What do you do to calm down before presentations?
This thread was created for people to share their advice on how they calm themselves before delivering a presentation.I personally don't have a way to calm myself,I always have anxiety attacks beforehand,and end up not being able to present properly.So,what do you do to calm yourself down?
This is just a short-term physiological solution, but if you take a deep breath, hold it for 5-10 seconds, and then let it out slowly, it can help relieve/calm some of the physical symptoms of anxiety.
Oh, what a good idea for a thread. Over the years I've had success with different methods, I'll share a few here.
1) Being prepared. My anxiety is noticeably worse if I don't practice the presentation beforehand.
2) Focus on something else (breathe, chat with someone, do a puzzle... whatever works). In the moments before the presentation, try and put the presentation out of your mind, trust that your practice beforehand will get you through.
3) Watch other presentations. This is a bit vague, but for me I realized somewhere along the way that I wasn't judging those who were doing presentations. If they had slip-ups I didn't think any less of them, in fact I saw their strength in continuing the presentation even after the goof. Knowing this helped me feel like others aren't thinking less of me either when I do presentations.