[mercantile]

Thanks for the response.

> You have to remember that most people there have started at the same place you're at right now. You even said it in your post.

So this is the part I disagree with. Everyone gets nervous doing public speaking, but there are some of us who get really nervous to the point that physical symptoms are, without a word of exaggeration, debilitating. Just getting up in front of that room and giving a crappy talk would have been very, very hard.

> That sounds like a goldmine of knowledge and experience to learn from. Find someone from that group who is willing to mentor you. Heck, the Leadership booklet has a checklist with one of the items being to mentor someone.

You're right, and I really don't want to slight the group here -- the interactions I had and everyone I spoke to was extremely supportive, it's just that getting spun up to their level would have an incredible daunting order even give months/years of work. I should give it another shot, but I just didn't see a path forward there at the time.

[amygdala_panic]

Right, the debilitating physical symptoms are the thing. It's not about being a good or bad speaker. Like you said, I'd be happy to get to the point of just being a plain "bad" speaker. There are times when even reading the words on a slide, verbatim, is excruciating. It's an entirely irrational autonomic response.