One of the themes that was especially strong at one of my recent workshops was how comparing ourselves with others - which often co-exists with feelings of competition, either subtle or blatant - leads to increased feelings of inner pressure, tension, and stress and ultimately feeds our performance fear. We have a tendency to judge how we are doing relative to others, checking to see how we stack up on the scale. Often we compare ourselves with those we perceive to be calm, poised, and seemingly at ease with speaking or performing and we feel diminished by comparison. We assume this based on peoples' outer appearance and have no idea how they are really feeling inside of themselves. People used to comment to me about how confident and at-ease I was as a speaker and little did they know that I was panicked inside. As they say, "Don't judge a book by its cover" because you never really know the truth of what is going on inside of another person unless they choose to tell you.

Even if we compare ourselves to those we feel better than, that can lead us down the wrong path as well. It can inflate us for the moment (the ego loves to feel better than others) but it sets us up for the next comparison and judgment when we will inevitably feel deflated. 

Another comparison we often make is to our own idealized standard of how we think we "should" be feeling and appearing in our speaking or performing role and, again, we feel diminished by comparison to the expectations we place upon ourselves. 

So, if you want to practice one concrete way to stop feeding this fear, it is to stop the comparisons/competition with others or with your own idealized standards and expectations. It can be challenging to break the habit of doing this, as we often do it without awareness. Like anything else you are attempting to change, it requires increased consciousness and willingness to put in the effort to change our ways.

A better way is to observe yourself and others without judgment - to notice what is happening without putting you or others against a measuring stick of who is better and who is worse. One of the recent workshop participants had a particularly noticeable shift away from experiencing a lot of anticipatory anxiety when he stopped framing his performance as a win/lose proposition. He simply decided to change the rules of his game and stop pressuring himself to compete against his own high standards and expectations. Sometimes we believe we need to set these high standards and expectations to excel, but his experience showed him and other group members that by taking the pressure off yourself, and allowing yourself to relax and go with the flow, you can often create the conditions to be at your very best.

Mental Toughness  

I recently listened to a tape series called "Mental Toughness Training", by Jim Loehr and Peter McLaughlin, who are personal performance coaches working with athletes and corporate executives. They speak about the importance of managing energy to be at your best in a performance situation and the need to pay careful attention to balancing time for rest and renewal with times of challenge and stress. 

They also speak of the importance of training your mind to view problems and difficulties as challenges, rather than threats or obstacles, and to create a positive state of readiness in stepping up to challenges as a way of strengthening yourself. They further note the importance of a good attitude in shaping one's mindset to be positive and focused.

In speaking about energy, they note four possibilities: High Positive, Low Positive, High Negative, or Low Negative. Most of us know well what the High Negative state feels like when we face a speaking or performing situation - a state where we experience highly charged negative emotions, thought patterns, and images of the dreaded event. This High Negative state may vacillate a bit with Low Negative, where at times we move into a lower negative energy state when we walk around feeling tense, irritable, and burdened, as though a black cloud is hovering over our heads. 

Rarely do we move into a Low Positive State as we anticipate a speaking or performing event and we likely never move into a High Positive State (unless, perhaps, we are consciously and deliberately applying the new skills we are learning and trying to channel our fear into excitement).

These positive energy states are important to cultivate to move us to a peak performance state of mind and body. The good news is that you can actively train your mind and body to cultivate more positive states through shaping your mental attitudes, images, and thought patterns.

First, we have to become conscious of our negative, self-defeating patterns and put a stop to them as quickly as possible. Then, we have to replace them with positive attitudes, imagery, and thought patterns (and "act as if" you feel this way even if you don't genuinely feel so positive - this is the idea behind shaping your behavior towards success).

These ideas remind me of the concept of imprinting, which I recently heard spoken about at a seminar I attended. The idea here is that patterns of thought, emotion, attitude and behavior get imprinted in us as automatic, conditioned responses to life situations. The more we repeat the thoughts, emotions, attitudes and behaviors, the stronger the imprint becomes.

We can apply the ideas of imprinting and energy states to our speaking and performing experiences. The negative imprint (energy state) in our mind and body is one of tension, worry, fear, panic, dread, self-doubt, and avoidance. Consider that every time you engage in these High or Low Negative energy states you are reinforcing the old imprint and it is adding more strength to the negative cycle. (A caution here: do not blame yourself if you get caught up in this negativity as this will only add further fuel to the negative state; instead, do your best to rebound and try to shift to a more positive state as quickly as you can.)

One way to release negative energy states is to do several strong and full exhalations of your breath (ideally audibly if no one is around) and imagine releasing the negativity with each out-breath. Alternate this with full, deep inhalations of breath (also audibly if you can), imagining breathing in the positive state you want to create within yourself.

It is possible to consciously change your imprint to public speaking and performing situations, releasing High/Low Negative States that have been strongly conditioned and cultivating High/Low Positive States - thoughts, feelings, attitudes and images of openness, faith and trust, readiness to embrace the challenge, mental toughness, strength, excitement, enjoyment and relaxation. Again, you may have to "act as If" initially if this seems like too far of a stretch from where you are right now. At some point, after much repetition, you will start to imprint a more positive state and it will become easier to create. Be very patient and forgiving towards yourself whenever you lapse back into old patterns and use these times to practice rebounding and recovering as quickly as possible.