“The number one fear in the world, ahead of even the fear of death, is the fear of public speaking”

The fear of public speaking is extremely common, most polished speakers experienced it. Facing your fear is a huge advantage in your career especially if you catch your boss’s attention. It shows you have communication skills.

Some tips to help you get over that fear and jump start your career:

Practice in advance in front of a mirror:Yes, in front of a full length mirror. it has a great value.The mirror will make every move you make distracting, you will notice if you are getting sweaty,if you spit while you speak. More important, you will notice if you move back and forth, if you say “um” ,”ah” and “you know”. in brief, the mirror allows you to be aware of subtl distractiong actions you do. Those actions are the reason why speeches go bad so often.

Practice your speech facing a wall: The opposite scenario as compared to the practice facing a mirror. Speaking in front of a wall will allow you to block out all distractions and focus exclusively on the content of your speech. You might feel silly at first (it’s fine and a lot of people feel that at first) but this practice will help you identify the parts in your speech that you are struggling with, where the speech is weak. Go on, hammer your way around the house.

Practice with a friend: Amore relaxing way to deliver in the presence of a friend. He will understand your point of view, ask questions and should give honest feedback (what parts were easy to understand and where he struggled to follow you). If a friend will only tell you what you want to hear, find someone else.

Practice with a peer (non-friend):  A useful technique because it will add some pressure. The pressure of actually delivering the speech is much higher but this is an opportunity to test a non-friend pressure.

Record yourself: Asimple tip but very useful. Recording your speech and critiquing yourself is extremely important because you will be able to identify and correct flaws.

Do a dry run: Get to the venue before the big presentation, have a feeling of the place and do a dry run. Make sure to practice your speech exactly as if there was an audience. Make it as realistic as possible (yes, use the microphone). the more realistic your dry run is, the easier it will be when the big day comes.

So by now you should know that the key to overcome that fear is practice. Doing it under different conditions and various scenarios will make you more relaxed , more confident and will reduce your anxiety. Practice however could make you feel bored and time consuming but it’s worth it. The more you practice,the more improvements you will see.

Practice makes perfection!

Now, if you think delivering a speech is a hard thing to do, try Stand-up Comedy!

"Find something you love to do and you’ll never have to work a day in your life.”

                                                      Harvey Mackay, author

In other words, it’s easier to work in something you are passionate about (it wont feel like work at all) than to be stuck in a 9-5 job that you don’t mind and sometimes hate.

Although this option isn’t always available for everyone (social situation, money restrictions, vacancies, etc…), the trick is to have a positive attitude and build up some passion about your current work.

Any trade/office job has its secrets and its benefits. To make it easier on you, dig deeper. Become an expert in what you do even if you didn’t like it at first.

The more you know, the easier your work becomes and the more you’ll end up enjoying it.

People hate their job for many reasons (Too complex / Not interesting / Pays little / etc…) and they won’t make the effort to fully understand it due to lack of interest. By changing your attitude, the job you hate will become easier and more appealing thus less annoying. I’m not saying don’t pursuit your ultimate job, I’m saying don’t spend your days feeling bitter about what you are currently working on. Your ideal job will come sooner or later; the road to it is full of pit stops in few inconvenient places but necessary to tune your skills, sharpen your mind and to gain experience. I worked in not so “normal” places; sometimes I didn’t enjoy it at all for different reasons. I ended up learning how to deal with a moody boss, a frustrated customer and to take charge and run a meeting. At the time, I couldn’t really see all the benefits but i made sure to have a positive attitude.

At the moment, I find myself deeply satisfied with the way Careerbox.net is progressing! I'm just enjoying it and it doesnt feel like work at all!

All in Attitude! Build up a passion about it and embrace the experience.

A nice story sent by MG:
The pastor entered his donkey in a race and it won.
The pastor was so pleased with the donkey that he entered it in the race again, and it won again.
The local paper read: PASTOR’S ASS OUT FRONT
The Bishop was so upset with this kind of publicity that he ordered the pastor not to enter the donkey in another race.
The next day, the local paper headline read: BISHOP SCRATCHES PASTOR’S ASS.

This was too much for the bishop, so he ordered the pastor to get rid of the donkey.
The pastor decided to give it to a nun in a nearby convent. The local paper, hearing of the news, posted the following headline The next day: NUN HAS BEST ASS IN TOWN.
The bishop fainted.
He informed the nun that she would have to get rid of the donkey, so she sold it to a farmer for $10. The next day the paper read: NUN SELLS ASS FOR $10.
This was too much for the bishop, so he ordered the nun to buy back the donkey and lead it to the plains where it could run wild. The next day the headlines read:NUN ANNOUNCES HER ASS IS WILD AND FREE.

The bishop was buried the next day.

The moral of the story is . . . Being concerned about public opinion can bring you much grief and misery . . Even shorten your life. So be yourself and enjoy life.
Stop worrying about everyone else’s ass and you’ll be a lot happier and live longer!

It looks that i haven’t blogged for a while now due to many reasons (working on other projects, being on vacation).

Anyway, let’s talk about how to maintain your work and life balance. How to improve your quality of life without affecting your quality of work. I find the following very helpful:

• Don’t bring your work back home with you: easier said than done, but try to avoid it. Finish what you have to do in the office, go home and relax.You earned it. An exception would be a deadline or an emergency but that’s why it’s called an exception.

• Seek and do whatever makes you happy: we all have to do different sort of tasks,some of them would bring us more satisfaction than others. Do those more often and minimize the rest. This doesn’t happen overnight, take some time to think about “happy tasks” and try to incorporate them in your routine.

• Don’t stay inside: make it a point to go outside the office, it always feels good under the sun.

• Go on holidays: do i need to say more? well maybe this small tip: “Stay away from the computer”. There’s a time and a place for everything. A friend once said to me: ” Work never ends while life does”.

• Be good in what you do: if you are a guru in your work, the stress becomes something from the past. If you are not an expert, look for training or ask for help and soon enough you’ll become one. I find unqualified people working in vain for extra hours, stressing over tasks and messing up their personal life only to achieve so little. You lose on both ends.

hope my tips helped you , feel free to drop me your thoughts on the subject and hopefully I’ll be posting more often now that I’m back.

This story is an ‘alleged’ transcript of an actual radio conversation between a US naval ship and Canadian maritime contact off the coast of Newfoundland in October 1995.
Unfortunately this tale is not true, but it is nevertheless a great story:

Americans: Please divert your course 15 degrees North to avoid a collision.

Canadians: Recommend you divert YOUR course 15 degrees South to avoid collision.

Americans: This is the captain of a US navy ship; I say again divert your course.

Canadians: No. I say again, you divert YOUR course.

Americans: THIS IS THE AIRCRAFT CARRIER USS LINCOLN, THE SECOND LARGEST SHIP IN THE UNITED STATES’ ATLANTIC FLEET. WE ARE ACCOMPANIED BY THREE DESTROYERS, THREE CRUISERS AND NUMEROUS SUPPORT VESSELS. I DEMAND THAT YOU CHANGE YOUR COURSE 15 DEGREES NORTH, THAT’S ONE FIVE DEGREES NORTH, OR COUNTER-MEASURES WILL BE UNDERTAKEN TO ENSURE THE SAFETY OF THIS SHIP.

Canadians: We are a lighthouse; your call