r/PublicSpeaking

I've had a stammer for as long as I can remember. Every time I try to speak, I have to put in so much effort, and the words still come out with a stutter.

Because of this, I built my life around avoiding speaking. I make websites and earn money through Google AdSense, so I rarely have to talk to people. While I'm grateful for that, I realize I've also been avoiding one of my biggest fears.

I freeze in conversations, arguments, or whenever I need to stand up for myself or my family. Seeing people speak confidently makes me anxious because I feel like I'm missing out on so much in life.

I barely talk these days. My communication skills are very poor because I've spent years avoiding speaking, and lately I've been feeling depressed about it.

If you've overcome a stammer, severe speaking anxiety, or became a confident speaker despite these challenges, what actually helped you? Can public speaking practice make a real difference, or should I start somewhere else?

I genuinely want to change my life, and I'd be grateful for any advice.

For the longest time, I thought everyone was paying attention to every little mistake I made.

Before I'd even start talking, my brain would already be telling me things like:

"You're going to mess this up."

"They're going to think you have no idea what you're talking about."

"They're all going to notice how nervous you are."

Then something happened that kind of changed the way I looked at it.

A guy in one of my classes completely lost his train of thought during a presentation.

He stopped, looked at his notes, smiled awkwardly, and said, "Give me a second."

Everyone just waited.

He found his place and kept going like nothing happened.

A few days later, I tried to remember what mistake he made...

I honestly couldn't.

That's when it hit me.

If I don't remember other people's awkward moments, why am I so convinced everyone remembers mine?

I still get nervous before presentations. I'm still working on it.

But I don't spend as much energy worrying about what everyone else is thinking anymore.

Has anyone else had a moment that made them realize people aren't judging you as much as you thought?

For a while, I honestly thought something was wrong with me.

I'd spend hours practicing my presentation, and I knew everything I wanted to say.

But the second I stood in front of the class... my brain just went blank.

Not "I forgot one sentence" blank.

I mean completely blank.

I'd stand there trying to remember what came next, and the more I forced myself to remember, the more I panicked.

One day I stopped trying to memorize everything.

Instead, I wrote down a few simple points I wanted to cover and trusted myself to explain them in my own words.

It felt weird at first because I was used to following a script.

But after a couple of presentations, I noticed something.

Even if I forgot a sentence, I didn't freeze anymore because I still knew the point I wanted to make.

I still get nervous before presenting. I don't think that part ever disappears completely.

But I don't get that "my brain just shut down" feeling nearly as much as I used to.

Has anyone else dealt with this? What actually helped you?

I have been through mock interviews and real interviews and a common feedback I have gotten recently is to be more concise. I’ve tried taking a pause before answering a question and practicing what I’d like to say before an interview but I still end up rambling or over explaining. I do it often in everyday conversation but I never thought it to be an actual problem. I have an interview coming up at a company I still need to do research on but I know I need to control the rambling. Do you have any advice on how to catch myself from rambling or any ways to practice catching myself because I generally don’t notice it until someone else points it out. I don’t think it’s particularly a nervous or anxious thing as it happens often but I don’t think the nerves help in this matter either. Any advice is appreciated. Thank you!

I occasionally give public speeches where I use video presentations to better illustrate my points and keep the interest of the audience. I recently had a real cringe moment where the presentation just failed right in the middle of playing it. I had to just soldier on but to be honest, it was downhill all the way after that. Not one of my best. Have you ever had one of those moments? What happened? Just need feedback on how to handle it next time.

Would appreciate any tips! I'm fairly good at holding people's attention once I'm speaking, but for some reason my mind just shuts down right when I need to talk. How do I fix this?

For a long time, I kept telling myself I was just "bad at presentations."

Every time I had one coming up, I'd get nervous days before it even started. Then, right before speaking, I'd try to remember every sentence I'd practiced... and that's usually when everything fell apart.

I'd forget one line, panic, and then my brain would just go blank.

A while ago I changed one thing.

Instead of trying to memorize the whole presentation, I focused on remembering a few main points and explained them in my own words.

I still get nervous sometimes. I'm not one of those people who suddenly loves public speaking.

But I'm not terrified anymore if I lose my place, because I know what I'm actually trying to say.

Maybe this sounds obvious, but it helped me way more than repeating the same script over and over.

Has anyone else found that memorizing every word actually makes presentations harder?

I’ve realized that I speak extremely fast around 280 words per minute, average person speaks 120 words , fast is 190, very fast 250 and extremely 250+ and I think it’s starting to affect my conversations

A lot of people struggle to keep up with me and honestly, I can’t blame them I often speak before I’ve fully organized my thoughts

my words end up running together, my pronunciation gets sloppy and people don’t understand what I’m trying to say
I’ve been told many times that I talk too fast
Sometimes it’s meant as a compliment, other times as criticism Either way I think it’s become a genuine communication problem

For those of you who speak more slowly and clearly, how do you do it? Help

Hey guys, I was just wondering if you had any tips to help me improve my speaking and social skills.

It's really hard for me to project my voice, and I tend to speak incredibly fast to avoid awkward silences. I'm also very bad at small talk. When I'm talking to someone for a while, maintaining eye contact and smiling starts to feel forced. On top of that, I have a resting sad face and tend to look confused, timid, or upset, making it hard to show when I'm actually happy or excited. My speech often sounds scripted rather than natural, and my body language is pretty closed off.

Public speaking is another massive issue. Whenever I'm in front of a large group, my hands start to shake, I stutter, and I look totally frightened. I forget what to say and usually just end up blurting nonsense.

I just started a job at McDonald's and I'm supposed to be leading a huge club starting this September, so I really need to fix my presentation and communication skills as fast as possible. I have the intelligence to lead, but what is a leader without communication? People always take advantage of this and use me for their gain and I hate it. What should I do? Any advice is appreciated!

I had to give a high-level presentation during a zoom meeting today and I was so nervous that I started stumbling on my words and couldn’t get them out because I was out of breath. I had to cut the presentation short. I feel like I got on management’s bad side and now I’m at risk of being let go.

Basically what the title says. I struggle a lot with speaking in public places and I’ve been trying to work on it but I’m torn between these two apps so I’m throwing it to the community here. I really enjoy the roleplay experience with the coach on the insight7 app and I also enjoy the daily practice on the wellspoken app. Has anyone tried them? Which is better?

Hi, I'm 17 m and my biggest problem is my stage fright. I'm not a shy person; I'm very outgoing and extroverted when meeting new people, but the moment I'm in front of a crowd, I get super nervous. My face starts twitching, and my hands get super shaky. Idk really know why this happens.

I really need some advice on how to improve, this really affects my performance in class.

You're in a meeting. You make a genuinely good point, well thought out.

Thirty seconds later the conversation's moved on and nobody brings it up again.

It wasn't the content. It was the delivery.

If the pitch is flat, even a valid point gets forgotten. Content is just data, it's the delivery that creates the authority.

Next time, try exaggerating the pitch drop at the end of your sentence.

Is this just me, or does nobody actually remember content, only delivery?

I wanna be a great public speaker however I find it difficult.

From the use of filler words, to stage fright and nervousness. Anytime this question is asked, all I ever see is motivation to do better however I want more than that

You sound muffled, and you probably think it's just "your voice."

It's not.

It's how little you open your mouth.

When the jaw barely moves, everything suffers. The words don't carry properly, you push harder to be heard, and people still have to lean in to catch what you said.

It's not about volume. It's not about projection. It's about the actual space you give the sound to leave your mouth.

The strange thing is, most people have spoken like this their whole life and just assumed that was simply their natural voice.

Has anyone else clocked this, or is this just something I see constantly in my work?

I just want to ask for some tips on overcoming anxiety of presenting - I was recently asked to do a short presentation at my work on legal implications of poor documentation in healthcare - not the mist thrilling topic to begin with but it was a small group of 5 people so I tried to keep it more informal. I had 8 slides and went through the basics and tried to add some examples to highlight.

They were not engaged at all (it was the end of the day in a small and stuffy room) and i ended up getting extremely anxious and losing my thread. I knew it didn’t go well but to make matters worse the person who asked me to do the presentation emailed me afterwards to give me lots of negative feedback about how I didn’t make it interactive enough.

I am so upset by this - I have to do another presentation in a month so I have time to improve but I’m already dreading it and don’t know how to make a dry topic interesting!

Most people think their voice is the problem. It's not.

It's the breath behind it.

When the breath goes, everything goes with it. The voice collapses, the rhythm is all over the shop, the pacing doubles and you lose the room before you've even made your point.

Breath is the engine of the voice. Not confidence. Not preparation. Breath.

The strange thing is most people hold their breath slightly before they speak. Right at the moment they need it most, it disappears.

Anyone else notice this or is it just something I see constantly in my work?

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I'm in my mid-20s and recently started working at a big MNC. I've realized that if I want to grow in my career, my communication skills need to improve.

One of my biggest problems is that I either stay quiet and don't express my thoughts at all, or I end up saying something dumb or awkward that makes the situation uncomfortable. After that, I keep replaying the conversation in my head for the rest of the day and can't focus on my work.

I don't want to keep staying silent because that's not going to help my career or relationships. But I also want to stop making conversations awkward and learn how to think more clearly before I speak.

Has anyone here struggled with the same thing and actually overcome it? What helped you become more socially aware and communicate more naturally?

I’ve always felt very comfortable doing public speaking, but never taken a formal class. I’ll be teaching a few thousand people online in October (and potentially giving me the ability to expand my business) and want to improve my skills. Please give me recommendations on classes. I can take online.

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I'm in my mid-20s and recently started working at a big MNC. I've realized that if I want to grow in my career, my communication skills need to improve.

One of my biggest problems is that I either stay quiet and don't express my thoughts at all, or I end up saying something dumb or awkward that makes the situation uncomfortable. After that, I keep replaying the conversation in my head for the rest of the day and can't focus on my work.

I don't want to keep staying silent because that's not going to help my career or relationships. But I also want to stop making conversations awkward and learn how to think more clearly before I speak.

Has anyone here struggled with the same thing and actually overcome it? What helped you become more socially aware and communicate more naturally?