This from Body Odd:

Before now, those with performance jitters have had to contend with the nausea and the nerves on their own, or take beta blockers to battle the symptoms.  New research has come up with another way to fight stage fright:  biofeedback.

“Our research looks at both the psychological and physiological effect of stage fright,”  says Dr. Myron Thurber, a counselor, physical therapist and biofeedback expert from Spokane, Wash.  “It raises our conscious awareness of our heart rhythms by allowing us to see them on a screen.”

In the study, anxiety-ridden musicians were trained in the use of a small biofeedback machine to “train” their body’s emotional response to stress.  After being hooked to the device with an ear clip or finger monitor, the musicians could see their heart’s responses to both anxiety or stress (typified by a jerky, edgy pattern) as well as feelings of joy or appreciation (a smooth, coherent pattern).  After four sessions, the subjects were able to shift their emotional response – holding onto the feelings of joy even while performing – successfully keeping the stage fright out of the limelight.

“After we trained them, people reported on average about a 70 percent improvement in playing ability as well as the same decrease in their sense of stress or performance anxiety,” says Thurber.

In other words, no more flubbed notes, flushed faces or tossed cookies in the recital hall restroom.

Even better, Thurber says the biofeedback machine is both versatile – it can be used for other types of anxiety such as test taking or public speaking – and unobtrusive (about the size of an iPod).

“Some people would practice using it in the recital hall before a performance,” he says.  “People are used to seeing little handheld devices so we hardly notice them any more.”

Have you ever gotten nervous before performing or speaking in public?  What happened?

Sims Wyeth is an executive speech coach in Montclair, NJ specializing in presentation skills and public speaking training in order to give accomplished people the knowledge and skill they need to become accomplished speakers. Learn more public speaking tips at www.SimsWyeth.com.

The sensation of stage fright is bad enough, but what’s worse is the damage it can do to your career and your self-esteem.

If you let it stop you, your sense of self gets smaller and your stage fright gets bigger and more powerful.

However, when you step into your stage fright, you learn quickly that it’s a phantom–a fog—like most of our fears.  When you step into that fog, you soon realize that it is a figment of your imagination—and that your effort to cut through it can easily succeed.

Here is a pep talk, courtesy of Theodore Roosevelt, who knew something about courage and determination.

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”                            

Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919)

Sims Wyeth is a speech coach in Montclair, NJ specializing in presentation skills and public speaking training in order to give accomplished people the knowledge and skill they need to become accomplished speakers. Learn more public speaking tips at www.SimsWyeth.com.