Oh my God! You have to give a speech to an audience of strangers. Speaking in public is up there at the top of most people's list of things to be avoided at all costs, along with spiders, snakes, dentists and lawyers. But why is it so frightening? After all the audience is on your side. Even stand-up comedians know that the toughest audience just want to laugh and all you have to do is give them what they want. Audiences are not like the baying crowds at the Colloseum in Rome, there for blood and death, or the little old lady knitting between beheadings before the guillotine.

In truth public speaking, for the speaker is all about fear, pure and simple. All they have to fear is fear itself. Fear of failure, such as drying up completely and forgetting whatever it was you wanted to say. Fear of dropping all your prompt cards and wetting your pants in public. Fear of the heckler in the audience who will publicly humiliate you by knowing more than you, about your chosen subject. Fear of the microphone failing or the slide projector breaking or everyone getting bored and getting up and leaving.

So the question becomes, "how can I convert fear into confidence"? There are 3 steps to confidence in public speaking.

Step 1 is to PREPARE. Get on a training course, make a list of top hints and tips, practice your speech with all the tips in place until you are word perfect and then practice again.

Step 2 is to get into your CIRCLE OF CONFIDENCE. You remember a time when you felt confident right? Well recall that time. See what you saw then. Feel what you felt then. Hear what you heard then and imagine a golden circle of confidence into which you can step at any time.

Step 3 is to get a subliminal message CD or MP3 for public speaking. Use it to persuade your subconscious mind that you are confident and capable and ready to deliver a great speech. Use the subliminal messages of confidence to reinforce your ring of confidence and get out there to blow them away with your brilliance.