Stage Fright: How to Overcome It in 15 Easy Steps

Stage fright is the second most common Fear, with around^{1 40% of people reporting a fear of public speaking} 40% of people reporting a fear of public speaking (the first was snakes). 

So, you are not alone if you get anxious and jittery before a speech or performance!

I met with ^{2Don Greene,} Don Greene, the leading sports psychologist, to figure out how to beat stage fright. He has coached the US Olympic swim team, served in the US armed forces as a Green Beret, and trained the San Diego Police Department’s SWAT team. If anyone knows how to get over stage fright, it’s him. 

In this video below, I teach you 7 steps to conquer stage fright and keep it at bay forever.

In the rest of this article, we’ll review Don’s tips and add a handful more stage fright strategies and tricks to help you find calmness, relaxation, and confidence before your big moment on the stage.

What is Stage Fright?

Stage fright, also known as performance anxiety or glossophobia, is when you experience a high level of stress, worry, or anxiety before a speech, performance, or presentation in front of an audience. Stage fright is uncomfortable for some people but doesn’t hold them back. For others, it’s an unbearable dread that prevents them from sharing their performance gifts with the world!

Here are the^{3 physiological symptoms} physiological symptoms of stage fright (that can happen before and during a performance):

• Racing pulse and rapid breathing
• Dry mouth and tight throat
• Trembling hands, knees, lips, and voice
• Sweaty and cold hands
• Nausea and an uneasy feeling in your stomach
• Vision changes

Tips to Overcome Stage Fright

Form your clear intention.

When you think about stage fright, you might think about anxiety or nerves, but often, the precursor to nerves is confusion or chaos; when our thoughts are scattered when we are rushing around, when we feel ungrounded and off-center, it’s almost impossible to feel confident. And often, this can lead to stage fright right before a performance or a big meeting.

So, the first thing Dr. Greene tells us to do is pick one clear intention. What is your goal? What is your hope? What do you want to achieve with what you are about to do? 

This intention should wipe away any other thoughts. Your intention is what you should think about while getting ready, driving, or pumping yourself up for your big moment. Use it like a mantra. This can calm your mind and keep it grounded in a positive rather than an anxious thought.

A great intention is something simple. For example, going into a negotiation might be, “Get the buyer to sign and stay firm on numbers.” If you are going into an audition, it might be “Play my heart out and hit all the right notes.” For me, before I hit the stage, I tell myself:

Be of service

This helps remind me that I am here to help others. This makes me far less nervous than thinking about ways to be impressive or make people laugh. 

The most important thing about a good intention is to keep it positive. Avoid words such as “don’t” or “no.” So, instead of “don’t mess up,” say, “stay confident.” Imagine if a basketball player is shooting a free throw in a high-pressure situation—what self-talk would work better, “Don’t miss! Don’t miss! Don’t miss!” or “Relax and trust my body.” 

Too many people psych themselves out before performances by stressing out about ensuring they won’t make mistakes. This isn’t very pleasant for performance. Studies have found that the more you focus on not making mistakes or embarrassing yourself, the more likely you are to crack under pressure and do just that.

Instead of trying to rehearse your entire performance in the moments leading up to it, focus on your intention. One psychologist found that when she had nervous athletes focus on something other than what it took to do well in their sport, such as reading a poem or other random things, they performed better because they weren’t being distracted by their self-doubt.

Action Step: Can you encapsulate your primary intention for your performance? Make that a point of focus leading up to the big moment!

Pick a focal point.

One of my favorite tips from Dr. Greene is picking a focal point. He says you should pick a far-off, unimportant point in the back of the room or auditorium. Later, you will use that point to throw off your nervous energy. 

This is an interesting concept because Dr. Greene isn’t asking you to ignore your nervous energy and redirect it.

If you don’t know the room you will be in or are on the way to a location you have never been to, you can also use a grounding prop. I have a pen I use that is my focal point. I imagine flinging my nervous energy toward it and then putting it on the table. 

It’s a really interesting mental trick. You feel nervous, then mentally imagine your nervousness flowing into that darn pen, and then you put it down on the table. It tricks your brain into thinking you have let go of the anxiety. Powerful and simple.

Action Step: Pick either a point in the room or an object on your person to dump all of your anxiety into. Imagine that item is holding your anxiety for you so that you don’t have to!

Any time you get anxious before or during your performance, you can dump that anxiety into your focal point.

Breathe mindfully

Oxygen is really like magic. We need it to live, but it also counteracts all the physical feelings of nervousness. The problem is BECAUSE we need it to live, we don’t even think about breathing it in. And so, when we are nervous, without realizing it, we take shorter, shallower breaths or hold our breath entirely.

This exacerbates the cycle of anxiety, making us light-headed, dizzy, and even more out of breath. 

Conversely, deep breathing is shown to activate your vagus nerve and parasympathetic nervous system, reducing anxiety and calming your nerves.

Action Step: Before your speech or performance, Dr. Greene advises going into mental preparation to breathe purposefully. 

• First, close your eyes. 
• Second, breathe in slowly through your nose. 
• Then, breathe through your mouth and push out your belly with each breath.

This deep belly breathing and closing your eyes will help focus and center you.

Release muscle tension

When we get anxious, we tighten everything. We clench our jaws, tense our shoulders, and squeeze our arms to our sides or in front of us. Even our stomach gets tight. This is terrible for blood flow and anxiety!

Dr. Greene recommends progressively relaxing your body, starting at your toes and moving up your body, slowly relaxing each muscle, one at a time. 

Each area of your body gets an inhale and an exhale. So, you can think—relax my feet [breath]. Relax my shins [breath], relax my thighs [breath], one at a time. This is a great exercise because it physically relaxes you. 

It ALSO has the added benefit of mentally distracting you. Instead of thinking about everything that could go wrong or all the last-minute things you need to remember, it focuses your brain on something calming. 

Let’s try it together. I am going to walk you through a progressive relaxation exercise. You can do this yourself any time you are starting to feel nervous.

• First, take a few deep breaths and shake out your body.
• Now, we will do one breath per area of your body. Close your eyes and think of relaxing in each of these areas.
• Deep breath. Relax your face and all the muscles around your eyes.
• Deep breath. Relax your jaw and neck.
• Deep breath. Loosen your shoulders and relax your chest.
• Deep breath. Relax your arms and hands and make sure they are completely loose.
• Deep breath. Relax your stomach and ab muscles.
• Deep breath. Relax your glutes and thighs.
• Deep breath. Relax your shins and lower legs.
• Deep breath. Wiggle your toes and completely relax your feet.

Ahh—feels good, right?

Find your center

Dr. Greene says that thinking about our physical center also can help ground us. This is also something tai chi practitioners have been doing for thousands of years. 

Think about the spot two inches below your navel and two inches below the beginning of your belly. Dr. Greene says we can focus on these spots to calm our minds. You can combine steps #4 and #5 and think about relaxing these spots with each breath.

Action Step: Before your presentation or any time you feel nervous, you can ground yourself by focusing on your center.

Find a go-to affirmation or pep talk.

In Step #1, we talked about your intention – this was your goal or desired outcome for your performance. Your go-to affirmation (or mantra) is an internal phrase to help lead you toward your intention.

For example, an interviewer’s process cue might be, “Smile and ask great questions.” Or a violinist’s process cue might be, “Smooth and good tempo.” If you are giving a presentation, it could be, “Keep it positive and engaging.”

Think about how you want to achieve your goal. What kind of tempo do you want? What feeling do you need to fuel you? Make this your internal affirmation, and you think it on repeat as a pep talk when you are getting ready, transitioning, and during your performance to keep you grounded.

I recorded a pep-talk you can save and use before your next big thing. Check it out:

Action Step: What phrase can you internally repeat that will help move you toward your intention and feel confident? Once you come up with a positive affirmation, try repeating it silently 10 times and notice how it makes you feel; this can start to anchor this affirmation so that you can call upon it in times of stress. 

Skip your morning latte.

Caffeine and refined sugar are both stimulants, and while they provide a quick boost of energy, they can also make you more jittery. Studies suggest that caffeine intake can lead to increased anxiety and a greater likelihood of panic attacks.

Having a latte (or any other food with lots of sugar and caffeine) prior to your big moment not only increases your nerves but also makes it more difficult to calm yourself down. 

Instead, opt for a filling, nutritious food that will give you sustained energy and save you from having to worry about upsetting your stomach.

Action Step: If you don’t normally rely on caffeine, try skipping it the day of your performance.

If coffee is a big part of your diet, try for a normal or small dose on the day of your event instead of going big.

Visualize success

Another tactic you can use before your performance is to visualize things going well.

Visualization is a technique where you create a mental picture of a desired outcome or goal. 

Interestingly, your brain doesn’t significantly differentiate between a visualized experience and an actual experience. Neuroscientist Matthew Walker says in this interview that when you visualize yourself doing a motor skill, it’s about 50% as effective in physically changing your brain as doing the actual practice physically. Wow!

It’s why athletes often visualize before their competitions. In^{4 this clip}, this clip, Michael Phelps, the Olympic athlete with the most gold medals of all time, talks about how he starts visualizing a month before a swim meet. 

His coach says, “By the time Michael steps up on the block to swim a race in a world championship… he’s swum that race hundreds of times in his mind… so then all he has to do is shut everything down and [go] on autopilot. His body automatically knows what to do. His brain switches into what he’s visualized.”

Powerful stuff!

Action Step: Spend a few minutes visualizing your performance. Imagine how you want it to go in a perfect world. Really put yourself in the sensory experience of the visualization–let yourself hear the audience and feel the air on your face.

If you’re interested in becoming masterful not just in public speaking or performing but also in everyday social interactions, you might enjoy my book. I use social science to help you master the art of understanding, influencing, and connecting with people.

Prepare for what could go wrong

Michael Phelps doesn’t just visualize the perfect swim race. He also visualizes what could happen and what could go wrong.

He goes through every scenario so that he can be prepared. That way, if he gets a rip in his suit or his arm catches the wall in a weird way, he’s ready for it.

You can use this same strategy.

Preparing for the worst doesn’t mean dwelling on what could go wrong and letting your Fear run the show. It’s quite the opposite. It’s exploring what might go wrong so that you can prepare yourself for it to lessen your Fear.

Action Step: What are the most likely situations that could go wrong in your performance? Visualize how you would gracefully react to these situations to save your show.

Visit the stage the night before

In general, the more comfortable you are giving your speech or performance, the better you’ll do. This principle extends to your comfort with the physical space.

Think about it—would you feel more comfortable giving your speech from your own living room or from a mystery location you’ve never been to before?

I love doing tech checks before I get on stage. This helps me mentally prepare and shake out nerves, and everything will run smoothly once I hit the stage. You can even do a technical run-through the day before a meeting!

Action Step: To build familiarity, try going to the location the night before to acclimatize yourself. Get to know the stage. Notice how it feels to walk on it. Look around the room and familiarize yourself with the space.

Practice with familiar conditions

A lot of people become stressed out in the moments leading up to their performance and during it because it is their first time performing under those circumstances. 

According to the ^{5Anxiety and Depression Association of America,} Anxiety and Depression Association of America, an easy way to prevent this from happening is practicing in conditions that are as close to the actual performance conditions as possible. This includes things such as your outfit, whether you’re standing or sitting, what materials you are using, what setup you will be in, your breath, etc. 

Practicing like this ahead of time allows you to become comfortable with most aspects of your performance so they feel familiar when you give your presentation.

Action Step: Try practicing in a way that matches your performance as much as possible. Wear the same outfit you’ll be wearing. Stand if you’ll be standing. You can even try practicing in an environment with mild distractions (like putting on the TV in the background). 

Water yourself!

Studies suggest that not drinking enough water increases your experience of depression and anxiety. 

And staying hydrated does more than that! If you don’t drink enough water, you can expect to experience the following:

• Headaches
• Worse short-term memory
• More fatigue
• Impaired vision
• Worse attention span

You get the idea! Not drinking enough water the day of your performance will give you an unnecessary handicap. And it makes sense. Your body is made of 57% water, after all!

Action Step: Try to drink at least 5 cups of water the day the day of your event. But be careful not to drink too much water right before your performance! You don’t want a bloated blatter to steal your attention.

Reframe nervous energy

I know that performance anxiety is the last thing you’d think to be grateful for before a big moment, but a simple change of perspective can dramatically change its effects. 

^6Research Research has found that when you choose to embrace your anxiety by telling yourself it is excitement, you can harness its energy to improve your performance. 

The key is using your anxiety to pump yourself up instead of allowing it to spur you into a self-doubt spiral.

Action Step: If you are experiencing a flock of stomach butterflies before your performance, label it as excitement instead of anxiety.

Plant a friendly face in the crowd.

If there is someone you know, love, and trust, you could ask them to come to your event. 

This way, if you are really nervous, you can return your attention to your loved one. If you must, block everyone else out and speak to them.

Grounding in the safety of a single connection can help some people feel more comfortable on stage.

Action Step: Invite a trusted friend to your performance. Make sure they get there early so you know where they sit.

Big body language

Researchers have discovered that your body language has a huge impact on how you are perceived. When most people are anxious leading up to a big moment, they engage in nervous behaviors such as pacing, self-soothing (rubbing arms, wringing hands, etc.), and closed-off body language where they make their bodies as small as possible to try to hide from the world and feeling safer.

The more you expand your body, the more confident you will appear. And the more confident you will feel! Here are some easy ways to engage in confident body language before your performance:

• Dance
• Stand like Superman or Wonder Woman
• Set your legs wide and put your hands in the air

Make your body big and open in whatever way feels most comfortable to you. If power posing in public makes you feel embarrassed, do it in the bathroom before going on stage or entering the room.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) About Stage Fright

Takeaways on How to Overcome Stage Fright

Best of luck with your speech or performance! You’ll do great 🙂 remember these tips:

• Form your clear intention: Choose a singular, positive goal or hope for your performance to keep your thoughts centered
• Pick a focal point: Select a distant, insignificant point in the room and channel your anxiety into it
• Breathe mindfully: Calm your nervous system with deep breaths
• Release muscle tension: Gradually relax each muscle group in your body before your performance
• Find your center: Focus on the physical center of your body, just below the navel
• Find a go-to affirmation: Create an internal phrase that embodies your intention
• Skip your morning latte: Limit caffeine or too much sugar to keep your anxiety down
• Visualize success: Create a mental image of a successful performance
• Prepare for what could go wrong: Visualize and prepare for potential mishaps to feel more grounded
• Visit the stage the night before: Familiarize yourself with the performance venue 
• Practice with familiar conditions: Rehearse under conditions similar to those of the actual performance  
• Water yourself! Stay adequately hydrated!
• Reframe nervous energy: View your nerves as excitement, not anxiety
• Plant a friendly face in the crowd: Plant a trusted person in the audience who you can look at
• Big body language: Legs wide, arms up. Project confidence before your talk!

If you’re a public speaker and would like some ideas to help you ace your next speech, check out these 16 Science-Based Public Speaking Tips To Be a Master Speaker.