Making a speech is right up there with death, divorce and snakes as one of people’s absolutely worst nightmares. Just the thought of getting up in front of a room and having to say a few words can send the pulse racing. Actually doing it can cause palpitations, raised blood pressure, and severe perspiration even on the coldest night.

Why is that? Almost everyone has no difficulty in talking to their friends or even strangers when necessary, which actually happens more often than they might realise. Waiters, shop assistants, bank tellers, and checkout clerks are usually strangers to us, and yet we manage to chat quite unselfconsciously to them.

But put a number of them together and suddenly our tongues swell, our voices disappear, we blush and we become bizarrely inarticulate.

This means that for those people who can’t make a speech, they are victims of their fear. Because of this, they will do practically anything to avoid making a speech.

Unfortunately, most of us are going to be called on at some time to get up and speak to an audience. Inevitably, we are going to have to stand and introduce ourselves; pass a word of thanks; or speak at our children’s/friends’ weddings or, God forbid, someone’s funeral. When these situations arise, because of the personal nature of many of them, it becomes almost impossible to avoid saying something. Imagine telling your daughter you can’t speak at her wedding because you are scared?

And yet, like a lot of victim states, it is unnecessary to let it control you or your behaviour.

Public speaking courses abound. There are Toastmaster International clubs in virtually every city in the world where one can learn to speak in a ‘safe’, sympathetic environment designed to encourage people to gain confidence.

I recall my first talk at a Toastmasters meeting in Pietermaritzburg, KwaZulu-Natal. My speech was what they call an icebreaker, where you just talk about yourself for about five minutes. Not being particularly shy and having made a few speeches in my time, I was actually looking forward to it. I mean, I knew the subject (me) better than most and had a few funny (to me) moments I could relate.

All was good until I got up and walked to the lectern at the front of the room.

For some inexplicable reason, I couldn’t remember my opening line and when, after a few embarrassing moments, I did, I got it wrong. I never recovered. All my funny stories fell completely flat, and I heard myself banging on as if I were talking about someone else.

Halfway through my talk, my left hand developed a life of its own and placed itself on my heart and wouldn’t move. After I finished and took my seat, the woman sitting next to me pointed at it and asked, ‘Is it stuck to your chest?’

It took me a long time before I could look back and laugh at my poor showing.

But what it did do was motivate me to do something about my public speaking ability.

Toastmasters was all very well. To become a competent Toastmaster, I had to do 10 talks, each designed to teach a skill. Eye contact, hand gestures, the use of pauses, etc., but as there was only one meeting a month, it was going to take a minimum of a year before I would be ‘competent’.

So I searched elsewhere for the solution to my newfound fear.

I went on a business presentation skills and speech-making course and a public speaker’s ‘boot camp’, and in no time I found that, at the drop of a hat, I could comfortably say a few words, and with more notice, make a lengthy speech without any hang-ups.

I am no longer a victim of the fear of public speaking, but that doesn’t, of course, mean you still won’t have the odd complete disaster.

The first book I wrote was on how to give up smoking. At the time, as part of marketing the book, I was invited to be the guest speaker at a Rotary International lunch. There were 70 people at the lunch, three of whom smoked.

To this day, I cringe at the memory of that lunch where I spent 45 minutes telling 67 non-smokers how they could give up smoking.