There have been studies that claim that public speaking is the number one fear among people. According to Nick Morgan (Forbes.com, 2015), people would rather die than give the eulogy at the funeral.
On Nov. 4th, I presented my Ice Breaker Project speech for the CSUSB Toastmasters Club. The Ice Breaker Project speech is about speaking about a familiar subject, which means talk about yourself. I chose to speak about my cancer experience and shared how the inFAMOUS video game franchise inspired me to move forward with my life.
The title of my speech was called Nothing is More Powerful than a Made up Mind. I wrote out my speech and studied it for three days before going to the Toastmasters meeting. I was focused on nailing this speech, because this was the first time I prepared a speech and was going to speak in front of my fellow Toastmasters.
While I was speaking about my experience with cancer, I had a slideshow playing on my fire HD 10 tablet in front of me. The slideshow consisted of different pictures of me while I was sick, along with screenshots from the inFAMOUS franchise.
I also showed the album covers from my favorite artists that helped me overcome similar adversities. The artists and albums were Nas’ Stillmatic, The Pharcyde’s Labcabincalifornia and Blu & Exile’s Give Me My Flowers While I Could Still Smell Them.
I started the slideshow slightly before I went into my speech. I paused for three seconds on purpose to see any reactions, and they were surprised. When I first started speaking, I was nervous, but as time passed I got more confident in what I was saying. I hit all the main points I wanted and got my point across clearly.
Overall, I did great and got a standing ovation from my fellow Toastmasters. They also gave me great feedback. For instance, they said I looked natural speaking about my cancer experience, and were impressed that I remembered statistics and rarely had to look at my notes.
Since I was nervous, there were somethings I was doing that I wasn’t aware of while I was speaking. For example, I was doing some distracting hand gestures which took away from my speech, and I spoke a bit in monotone. These are things I could work on and will make sure not do during my next speech.
From my Ice Breaker speech, my fellow Toastmasters got to learn about the most difficult struggle I had to go through while I was in my teen years. My evaluator said that through my speech, everybody got to learn about my determination and how I didn’t let cancer conquer me, because I conquered it.
I feel I did a great job for my first prepared speech, and I would give myself an 8/10. I definitely see the progress towards being a better public speaker. I believe my altruistic approach for helping people, along with my determination and passion is what will lead me towards my destiny.
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