What Sparked Your Fear of Public Speaking – and What Should You Really Learn From It?

I was working with a banker recently when I asked him a simple question:
“Can you remember when your fear of public speaking began?”

At first, he couldn’t think of anything specific. But toward the end of our session, a memory surfaced.

He said:
“I think I know where it started. I was new in my role and attending a meeting with senior government stakeholders during COVID. Out of nowhere, my boss asked me to explain what we’d been observing about customer behaviour. I froze. I could hear myself talking in circles. Eventually, my manager had to step in. It was embarrassing—and things have only gotten worse since.”

Most people with public speaking anxiety have a triggering event. Many people can trace their anxiety back to an incident at school. A client told me that her anxiety started when a classmate commented that she was blushing during a speech—and just like that, she developed a fear of both public speaking and blushing.

Another was a confident speaker until he was thrown into presenting someone else’s PowerPoint slides—slides that didn’t make sense to him. He started out fine, but then the panic kicked in. After that, every speaking engagement felt risky.
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An event promoter, usually full of confidence, had to pivot to promoting AV systems during COVID. She didn’t understand the technical side and suddenly felt like a fraud in front of her clients. 

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