BOY OH BOY. Who knew public speaking could take over my body with such ease? For starters let me give you some background context so you know what i’m talking about! This past Wednesday 12/5/2019 I was chosen to speak at the Board of Trustees meeting along with some student life staff. I can clearly remember Mrs. Dell asking me and Jada (FYE mentor) if we could speak that night and we both agreed to do it. I didn’t put much thought into at the moment until I got an email from Mrs. Dell saying that the board would love to hear my CCBC experience, and that’s when I knew this was kind of an important role. I prepared my speech and when I was done revising that’s when I started getting nervous. Mind you the meeting date was changed which gave me more time to breathe. But even with the extra time I was still very nervous that night. Not many things can uncontrollably take over my body but public speaking does wonders to me.
Have you ever encountered a feeling mixed with a lot of adrenaline? Like how the singer The Weeknd says “ I can’t feel my face when i’m with you” WELL all I could personally feel was my face ahahahahahaha!!!!!! My face felt like a simmering tomato in the stove, and I’m not going to lie, I weirdly treasure that feeling because not many things in life will make you feel that way. I can remember I got really anxious at the beginning but after that I really can’t remember much of my speech. WHICH IS WEIRD, but all I can remember is doing my introduction and somehow I was at the end of my speech thanking them for allowing me to speak. The power of emotions are crazy powerful. I remember getting nervous in my communications class when it came down to doing my speech presentation and it honestly felt the same. Regardless of who you are and what you do, I will always get nervous… Personal downfall of mine. Someone that night told me “they are just people” and yes, indeed they are simply just people but people who will have their “undivided” attention set on me for those 5mins ahahahaha. The most important thing is that I did it!!!!!!
Regardless of all these feelings I had, i’m glad I got to experience it all. It’s nice to get out of your comfort zone because you can truly amaze yourself and say HEY YOU DID IT! Would I do it again? Probably, honestly because, what is a life if you never take a risk? Ask yourself that question at least once a day and you’ll be surprised that there in fact is no such thing as limits. The only limits you have are the ones you set upon yourself. Personal pro-tip for anyone who has to do public speaking soon, just know people will forget about you within a few hours (unless you fail terribly but that just makes good memories). Thank you, Lesley, Dell, Sakina, Crissy, (and remaining staff of Student Life) for making this college experience memorable for me. I’m grateful to be part of such an amazing program and I will never forget this.
