Several weeks ago I gave a workshop on this topic with the intention of, for the first time, beginning to clarify what I mean by the phrase “embodied presence”. Here is some of the thinking that went into the workshop. Where we put our attention, that’s where energy goes. This is probably the core principle More…
Category: Public Speaking Presence
Self-consciousness vs. Presence
In response to David’s comment to my last post about fear arising not at the beginning of a talk but rather 3 or 4 minutes into the talk, I thought I’d share the first article in a 26 week article series I’ve written entitled The ABCs of Presence in Speaking, Leading, and Life! This first More…
Fear of the first few minutes in public speaking
I swim for exercise. I swim in pools that are kept relatively cool so that lap swimmers don’t overheat when they work up a “sweat”. This means that it’s always hard to get into the pool at the beginning of my swim. Once I’ve been in the water for even one lap, the chill wears More…
The “less is more” approach to public speaking
I am moving! My new home is about one quarter the size of my current home. This is a conscious choice for me as I have begun to realize that the only way we can truly impact our ever growing environmental crisis is to make a much smaller footprint on the planet. And, I have More…
Contemplative practices reduce anxiety
Several weeks ago, I gave a talk with Dr. Sara Lazar, neuroscientist and researcher at Mass General Hospital, a Harvard teaching hospital. Sara’s research is centered on changes in brain structures that result from meditation and yoga. Her results are very interesting! Basically they show that regular awareness (or contemplative) practices like yoga and meditation More…
The Tai Chi concept of Sung
Exploring how the Tai Chi concept of Sung can help us let go and relax when we speak in public as opposed to being “uptight”.
The power of silence to unite…
I recently attended a meeting where after we went around the room and introduced ourselves, we dropped into a period of silence before anyone began to speak. This was not an uncomfortable silence but simply a time for each of us to become present so that the ensuing conversation felt very different than the way More…
Consciously slowing down can reduce anxiety
I just caught the tale end of an interview on NPR with Michael Tilson Thomas, music director for the San Francisco Symphony, talking about the audition process for the YouTube Symphony Orchestra. I tuned in to the interview just as he was talking about how musicians tend to speed up when they are nervous. My More…
Space… The final frontier!
Last summer I received an email in response to one I had sent out. Something weird happened in the transmission. All the space between words had been stripped away and the email I received looked something like this: LastsummerIreceivedanemailinresponsetooneIhadsentout. Somethingweirdhappenedinthetransmission.Allthespace betweenwordshadbeenstrippedawayandtheemailI receivedlookedsomethinglikethis: While I eventually was able to figure out what it said, it was More…
Paying attention
I was in yoga class this morning doing a posture in which I was paying most attention to the position of my upper body. While in the posture, I suddenly became aware that I had no sense of what my left leg as doing… it was just hanging there without any awareness on my part More…