Personal Essay
I had always been fascinated by the skills possessed by the great public speakers. It was a pleasure to witness the power of expression displayed by the orators. I always thought that, to get the recognition and popularity, oratory is the best method. Every time I was swayed by any eloquent speaker, the desire to imitate the performance, similar to one that witnessed, arose. However, there was a big problem that always held me back from taking the initiative. It was the fear of being mocked in the event of performance going haywire. Whenever I thought of addressing a gathering, I visualized myself getting stuck in the middle of the speech and people making fun of me. Sometimes, I imagined that, before saying a single word, I would start trembling, my body would be perspiring, my tongue would be getting tied and my performance would be a flop show. It was this doubt and imaginary fear, due to which, I had to suppress my desire to fulfill the ambition of becoming a recognised public speaker. That is how many years passed, and a day came that changed the whole perception I had about my speaking skills.
It so happened that, as per the tradition of my school, eloqution competition was going to be conducted after few days. As usual, I wanted to stay away from participating in it and I was content to watch the skills showcased by the participants. From every class, at least one name had to be given. Normally, there was a student from my class who would participate and represent all my class in the competition. Unfortunately, the student concerned was sick and had not been coming to schools for several days. So, several names came up for consideration and, finally, my name was considered fit for the replacement. I wanted to back out due to lack of confidence and experience. But, since the whole class had unanimously approved my name, it would have been very insulting to withdraw from the contest. I had to live up to the faith reposed in me by my all classmates. As decided, my name was put forward for the competition that was to take place ten days later. The next step was to gather the information needed for a war like situation. Luckily, I got an easy topic- Air Pollution. It was easy to prepare the script because lot of relevant information I found in my textbook itself. The rest was collected from other sources like internet, magazine etc.
Being equipped with the adequate speech material, the next task was to memorize it. This was, perhaps, the biggest mistake, which had the potential to spoil all my hard work. In fact, my teacher had warned me against this method, still I decided to go ahead with it as I was good at mugging up. I thought the public speech was just the verbal form of the written exam and I would easily replicate the good performance put up in the written format. For the next few days, the rigorous practice continued and I made sure that every word of my speech gets firmly engraved in my mind.
Finally, the crucial day arrived. I got up early in the morning ing and revised the whole script. Everything appeared to be perfect. The event of elocution began and I was third to be called. I hardly listened to the first two speakers as I was revising my own script in mind. Then came the moment when my name was announced. My heart beat rose to an extent that I found it difficult to get up from the seat. The performance anxiety had started taking over me. By the time, I took my position on the stage, I saw that all eyes were gazing me. In reaction, my mind went completely blank. I only remembered the topic of my speech and rest had been washed away from my memory. Anyhow, I made the beginning but could not sustain the speech for long. Very soon, the nervousness obstructed my speech and I came to an abrupt halt. I tried hard to recall at least few broken elements of my script to save my face, but to no avail. Finding no way to continue, I had to leave the stage in humiliation. The only consoling factor was that the audience still clapped for my performance, far from being acceptable. Perhaps, they appreciated my courage to face the audience and an honest attempt to say something despite having forgotten the whole speech. My flop show shook me badly and dented my confidence. More than my own insult, I was feeling guilty of letting my all classmates down. The next day when I entered my class, I could not face my classmates. But, to my pleasant surprise, nobody asked me anything about the horrible experience. It appeared that my teacher had instructed them in advance, not to discuss this issue any more. Had it not happened, I would have broken down in the class itself. I spent the subsequent period in analyzing the factors responsible for my setbacks.
Over the period of time, I detected all the mistakes made by me in the first public appearance. I discovered that, to speak well, I should have chosen the words coming from the bottom of my heart. In other words, my script should been be my own. The next was the delivery factor. There should have been a proper rhythm during the speech. Subsequently, I downloaded many speeches from internet and started working on the diction and intonation. I was determined to erase the blot caused by my first encounter with audience. The final corrective measure needed to have maximum exposure to the public speech. I participated in every event, however small, that would allow me to address the group of people. I also wanted to see my body language while speaking. So, I bought a video camera with which I recorded my speech and later watched it as a critic. This exposed me to see if the movements of body were consistent with the words being spoken. Besides my own observation, I also wanted to know how others felt about my performance on the stage. Therefore, I sought the reaction of my friends and my foes also. I took the opinion of my unfriendly class mates more seriously than the friendly ones. A friend may lie to please me but a hostile mate will speak the truth, something crucial for my improvement. This practice continued till the last day in my native country.
My migration, as an international student, to a different country didn’t change my pattern of honing my communication skills. Even now, I maintain the same approach as I practised in my home country. As per my evaluation at regular interval, I still have a long way to go as a speaker. Despite the practice of rigorous public speaking for quite some time, yet I have not become an orator. But the journey continues with hope and enthusiasm. I make sure that, at least for half an hour every day, I practice speaking in front of a virtual audience, which means that I imagine that there is an audience and address it.
This experience has taught me a great lesson that it is the fear of failure of a task that makes it more difficult and painful than the task itself. The only way to decimate the fear is to do the same work over and over again and to learn from the mistakes made in the previous attempts. By doing so, my fear has been replaced by the confidence of speaking before the audience. Now, when my name is announced for the next address, my heart beat does rise, but not beyond my control. I have succeeded in checking every undesirable distraction during the public speech. Truly, every discovery requires initiative, efforts and persistence and the self-discovery is no exception to this rule. I thank again my previous classmates and my teachers who enabled me to discover, recognize and develop the speaking talent in me that had been lying dormant for years. I can sum up my self-discovery in the form of the following couplet.
The fear of failure takes the flight.
