Do You Feel Nervous When Speaking To People?

I used to find myself feeling really nervous when speaking to people. I'll explain why I think this is and suggest ways to prevent it from happening in future. What I say is based off of my own experiences and may not relate or help everyone. 

Why Might You Feel Nervous?

I believe it begins with predicting what someone is going to say, which means you're less required to concentrate and then your mind begins to drift. 

So, they've only just opened their mouth and you can already predict the end of the story - do you interrupt and finish it for them? No! While you're waiting for your queue to reply you begin to lose concentration, you start to think about what you're going to eat for dinner, if cats would endorse slavery or if that special someone is currently writing a reply to the text you sent them three days ago.

Do I Look Like I'm Concentrating?

How is this related to making you feel nervous? You're a polite, honest person and you start to worry and become nervous because you think - that they know - that your mind is drifting. Which 99.9% of the time, isn't the case!
You feel nervous because you don't want to
offend them by displaying a lack of concentration.
Have you ever walked down the street and said to yourself "Am I walking normally?". You start focusing on "walking normally" even though you already were. The same thing happens when when you question yourself "Do I look interested?". And so, you try to look more interested and the awkward dog picture summarises how you might feel.

How Can I Calm My Nerves and Feel Less Anxious? 

We're going to tackle this in four ways.

1. Firstly, learn  how to use your body language to manipulate your brain. 

Amy Cuddy explains how you can strike two minute power poses to decrease the amount of Cortisol (a primary hormone released when you're stressed) and increase the amount of Testosterone in your body. This will make you feel calmer and more confident.

2. Meditate - learn how to be mindful and live in the present. 

I believe the best thing I discovered while doing CBT (cognitive behavioural therapy) was - Headspace. I tried meditation before but couldn't get into it, the guided meditation sessions taught me how. Meditating to improve mindfulness helped me by:

• Preventing me from getting caught up in repetitive thoughts. 
• Living in the present so I can fully concentrate on people and my surroundings. 
• Improving my chances of a deep sleep with lucid dreams.
• Keeping my level of anxiety down so I can approach any situation calmly.

There are many more ways meditation can help you. I believe the ones listed above are most relative to helping you from feeling nervous when talking to people. 

3. Embrace Vulnerability. 

You may not be perfect, but that doesn't mean you're not enough. Be yourself and do not hold back for fear of embarrassment, rejection or ridicule. You will get the most from life by embracing vulnerability, facing things with a positive attitude as apposed to hiding from them with a negative attitude. Brené Brown explains this a lot better in the Ted talk below.
 

4. Like, Understand, Forgive and Pity People.

You are your surroundings and your experiences. Philip Zimbardo explains how almost everybody can become evil. This may seem irrelevant, the reason I want you to watch this is because I've found with an improved understanding of people I am in a better situation to like them, understand, forgive and pity them. With the alleviation of being irritated and disliking people you'll feel a lot less stressed in general.



If you're looking for more ways to improve your understanding of people I recommend - How To Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie.

To become more a more positive person and to attract more positive situations I recommend you investigate The Law of Attraction. I read Esther and Jerry Hicks take on this.