How to Overcome Communication Apprehension
Pinpoint your fears., Identify small ways you can face your fear., Imagine yourself in a distressing situation., Use relaxation techniques as needed., Do a trial run by attempting one of your fears.
Step-by-Step Guide
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Step 1: Pinpoint your fears.
Before you can learn to overcome your communication apprehension, you must figure out exactly what it is that is scary or nerve-wrecking.
Construct an anxiety hierarchy to help you better understand your fears.Constructing an anxiety hierarchy starts with a list of situations where the anxiety is felt.
After the list is complete, you then rank them from the lowest level of anxiety all the way to the one situation with the highest level of stress.
The final list would normally contain between 10 and 20 items that begin with something that brings on so little anxiety is almost does not bother you to the one situation that gives you the most anxiety.
For example, an anxiety hierarchy for talking to your boss might look like this:
Saying hi to the boss in the hall Talking to the boss in her office in a neutral situation Answering a direct question from the boss when put on the spot Talking to the boss about a negative situation -
Step 2: Identify small ways you can face your fear.
While you may hear from some people the best thing to do is to ignore the fear, it is actually better to break down what is actually making you fearful and take small steps to work through that.If you are fearful of being in front of an audience, take a small step like making an effort to speak up at a meeting in front of a small group of other employees.
Work your way up to slightly larger groups.
If the fear is more related to speaking in front of strangers, a first small step could be as simple as making a call to a wrong number on purpose simply to force yourself to talk to a stranger.
Build from there by starting a conversation with a stranger waiting in line at a coffee shop. , If you fear speaking up in class, go through the motions of envisioning yourself doing this.
Practice how you would handle the situation and prepare as much as you can on the subject so you are ready to speak up without fear of the subject.Practice and role play the situation that is intimidating.
Become very familiar with whatever subject you are talking about so it becomes easier and almost second nature to talk about the subject.
This will help with your fear of forgetting the topic.
Making sure you feel confident in the subject will also allow you to focus on the topic instead of the audience.
You do not want to totally ignore the audience since you need to be aware of their reactions, but focusing on your mastery of the topic will take some of the focus off the audience. , This would include a combination of deep breathing, visual imagery and other methods discussed in this article.
As you are imagining your fears, you are likely to experience anxiety.
Use the techniques you have learned to return to a state of calm.
Over time, the anxiety-provoking situation won’t affect you as much., Avoid waiting to speak in front of a group until it is critical to your job or school life.
Give yourself time to succeed and testing grounds to make mistakes without the worry of messing up the “big speech”.Learn to work with your fear instead of trying to hide it.
When you try to hide the fear you may find yourself overcome by internal negative self speak that is almost always far worse than what the audience is actually thinking.
You do not need to like public speaking to be good at it and to do it successfully. -
Step 3: Imagine yourself in a distressing situation.
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Step 4: Use relaxation techniques as needed.
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Step 5: Do a trial run by attempting one of your fears.
Detailed Guide
Before you can learn to overcome your communication apprehension, you must figure out exactly what it is that is scary or nerve-wrecking.
Construct an anxiety hierarchy to help you better understand your fears.Constructing an anxiety hierarchy starts with a list of situations where the anxiety is felt.
After the list is complete, you then rank them from the lowest level of anxiety all the way to the one situation with the highest level of stress.
The final list would normally contain between 10 and 20 items that begin with something that brings on so little anxiety is almost does not bother you to the one situation that gives you the most anxiety.
For example, an anxiety hierarchy for talking to your boss might look like this:
Saying hi to the boss in the hall Talking to the boss in her office in a neutral situation Answering a direct question from the boss when put on the spot Talking to the boss about a negative situation
While you may hear from some people the best thing to do is to ignore the fear, it is actually better to break down what is actually making you fearful and take small steps to work through that.If you are fearful of being in front of an audience, take a small step like making an effort to speak up at a meeting in front of a small group of other employees.
Work your way up to slightly larger groups.
If the fear is more related to speaking in front of strangers, a first small step could be as simple as making a call to a wrong number on purpose simply to force yourself to talk to a stranger.
Build from there by starting a conversation with a stranger waiting in line at a coffee shop. , If you fear speaking up in class, go through the motions of envisioning yourself doing this.
Practice how you would handle the situation and prepare as much as you can on the subject so you are ready to speak up without fear of the subject.Practice and role play the situation that is intimidating.
Become very familiar with whatever subject you are talking about so it becomes easier and almost second nature to talk about the subject.
This will help with your fear of forgetting the topic.
Making sure you feel confident in the subject will also allow you to focus on the topic instead of the audience.
You do not want to totally ignore the audience since you need to be aware of their reactions, but focusing on your mastery of the topic will take some of the focus off the audience. , This would include a combination of deep breathing, visual imagery and other methods discussed in this article.
As you are imagining your fears, you are likely to experience anxiety.
Use the techniques you have learned to return to a state of calm.
Over time, the anxiety-provoking situation won’t affect you as much., Avoid waiting to speak in front of a group until it is critical to your job or school life.
Give yourself time to succeed and testing grounds to make mistakes without the worry of messing up the “big speech”.Learn to work with your fear instead of trying to hide it.
When you try to hide the fear you may find yourself overcome by internal negative self speak that is almost always far worse than what the audience is actually thinking.
You do not need to like public speaking to be good at it and to do it successfully.
About the Author
Isabella Turner
Creates helpful guides on crafts to inspire and educate readers.
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