Public Speaking Anxiety is a Godsend

We come into this world as fully expressive bundles of divine energy, but as relational beings we need our divinity mirrored back in order for us to fulfill our unique expression on earth.

After our physiological and safety needs are met, our need for belonging through such mirroring is paramount. (See Maslow's hierarchy_of_needs.)

Those with eyesight get this mirroring through the intimate gaze of one or more adults. The availability of such mirroring in early years determines how strongly we sense that we belong in our body, in our family, and in the world, and how fearlessly and responsibly we express ourselves as we grow.

When my dad was not too distracted to look at me at all, he shot daggers of blame and shame into my eyes. My mom's eyes, usually available to me, reflected pity for my plight and sadness for her own, along with a pull on me to merge with her.

Most of us were born into a world in which the illusion of separation was the norm, so we were seen as the Other rather than the divine manifestation of the One that is the reality of who we are. What we needed in large doses were receptive eyes, soft gazes signifying: "I am here for you. I see you, I hear you. There is nothing to do, nothing to perform. You don't have to smile or delight me to keep me here. Just being with you and breathing together is my great pleasure."

To the extent such unconditional welcome was not available to us in what I have come to call Relational Presence, the eyes of others became an unsafe place in which to rest, and we grew up with some degree of self-consciousness, anxiety, avoidance and/or aggressiveness around meeting eyes.

Until I was 45 years old I was painfully self-conscious, with no idea how to let myself "be seen" or how to gently and steadily hold another in my eyes. You might say that "windows of my soul" were boarded up, complicating attempts to express myself clearly and have authentic relationships.

Psychotherapy and spiritual exploration had given me the intellectual understanding that I was not alone, and the capacity to cope and achieve some degree of success in the world. I became good at acting as if I was doing just fine while alienated within.

The place where I couldn't "hold it together" at all was in front of any group, where I was frozen in terror no end.

Looking back I now understand why that was necessarily so, and also why that particular terror was the Godsend that transformed my life.

Why public speaking anxiety is inevitable

Any unease you may have in being truly seen by another human being is multiplied dramatically in front of a group, which becomes an instant firing squad. Our normal coping mechanisms become useless when a sea of eyes evokes in us feelings of separation from the herd. We experience primal for fear for our survival, and naturally project contempt, boredom, or impatience.

Why public speaking anxiety is a Godsend

Contraction in front of groups, from mild self-consciousness to terror, is but a symptom of the illusion of separation most of us grew up with and live with. The Speaking Circle format recreates a scenario that predictably evokes that contraction, absent the pressures of time or effort or performance, or even the need to speak. This allows participants to breathe, “stop the world” and re-access, at their own pace, the natural relational gaze with one person at a time that had been compromised early on in order to survive.

This Relational Presence practice rewires our neural pathways, liberating the eyes and dissolving self-consciousness in just a few sessions for many. Once we rediscover the capacity to inhabit our own skin while being seen by a group for who we really are, we naturally express ourselves with more ease, power and flow. And not just with groups, but more and more in all our communications and relationships.

This is why Relational Presence, though primarily a spiritual practice toward dissolving the illusion of separation, has great professional development benefits.

The Facilitation Factor

The Speaking Circle format does require masterful facilitation to maintain the delicate balance between safety and full expression required for liftoff. Continuing to refine my mastery, and training others in this exquisite art, is a lifelong labor of love. (Our other Facilitator trainers are Dr. Doreen Hamilton here in the S.F. Bay Area, and Koos Wolcken and Jennet Burghard in the Netherlands.)

Facilitating Speaking Circles and training Facilitators is my most profound pleasure and usefulness on this plane of existence, and it was all made possible (and necessary) by my public speaking anxiety.

Yes, what a Godsend!

Comments

[Maxim Zbitnoff]

Thanks for the inspiring article. Some reflections:

I find the more you are self revealing of your own experience more I feel at ease with you. A piece you wrote that tells of your aspirations to comedy that got channeled to teaching touched me.

As noted before, for me and others, meeting the gaze of a group one at a time can be easier than meeting the gaze of a single person on my own, with no one else to turn to. Our social imperatives work against simply hanging out like babies with large eyes and nothing to say.

Part of the magic as you noted is the facilitation.... though I would also say ritualization.... and the focus on relational presence: the matrix in which all communion happens knowingly or unknowingly. I find the eyes meeting eyes part of the exercise evocative of this communion.... one way to enter. I can imagine doing a Speaking Circle with eyes closed. Then we could say you know how easy it is to talk to someone on the phone without seeing them.

[Doreen Hamilton]

Hi Lee,

Yes, you are so right to point us toward our anxiety. Whatever challenges us is perched right in front of a door that will open and lead to new possibilities. I'm so happy I walked toward my fear of public speaking because just beyond that block of anxiety I discovered my true self, my life's calling, my purpose.

[Lee Glickstein]

I received this email in response to the article:

"Wow, my experience growing up pretty much exactly parallels what you described, Lee! When you talk about 'the availability of such mirroring in the early years...' I was wondering where you got that information. Just curious, it really makes a ton of sense to me. I feel like I'm finally getting answers to things that have puzzled me for LONG time."

Jim

I'm not sure exactly where I heard about mirroring, but I just found this paragraph in Widipedia under "Mirroring":

"Within the area of self-psychology, being mirrored refers 'to all the transactions characterizing the mother-child relationship, including not only the reflections of grandiosity, but also constancy, nurturance, a general empathy and respect' (Kohut, 1977, pp. 146-147). The parents' mirroring responses influence the development and maintenance of self-esteem and self-assertive ambitions. Their response will mirror back to the child a sense of worth, which in turn creates an internal self-respect."

An East Coast Speaking Circle Facilitator just sent me an email with a book passage that sheds light on the subject:

"I was reading something today and was so struck by its relatedness to RP, from a book called Spiritual Midwifery by Ina May Gaskin. This is the midwife (Ina May) talking about greeting a 6 week old infant upon his return from the hospital's premie nursury where he had to stay for 6 weeks after his birth at 7 months:
 
"I hardly recognized Aaron when Walter and Susan brought him home from the hospital. It wasn't just that he was bigger and older- almost six pounds at six weeks old by then- he had a whole different look on him than he'd had at birth He looked like a convict who had been in prison long enough to learn to not move his face. Instead of his face being rounded and soft and babyish, it looked long and lean, and he held the micro-muscles around his mouth and chin so tight that it gave the skin there a greyish cast, making it look like he had a five o'clock shadow. He looked amazingly hard and immobile for someone who wasn't even supposed to be born yet.
 
"I knew that i could get him back looking like a baby, and that he looked the way he did because the nurses who had been taking care of him in the nursery for premies took care of so many babies that they didn't relate with each one as a unique individual. Nobody treated Aaron like he was aware and intelligent and capable of communicating. I don't think anyone had looked him in the eyes since he had been born.
 
"I took him in my arms and tried to look in his eyes. he looked away as soon as I got there. I moved with him, caught his glance again and he immediately looked away. Nothing wrong with his synapses, obviously. I chased him for a while in this fashion, trying to get him to hold still and look at me.
 
"After a while I could feel him getting interested, wondering, 'who is this checking me out so close?' Sometimes I would catch his glance for a second and we would get high together; his pupils would dilate noticeably and my head would rush. It was lots of fun. The more I tried to get Aaron's attention, the higher we got; his eyes started looking big and round and alert, and the muscles in his face relaxed, allowing the circulation to improve. He began to look delicious. I nuzzled his cheek and looked at him again and he was even prettier, so I did that a few more times and rushed and rushed. By this time I had achieved good eye contact and telepathic rapport with Aaron. I handed him back to Susan so she could get to know him too.
 
"What I had done with Aaron was a kind of healing that you can give a person just by how purely and cleanly you look at him. The nature of this healing was a communication, which was a two way transaction and required obtaining his cooperation."

[Lee Glickstein]

Email question: "If I'm in a conference room and we're going around the table introducing ourselves, it's always a situation that makes me uncomfortable. I would love to hear any advice you may have as how to deal with this. (BTW, this next week is a big one for me as I'm not only be doing that, but also presenting about 30 minutes of technical material to about 20+ people.)"

That type of situation is an extra challenge since the listening usually isn't very good because the people who go after you are going over their talk and the people who went before you are worried about how they did. I'd say first lower your expectations about how good or bad it might turn out. There are no big winners or losers in intro go-rounds.

While others are talking, breathe and appreciate them at a spiritual level. See if you can not go over your lines. Instead, have a first sentence ready and a sense of what you'd like to cover, and don't think about it while others are talking.

You don't want to rush so don't try to cover too much territory. These situations are not conducive to the full RP breath, so try to take 3 seconds of silence before you start, and 3 seconds after the first sentence. Ideally, start with something personal that allows some emotion into the room and gives your anxiety a chance to breathe rather than try to stifle itself. Perhaps start by expressing a generous sentiment to the group. Do some RP, but don't hold yourself to a high standard in this situation. Mostly again, don't try to cover too much ground.

When you anticipate this event, imagine it being fun to have a chance to be seen and heard and appreciative of the group.

[Lee Glickstein]

JoAnne Smith forwarded this piece which indicates the neurological basis for Relational Presence. (By Martha Beck, Oprah magazine.)

OPEN YOUR FOCUS

The first time a yoga instructor told me to "soften my eyes," I thought she was insane. Strangely enough, I sort of did it, though I had no idea how. And suddenly, I felt wonderful.

There's a neurological basis for this. Les Fehmi, PhD, a brain scientist and author of The Open-Focus Brain, found that when our eyes are in "sharp focus," our stress responses increase; when they're in "soft," or "open," focus, we relax.

An animal relaxing in the sun will maintain soft focus until something threatening or appetizing appears; only then will its eyes become sharp. Softening your eyes releases the sequential processing of the left brain and turns on the holistic perceptions of the right.

Try softening your focus now. After reading this paragraph, look up at whatever's in front of you. Then, without moving your eyes, allow your attention to broaden, taking in everything you see. Slowly expand your attention to include everything you can hear, smell, feel, and taste.

As your focus opens, you'll stop thinking in words, become more present, and see beauty everywhere. Fehmi's research showed that if we do it consistently, this practice affects the brain like meditation on steroids. Try it. It works.

[Sahara Chaldean]

Hi Lee ~~

I especially appreciate that you call it "the natural relational gaze". I often hear at the Speaking Circles I facilitate, how "unnatural it feels to gaze into another's eyes". But, it seems to me that once we rediscover our innate capacity to be available in stillness and hold the other with our eyes, some essential parts of ourselves begin to blossom for the first time! And the natural world mirrors this same relational presence capacity to us all the time.