“Why do we fall, Bruce? So we can learn to pick ourselves up.” – Thomas Wayne
I have enjoyed the following two pastimes for a number of years:
- Stand-up comedy.
- Running.
If I ever had a bad gig as a stand-up comic (it happened), I was desperate to get the next gig under my belt, to get the fix again. Every comic I’ve spoken to about this had the same desire; to perform again and erase the bad experience.
When I’ve done a long run (say, 10k), the run immediately after it is the ‘recovery run’, where you help your muscles get back to their normal state. When I first read about the technique I thought it was daft (‘recovery’ is resting, surely?), but I soon realised that the unpleasant feeling in the Monday run that followed my glorious Saturday 10k was a necessary part of the process of maintaining my fitness.
When things haven’t gone well in a public speaking situation, your instinct may be to give up. This, while the easier option, is not what you should do, because you will be doomed never to move on. Instead, you have to identify what went wrong, learn from it and speak in public again. Not easy, but ultimately far more rewarding.