Triumph!

Many of you, who know me personally, know that my avocation is guitar playing. It has been a part of my life for nearly 60 years. I do my own composing, recording and play the odd concert, recital, and coffeehouse. The reason for sharing this with you, is to recount a story from long ago, that changed my life, and might be of interest and help to you.

Years ago, I suffered from stage fright. It interfered with any public speaking situation as well as playing my guitar for an audience. In time, a career move required public speaking and presentations to be given on a daily basis. The rest of this story was unbelievable timing for me. The day before my debut presentation to a large group of financial advisors in Chicago, I attended a live, up close-concert, by jazz guitarist, Barney Kessel. He was my idol, at the time. After the concert I was able to speak with him for thirty minutes. Among other things, we discussed performance anxiety. His advice was to simply be authentic. If you make a mistake, play around it, or acknowledge it and move on. This is exactly what he did, that night, during his performance. He had introduced one of his personal compositions started to play it and then stopped! He pulled the microphone over and said, “I’m sorry, but that’s not the way this song goes. I wrote it, but just played it the wrong way. So, if you don’t mind, I’ll start over.” He then proceeded to play it perfectly to a standing ovation. His endearing introduction and touch of humility, absolutely, won the audience over, and changed my life at that moment.

I decided, then and there, that if a real professional could do that and live with it, I could easily handle the presentation I was to do in Chicago two days later. The rest is history, as they say. My presentation to more than 100 advisors was a hit and I enjoyed every minute of it! Never again have I experienced performance anxiety. This was my personal triumph! In fact, I now love speaking and presenting. By the last estimate, I have made more than 3000 presentations and still look forward to every opportunity afforded me.

If you experience stress when speaking in public or when presenting, remember my story! It is my hope that you will find my story useful and that you too, will become comfortable with your presentations. Just be your authentic self, like my idol Barney Kessel did, and just do it!

Endnote:

Sadly, Barney Kessel died in May of 2004 of brain cancer, and owned no life insurance.  Please offer your professional services to everyone!