Have you ever been forced to listen to a speaker who made you work to stay awake? Some speakers hold your attention by making you feel like the most important person in the audience. Others look like they couldn't care less whether you were there or not and made you feel they wished they were anyplace else but here.      

      Many people feel that speaking in public is like walking barefoot on hot coals. You can see their discomfort. They can't stand still. They constantly shift their balance from one foot to the other, like marching in place.

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When you're preparing a speech, what should you say first?  What should your opening sentences be?  

      It all depends on a number of important variables, some of them obvious, none of them difficult to deal with.

      First of all, who is in the audience and how many people are you speaking to?  This is a key question to ask when you're creating your speech.  What kind of a group is it?  A fundraising event, or the monthly meeting of the local Chamber of Commerce?  A company conference or a roast, toast or retirement farewell party?  A wedding, sales meeting or something else?  Knowing who and how many you're speaking to is the first clue to what to say first.

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     Question: What do overcoming the fear of speaking in public and holiday gift-giving have in common? 

      Answer: We use the same principles to give a speech or to give a gift!
 
      We've just spent a lot of time thinking of the folks on our holiday gift list.  We took into consideration their likes and dislikes and the financial limits we all agreed to observe. Then we tried to come up with something they'd appreciate that they didn't have before, that would make them feel we cared about them. And when they smiled and said, "Thanks, I love this, it's just what I need!", we knew really meant it.

      This is a great technique for overcoming the fear of speaking in public.

      If we break down the elements of our gift-giving technique, we find three simple principles:

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      People who aren't comfortable speaking in public have dozens of reasons why they can't or won't do it. For some it's a really debilitating fear; for others it's just laziness or a reluctance to work that little bit harder to achieve something that doesn't come easily. The fact is that no matter what your fear, it's possible to overcome it. The question to ask is, "How would my life be improved, if I weren't afraid?"

      Let's imagine a few typical scenarios.

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