Welcome back! Did you check out how you stand when you make your presentations? If you did, you probably found out that several of your muscles were working hard while you were standing. And yet most anatomy experts agree that there are no more than two muscles required for standing upright: the Soleus and the Gastrocnemius, both of which are located in your calves!

So, if you noticed that your shoulders or your back muscles or your thigh muscles were tightening when you were standing, I have good news for you: these muscles do not have to be contracted in order for you to stand easily and efficiently. In fact, they will only get in your way if you tense them up.

Speakers who use unnecessary muscular effort to stand can find themselves in a real trap. If you’re using too much effort to stand when you speak, the chances are exceedingly high that you also do so for standing generally. Unnecessary muscular effort doesn’t diminish under the spotlight, it actually increases! And additional muscular effort through your system can cause problems with breathing and consequently with vocal production. I have worked with many speakers who were desperately uncomfortable on stage and often unable to produce clear and pleasant vocal tone due to their ideas about needing to tighten up all sorts of muscles just to stand. And this sort of discomfort will not help us to manage any stage-fright symptoms.

I suggest that you continue to monitor how you stand, both off-stage and on. If you are bracing your knees, tightening your upper legs or your back- or stomach muscles, see if you can let go of them. If you do, you will quickly start to feel more comfortable on stage.

Next week, we’ll return to stagefright. We’ll find out where it comes from, and how its symptoms can be most successfully managed.