Public Speaking - Creating Confidence After You Really Screw Up

Why is it that when we make a mistake, we tend to kick ourselves in the head over and over, cursing ourselves, feeling crummy and discouraged? Do we really think that that's going to help us in some way?

Last week my husband and I went to hear my friend Tom play at a jazz club in Santa Rosa. Tom plays bass in my jazz trio, but this night he was playing bass with his own trio made up of a pianist and a drummer.

As we were sitting there, listening to the music, sipping Zinfandel and contemplating the menu, Tom called me up to sing a few tunes. An invitation to sing! My favorite thing. So, jumped up and sang a Cole Porter tune, which went very well. What fun!

The trouble started in the second set when Tom asked me to come up and sing again. Sure, you betcha! As the pianist launched into the tune, "Skylark," I couldn't really hear my first note from his introduction but I just opened my mouth and took a guess. A wrong guess. I started wrong, quickly found my way to the right pitch, and the rest of the song went beautifully.

Ah, but that first note! The very first one! To screw that up, ugh!

Even though I went on to sing a fun duet with Tom, even though I had sung well all night, I couldn't stop mulling over my previous mistake. Damn, that first note of "Skylark."

Now, if you were me and that had happened to you, I would be squawking at you, saying, "One bad note? How many other notes did you sing perfectly? What about how much fun you had singing? What about how well you interpreted that song and all the others? And what about how quickly you recovered and went on to nail that tune? How come you're not focusing and replaying all of that?"

Yeah, how come?

Here's the deal. When you keep replaying your mistake and feeling badly about it, you are not helping yourself. In fact, you are actually increasing your chances of it, or something worse, happening again. Why? Because you are feeding it with your attention. You are reinforcing it in your experience. It's as if you are mentally practicing your mistake. You are also feeding your doubt, anxiety and fear, which are three monsters you don't want to feed.

Stop it!

Do this instead. After every public speaking experience, take a long inventory of all the things that went well, all the things you loved, all the things you want to do again. Then, only after you've appreciated everything that went well, take note of what you want to change, what you would have done differently. Then sit and recreate that experience in your mind, except this time let it unfold exactly as you want it to go.

When you do this after every performance or speech, you pre-pave the way for the next experience to be all the more wonderful and satisfying. You reinforce and give energy to what you do want, rather then empower what you don't want. You connect to your confidence, your capacity, and your greatness, rather than your doubt, worry and fear.

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