Why You Struggle to Speak Confidently

when you communicate at work let's say in a meeting or with your co-workers do you ever struggle to speak confidently you might spend entire conversations being physically present but never sharing your thoughts because you don't know what to say or how to say it you might have regrets after meetings or conversations thinking I should have said this I should have said that you look at how other people share their ideas publicly at work and think to yourself wow they share their ideas with so much confidence I wish I could speak confidently like that and because you're genuinely worried that your inability to speak confidently is what's holding you back from reaching your full potential at work you've clicked on this video speaking with confidence is a struggle that many professionals deal with on a daily basis you might think that you are the only one in the room who deals with this but I know from my experience working with my clients the majority of them come to me because they have difficulty speaking confidently in public situations especially at work especially in meetings and especially in public presentations there are many reasons as to why this happens and the first one is you're worried about what others will think specifically you fear that people will judge you in some negative way so you remain quiet and you don't contribute to the conversation in your mind it's safer to stay quiet than to say the wrong thing and reveal that you're not really that competent at all but when you do this you're essentially making yourself invisible and this is one of the biggest mistakes that emerging leaders can make because people who are invisible often get overlooked for promotions and for higher opportunities they're essentially stopping themselves from reaching their full potential all because they're worried about what other people will think whereas if you share what's on your mind your thoughts and your opinions and your ideas you make yourself present you make yourself visible and visible in the mind minds of those important decision makers plus it's a great form of self-promotion without the tackiness that turns a lot of people off of self-promotion so how do you overcome the fear of what other people will think well the first thing you need to remember is that it is okay to be wrong this is something that holds a lot of people back from speaking up in meetings they're worried what they say will be wrong their idea or their opinion will be wrong and that other people will disagree I want want you to remember being wrong isn't a failure being wrong is a learning opportunity and simply by sharing your opinion and your idea you might actually learn that you are in fact right not wrong also remember that people aren't that focused on you they're really focused on themselves for the exact same reason that you are focused on yourself and for the same reason you're worried about what others will think of you you have to remember that everybody is the lead actor in their own story so don't worry so much about what people think of you remember they're worried about what people think of them the second reason you struggle to speak confidently is that you are worried about not sounding intelligent meaning you're worried that people will think you were a dumb and they might start to question your overall level of competence at work this is somewhat linked to the previous point where you worry about what others will think but it has a narrow focus on intelligence because in the workplace there's a lot of pressure to be or to appear intelligent in many cases is probably why you were hired for your intelligence and for your competence so to put yourself in a situation where this might be questioned is risky it's often safer to not reveal a lack of intelligence and to stay quiet but just like what I mentioned in the previous point this makes you invisible and rather than being fired for not being intelligent enough you might be fired because you don't add anything to the team how can you overcome the fear of not being intelligent enough well you need to remember that you were hired for a reason at some stage in your career Journey somebody in that company thought that you were intelligent and competent enough to do your job and to contribute to the team live up to their expectations of you and contribute with confidence take note of when people respond positively to your ideas and when they respond positively to what you have to say this will help you to retrain your your brain and to believe that you are truly intelligent and build up your knowledge base so sometimes you might fear that you lack intelligence simply because you don't know enough about the topic that's being discussed so build up your knowledge base in that area and contribute again to the conversation at a later time the third reason that you struggle to speak confidently is because you are intimidated by other people this can happen when you're in conversations with people who are older who are more experienced or or those who have stronger personalities than you do you're worried they will question what you have to say disagree with you or think that you are not intelligent enough like in the previous point in order to deal with this you might share your ideas in a passive way to kind of test the waters or you might not share your own ideas at all and simply agree with what everyone else has said the fix to this is you need to remember everybody started from the beginning just because they are older or more experienced doesn't mean that they started from that point it's very likely that they started from where you are now or even an earlier position so don't be embarrassed about sharing your ideas or your opinions with somebody who is more experienced or more senior than you do it with confidence also remember that just because they are older and more experienced doesn't mean that they know more than you about the topic being discussed you could have a higher level of competence and intelligence about the topic being disc discussed because you are working in that topic a lot more the fourth reason you struggle to speak confidently is because you are not prepared enough meaning you haven't put enough research or planning into the topic at hand to build up a knowledge base large enough so you can speak confidently about that topic this is completely normal nobody can expect you to speak confidently about a topic that you know nothing about I would not be able to speak confidently about the topic of the solar system or a star constellations because I don't know anything about these topics similarly if you asked to present on the topic of a leadership and you don't know much about it you might have a lot of difficulty speaking confidently about that topic in order to speak confidently about any topic you need to have a certain level of knowledge about that topic to start with in order to prepare yourself to speak confidently about a topic you need to get to know your content if you're asked to present on a specific topic make sure you prepare really really well so you know your content inside out before you present on it practice is really really important as well practice what you're going to say either verbally or in writing if you have enough time this will help you to get familiar with the content so you can speak confidently about it plan out points this is really handy to use in meetings where you can jot down some points about what you want to talk about before every speaking opportunity and if you're in a conversation where the topic is unfamiliar to you and you still want to contribute with confidence then I recommend that you ask questions this will help you to show interest in the topic to show interest in what that person is saying and it will also encourage them to explain Concepts to you so you will not only learn but you will also look like you are in the conversation and also confident in the conversation the fifth reason you struggle to speak with confidence is is because you are anxious anxiety is a confidence killer it will make you feel that you are not competent or not intelligent enough it will make you forget your acquired knowledge so you can't communicate it confidently how this happens is when you are anxious it triggers the fight ORF flight response in your body and in that moment because your body is preparing itself to fight or to survive all of the bodily functions go from your brain to the parts of the body where you need them the most at that time for running and for fighting so they go to your legs they go to your arms they go to the core of your body you'll often feel physical symptoms of this your heart rate will increase your legs might go weak you might become a bit breathless you might even start to sweat all of this happens because your body is preparing itself to fight or to run and it takes away the resources from your brain in order to do do this but it's in your brain where you need these resources for things like communication and for cognitive thinking so if in times of stress when you are anxious you forget your thoughts and you can't communicate confidently or you can't communicate at all it's probably because of the fight ORF flight response to combat this try to use breathing techniques make sure you breathe deep down into your diaphragm make sure you exhale all of the air that you have breathed in do this two to five times and you will immediately start to feel a lot calmer and a lot more confident too also reframe your expectations because you might be thinking that people expect more of you than what they actually do quite often this Gap in expectations between what we feel other people expect from us and what they actually do expect from us can cause us to feel that we're not contributing enough that we are not contributing in the way that they would like that we're not meeting their expectations so I want you to reframe your expectations so that you can start to feel more confident about your position in the team about your seat at the table if you're in a meeting and so you can start to feel more confident about yourself as a professional overall the sixth reason you struggle to speak confidently is because your body language puts you in a shy State meaning the body language that you use doesn't help you to project or to feel any confidence at all there's been quite a lot of research done in the field of body language and confidence the most notable research was done by Amy cudy and her colleagues in 2010 they found that certain body language postures specifically high power poses trigger a hormonal change in your body and can help you feel more confident they basically put put you in a state of confidence so you can handle whatever situation you're in much better people have found that using her suggested high power posers before meetings or before public presentations has helped them feel a lot more confident during that meeting or during that presentation personally the clients I've worked with have used these high power posers before meetings before presentations to the courtroom because they are lawyers and they have also told me that those High power opposers really helped them feel a lot more confident in that situation and helped them to speak a lot more confidently as well if using high power poses can help you feel more confident then one can say that using low power poses can make you feel a lack of confidence and maybe that is the reason why you are not feeling confident in situations that you want to be confident in to improve your communication and help you speak confidently I recommend that you take up more space when you're standing try to stand with your leg slightly wider than shoulder width apart take up more space when you stand when you are sitting in a meeting or at some kind of table try to take up more space with your arms try to use the armrests on your chair to take up space with your elbows try to take up space on the desk in front of you spread your papers out or even sit at the desk with your elbows on the table and your hands clasped in front of you also use good eye contact when you're feeling shy or when you're feeling a lack of confidence you might avoid looking people in the eye you might look down toward the ground or down at your papers on the table so I want to encourage you to use good eye contact to look people in the eye when you talk to them or when they are talking to you as well and I encourage you to keep your head high because when you're feeling that you are not confident you'll tend to look down toward the ground you will close off your neck area whereas if you were proud if you were happy if you were confident you're likely to keep your head high just a little so by physically keeping your head high it will help you to look confident to other people and it might help you to eventually feel confident inside as well when you start to use more confident body language you will start to feel more confident inside and you will better be able to communicate your thoughts in a confident way too the seventh reason you don't speak confidently is because past experien has taught you to not be confident meaning previous interactions with people have been negative and it's been ingrained in you that you shouldn't be confident or you shouldn't speak in a confident way maybe you spoke confidently in the past but whenever you did so people tried to push you down because you can't rise higher than the other people in the group tall poppy they might have made fun of you they might have told you that you were showing off with your knowledge or because they were intimidated by you as a professional so over time you've learned that it's safer to be quiet to hide your intelligence and to comply with their expectations and it's so ingrained in you now you don't know how to speak confidently you need to reverse this mindset you need to erase this past negative experience and build your self-confidence on new experiences surround yourself with people who are supportive those who are going to Champion you and your ideas start to share your ideas gradually over time start to share more ideas start to share stronger ideas and you'll eventually learn that people actually respond positively to your ideas and what you have to say see through those who try to keep you down usually it's because they feel threatened by you one thing that happens when you can't speak confidently is that you struggle to articulate your thoughts clearly these two things kind of go hand inand so if this is something that you struggle with then this video up here will definitely help you out thank you so much for watching this video I hope you got a lot of valuable content from it if you did like it please hit the like button below subscribe to my channel as well for more content like this in the future and I will see you next week in another video

Channel: Kara Ronin

Views: 23,958

Keywords: Why you struggle to speak confidently, Why you can't speak confidently, Why you can't speak in a confident way, Why you struggle to speak in a confident way, Unable to speak confidently at work, Speak confidently, Speak with confidence, Speak with confidence at work, I want to speak more confidently, Confident communication at work, Speak with more confidence, Stop being shy when speaking, How to speak with confidence at work, How to communicate with confidence

Id: QRRf7WunZ34

Length: 15min 17sec (917 seconds)

Published: Tue Jan 09 2024