My brother told me once that COURAGE is knowing your fears but willing to deal with it heads on! I have always known that I have a fear of being on stage and fear of public speaking. But I have been determined to overcome both!
I had a fear of the stage! On a scale of 1 – 10 in terms of confidence level, I was a minus 2. But after 6 months of Toastmaster, my confidence level got to 5 which was good enough for me back then so I stopped going. But I am determined to get to level 9 therefore decided to go back to TM starting this week.
Thanks to Paul for inviting me to check out an Advanced Toastmaster Club on April 21/16! Wow! I so LOVE the structure of this club! Very different from a regular TM! Excellent feedback by advanced and professional speakers after every speech. The 6 speakers today REALLY inspired me. I am so determined to become one of them some day! I want to feel like I own that stage! Can’t wait to check out other Advance TM clubs soon!
Four days later, I watched the Toastmaster contest. I have a really weird feeling today compared with how I felt last Saturday at the Advanced Club. I was really inspired and all those things were super positive but then I also felt really discouraged: the reality of being like them is so far from me. I felt that I set an unreachable goal! But this feeling didn’t last long. Fortunately. After a while, I just felt like reality was starting to kick in. Suddenly, I didn’t feel intimated anymore. I know that the journey will be a lot longer than I’d fantasized. But I won’t give up. Not just yet. Will continue to pursue becoming a more confident speaker someday.