“When you are nervous, if you walk around a little bit or become gesticulate or change the timbre in your voice, you can manipulate that anxious energy.” – dimitrireyespoet.com
So you got your ideas together and you penned your poem! You’ve looked it over, it looks good. Even good enough to share. Now it’s printed or downloaded on your phone as you get down to an open mic and sign up before you realize… “I’ve never done this before.” Next thing you know, you’re getting your name called and people are cheering. You’re walking up to the mic and you might be getting butterflies in your stomach or you’re feeling a bit hazy. You get on the mic and say your first “um” and your throat is a set of jingling keys. How can I explain this so well? I get these sensations at every reading I’m a part of as well as every class I teach.
That’s because performance anxiety is completely normal! Even those like me who like public speaking get a bit of anxiety because naturally our bodies are registering the situation with a heightened level of importance. This “survival mode” causes our heart rate to increase and our energies cause us to be faster reactors. This is why stage fright can cause a person to freeze or stutter because our minds are trying to help us in the situation by increasing our ability to intake information. It is up to us to channel these energies and use them proactively as our body wants us to.
To make an example of myself, I’ll show you two videos that highlight being in my nervous energy and harnessing that nervous energy.
This first video is actually my first ever reading in public. Yep, that’s right, the Dodge Poetry Festival was my first poetry reading! I’d say that there was anywhere from 15-20 people in the audience and to put things in perspective, some writers begin reading publicly in small groups at a coffee shop or a local library with an audience of only a handful of people. Starting with 15-20 audience members as a shy poet was both nerve wracking but a gift, because it made many readings after that even easier. What you’ll notice in the video is a shaky voice where I’m sometimes a bit too breathy. I’m also hunched, (my mic was too low, I never adjusted it!) And what you can see highlighted in this video is the subtlety of that nervous energy attempting to turn itself into a character that I’m allowed to hide behind as the reader. This is something that is more perfected in this next video for instance.
A professor in college had talked about nervous energy once, and he explained his nervous energy being harnessed in his gesticulations and the loudness of his voice during lectures. When you are nervous, if you walk around a little bit or become gesticulate or change the timbre in your voice, you can manipulate that energy. Do you notice all the movement in my second video example? Or the fact that I chose to use no microphone so I had to belt out each line? Yep! I was still nervous, except now I harvest that energy into my performances.
DO you have any other techniques you use to negate performance anxiety? Rituals? Please watch my YouTube video on Poetry Performance Anxiety to receive more tips.
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