The Art of Presence in Public Speaking
by
Carla Kimball
©2003, Carla Kimball
All rights reserved.
For the past several years, through my own experience speaking to many audiences and hearing about the experiences of participants and clients, I've become very interested in exploring what's involved in staying present when we are in public. I've applied my understanding of yoga and meditation to help inform me further and at this point I've begun to describe what I consider some of the essential elements of Presence in public speaking.
Anchors
One important aspect of Presence is, predictably, being present in the
moment. For thousands of years, meditation has been one of the most effective
tools for dropping into the Now. In any meditation practice there is always
an object of focus to anchor our very active minds back to what is happening
right at this moment rather than being caught up in the distractions of
our mind. When we practice yoga, the anchor is physical sensation. When
we do a sitting meditation, the anchor might be our breath, a mantra (some
word or phrase we repeat to ourselves), or the observation of our thoughts
themselves. When we do a walking or eating meditation our anchors are
the experience of the act of walking or eating.
A public speaking event often involves a significant number of distractions for the speaker. These distractions are very powerful currents that draw us away from responding to what is happening in the present moment. The question then becomes, how can we anchor ourselves into the present moment despite the strong magnetic pull of all the distractions that we encounter when we speak. I believe that when we speak to a group we need three strong anchors working concurrently.
We need to find effective ways to stay anchored and aligned with ourselves, and I have found that many yoga and meditation practices are very useful for this purpose. Focusing on the breath, for instance, can help to slow us down enough to be able to come back into personal alignment and to feeling centered within ourselves. Doing a yoga pose can help us to feel the support of the ground beneath us and our own internal physical support.
We need to stay anchored with our audience which can happen best by recognizing that the audience is filled with people - with individual human beings just like us - and by connecting with them one at a time. This involves turning our attention outward, allowing ourselves to receive each person, and being with or speaking to one person at time. Speaking Circles® are extremely effective at giving people multiple opportunities to practice that level of connection as we "be with" one person in the audience at a time.
And, finally, we need to stay present with and anchored to our message, with what we want to say. In my mind, one of the best anchors for content (besides for knowing our material) is remembering our purpose. What is it that we want to accomplish? Why have we been asked to speak in the first place? What do we feel passionately about that brings us to this presentation? What is the gift that we are sharing with our audience? What is our core message? When we focus on these questions rather than our fear, we are able to stay grounded in what's truly important to us.
Arrows
Presence also involves an engagement with the audience - one in which
both the speaker and the audience are drawn out of themselves and into
a shared space. When we are filled with fear, contracted, or anxious,
we are primarily pre-occupied with ourselves and our personal survival.
Our arrows of awareness are turned inward towards our thoughts causing
us to become ego-centered and very self-conscious. If we want to be fully
present with ourselves, the direction of these arrows of attention must
shift from the single-pointed focus on our thoughts to a more general
awareness of our whole being - our mind, our body and our place in the
world. Rather than all arrows pointing to our heads, our awareness arrows
sweep out to encompass our entire experience of ourselves. Through this
process we can find ourselves grounded, centered, and open to the external
world, becoming genuinely curious about what we see and experience outside
of ourselves. The most effective public speakers are not self-conscious.
Instead, they are centered and grounded in themselves while at the same
time very open and receptive to their audience. Their arrows are aligned
both internally and externally, in a wonderful energetic dance with their
audience in which they are both receiving and giving at the same time.
Being vs. Doing
Presence also has a quality of simply being rather than actively doing.
When we think of public speaking, most of us feel that we must do something
- entertain, perform, impress. What if, instead, we thought of public
speaking as an opportunity to simply be present with our audience without
feeling the need to do anything? What if we allowed ourselves to just
silently wait until we dropped deeply into what really wants to be said
and then spoke, just as surfers do when they wait for the right next wave
to come along? A radical concept, and perhaps not appropriate for every
situation. But even allowing ourselves to consider that this might be
possible gives us some permission to let go of the idea that every public
speaking event is a performance. And, when we speak from our deeper knowing
places, we become much more present with what it is we truly want to convey.
*******
Carla Kimball, M.A., M.B.A. is a speaking presence coach, workshop facilitator and president of RiverWays Enterprises. Over the past 18 years she has presented and coached on a diverse set of business, stress management and communication topics to thousands of business and service professionals. Client companies include leading financial management, health care, and accounting firms.
Carla offers a selection of regular public speaking presence and presentation skills programs and coaching services for individuals as well as for corporate groups. Carla works from inside-out and helps people become more confident speakers while establishing a strong relationship with their audience.
Carla is a prolific writer on public speaking topics and currently offers a 26 week subscription to The ABCs of Presence in Speaking, Leading, and Life!, a newsletter which presents one article and exercise a week organized alphabetically with a unique perspective on public speaking issues. She has also distilled her approach to public speaking presence into a workbook/audio set entitled the SpeakingPresencesm Toolkit.
Carla is based in the Upper Valley region of Vermont and New Hampshire at the intersection of Interstates 91 and 89 and centrally located to all of New England, including Boston, Western Massachusetts, Connecticut and Maine.
(You may freely copy and distribute this article as long as you keep the content intact and unchanged including title, author, copyright notice, text, contact information, and this entire notice. )
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