a message and wonky final point, what makes a great public speaker, other than being physically, verbally, intellectually in sync. They should be, or he or she should be emotionally and say, So, what does that mean? If someone is able to carry themselves during your presentation, they're able to communicate their end goal, their message. They have the great visual aids, great presentations. Everything is quite on point, but they're afraid. They're anxious, they're sweating, their stuttering. They are not passing on the message clearly. All of these, the impact, the other facets of being a public speaker, salt literally the perfect word for great public speaker. Or someone who's completely in sync with their message. Someone who's trying to communicate to a group of people, to the masses. And they are in sync in every single way. They are physically, intellectually, emotionally, mentally with, along with the supporting tools aligned with the aim of passing on that specific message. 6. The Fear of Public Speaking: This part or segment of a course, it's kinda surprising to many. But if you just simply take some time and try to do some research on your own, you would find out that public speaking is considered to be one of the most feared, that it's up to the point where it gets phobia. You have an idea what phobia is. A phobia as basically a next level of fear where someone just simply freaking out from a specific aspect of circumstance, a creature and entity wherever it is. Not just simply being afraid. But I guess to a phobia then gets classified psychologically as being one of those phobias that people began to associate with. One of them is public speaking. Public speaking is considered to be one of the, not one of the, actually the top. The most common fears that people have. Now that shouldn't be surprised. But if you think about it as creatures, we tend to avoid being under the spotlight, being under the spotlight, especially from other fellow creatures, other fellow humans tends to provoke a sense of fear, anxiousness, worry, and turbulence. Well, and how can you overcome it? This is basically which, which is a challenge for many. How can you overcome the fear of public speaking? Well, the simple answer to that is just simply speak publicly. Literally even psychologically, when you are trying to overcome a specific fear. One of the greatest techniques actually is to confront that fear and train yourself to become immune to that fear. There's no course that you can take. There's no medicine that you can take. There is no a certain procedure that you can do or a certain diet that you can follow in order to eliminate the fear of public speaking. The only way, the only path to eliminate public speaking is actually by becoming a public speaker. By failing over and over again up to the point where you are okay, standing in front of an audience and just simply talking and passing on the message to the audience in whatever way you think is necessary in order to convey the message. And you accept the criticism as is, and you just simply move on to your next public speaking event. Simple as that. Not we could ask ourselves why people are afraid of public speaking, even though it could be quite simplistic to wrap your head around as an idea. A person standing in front of a group of people and is simply talking. Well, mainly for two reasons. One of them is fear of rejection. Now as individuals, as humans, as creatures, if you think about lions, if you think about tigers, bears, and all those kinds of creatures in nature. All of them, they would like to belong to their pack. And being rejected at that level is considered to be quite determined to their mental, physical health, and similarly applies to us, humans as well. Fear of being rejected as you pass on the message that you have or as you pass on your idea, your project, your concept to a bunch of people. And once you get rejected, puts you at a place of being vulnerable. And it's projected as a point of weakness where you are not able to confront all of those people at the same time. This is just simply a psychological trick that your brain plays on you. Is it true? Not really. That scary? Well, not really as well as public speaking considered to be such a fearful situation or such a fearful event in your life that you should do all of your best to avoid it. On the contrary, it is fun. It is exciting. It is considered to be as a potential for growth because you're stepping out of your comfort zone. At the same time, it will help you build that level of confidence and build that level of authority and build that skill set that you need to have to grow in life. So even if you're afraid, stepping up in front of a public and just simply talking, that's a great milestone because let me break us. Do 95% of the people would not do that. They are too afraid to actually step in front of an audience and just simply pick up a microphone or just simply talk the same way I'm talking to you right now. I got a microphone on and passing on the message. We do have a recording, we do have delighting. We do have all of these things set in order for me to be able to pass on my message to you. Simple as that, that could be quite fearful. Too many, they are not going to be doing it. Many individuals were not stand in front of an audience and just simply present because of the fear of rejection. What if they reject it? What if no one liked their idea? What if people do not applaud? What if people booed them, e.g. what if they got a negative comment, whatever they got a negative feedback? Well, all of these things are possible. But it's also possible that people like your idea. People like your presentation. They like your product, they are with you. You're going to applaud there. You're going to have a standing ovation. They're going to salute you and they're going to help you grow and get from one point to the other launcher or the, your project, your presentation and succeed. Both of them, they are equally feasible. Both of them, they are equally probable. Ones. Like imagine again, this is a mental trick that your brain plays on you in order to protect you from an uncomfortable situation or a situation that could potentially be harmful based on the way you see it. Basically, this is the main reason, number one. The second reason why people fear public speaking is the fear of criticism. Being criticized that your concept or your idea is not good enough. The point that you're talking about is not good enough. The project that you have is not good enough. Or you, as a person, you're not good enough to talk about such a specific subject. And all of these things that follow the same path. Criticism. Well, let me break it to you. Not everyone is going to be on board with you. Even if you are the best presenter, you are the best public speaker. You are the go-to option go-to person on a specific subject. You are an expert, your professional, you are just simply spot on every single way as a great public speakers profile. Yet, you're going to find that there are always, always, always a part of the audience, part of the crowd who are not aligned with you. You don't like the way you talk. You don't you don't they don't like the way you carry yourself. They don't like the way you present. They don't like the idea. They don't like the concept. All of these things are completely opposite. What are you trying to achieve? And let's consider it to be criticism. There are two ways to deal with such a circumstance. Number one, tried to listen objectively and tried to get the message from such a criticism. Is there something that you need to do better? That's it. Do it better next time. Simple as that. Just simply gone through your upcoming public speaking event, Your Own Webinar, your workshop are respectively. The other thing would be, everything is perfectly fine. You are doing your best. The comments or the feedback that you're getting, their criticism that you're getting actually has no basis. And you're going to do the same thing as well. You're going to go onto your upcoming public speaking event and just simply move on to your upcoming events one after the other. And grow and grow and grow and become better over time. That's simply because at the end of the day you will be criticized. No matter how good you are, no matter how great you are, no matter how, let's say a great public speaker you are. You could be the most experienced public speaker with a years worth of experience. And then you'll find someone in the crowd who has no idea what you're talking about, they're going to criticize you. It is possible because they are trying to get your attention in order to, let's say, show you that actually they know what they're talking about. Which is some sort of a situation that many people were then an event tried to do. Well, I've seen multiple events pursue multiple workshops. And then you find out, out of the blue that someone's going to pop a question and ask a question and they have no idea what is the answer in the first place. Or they have no idea what they're talking about the first place. But the Ask a Question for the sake of asking, that's it. In order to let say, diminish your efforts, the great efforts that you're putting as part of their presentation. Now, why is that the case? Well, no one really cares. This is the thing you need to keep in mind. No one really cares. At the end of the day, it's your own project, your own work, your own set of skills that your fine tuning. You cannot please everyone, especially when you're trying to become a great public speaker. That's why we said at the beginning, becoming great public speaker is someone who is physically, mentally, emotionally, intellectually in sync with their message. Now, regardless of the feedback that you're getting, if you're able to grow from it, so be it. If not, you're just simply move on to the next presentation and make sure that you're going to do your best. That's it. That's why from all the things that we have talked about right now, public speaking is considered such a tedious task. Too many. People are afraid of public speaking mainly for these two reasons. Being rejected in front of a crowd or being criticized in front of the crowd. Which projects a sense of fear and sense of weakness, which they would try to avoid. But if you face those challenges head on, that could be a source of strength for you to become a great public speaker. 7. Subject Research: Now we're going to get to the juicy part of the course, the core, the meat of the course, which is, how do you become a great public speaker? We've covered the importance of public speaking. Why people are afraid of public speaking. How public speaking is going to help you develop and grow as part of your career professionally, personally, it's up to you, use those skills the way that you see suited. The first thing that you should do. In order to build those stepping stones to become a great public speaker will be the subject research. If you are going conduct a specific presentation or public speaking event on a specific topic, the first step that you need to do would be to research the topic. Your goals would be your goal to get that level of knowledge such that you are the go-to person on a subject. You know the subject inside and out. You have superior knowledge compared to the audience. This is very crucial. You don't want to be someone presenting on a specific product or a topic to an audience. And every single one of them knows more about it than you. That would be quiet the terminal because what? You think about it for a second, at any point in time, one of the individuals inside the audience could raise their hand, ask you a question, and just simply sabotage your entire presentation if you have no idea how to answer that question. And I've seen this a multiple points in time. Multiple events were, let's say during my career as a project manager, I had multiple sales reps would come and present to me their products. Let's say they're selling a pumping system, they're selling a bump there, selling filters, are selling valves. Now, based on my engineering background, on my experience and the construction oil and gas and contracting fields. I'm quite familiar excessively with what you're talking about. Now. They would try to pass on a message trying to sell me a product, let's say a pump. And they're going to highlight the qualities of the product, the RPMs, the materials, construction, the capacity, and all those stuff. Then I would ask him a question and then they will have no idea how to answer that question. As someone examining such a product, the first thing is going to happen is I'm going to lose trust in the sales representative. Then I'm going to lose trust in the product. Then I'm not going to buy that product, Simple as that. Why? Because the person in front of me has failed to equip themselves with the sufficient knowledge to talk about that specific product. And this applies to any topic. If you are having a webinar related to fitness, e.g. if you are having a workshop related to engineering, if you are related to data science, programming, you're talking about neuroscience, whatever it is, whatever it is. The first thing that you need to do is do the sufficient research on that specific subject, acquire knowledge in depth knowledge Titles you to actually stand up to a crowd and talk about that specific subject. Because if you don't have the knowledge, then there's no point of view presenting in the first place because people are going to attend a public speaking event in order to learn something from you, not teach you something. So that's the first step that actually many tend to fail, that many depend on their communication skills. They're worried that the way they carry themselves. But it takes one specialized individual from your audience to shatter all of this event or public speaking event, two pieces based on a single question. So you have to be foolproof and the work to do so as doing, we searched on the current subject and get some books. Online. Research asks experts, make sure that you cover the key crucial points that your audience needs to know. Now, the minor details, you can just simply add them to help you supplement your knowledge. But you better know the core concepts and details of the subject that you're dealing with. 8. Subject Pointers: So we've conducted research on the subject of acquired some knowledge. It is important to have subject pointers. What our subject pointers, just simply a couple of flashcards or a notepad. Write down what are the main areas that you need to cover. Your current subject should be broken down to key highlights. As part of your presentation or public speaking event. You're trying to cover these points one after the other. The same way you're building a building, you're going to transition from one step to the other along the way in order to deliver the complete picture. And this applies to any subject. Think about it this way. What would your audience look forward to learn or acquire or know about from your current presentation or from this current event. These should be your main areas that should be covered. What is the most important message that you're trying to pass on to your audience, that should be the core of your presentation when they walk out of this event, when they walk out of the public speaking event that you're trying to present, what have they acquired from you? When they walk out? What are they talking about? What they shouldn't be talking about? How great the product was. Well, how about product is, how great the subject is? They have learned something new, what they have learned. This target or goal should be the focus of your research. You'll learn about this subject as a whole. Then you're going to be mapping it to your own goals. What are the key things, the pointers, the main message that you are trying to achieve or pass on to your audience, then you're going to get further resources to help supplement your efforts from having a main topic that you are familiar with. Two main key ideas that you are trying to deliver, the specific audience. 9. Visual Aids as a Tool: Now we've learned about the importance of subject research. We've acquired some knowledge with guards, some information, some resources. Not what stump to map them, to present them in a visual format. And this is where visual aids come to play. Whenever you have a specific event, presentation workshop, a webinar, visuals, they help you convey your message easily. I'm sure you've heard the saying, a picture is worth 1,000 words. Literally, this applies to anything in life. You could have a demo, you could have a model, you could have a prototype. You could have a presentation, a visual presented during the course of your event to help you accelerate the message delivery. Visual aids are very important because first of all, as you can see, they help you clarify your point. Sometimes your words would fail you, but the slides that you have behind you or the video that you're playing or the prototype in front of you would give you that Bush on supplement your key point. It will take attention of you. This is a very, very important point which is often overlooked. It during a public speaking event, sometimes you need a break with them, the event. How does that look like or how, how is that possible? They may elaborate. When you are presenting for couple of hours or an hour, let's say you're talking, you're talking, you're talking, you are going to get tired. You might lose some, you lose your train of thoughts. You might be distracted, or you might get, let's say, offbeat as you go about your presentation. And you need some small gaps in order to help you regroup and really pick up the pace and carry on with the presentation. Or even just simply have a small bottle of water to drink from to hydrate. Because if you are talking for quite a long period of time, you're going to get dehydrated. Your voice is going change. You might get thursday, need to drink something order to help you carry on with their presentation. And those mini gaps are really helpful. And visual aids to help you do that. They help you take attention off you. Now, most probably you have seen presentations where you have a presenter just simply tell you, we're going to show you a couple of images from our projects, let's say, or we're going to show a video with you on our latest project. And then the presenter as the video is being played or the slides are being displayed, you're going to just simply step to a minute or so to their computer or to the desk, grab a bottle of water or drink some water. They step back on the stage and just simply communicate and carrying on with their presentation. This is clearly seen with stand-up comedians. If you have attended a stand-up comedy show, you find out that one of the comedians, e.g. the professional just simply trying to talk to an audience of stand-up comedians are great public speakers, by the way, during the course of conveying the material, their act. They do have a bottle of water on a chair, e.g. and if they lose composure, they might take a break. They have a towel and just simply wipe off their sweat, have a drink from a bottle of water. This will help them recollect and we align the trajectory of their current acts on the presentation. And the same applies to you during your public speaking event. By having solid visual aids, it will allow you an opportunity for minute breaks to help you catch your breath, hydrate, recalibrate, and go up by your presentation. And finally, the third point would be engaging with the audience. Every single individual within the audience would love gouache visuals, great presentations, great videos, rather than simply having a research paper presented to them and asking them to read every single. They'd like videos, they like presentations, they like models, prototypes. That's why when you take a look at the new releases of phones or cars, what do they do? They roll in the car, they roll in the fall and the display it to the people to help elliptic you look up, look at it. And that's a great incentive for people to be engaged in your presentation, what you're talking about. Because as humans in general, we'd like visuals. Something that we can take a look at. An object, a prototype, a model, a presentation at painting and image, all those stuff. They help deliver your message easily at the same time, keeping your audience engaged. So let's replay the importance of visual aids. They will help to clarify your point that help to take attention off you. They will help engage your audience. And the way that you see necessary to help you pass on the message. No visual edge could be your slides. When you are creating a slides, you're going to have some images, some bulletin points, videos during your presentation, you could have a small one to two minute video as an introduction, an introduction, or midway through your presentation or your public speaking event to help you build up on your, one of the key points during the research phase. Also engaging with the audience. When you have something on display, you can pinpoint your finger to one of the audience members. Ask them onstage. Ask them, what do they think? What they are? What's their feedback, What's their name, so on. So just simply engage with the audience again the same way stand-up comedians do most of what we have seen it. You have a stand-up comedian just simply pickup person from the crowd and they talk about them. This is a great way. This is a great public speaking skill because it does two things. First of all, it engages the audience. The audience is part of the event, they're part of the message, the art part of the context. The event that's 12, which is the sublime or the subliminal message, takes attention of the prisoner. The public speaker, once they engage with the audience, did talk to the audience. All of a sudden, the entire focus goes from the speaker, the member of the audience. This gives the speaker a room to recalibrate, to engage with the audience, and set the pace of their upcoming pointers as part of the presentation. So you see at this point, you should understand at this point the importance of visual aids as tools that supplement your public speaking efforts. Again, let's recap the essentials for great public speaker. We said, as a person or individual who is physically, mentally, emotionally, intellectually in sync, along with the tools that they are using to help convey the message. And one of these tools is basically visual aids. Now, make sure that you are quite familiar with the current concept as we are going to transition in the upcoming lecture, two further important skills and best practices that make a great public speaker. 10. The Audience is Key: Great public speaker or prisoner, knows their audience quite well. They understand who they are. How old are they? What are their interests, life, what are their professions? What are they looking forward to learn or acquire from attending their event? If you're planning on becoming a great public speaker, one of the key milestones that you need to accomplish is understanding your audience. Before thinking of creating a public speaking event, stepping on the stage, talking to a crowd, you have to understand who your crowd is in the first place. What are they trying to learn from you? Are they going to be listening to you and the first place? Or are you going to be presenting to them or providing to them or whatever you're going to be providing to them. Does it have any value to that specific audience? Because you don't want to be presenting or talking in front of an audience that is not aligned with your topic that you are presenting. Let me give you a great example. Let's say you are an executive. You have your own company. You are building a compound of buildings and housing for a certain country or a certain district. And you're planning on presenting your project to an audience. And all of a sudden, your audience is basically students in great 12 and 3.4 e.g. obviously, there's a mismatch between your topic, your subject, while trying to present, and the audience. Because that specific audience, you don't really care about your project. They don't really care about we are going to be presenting and we've talking about their interests is quite different. Their goal is quite different. What would grab their attention is completely different. On the other hand, if we remove the audience and we add them a different audience which is made up of architects, project managers, engineers, developers. Let's say mayors. All of a sudden, your project makes perfect sense to that specific audience because it's aligned with them, with their expectations, where their career path, what did he have in mind? What are they expecting, and what could be beneficial to them at a personal level or at a community level. So knowing your audience is very crucial to the success of your public speaking event. The first thing that you need to simply do as part of your research. It's tried to develop a generic idea of your potential audience. We're not going to take a look at an in-depth details analysis and no, no, it is a very basic process to do your topic. Who are the best matches for that specific topic? Just do a simple research, ask around, ask some professionals who have done it before. Has him to elaborate on the audience and the quality of the audience, the age groups, the demographics of these people who have attended such an event to have an idea in the first place, how to create and tailor your presentation to be aligned with those expectations, their values, and what are they trying to achieve from being part of your public speaking event? It's a very simple thing to do. There's no need to make it complicated, but at the same time, it's a very important thing to do and keep in mind because it will help you fine tune your research process as you acquire knowledge, as you acquire information about the topic of your events, you public speaking event, your presentation. Knowing at the back of your mind, who are you talking to will help you pick the right words. Pick the right vocab, pick their watch slides, pick the right visuals, communicate in a specific way that will help you convey the message clearly. 11. Your Style and Your Persona: So now you've learned about your audience. You've done some research about the topic. Now at this current point in time, you need to visualize what is your style in the presentation. Now, wherever you look, nor are we to talk about these things. But in this course we are talking about it. When you pick your style for presentation, It's basically like you're setting a vibe in the audience and prepare them. Preparing them to acquire the message that you are trying to project to work them. Now, there are various tiles based on the complexity of the subject, the seriousness of this subject, your audience. Now, you could follow a formal style where you are trying to be as formal as possible, trying to pass on your message in a professional manner with minimal engagement, sarcasm and humor, with the audience, maintaining such a professional formal tone, the best way to visualize this is at a corporate setting where you have a crucial project, are crucial presentation for a very important client that you're trying to present to. This would apply. A casual setting would be, let's say you're presenting to an audience in a setting which is not that complicated and you don't have sense of R, that level of responsibility towards the audience. You're trying to pass on the message you are communicating with the audience, engaging with the audience. You do have that a casual vibe with the audience where you can chip in with your idea, chip in with your comments and feedback. And that cycle goes on in a very uplifted manner. It's not as formal as the formal setting. In a casual setting where let's say you're having a presentation to an audience or coming to listen to you talk about your latest discovery, about neuroscience, which couldn't be formal, but you could make it casual as well. We are just simply sharing your own insights and finding because you are the one delivering the message, you get to pick whether you want to be formal, you want to be casual. But within a corporate setting, because you have that level of responsibility towards the company and towards the client that you're going to choose the formal style, more preferably entertaining. This but best fits. Events which the whole focus as entertainment rather than education, where you are trying to have the audience be involved with your topic. Enjoy being part of the event. To really, I just simply having some sort of value in the message. And that will be within, let's say, stand up comedy, e.g. if you do have stand-up comedians, they follow the style, which is the entertaining style in which there are publicly speaking to an audience. But the whole goal is entertainment. Rather than being formal or casual. Trying to pass on a message I bought a product, an idea, a concept, a project. The whole point is entertainment. And finally, you have educating whether you are a lecture, you are a teacher. Your main focus as to deliver a series of objectives to your, to your audience and order their knowledge level from one point to the other. Now when you are educating, you could combine all of the above. Now, the educating style is where you try to be formal at one point in time. Let's say you are a professor at the university, then you transition to be casual where you engage with the students. Then you transition to being entertaining where you have, let's say you have someone at crack a joke in the lecture hall or the class. And then you switch back to formal and too casual based on the pace. Now, this level, the educating level. Personally speaking, I think this is more complicated compared to the previous ones. When you set a formal style is simply following the same style. Casual, just simply casual, entertaining, just entertaining, but educating. You need to calibrate because if you are simply being too formal within the education setting, you're going to lose the engagement of the audience. But at the same time, you need to maintain a certain level of formality to pass on the knowledge and the information that you would like to pass. Being casual hope will help you acquire the attention of the students that you're having, the people that are trying to lecture two, preparing them to absorb the knowledge the way you want them to. And entertaining is basically when you find out that they have lost engagement 100% and you want to pull them back into the event or the electrostatic trying to convey to them. So educating requires a bit of experience in terms of public speaking. How can you maneuver with all of them? You can start off with formal casual entertaining. And as you become better and better and better when you are educating, you can just simply switch between all of these styles in terms off your presentation or your public speaking. But these are the main force tiles for public speaking. You can be too formal about it. Someone presenting to their boss or their manager or to a client in front of a whole company where you want to pass on the message and the best way possible and the professional manner because of the end goal, there are things to be delivered, risks to be taken, money to be gained, money to be lost. So no one is going to be wasting time being entertained or casually being involved with the presentation or the public speaking event. On the contrary, you want to walk in, make sure everything is perfectly fine on walkout. So that's the formal case. Casual is basically where you're engaging with an audience. You're passing on your own findings, information, your product, your presentation, your own input to that audience. Entertaining the main goal, just simply entertainment, rather than educating. You want to have the audience have fun, enjoy their time as being part of the event. And finally, you have the education where you are trying to make people learn something, acquire certain specific knowledge. And you want to make sure that they're engaged as much as possible along the way. Because frankly speaking, when you are trying to teach someone something in a very monotonic manner, you're going to lose their attention and this will affect the way they are learning. So it can transition between formal, casual and entertaining to help them stay engaged all the time during the their presentation. Now, which style should you go for? Well, that's completely up to you. Depends on your personality, what kind of person you are, and the way you feel comfortable presenting to an audience and pick the style that works best for you. And as you become more experienced in terms of public speaking, you mastered those skills, try experimenting with various styles. And finally, you'll be able to combine all of them within one. Public speaking about. 12. The Hidden Art : Now I remember at one point in time, I was actually presenting to a large audience. And all of a sudden the lights went out, the microphone went off, and then found out that there was one of the audience members had a pet with them during the presentation, which was a small bull. I have no idea how they managed to put them or allow them during their presentation hall. And all of a sudden that people went loose inside the presentation. All people were scared of surplus are running around. And all of a sudden that pupil jumped on stage and I was facing that pit bull. It was dark and I had no idea but all of the growling like those surrounding me on that point in time was horrific. So I just simply jumped off the stage and I started walking towards the exit. But all of a sudden, I've heard that the ground laying off the football is getting stronger and then the pit bull was actually getting closer and store it to chase me. Well, what happened or what is happening right now, as I'm telling you a story which did not happen at one sort of form or manner. But yet, you are still listening to me up to this point, which tells you the importance of storytelling. When you are a public speaker, one of the greatest skills that you should possess, which is the art of storytelling. Like right now, I've been telling you something which literally did not happen. But for the sake of explanatory purposes. Because I wanted to pass on to you the importance of storytelling and how it affects truly the audience. The best way to do so as simply by telling you a story myself, and you see the impact on you as an audience. Look at the key points that we're going to be highlighting right now. Stories, they do grab attention when we are telling a story, especially if it's a personal story, all of a sudden the audience is going to have their attention 100% on you trying to learn what happened during that story. The same way you have a child or a kid. You're going to tell them a story once upon a time, and their imagination is going to wonder for the events of the story. Stories, the ignite brain cells. And this has been scientifically proven when you tell someone a story, some parts of their brains they ignite, making them more susceptible to the image or the message that you're trying to pass on to them. You've got their attention, they are focused with you. They are engaged with you under are trying to learn and know what happened during that sequence of events and stories, they established connections. Obviously, you need your story to be true. Authentic, meaningful, has value. You're not going to lie, you're not going to make up stories like I've done right now, obviously. But again, explanatory purposes to help you understand and get the idea. You're not going to make up stories. You're not going to lie to your audience, so you're not going to come up with stories for the sake of delivering new concept. On the contrary, all of these mechanisms fail and they fail horribly. You need to become authentic storyteller. You're going to share your experience. You're going to share a story, whether a personal story or a story of someone that you're working with. You heard the one point in time, it's up to you. But it has to be authentic, it has to be meaningful, it should possess and present value to your audience. That way they are going to be engaged and connected to you. And they're going to be listening, they're going to be participating, they're going to be part of your events fully. You are simply going to present to them and they are listening to you, focusing with you and they are right there with you as part of your public speaking efforts. So you should master the art of storytelling. And how do you do so? Just simply tell a story of something that happened to you which is related to the event that you're dealing with. Or you can just simply share a story that you heard or something that you came across, or a movie that you have seen, or an event or situation that you came across real life or a book that you have read on an article that you found online or a video that you found I found online. As long as it's coming from you, the presenter, where you're sharing something that you have done or sharing something that you came across to your audience. That's storytelling aren't going to reciprocate. They're going to engage with you. They're going to be part of the event with you because you are being true and authentic. That's the entire point. By being a true and authentic public speaker. There's no way for the audience not to connect with you. On the contrary, if you're going to make up a story and make up an event, and just simply create those stories for the sake of passing on the knowledge or passing on the information? Well, it couldn't work. It could not work. But personally speaking, I would have preferred to just simply focused on providing the authentic story that has some value in it, which will help you provide more value to your target audience. So, start off by telling a story at the beginning of the presentation or halfway through. Or you could just simply during the course of that presentation, change the pace and you can share a story with your audience which is related to the entire subject. And sometimes it would be quite helpful to share a story which is completely off track, has no relation whatsoever to the subject. And that will help grab their attention and pull them back into your presentation of public speaking event and carrying on with your own trajectory. Now, feel free to replay this current lecture because it has a lot of value. Take some notes, try to implement what we have learned, and replay the first part of this lecture, as you are able to see for yourself the impact of storytelling and tried to implement that on a small group of people or your friends. Have a small story. Tell them a story of something that you would like to share with them. In the form of storytelling. Not, not a chit-chat or conversation, bought a story where you are trying to present something in an entertaining manner. That way you're, for sure, you're going to have an audience that is working on your site, which is great and crucial for a successful public speaking of that. 13. Body Language Essentials: When you're trying to communicate, there are multiple things that convey an expression and make an impression other than whatever they are saying. Now, like right now, when I'm talking to you, I'm using hand gestures, facial expressions, facial expressions to help deliver a certain point. And this is what we call as body language when you are trying to communicate humans in general, we tend to pick up cues from the physical demeanor, the movement, and the behavior of a person physically, without even saying a single word. Think about it this way. Whenever you're walking in a supermarket or you walk into a meeting hall, you find the person e.g. sitting with their hands crossed. What kind of impression does that person give you? Well, they're being defensive, they are quite uncomfortable. Or the ulna easy to approach an initiator discussion with. Now, those are cues that we tend to pick up on an order to become a great public speaker, you should develop the habit of being quite attentive to whatever you're saying and how physically are you moving in line with what you were saying? If you are trying to convey a message mixture that you're using hand gestures appropriately. Not just simply keep pointing your fingers at the audience that will make them feel uncomfortable. But you can use hand gestures. Responsibly. Move around, point that something on the slides. Or you're simply, if you're asking a question to the audience as them to raise their hand and literally raise your hand as well to help them reciprocate the movement when you are talking to them. If it's a serious point mixture that your facial expressions conveyed the seriousness of the subject. And if it's something quite lighthearted, humorous, try to smile or just simply a reflect that the current subject is not that serious. So you get the point which is basically making sure that your body is aligned with your verbal expressions. Your body language should reflect us. So what are the key elements of the body language? Let's take a look at them. Now. First of all, we do have the facial expressions. You need to make sure that you do have some sort of expression on your face. And there's just simply having some sort of a blank face. And there's nothing showing to your audience where they cannot reciprocate or they have no idea what kind of a state you're at. Where you just simply talking, talking, talking, talking with nothing showing on your face to help them get engaged with the current topic or provide some sort of attention to the topic that you have. Nothing is worse than having a monotonic event or a monotonic speech. I'm sure you've seen these time. We're just simply watch someone talk for a long period of time. Now, have you noticed what I've learned while here? I extended my hand just simply to elaborate the length of the period than the duration of time that will amplify the message for your audience. The same thing keeping in mind is just simply take some notes. They will surely help you out in order to develop those skills. Now when you are trying to pass on this message to your audience, you're trying to make sure that your hand gestures are in line with your own words and vocab and the expression or the image that you would like to paint to your audience. Responsible way such that your audience has their attention with you all the time. They're focused on you and they're keeping up with you. Because as humans, we tend to pick up cues verbally, physically, and in terms of the movement as well, how someone occupies a space. So you do have the facial expressions, you do have your posture when you're standing in front of the audience. Always go for the power stance. And the power stance is quite simple, where you stand upright and simply you have your feet exactly at shoulder width. You're standing upright and talking to your audience. This provides the impression of confidence and actually it changes your brain chemistry to reflect as such, it has been proven whenever you are in a discussion or you are in a presentation, try to do it by yourself. You'll see the results. It's just simply applied the power stance and spread your feet, shoulder width, and talk. This will raise some hormones and your brain that will be reflected in the form of a sense of ease and confidence and that will show as well on your audience. Then you have to keep in mind how you use the space. If you are presenting, you are moving around the, let's say the event, you are engaging with the audience. The best example it would be if someone is a TV hosts, a TV show host, most probably you've noticed there'll be talking on stage at one point in time, then they will go between the crowd, pass on the microphone, talk to the audience, point their fingers at them to help them get under the spotlight and answer a specific question. Take the microphone from them, they walk back up to stage. This is basically an example of how to occupy a space physically. You have to keep in mind your body language. So let's, let's go through the key main points that you should keep in mind. Always, always, always whenever you're presenting to a crowd, have the power stance. We're standing upright and your feet are just simply shoulder width apart. This will initially or provide the queue that you're confident and you're coming from a place of authority which will help easily deliver the message to your audience. The second thing would be, how are you conveying your message with facial expressions and hand gestures. And the best way to go about this, because everyone is quite unique and special. Use a mirror. Be your own, judge. Pick a topic, try to talk about a topic in front of a mirror and see what kind of cues are you picking up an altered them. This is a great practice, a great example that you can keep in mind in order to harness those skills. When you are trying to judge your official expressions, you can ask someone to do so as you present, present to them, your friend, your colleague, or respectively. Or you can do it in front of a mirror. And just simply carry on with your presentation and see how your hands are moving, how your facial expressions are aligned, how is your body language on your stance when it comes to conveying the message. So all of these things, they tend to send cues to the audience with relation to the entire subject as a whole. Now, at this current section of the course, feel free to replay it again from 0.0 and watch it over and over again where you are going to notice that I've deliberately use all of the key points I've been telling you about to deliver the message. Facial expressions, hand gestures, movement in order to help you get the message in the way that I'm intending to deliver to you in the first place. So this segment from the course is a great, Let's say, practical example that you can replay over and over again to help you get the idea and apply those concepts and those skills to your own practice. 14. Voice Tone and the Impact it Makes: Following body language, we're going to talk about the tone of your voice. How do you speak? How do you calibrate? What are you going to say to your audience based on importance and significance, and adjust your tone of voice accordingly. If you've listened to any bought podcast at any point in time, without seeing the person talking, without visually being present at the venue where the event is taking place. Simply by the Odeo, by listening to what are they saying, you are able to understand the importance of a specific message. You are able to visualize what are they talking about based on the tone that there are projecting. So when you are talking to an audience as part of developing your public speaking skills, you need to first of all, control your pace. Whenever you are talking about something which is very important, you need to slow down the pace the same way I'm doing right now in order to emphasize the importance of the subject. If you have something really important that you want to audience to comprehend or understand, slow down the pace, make sure that you give them sufficient time to understand what you're talking about and to comprehend what you're talking about. If things are quite trivial, trivial, just simply pick up the pace and move on to the next point. Now, you need to lower and hired the tones depending on the point you want to make. If you want to be sarcastic or you're going to be, let's say, happy about something, or you want to be negative about something. You need to pick up the tone in order to make sure that you pass on the message in the best way possible. Now, this segment from this current course, feel free to replay it again. I just simply picked up the tone, drop-down the tone in order to help you understand the importance of the message without losing attention. Avoid monotonic communication. When you are talking to someone. The best way for you to lose, for them to lose interests and whatever that you're talking about is just simply keeps saying the same thing at the same pace. Let me give you an example. If you walk into university and you sit or attend one of those lecture halls where you have a professor who is quite too old and he wants to just explain the lesson for you. They have a certain pace where they keep saying the same thing over and over again without any change to their noise, tone, or behavior or demeanor. And after a point in time, you are going to be losing interests and the entire subject. The tone is quite too monotonic that you really have no idea how to engage any better with the current lecture. That's another example. When you are talking to someone, make sure that your tone fluctuates based on the importance of the subject and based on the context that you have an order to keep your audience engaged, setting a specific tone, your brain automatically becomes quite familiar with the level of the voice or the volume that you're having. It adapts and loses interest and disconnect and focuses on something else. Your eyes are going to be looking all over the place for any distractions. A bottle of water that folds the lighting is off, where you are just simply not focused on the presenter. And obviously you don't want to be one of those public speakers where your audience loses interests and whatever you are saying. On the contrary, you need to grab their attention from point a to point Z until you fully deliver your message as planned. You have to alter your volume and your pitch in order to convey positivity or negativity as you see necessary. If it's something quite joyful, something quiet, happy, which is part of your own event. And you want to reciprocate that happiness, that joy to your audience by all means, pick up your tone, pick up your voice, and your audience is going to understand that you're conveying happiness. However, if something is quite to negative, which is quite frustrating, you are going to really slow down the pace. You are going to drop down to tone to show how negative the contexts that you're highlighting is. When you understand the importance of your tonality in accordance with your body language, it's a very powerful tool. It's literally powerful where you are able to communicate verbally, physically, emotionally, mentally and intellectually with your audience. You are a powerhouse to be reckoned with as a public speaker, because every single part of you, mentally, intellectually, emotionally, physically is in sync to provide the message are planning on delivering, which is the main definition that we have highlighted at the beginning of the course. What makes a public speaker someone who is physically, mentally, emotionally, intellectually, along with their tools, they're quite in sync with the true message. 15. Breathing Exercise to Calm the Nerves: One of the greatest pitfalls for even great public speakers is losing their breath as they talk. At the same time, when you are trying to grasp for breath during a presentation or public speaking event, you wouldn't want to, we're going to want your audience to pick up on that, that you're losing your breath. And you're just simply trying to grasp for air in order to carry on forward. That's where breathing exercises come into play. You need to breathe in order to help you carry on with the pace that you want. At the same time, it breathing affects your tone and composure. Imagine we were talking quite too fast and you lose your breath and you run out of breath. All of a sudden, your tone drops and your composure changes because you're trying to move, you're out of breath. And you're just simply quite off balance. And you're trying to just simply get some oxygen and recollect yourself. It's quite too hasty to take a look at because it seems like something is wrong and your audience has no idea what's wrong. And the only thing which is wrong as you are running out of time. Now in order to do so, you need to calibrate your breath. Well, this is an advanced stage, but you'll get there one point in time because oxygen will just simply flood your brain and keep you focused and keep you on track. And most importantly, would use the butterflies. And being worried and anxious. Physiologically when you run out of oxygen, think about it this way. You're suffocating. The same way that you're drowning. Your brain will fire up adrenaline and the form of fight or flight response. And thus why many people, when they are, when they step on the stage and they are quite worried, they lose the sense of proper breathing. They run out of oxygen, and all of a sudden they're panicking. I simply want to get off the stage because of the lack of oxygen going to the brain. And the first thing that you should have them do is simply sit down and breathe. Because once they do so, oxygen is going to flood the brain and reduce that anxiousness and the sense of being worried. This is a physiological response. It has nothing to do with being afraid or not afraid of public speaking. This is how your body behaves when you run out of oxygen. So in order to do so, you should learn how to breathe properly. Most often people do breathe in the wrong way. In order to breathe properly, let me walk you through a very simple exercise that you can apply right now. You can replay it over and over again, or just simply pause and applied by herself and carry on with this current lecture. We are going to go for the concept of four and threes, where we are going to inhale through our nose for 4 s. Then this is the important part. When you're trying to exhale. You are not just simply going to exhale through your chest, but through your stomach, you are going to press outwards as if you are, let's say, pushing the air out of your mouth and simply dropping down your lungs through your stomach. And when you are inhaling, you are not going to pick up your chest. On the contrary, you are going to maintain that same position of your chest, but you will inflate your stomach. So when you have air going through your nostrils, it will go all the way to your stomach, Let's say inflate your stomach, pushing your stomach outwards. This in turn will help you relax the diaphragm which is under your lungs. Helping your lungs absorbed more air into the, Hence enhancing the effect. So let's go through it one step at a time. So we're going forward the counter for, through the nose and a count of three. So when we go through the nodes 12 For we are going to inflate our stomach outwards, hold it. Then we are going to breathe out words for 3 s in the same way, dropping our chest. So let's go through it together. Ready? 321. So you'll notice once you're doing this, all of a sudden, calmer, you more focused. You had to run than the level, just simply go down. Your brain is flooded with oxygen. You're more focused and you're able to easily pick up with your own presentation smoothly and perfectly. So let's recap the steps. When you're trying to breathe, simply inhale for 4 s is simply for the counter for nothing. Not to make it complicated through 1234 through the nose, keeping the mouth closed. And then you are going to inflate your tummy outwards. You're going to inflate your stomach upwards as if the air is coming into the lungs, through the mouth, into the lungs but enter the stomach. So we're not going to have the chest pop upwards. A sign-off. Were worried or afraid. And this is your body, where your body is going to translate this movement by producing extra adrenaline. You don't want to do that, which is counter productive. Well, you need to do is when you inhale, maintain the same level if your chest and shoulders and direct the air from the nostrils all the way to your stomach, inflate your stomach, push your stomach outwards. This will help relax your diaphragm, which is the barrier under your lungs, giving you more space to occupy oxygen and absorb oxygen. That will be for the count of 41234. You hold. Then you release the air that you have inhaled through your mouth, forcefully, outwards and dropping down your chest and repeat the process again and again and again. Now, this is my own personal practice that I tend to use form of the breathing exercise. Now, obviously, if you look around and you do a bit more research, you're going to find a lot of options. Different mechanisms, 3 s for inhaling, 3 s for exhaling. And different approaches for how you do so physiologically, this is my own preference. Feel free to explore yours if you're not comfortable with this one, and if it works for you, that's great applied and use it to help you become a great public speaker. 16. How to Engage with the Audience: The subject, or this part of the course is a no-brainer. Yet many public speakers, they fail to do so. When you are publicly speaking, it's often quite easy for you to lose focus and lose the attention of the audience. You're too focused on your own self and your own subject on how are you presented to the audience. And you'll lose sight that they are the key element in your old presentation. You should understand them, engage with them, communicate with them in order for your message to pass on smoothly from you to them. In order to engage with the audience, you need to interact with them in the form of questions asked for participation of possible and just simply highlight key questions and pointers to specific person as them. What did they think? That will help you? First of all, deviate that tension from you to the audience, giving you some time to breathe and keep your audience engaged with you. Because obviously, no one wants to be picked up from the audience. Being put under the spotlight. And all of a sudden they have no idea what you're talking about that will be quite uncomfortable to them more than you. When you are trying to present a subject, combine everything that you have learned so far. The focus on communicating with the audience and engaging with the audience. Participate with the audience. Ask questions. Ask for input, ask for feedback. Ask if one of the audience has experienced wherever you're talking about before. And you could use that as a stepping stone for to initiate your own discussion. When it comes to engaging with the audience, sky's the limit. You can just have something pop out of the blue on your slides or video. You can bring a model, you can bring a prototype. You can bring a sample of the product or the project that you're talking about. And you pass it on to your audience, helping them see it up from getting more engaged with your subject. I'll leave that for you to get creative with. But the main focus should be simply engage with the audience. You don't want to lose your attention no matter how great of a public speaker you are. You have a great communication skills, great intellectual knowledge, perfect body language, perfect facial expressions, perfect slides. And you are just simply occupying the space perfectly during the event. Yet, your audience does not see the importance of your communication and they're not able to reciprocate that communication or feel a sense of connection between you and the audience. And all of a sudden your audience loses interests and whatever that you're talking about. You want to avoid that point by simply knowing your audience quite properly and try to help them be part of your project or your presentation as the event goes on. 17. The Powerful loop of Feedback and Rehearsal: Now let's say you've applied everything that we have talked about. You've added all these tools to your public speaking kit. Now, once you initiate a public speaking event, you'd go through it, you conducted and you finalize it. This is a great opportunity for you to get some feedback to help you fine tune and master your craft. This is where you ask your audience. You just simply conclude the event. Walk around, engage with them, talk with them, have a chat with them, and ask them for feedback, how they felt during the event, what are the key pointers that they have understood? What are the key things they were looking for to achieve from your event, but they haven't done so and try to absorb and collect that knowledge without feeling criticized. You are looking for feedback. You are not looking for criticism, whether positive or negative, constructive or destructive. That's not the whole focus. The focus is getting some feedback in order to become better next time. Now, you can simply get the feedback from point a at the preparation stage where you are just simply doing so, I'm practicing in front of a mirror. Your April by yourself to get your feedback, analyze and assess how are you applying all of the stuff that we've talked about. Or you can just simply do in front of a crowd where you have a small group, five to ten individuals, whether your colleagues at work or your friends, and pick a topic which is basically the focus of your project, let's say. And you are going to present to them your topic and ask them for their feedback. How did you do what they picked up on? What was the best part of the presentation, what was the best part of the public speaking event? And you recommendations that they would like to provide to you in order to help you become better. Now you're going to collect all of these sources of information, write them down, list them down, just simply think about them and pick the things that are true and authentic and use them to become a better next time. I want E is a great way to rehearse for public speaking event, is literally record yourself presenting the same way right now, when we are recording this current course, take a look at your recordings. Once you are done, take a look at your own public speaking skills. Let's say how are you communicating, your tone, your body language, the content that you're providing, the information that you're sharing. Are they delivering as per your plan and as per the audience requirements? If both points are checked, it means you have provided the perfect bridge between your own message, your own source of information, and the audience. And your communication skills are spot on mentally, physically, emotionally occupying the space. The tools they're using have actually served you to accomplish the task. 18. Final Note: Our journey comes to an end. Temporarily. We're going to wrap up the current course at this current point in time, we truly hope that you found some sort of benefit. And this current course, at least 1%. If 1% has been beneficial to you, that's an accomplishment. As long as you're growing, as long as you're becoming better, That's the entire goal of the current courses that we're providing. Now feel free to share your feedback. Feel free to share your insights and your experience from the current course. Because like we have established, feedback will help things become better in the future. And don't forget to follow my profile and stay tuned for the latest course releases and updates until the next course.