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1-Page Summary of Confessions of a Public Speaker

Don’t Picture Anybody Naked

Public speaking is a form of expression. It takes emotional commitment, as well as the right material to back it up. Your presentation defines you more than your actual speaking ability does. When you present well, you disappear and your audience experiences only what you’re saying because every presentation should concern one specific topic. Public speaking makes people awkward because it’s awkward in itself; nobody can pay attention for longer than 10 minutes at a time regardless of the theme or subject matter, so they will tune out no matter how interesting or important your message may be before long. Before even starting a speech, most people wish that the speaker would hurry up and finish already since they don’t want to have to listen for too long anyway – but this is just an unfortunate fact of life which we must learn to deal with regardless of our own personal feelings on the issue! Getting them to focus on us isn’t easy (especially when we’re nervous about presenting), so obviously picturing our audience naked wouldn’t help anything either… That useless piece of advice (which seems to have originated with Winston Churchill) is always the first thing anybody tells us when we admit that we are nervous about giving a public speech – if anyone could even imagine such a scene in their mind at all (and why would they want to?), then that image would certainly only distract them from hearing any worthwhile information being presented by someone else!

Perfect Imperfection

Fear of failure often prevents people from trying to do something. If you don’t try, then you can’t fail. But if you’re afraid that there’s a chance that things won’t go well, then it will be hard for you to start working on the project. You should understand how to deal with mistakes and recognize that your reaction will influence how others react to the mistake as well. Your goal is not perfection—your goal is usefulness, being good at what you do, and sounding like yourself.

Speeches will never be as good as we want them to be. We’ll always find flaws with our speeches, and it’s not how the speech sounds in our heads when we give it that matters. The audience wants to learn something from what you’re saying and they also want to have a little fun too. They actually want you to do well, so don’t worry about messing up because everyone is rooting for you!

The speaker’s advantage over the audience is that she knows what comes next. She can fix mistakes in her presentation before giving it to an actual audience. The more times you practice, the better your presentation becomes.

If something goes wrong during your presentation, you can focus on dealing with it because you will have learned how to handle such situations.

“The Lecture Circuit”

People often go on a tour to give speeches. They say that they’re going on the lecture circuit, but few know where this phrase originated. It’s believed that Americans made public speaking popular in the early 1800s. In 1820, Josiah Holbrook started what is considered one of the first lecture tours called Lyceum. In 1835, presenters staged some 3,000 similar events and people would travel from town to town for these lectures at $20 per ticket ($200 today). The Associated Literary Society created a set schedule for its speakers which was known as the “lecture circuit”. Mark Twain sold out his presentations at $20 per head ($200 today), while Malcolm Gladwell might get paid $80,000 for a speech and Bill Clinton charges $125,000 per presentation.

“Good Private Thinking”

To be relaxed in public, you have to think hard in private. You can do that by taking your rough ideas and turning them into a clear presentation. People crave stories and respond to narratives about situations they’ve faced or events they’ve experienced. The best presentations are a series of points built on top of each other until the conclusion is reached. Try to turn your points into real-life experiences that relate directly with what people face every day.