Help Me! I’m Afraid of Public Speaking!

This year, it is a decade since we started to do training. Looking back it has been an incredible journey for the both of us. My uncle always introduces me to people as an engineer in the wrong profession!

Anyways today we want to share about public speaking. Did you know that almost 80% of the world’s population in the world have a fear of public speaking? One of the most well-known statistics in the US states that more people are afraid of public speaking than death! Go figure.

Today if people look at us conducting a training, seminar, conference or workshop people will have the impression that we are natural public speakers. To tell you the truth we were far from natural.

We were never the speaking type. In fact one of the reasons why Elin chose me was because I did not talk much but, look at me today. We were not debaters at school nor were we speakers during our university days. It’s a skill that we acquired and learned along the way.

There’s a saying, “Every Master Was Once a Disaster!” I was definitely a disaster. I remember the first time when I started work one of my first assignment was to be the Master of Ceremonies (MC) for an official function at our office for our customers. I still remember on that particular day, instead of being the MC, I instead went on a different MC – Medical Certificate!

In fact I still remember the first official presentation that I had to do in Bangi. It was very nerve wracking as I could not even go to work on that day. We took the day off so that we could go to the venue. It is very important to do this. I tried to do a mental rehearsal of the presentation. To me it should be easy as I have done it before one on one and I have seen people doing it so many times. Boy was I wrong!

That night, I froze! I was so hard and I could not move. It was like my whole body was in a shock that the rostrum was more alive! Can you imagine that my coach stopped the presentation in the middle and asked me what’s wrong! I told him that I was nervous and I was scared!

Well, that was 12 years ago. The truth is that if we can do, so can you. Understand the fact that success is something that you can learn and public speaking is also a skill that you can learn and become a master. The important thing here is that you must have the right attitude!

Here are 20 tips that could help you to improve on your public speaking skills:

#1 Watch the Experts

The best way to start learning good speaking methods is by watching good speakers. Ten years ago, this would have been more difficult, but today you can quickly find good example speeches online.

#2 Know Your Material

Before you give you speech, do enough research to have a strong grasp of the subject matter. You do not want to forget an important fact.

#3 Take Notes

Although you do not want to read your entire speech off a script, writing down a brief outline will help you stay focused.

#4 Rehearse In Private

One of the most important keys to giving a strong speech is the practice. Rehearse your speech enough that you can (almost) say it in your sleep. Do it in front of a mirror!

#5 Rehearse To a Small Audience

After practicing by yourself, give your speech to a small audience. After you finish, ask for feedback on your performance. You can then use this advice to perfect your presentation even more.

#6 Know Your Audience

Your speech should be carefully targeted to your audience. If you have to use terms that are unfamiliar to them, you will need to give the definitions.

#7 Know Your Surroundings

Before you give you speech, visit the place you will be speaking. If possible, you might even try to have a practice run on location.

#8 Dress Properly

Depending on your audience, you may need to dress formally or casually. In addition, dress in layers to prepare for a wide range of temperatures.

#9 Relax

Almost everyone feels nervous when speaking. Calm you nerves by pausing before starting you speech and by channelling your nervous energy into enthusiasm.

#10 Start With an Intriguing Question or Fact

Most audiences subconsciously give the speaker 20 seconds to capture their attention. Engage your audience quickly with an engaging question or startling fact.

#11 Realize That Your Audience Is On Your Side

Very rarely do audiences want the speaker to fail. Most of the time, the audience will want you to succeed. After all, who wants to sit through a boring presentation?

#12 Use Gestures

Do not be afraid to use hand motions. As long as you use them naturally, gestures will add to your speech.

#13 Use Visual Aids

In addition to gestures, visual aids, ranging from high-tech Power Point presentations to simple chalkboard diagrams, can help keep visual learners interested.

#14 Do Not Over-Use Visuals

Although visuals are very useful, too much of a good thing can be bad. Use visuals sparingly and tastefully. (Yes, your spectacular slide show transitions will distract and annoy the audience.)

#15 Speak With Conviction & Confidence

If you want your audience to believe you, you have to first believe yourself. If you do not believe your speech yourself, do not give that presentation in the first place!

#16 Do Not Speak To Your Notes

First-time speakers are often tempted to talk to their notes. Instead, set yourself apart by speaking to… surprise… your audience!

#17 Pauses In Your Speech

Do not be afraid to add silence to your speech. In fact, this quietness will help keep your audience awake and focused on your topic.

#18 Add Humour and tell Stories to Engage & Relate with Your Audience

Although too many jokes can ruin your persuasiveness, the occasional humorous anecdote will add levity to your speech and engage your audience.

#19 Don’t Apologize For Nervousness

Some speakers feel a need to apologize to their audience for sounding nervous. Don’t do this! Not only does this mistake detract from your persuasiveness, but it will not be useful information for your audience.

#20 Prepare a Good Ending

Rather than mumbling, “Well, I guess that’s it…” as you slowly back off the platform, plan a strong ending. One ideal ending is a call to action. For instance, in speech about blogging, I might end, “Now, go start your blog today!”

Importance of Coaching

Yesterday we had the second coaching session for the REAL Sahabat SERU program. Alhamdulillah the session was very good. In fact we could see the participants developing themselves. the sharing was also very powerful and empowering.

I am sure that everybody learned something new as I personally learned a lot of new things. Some of the sharing was fantastic!

The Only Way YOU Can Get What YOU Want Is By Becoming a Leader!

When we graduated, got married and started our jobs to us leadership is just another term and we figured it was just something for the select few. Leadership is only for people with power and position. This all changed when we got into business.

You see, as Muslims we were taught that we are put on this earth to become khalifas or leaders on this world. This morning we just read the following…

Firman Allah SWT yang bermaksud, ‘Bukankah Dia (Allah) yang memperkenankan (doa) orang yang dalam kesulitan apabila dia berdoa kepadaNYA dan menghilangkan kesusahan dan menjadiakan kamu (manusia) sebagai khalifah (pemimpin) di bumi? Apakah di samping Allah ada tuhan (yang lain)? Sedikit sekali (nikmat Allah) yang kamu ingat.’ ~ Al-Quran Surah Al-Naml Juz Kedua Puluh Ayat 62

We just took that on board and never really bothered to understand or explore the meaning of this responsibility bestowed upon us by God.

You see, in life you need to become a leader. A leader to you first and foremost which is the most difficult thing to do as it requires DISCIPLINE! Warren Benis in his book simply entitled, Leadership states that ‘The Only Way You Can Get What You Want In Life Is By Becoming A Leader!’.

We never really understood what it meant until we started building our business. Becoming a leader means that you are taking responsibility for yourself, for your life, for your future and for everything that is connected to you. In short you have got to make things happen!

We learned that leadership is a skill that anybody can develop and it is a process that develops daily. We are always amazed how so many people think that they can change who they are just simply by attending a seminar or workshop and not do anything. It is just crazy especially in today’s world.

Today we want to share with you the 5 Golden Rules of Leadership. These are the 5 things that you can do to develop your leadership skills. These are the 5 things that we do and continue to do. We can GUARANTEE that if you start to do them you too will be able to Upgrade Yourself to a NEW level.

The 5 things are:

1.   Attend functions! In short attend Majlis Ilmu

When we talk about attending functions it is not attending kenduris or majlis. Functions means seminars, trainings, workshops and etc. Why? The main reason for attending functions is to get EXPOSURE!!!

Remember this, EXPOSURE leads to EXPANSION of the mind! Most of us are not exposed. We keep to ourselves and we think that the world revolves around us. We feel that we know everything and with today’s technology it is even worse as we confine ourselves to the digital world.

You need to invest in yourself. Go out and attend all this talks and seminars. It could be a motivational talk, a business opportunity, an investment talk, a talk on money management and etc. The point is, you must attend and join these functions. Trust us you will learn something NEW! You will get NEW ideas and DISCOVER new friends and expand your relationship.

Attending functions will also get you excited about life and it will inspire and motivate you to move and go after your dreams!

2.   Read Books

You need to feed your mind with knowledge. My late grandfather always told me this, ‘Cultivate Your Mind and The Way Will Open for You.’

The best way to cultivate your mind is by reading. Reading is the shortcut to success. That is why in the Al Quran the first message or the first word that was taught to the Prophet SAW was Iqra’ meaning READ!

From reading you get to learn from other people’s experience. You will be empowered and it will help to accelerate your process.

One of the great books that we read was by Napoleon Hill entitled, Think and Grow Rich. This book has inspired millions of people around the world and it has been translated into so many languages. You should get a copy of it and read it today!

After all as Pat Mesiti says, ‘Leaders are Readers.’

3.   Listen to Positive & Motivational Materials

You are what you listen to. Remember earlier we share about how our thoughts were shaped from early influences. Hence the importance of controlling what we listen to and also what we watch.

What you listen you forget, what you watch you remember but what you do you will understand.

The point is that today there is just too much negativity around us. You listen to the radio, watch TV, surf the internet, read the newspapers there is just too much. As they say it in Italian, TROPPO!!!

We need to control what we feed our mind. Nothing stays in our mind rent free. We pay a price for every thought. Make sure that whatever you are thinking is something positive and empowering! You are the master of your own attitude.

4.   Get a Coach!

A lot more people will be more successful if they had a coach in life! That’s a fact. Everybody needs a mentor or a teacher in order to become a master.

How many movies have we seen where the hero is mentored and taught by a master. Once they have been coached it is only then they become heroes!

Today it is so easy to succeed as there is so much that is available for all of us. We sincerely believe that everybody can become successful, healthy and wealthy today because of all the opportunities. But you will need someone to guide you.

For example, right now we are building a team of people in our business to take our health and nutrition business to the next level. If you want to be part of it you can come and join us. We will be your coach! Just go to http://www.peaklifestyle.com/real or contact us directly. We are so excited!

We have been coached and today we still being coached. It is great to have a mentor!

5.   Get Involve and Do A Project

The only way you can develop your leadership is by getting involved and becoming active. Nobody can develop leadership by doing nothing.

Remember leadership develops daily not in a day. The only way it develops is through activities. One of the best ways to develop leadership is to get involved in projects or programs that allow you to grow and become a leader.

For us the best program would be to start your own business whether it is part time or full time. It is up to you. Why business? This is because in business you will need to be a leader to succeed. A lot of people who go into business do not understand that building a business is actually all about building your leadership.

How big your business can grow is about how you grow yourself to become a leader. When you grow your business will grow.

It always amazes us to see people expecting to have a huge salary or a big business but there are not willing to develop themselves. You must understand that you need to upgrade yourself to the point where you can attract people to you, inspire people, motivate people and in short LEAD yourself and other people.

Hopefully what we shared with you today can help you to reach greater heights. Talk to you soon.

Until then, take care and have a good one. J

Cellular Nutrition, why we all need it!

This past weekend we had the wonderful opportunity to attend a fantastic training. There were a lot of powerful teachings and sharing.

One of the things that I learned was on cellular nutrition. I understand now that it is so important for everybody to get cellular nutrition. You see most of the disease that we have is food related. It starts from our stomach. In fact recent surveys of clinics and hospitals shows that 70% of patients coming in to seek medical attention have all suffered due to poor eating habits.

This is justified from the number of case in terms of heart attack, diabetes and other diseases. All these disease are the product of poor eating and bad lifestyle hence the need for cellular nutrition. There are 3 major reasons why you need cellular nutrition. You can sum it up to the acronym C.A.R.

1. C - Cleanse. With cellular nutrition it will help to cleanse your stomach especially help to get rid of toxins in your body. This can only happen at the cell level.

2. A - Absorb. Cellular nutrition allows your cells to absorb the nutrition it needs. That's why some food and medicine do not have the effect that we want as it cannot be absorbed by our cells.

3. R - Repair. Cellular nutrition will help to repair our cells. This is very important to ensure that stay healthy all the time.

In short, we need to have access to cellular nutrition. Today with technology there are so many products out there available for all of us to have it. We need to understand that these products have been tested and are proven worldwide. It is up to us to give our body what it needs. Of course we all are going to grow old and die. God willing. But let's grow old gracefully.

If you want a source of cellular nutrition, please contact us at amiruliskandar@gmail.com or visit www.peaklifestyle.com/real/coi

Explanation of NPK and fertilizers

Explanation of NPK and fertilizers

Lessons learned from my 2 year old son Danish

Today was just another Tuesday. I was preparing to head out to office when my son asked me to play with him for a while. He was practicing to use the pencil with his Kumon book. Then suddenly he saw pictures of paper planes in the book. Immediately he asked me to make one for him.

I happily took a piece of paper to make him a paper plane. To my surprised he refused and started to point towards my wife's laptop. He kept telling me to find it first. My wife then told me that he wanted me to use the internet and search how to make paper planes on the internet! Imagine that! A 2 year old wanting to search the internet on how to make paper planes.

I was amazed and in awe as this is my son, only 2 years of age asking me to search. Sure enough, we found a list of page on google. The best part was yet to come. He pointed to the page he wanted and guess what it was the one that says, 'How To Make The Best Paper Planes!'.

Wow! That experience today blew my mind. Kids today are so advance. We as parents have to equip ourselves and prepare our kids properly. The beautiful thing about it is that we will be discovering things together. It is a great experience. It is one of the best opportunity to build relationships. Today, now more than ever if we choose to use technology we can choose to use it to build a stronger relationship.

I made the paper plane as per the instruction. I was amazed as to how many different designs and different kind of paper planes that you can actually create from a piece of paper. Today I learned something from my 2 year old son. Thank you Allah for blessing us with all our children.

I'm Allergic To Bullets!

Today we want to share with you a great story that we read a few years ago. For us it was a great story as the lesson stuck with us until today. If you have read this story before just consider it is a great reminder of how our attitude can determine our success in life. In fact in this story, your attitude could even determine whether you are going to live or die. Anyways enjoy the story!

Read this, and let it really sink in...Then choose how you start your day tomorrow...

Jerry is the kind of guy you love to hate. He is always in a good mood and always has something positive to say. When someone would ask him how he was doing, he would reply, "If I were any better, I would be twins!" He was a unique manager because he had several waiters who had followed him around from restaurant to restaurant. The reason the waiters followed Jerry was because of his attitude. He was a natural motivator. If an employee was having a bad day, Jerry was there telling the employee how to look on the positive side of the situation.

Seeing this style really made me curious, so one day I went up to Jerry and asked him, I don't get it! You can't be a positive person all of the time. How do you do it?" Jerry replied, "Each morning I wake up and say to myself, Jerry, you have two choices today. You can choose to be in a good mood or you can choose to be in a bad mood. I choose to be in a good mood. Each time something bad happens, I can choose to be a victim or I can choose to learn from it. I choose to learn from it. Every time someone comes to me complaining, I can choose to accept their complaining or I can point out the positive side of life. I choose the positive side of life. "Yeah, right, it's not that easy," I protested. "Yes it is," Jerry said. "Life is all about choices. When you cut away all the junk, every situation is a choice. You choose how you react to situations. You choose how people will affect your mood. You choose to be in a good mood or bad mood. The bottom line: It's your choice how you live life."

I reflected on what Jerry said. Soon thereafter, I left the restaurant industry to start my own business. We lost touch, but I often thought about him when I made a choice about life instead of reacting to it.

Several years later, I heard that Jerry did something you are never supposed to do in a restaurant business: he left the back door open one morning and was held up at gunpoint by three armed robbers. While trying to open the safe, his hand, shaking from nervousness, slipped off the combination. The robbers panicked and shot him. Luckily, Jerry was found relatively quickly and rushed to the local trauma center.

After 18 hours of surgery and weeks of intensive care, Jerry was released from the hospital with fragments of the bullets still in his body. I saw Jerry about six months after the accident. When I asked him how he was, he replied, "If I were any better, I'd be twins. Wanna see my scars?" I declined to see his wounds, but did ask him what had gone through his mind as the robbery took place. "the first thing that went through my mind was that I should have locked the back door," Jerry replied. "Then, as I lay on the floor, I remembered that I had two choices: I could choose to live or I could choose to die. I chose to live."

"Weren't you scared? Did you lose consciousness?" I asked.

Jerry continued, "...The paramedics were great. They kept telling me I was going to be fine. But when they wheeled me into the ER and I saw the expressions on the faces of the doctors and nurses, I got really scared. In their eyes, I read 'he's a deadman'. I knew I needed to take action." "What did you do?" I asked. "Well, there was a big burly nurse shouting questions at me," said Jerry. "She asked if I was allergic to anything. 'Yes' I replied. The doctors and nurses stopped working as they waited for my reply. I took a deep breath and yelled, 'Bullets!' Over their laughter, I told them, 'I am choosing to live. Operate on me as if I am alive, not dead'." Jerry lived thanks to the skill of his doctors, but also because of his amazing attitude. I learned from him that every day we have the choice to live fully. Attitude, after all, is everything.

If you are really keen to stay positive than you might want to check out the following link: Instant Positive Attitude NOW!

Real Quote for the Day

Your Attitude Determines Your Altitude

Real Action To Do for the Week

This week every time something happens to you, make an effort to see the positive side of it. Focus and control yourself. Try to do it for the next 21 days and you will create a new habit of being positive. In fact you have created not just a positive attitude but a power attitude. Do it and see your life change for the better. J

To your success!

Amirul & Elin

CEO & Founders

www.realleaders.net

PS - The only way things can get better for you is if you take action NOW! Come and join Discover Yourself Seminar.

Go to www.realleaders.net for details.

PSS – If you want to know how you can control your attitude, you can check out Instant Positive Attitude NOW!