3 Reasons why having FUN will help your public speaking!

Having as much fun as possible in life, will help your public speaking so much... I know, I know it sounds too good to be true that having lots of fun will make you better at work, but it's true!

Incase you need to convince your boss.... here are 3 of the many ways it can help you be a better public speaker.

1. When we have fun, it puts us in a happy headspace. And when we're happy, we feel good about ourselves, we have a positive outlook and we are ready for things to go well. Our self esteem is much higher in this state, and therefore we trust ourselves to a) do a good job and b) navigate anything that doesn't go to plan. This reduces a lot of the negative thoughts that like to creep up in moments of high pressure and helps things to go much more smoothly.

2. When we have fun in our lives we explore the real value of our lives outside of work (and in particular outside of this speech). Sometimes when we're 100% focused on this 1 moment and we put all our self value and worth into this speech going well, it adds even more pressure than we're already feeling. This pressure makes us feel threatened and we go into fight or flight mode - which (whilst marvelous for surviving a tiger attack) isn't great for public speaking .... (I'll do another post on fight/flight mode - so keep an eye out if you're interested). By remembering the worth we carry outside of this speech, and the value we add to the world outside this speech, it releases us from some of the pressure and weirdly, sometimes caring less actually makes it easier to perform better.

3. Once we've got ourselves into the habit of having as much fun as possible, it'll be much easier for us to find the fun in our work/public speaking - whether that's adding humour to the speech or performance, or even just the process of enjoying the moment.

Focusing on enjoying the moment when you're speaking is really useful. It allows you to re-write the story you tell yourself - from "speeches are stressful" to "speeches are something I enjoy doing". Once our brains see it as a special, enjoyable moment that we're working towards, we will look forward to the preparation and be much more keen to spend time exploring the best way to perform it. We will also look forward to the actual speech too! (be gone dread & fear!)

BONUS REASON! Happiness is infectious. If you are happy and passionate about what you're talking about (even if it's just graphs and numbers), your audience are much more likely to engage with your speech and catch your enthusiasm!

Hope that helps, let me know how you get on 😊

If you're keen to learn more, why not follow me on instagram @stepupvocalcoaching for more free tips & tricks. Or if you're ready to transform your breath & public speaking skills, drop me an email at info@stepupvocalcoaching.co.uk . I offer a free no-pressure discovery call to get to know each other and find out how I can help.

Lydia is the Founder & Lead Coach at Step Up Vocal Coaching. She is passionate about helping people speak with confidence, personality and impact.