Personal Narrative: The Iceroom

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Standing in “The Icebox”, a room holding P.E. supplies and ten degrees colder than the rest of the school’s gym, I am sweating. The microphone is slipping out of my clammy hands, and I am feeling queasy. Panicking and desperate to find any way to calm myself down, I gulp down an entire water bottle. “And now,” my leadership classmate bellows into his microphone, “please welcome Emily Collins, your junior class of 2016 rally leader!” My stomach drops and I force myself to run from my cool compartment to the hot, muggy gym. I flash a huge smile to the 1,300 students as I run around the gym in a ridiculous Princess Peach costume. I am radiating what looks like confidence, but my peers have no idea that I threw up thirty minutes before the rally. …show more content…

I still felt sick from throwing up earlier, but felt even more of a coward once I realized how great my fear of public speaking really was. Nerves and anxiety took control over me when I had to speak in discussion or presentations. Even being in the environment and the thought of speaking or presenting would emulate the same fear. But these emotions did not compared to the ones I experienced when I stood in front of 1,300 people. My body felt like it could collapse at any second due to the intense level of nerves, overwhelmingness, and nausea. Recognizing that I had a legitimate fear, I decided that if I was selected to be my class’ rally leader, it was time for me to make an effort to conquer the fear and develop public speaking skills. I had a Spanish presentation the following week which I meticulously memorized my lines for. As I studied, I could not stop recalling the horrendous feeling the rally caused me, so I read a few articles with tips how to conquer my public speaking fear. Reading a few articles was obviously not enough to eliminate my fear, but I did not want to admit this to myself. On the day of the presentation, my typical presentation nerves arose. I learned very quickly is that getting over a fear is a long process and cannot be fixed over a few days, nonetheless a few articles with

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