TED Talk: How I Beat Stage Fright

Ted Talk: How I Beat Stage Fright

            I watched “How I Beat Stage Fright” by Joe Kowan. In his Ted Talk, “How I Beat Stage Fright,” Kowan talks about how he had such an irrational, overwhelming fear of playing his music or talking in front of a large, or even sometimes small number of people. Kowan decided to go to an open mic on his 30^th birthday to try to help himself finally overcome this terrible fear he had. When he got there, he signed up to play and the fear and anxiety in him to started to take over about ten minutes before his turn. When his turn came around, he pushed himself to walk onto the stage because he knew he had to do this if he wanted to make any progress. He had a small glimpse of that audience connection that he was looking for. He went back week after week to get himself to try and completely overcome the fear he had. He wrote a song about his fear to perform on stage, because in his mind he thought maybe that would make him feel more comfortable if the audience knew how he was feeling. This helped him progress significantly over time and resulted in him eventually being able to become successful in what he aspired to do.

I enjoyed watching Kowan’s talk because he not only wanted to overcome his fear, but he took an extra step in showing the audience that it’s okay to have a fear of something in the first place. I can really relate with him and his fear of performing or speaking in front of other people. He was very descriptive about his feelings, making me feel like I was actually in his shoes while he was standing up there talking. Kowan’s way of trying to relate to the audience really made his talk more interesting. For example, when he says, “Really, 200 thousand years of human evolution and it still can’t tell the difference between a saber tooth tiger and 20 folk singers on a Tuesday night open mic?” I felt as if this was a good example that many people could relate to, not with just a fear of stage fright, but with any fear they may have and that’s what I really liked about Kowan’s talk.