[HN Gopher] Stepping Back from Speaking
___________________________________________________________________
Stepping Back from Speaking
Author : alfredbez
Score : 322 points
Date : 2021-06-29 15:14 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (martinfowler.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (martinfowler.com)
| dom96 wrote:
| Martin mentions online talks explicitly as something that he
| found even harder, but the reference is to talks that are still
| done live. I wonder if pre-recorded talks would alleviate some of
| the stress/anxiety.
|
| Personally I loved the opportunity I got to pre-record a talk and
| then allow the conference organisers to premiere it on
| YouTube[1]. It works incredibly well and enables speakers to
| answer questions live while the talk is played. I hope more
| conferences adopt this.
|
| 1 -
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxLL3km21Aw&list=PLxLdEZg8DR...
| legerdemain wrote:
| Thank you, Uncle Bob, for stating the obvious. As we enter an era
| where remote, distributed work is common, normalized, and, nay,
| even _the default_ , we will quickly realize that human contact
| at work is unnecessary.
|
| That teammate tapping you on the shoulder to ask you "a quick
| question"? An unnecessary distraction. A daily standup where you
| take turns passing a ball around and making up a 30-second
| summary of what you did yesterday? A stressful and useless waste
| of time.
|
| Outside of companies heavy on the office politics, it should
| quickly become obvious that full-remote, full-async teams are far
| more effective, and sanity will finally prevail.
| jrochkind1 wrote:
| Martin Fowler is not "Uncle Bob". And "thank you for stating
| the obvious" is usually an insult in American English.
|
| If you're wondering why you're getting downvoted, might be one
| of those.
| legerdemain wrote:
| Are you... complaining about downvoting _on my behalf_? How
| absurd.
| jrochkind1 wrote:
| Nope, wasn't complaining.
| dbt00 wrote:
| I think it's incorrect to assume that your preferred working
| pattern (remote) is universally good for other people, even
| setting aside the legitimate concerns about interruptions,
| daily standups (something plenty of remote teams do), or office
| politics.
|
| I don't like any of that latter group of things. I still work
| much better in on a team that I see every day and my
| productivity suffers immensely when working remotely and not
| talking to other people.
|
| "This works for me, it should work for everyone." is an
| antipattern.
| goshx wrote:
| What a relief. I thought he was going to announce a new
| architecture/methodology and we'd have to start bracing ourselves
| to convince our developers they don't need to shift to it right
| away.
|
| Jokes aside, kudos to Mr Fowler for the decision. I'm sure we are
| all going to benefit even more from his focus to writing and
| things that don't make him miserable.
| fossuser wrote:
| I can relate to the anxiety before something like that which
| often then disappears when you start.
|
| I feel similarly before technical interviews and it's really
| unpleasant, the fear holds you back from doing things you'd
| otherwise want to do.
|
| It's hard to evaluate sometimes or be honest with yourself if
| you're making a decision based on what you want or if it's a
| rationalization to avoid the fear.
|
| I often suspect a lot of the dismissals of technical interviews
| are more about rationalizing responses to the fear.
|
| It makes me wonder though, does he dislike giving talks or is it
| mostly the anxiety that he dislikes? They're hard to separate. I
| can understand giving up on one to avoid the other.
|
| I think most people don't face the anxiety directly, they tend to
| avoid the task and stay in their comfortable zone - I can
| definitely understand why. It's cool he faced it for the amount
| of time he did.
| mathattack wrote:
| This is true of a lot of things. It also appears in athletics.
| Most competitors get very anxious. (Even Mike Tyson in his
| prime!) but once you're in the zone, the anxiety goes away.
|
| We are all nervous in job interviews. The best ones flow once
| they start.
| fossuser wrote:
| Yeah - I think it's a normal human experience, but there's a
| spectrum of intensity. It becomes a problem when it starts
| limiting you from doing what you want to do.
|
| Bobby Fischer was also terrified before chess matches, Elon
| Musk says he's terrified of things failing all the time. I
| think bravery/courage it's not so much not being afraid, but
| being afraid and coming up with strategies to push through
| anyway.
|
| For sports two tennis players come to mind too, Naomi Osaka
| recently but there was another earlier (I think Mardy Fish?).
|
| I think different people feel the level of fear at different
| intensities though - probably a mixture of genetics and
| parenting. The physical symptoms are the worst part (waking
| up hyperventilating, etc.)
| throwawayboise wrote:
| I think people who really experience no nervousness or
| anxiety before doing something with a risk of failure
| either don't care at all, or are just bullshitters (in the
| Harry Frankfurt definition). It's likely that they are
| somewhere on the sociopathic spectrum.
| raegis wrote:
| I understand your feelings, but I disagree. The first
| time I stood in front of a classroom (~30 years ago) I
| was visibly shaking from nervousness. Over the years I've
| learned that everyone is human, makes mistakes, and
| sometimes their minds just go blank. Nowadays the only
| time I get anxiety over a presentation is when I'm not
| prepared. I think of public speaking not so much as a
| performance, but as an opportunity to share one or two
| simple ideas with the audience. Some may receive it well,
| and some not, but that's true with most interactions.
| Most nice people won't fault you for trying to be
| helpful.
|
| Oh, and by the way, I'm not a sociopath :)
| sangnoir wrote:
| > We are all nervous in job interviews. The best ones flow
| once they start.
|
| I've found I'm least anxious in interviews where I don't feel
| like I _need_ to get the job, e.g. at an org that 's not at
| the top of my list, or when the desire to switch employers is
| not urgent or desperate[1].
|
| If you have the time, and the experience is not traumatic,
| I'd encourage everyone to interview once a year (or once
| every 2 years) even if you're happy with your current
| position. At worst, you bomb out of an interview for a job
| you never really wanted; at best, you can a find out that the
| job is actually interesting (or pays more, or both). You may
| even get a raise and keep your old job. In any of the cases,
| you likely come out a little better at interviewing.
|
| 1. Which means you shouldn't wait until it's too late to
| switch jobs. If you see any warning signs, start sending out
| feelers, if you wait until you can't stand the sight of your
| manager (or cubicle/corporate logo), then your job search
| might feel urgent, which is not good if you're not a natural
| interviewee.
| mathattack wrote:
| Very true. There's a fine line between having a chip on
| your shoulder and desperation on your forehead.
| dmoy wrote:
| > It also appears in athletics
|
| In precision shooting, any anxiety absolutely destroys your
| scores. When your heartbeat alone is enough to drop points
| directly, anxiety is brutal.
|
| It wouldn't surprise me at all if a lot of top precision
| shooters were on beta blockers.
| mathattack wrote:
| Every sport has it's Performance Enhancing Drugs. Even
| chess and eSports.
| cmckn wrote:
| I too get _really_ anxious when I have to give a presentation
| or do an interview. Beta blockers like propranolol have been
| incredible for these moments. I don't take them every time, and
| I luckily don't face these situations very often. I wouldn't
| encourage anyone to dedicate their life to a career that they
| need medication to survive, doesn't seem like a good trade off
| to me. But if you find this to be a real negative thing in your
| life, you have options besides deep breathing and power poses!
| Talk to your doctor :)
| fossuser wrote:
| Interesting about the beta blockers - docs mostly seem pretty
| clueless about this kind of thing and often suggest
| benzodiazepines (lorazepam, alprazolam, etc.) or SSRIs -
| neither of which I really want to take given their negative
| effects.
| ketzo wrote:
| Yeah, seriously. A friend and I in college were talking about
| how we handle our pre-presentation nerves, and I was
| suggesting she should try deep breaths, counting to ten,
| etc.; meanwhile, she would routinely go into full-body fight-
| or-flight mode, panic attacks, barely able to speak.
|
| Yeah... "count to ten" is probably insufficient for that! Her
| body needed more help managing her chemical response to
| stress. Same thing for her -- beta blockers (propranolol too,
| actually) were a _complete_ life change.
|
| Just to hit it on the head for anyone reading: everyone has
| anxiety, it's a normal part of life. If you find yourself
| _physically incapacitated_ by anxiety on a regular basis,
| that 's not something everyone deals with, and you can
| absolutely seek the help of a psychologist or psychiatrist!
| siavosh wrote:
| I wanted to only comment that I admire the bravery of the author
| being so open about such personal fears like this. Many times
| it's safer to not open up because there maybe little to gain and
| potentially a lot to lose.
| aksss wrote:
| It's normal to have anxiety about public speaking. It's also
| within reach of most to overcome it. I think taking meds for it
| is not a good practice at all.
|
| It's important to distinguish the fear you may have of speaking
| in front of people from the fear you may have of presenting
| incorrect material. If you're giving an instructional speech
| about a practice/process that's well known with zero controversy,
| and which you are very familiar with, do you still have anxiety?
|
| That's a different breed of anxiety than when you are postulating
| in front of a crowd of peers about fringe techniques that you may
| harbor doubts about yourself (a new way to do a process, or a
| change to the accepted standard, or a new interpretation of
| history, etc).
|
| It's important to distinguish what's causing the anxiety because
| the fix is different for these two issues. For the latter, it's
| building confidence in your own preparation and learning. Do you
| know what you're talking about? Could you put it on paper and
| publish it and not look like a jackass? If so, carry on.
|
| For the former - like you just get anxiety from talking in front
| of people even about material that is uncontroversial - the key
| is kind of a mind trick on yourself. For me, I try to find some
| aspect of the topic that I really love and enjoy, and am
| fascinated by. If I can do that, my mind is focused on giving and
| sharing that fascination, and all anxiety goes away.
|
| That said, I started speaking publicly in high school as part of
| Academic Decathlon - speech competitions and the like. I remember
| being anxious about doing that in the same way I would be anxious
| about a school musical. As a kid, overcoming that and just doing
| it is the first step to learning how to enjoy it.
|
| I highly recommend that parents expose their kids to this early -
| school plays, speech competitions - if they have the opportunity
| to do so. With most skills in life, exposure to it as a kid helps
| greatly.
|
| As an adult, I look back on those younger days about stressing
| over a two-minute speech with some amusement. Now I have zero
| problem talking for 40+ minutes. It's not something I every
| worked up to like reps of an exercise, it's just the relatively
| simple trick of falling in love with subject matter and having
| confidence that you know the material and have seen a thing or
| two that gives you some authority (road mileage) on the topic.
| Probably also advantageous as an adult to recognize that
| EVERYBODY out there in the world is fundamentally a hack in life,
| just trying to get by day-by-day, the same as you, wanting to
| understand things and for people to treat them with dignity.
|
| Speaking is serving - think of it that way and (for me at least)
| anxiety goes away.
| anyfoo wrote:
| For me, the dread is in the _preparation_. Once I 'm on the
| proverbial stage, everything is usually good if I have prepared a
| good presentation. There is definitely some pre-stage anxiety,
| but I know it will go away when I actually present.
|
| But the preparation, I hate it so much. Sitting in front of that
| empty window and trying to come up with something that makes
| sense, then refactoring it multiple times. Practicing,
| identifying stumbling points, fixing them... I put it off as long
| as I can, but not how I put off some programming work if it's
| boring, instead I put it off because of how dreadful it feels.
| This is somewhat of a vicious cycle, because there's only so much
| on-stage adrenaline and maybe resulting improvisation power can
| do: To have a good talk, you _have_ to have a good preparation,
| but if you put it off because it is so anxiety-inducing, the fear
| that you are not prepared enough as a result is even more
| anxiety-inducing.
| throwawayboise wrote:
| "I've reached the point in my life where I'm lucky enough to be
| able to avoid things that make me miserable"
|
| I'm there. I've reached a point in my evolution as a programmer
| that I have ways I like to do things. Ways that work for me.
| Unfortunately they are not popular. But I'm tired of working on
| stuff the way others want it done. I'm teetering on the brink of
| either early retirement or contract work with a strict "my way or
| the highway" approach. We'll see what happens.
| [deleted]
| UncleOxidant wrote:
| Good for him. As someone who struggles with serious anxiety
| issues I decided not to do interviewing anymore as it just became
| too debilitating - days of worrying before the interview, the
| feeling of dread and doom. That point in the interview when the
| interviewer says "Ok, now I'm going to ask you a few technical
| questions..." my heart rate would skyrocket and I'd start
| sweating perfusely. It's just really difficult to shine in an
| interview when you're also fighting to stay lucid, let alone
| calm. It's like there are all these processes that suddenly spin
| up and swamp your mental CPU. I'm retired from interviewing.
| ogjunkyard wrote:
| I mean this question is the most empathetic way possible, from
| a curiosity-based perspective, and feel free to tell me to
| shove off if you don't want to answer it.
|
| How do you gain employment in the event you decide you need to
| leave your current place of employment?
| [deleted]
| UncleOxidant wrote:
| I have no current place of employment. I'm fortunate to be
| able to live without paid work for a long while. I'm possibly
| even retired from paid work altogether and not just from
| interviewing. This has happened a few years earlier than I
| had thought it would. I'm definitely in the "leanfire"
| category - I can be retired, but I'm going to have to be
| pretty frugal.
|
| That said, I do occasionally get contract gigs through people
| I've worked with in the past where there are no interviews
| required, it's more like "Hey, we need someone to do this
| project and we know you can do it because you've done similar
| in the past - can you help us out?"
| ogjunkyard wrote:
| That's awesome to hear and I appreciate the answer!
| atulatul wrote:
| Very good communicator. And one of the most 'balanced' speakers.
| I have seen a few people get so stuck in topics that they forget
| about the bigger contexts (for example, craftsmanship,
| microservices). He always looked pragmatic in his approach (for
| example, tech debt). Possibly because he is not only a consultant
| but works for a company that delivers things into production- and
| comes up with radar).
|
| He can explain the overall concepts very well. You can then go
| into details. (Refactoring book, UML distilled, NoSQL distilled,
| etc. I even learned LMAX first from his bliki.)
|
| Going by blogs on his site and his signature series books, I
| certainly look forward to things he will write/ contribute to.
| asmos7 wrote:
| There have been a lot of character assassination's on prominent
| white men in the conference space by far left extremists. I
| wonder how much of his anxiety can be attributed to seeing
| colleagues go through that?
| mttjj wrote:
| Care to explain the connection between your unsubstantiated
| claim and the original article?
| tester756 wrote:
| I think he's talking about cancel culture inside Scala
| Community
|
| e.g
| https://twitter.com/skillsmatter/status/1168944236181557254
| busterarm wrote:
| I used to volunteer at a lot of conferences. Especially the
| opportunities to mentor people who receive sponsored attendance
| based on being from an underrepresented community.
|
| After seeing some heavily charged scenarios play out where it
| seemed like situations were grossly misinterpreted or
| expectations were wildly out of whack (none that I was party
| to, just as a bystander), I no longer do any kind of conference
| volunteering. I also no longer interact with anyone I don't
| know _very well_ outside of large groups.
|
| Basically I limit my stranger-interactions to group lunches.
| Out of personal caution/safety. That also eliminates the only
| reasons to go to most conferences, so my schedule is a lot more
| open.
| slver wrote:
| Unexpectedly personal, but I'm happy he's sharing this with us.
| We're all human, eh?
| sumnole wrote:
| He's a human with superhuman writing ability. It's good he's
| not stepping back from authoring. I can understand not wanting
| to face situations that make you miserable all the time.
| SNosTrAnDbLe wrote:
| I am so glad to hear it's not just me. I have recently been doing
| some meditation to help me with this.
| niix wrote:
| Once I figured out what was happening to me was anxiety I also
| started exploring meditation. Often times I can feel the
| anxiety first thing in the morning and I know I need to have a
| nice mediation session to calm me down (and usually the helps
| throughout my entire day). And you're definitely not alone, its
| way more common than I originally thought as well.
| potamic wrote:
| Good on him for coming out and saying it straight. So many people
| go through such discomfort and are constantly pressured by their
| environment to put up with it. You're not encouraged to say no.
| It is seen as unnatural. It is career limiting. I do believe the
| tech industry puts an unhealthy obsession on public speaking, to
| the extent that you aren't considered fit for leadership if you
| can't give public talks.
| mabbo wrote:
| I really like Clean Code and agreed with a lot of the points it
| makes. I would be lying if I said Bob Martin hasn't made me a
| better programmer. And I can can empathize with what he's saying
| about not liking public speaking anymore.
|
| Despite this, part of me wonders if the reason to pick now as to
| time to stop doesn't have something to do with the criticism-
| valid or otherwise- he's now receiving. Some of his Clean Code
| videos have some pretty offensive stereotypes which have been
| pointed out. Some of his loud political views have been
| criticized. People are saying they won't share a stage with him.
|
| People always have reasons to quit but the precise moment they
| choose to quit often tells the story of why they're really
| quitting.
| derekbaker783 wrote:
| Isn't this referring to Fowler as opposed to Martin?
| [deleted]
| radicalbyte wrote:
| This post is from Martin Fowler (author of Refactoring,
| Patterns of Enterprise Architecture and a fantastic blog) - who
| has a much better grasp of software development and who has had
| a far greater positive influence on our craft than Robert C.
| Martin could ever dream of.
| benatkin wrote:
| Don't worry - this article isn't about Uncle Bob.
| jrochkind1 wrote:
| > It's not always been this way. When I was a kid at school I
| felt none of the fear of public speaking that others talked
| about. I enjoyed being on stage, and with my loud voice and
| plenty of confidence, I felt good about being there. That
| continued to be true once I entered the world of work, and my
| comfort on-stage did much to boost my career. But over time, this
| changed.
|
| I am very curious about this dynamic, and why it changed.
| panzagl wrote:
| For many people increased anxiety in general is part of the
| aging process.
| throwawayboise wrote:
| Young people, especially young men, tend to be fearless in
| general, at least compared to older people.
| johnwheeler wrote:
| For me, it's somewhat ironic then that during my early software
| career (20+ years ago), Fowler's lucid writing helped me through
| a lot of the anxiety, insecurity and impostor syndrome I
| experienced.
|
| His work introduced me to eXtreme Programming, UML, Refactoring
| and more. Much of the agile tooling used nowadays are a
| consequence of effort he and the groups he was a part of put
| forth. The book Analysis Patterns is very underrated IMO and was
| a breath of fresh air after futzing around with the SAMS Teach
| Yourself series books that were undeservingly popular back then.
|
| I think of Fowler as a virtuoso when it comes to explaining
| practical software matters. I haven't watched much of his talks,
| but I've read most of his books and PLoP papers.
|
| I'm glad he's going to focus more on writing and helping others
| with theirs.
| mavelikara wrote:
| +1 on Analysis Patterns. The notation is a little dated, but
| the book is still a good read.
| HeyLaughingBoy wrote:
| +2 and thank you for reminding me that I have a copy of this
| book. About to start a new job and it would be worthwhile to
| refresh my mind on the concepts.
| jjoergensen wrote:
| How wonderfully liberating when people dare to be honest with
| themselves and others. It's a good thing.
| brianmcc wrote:
| Fair play to him for coming forward and good luck, I say.
|
| I always assume that the people doing talks are eager to do so,
| or at the very least find the adrenaline etc of the "performance"
| worth it when compared to the nerves and work involved.
|
| I wonder if there are a lot of people in the "don't want to do
| this but feel I have to" category.
|
| (I have no interest in public speaking, and don't make any effort
| to be put in such a position)
| cableshaft wrote:
| There's at least one high-profile performer that had to take a
| 5-year break because going on stage gave him anxiety attacks:
| Bo Burnham.
|
| He does a good job describing the experience in this interview:
| https://youtu.be/GbS-7jUBJGY
| [deleted]
| oh_sigh wrote:
| Martin - if you're here, and would want to continue speaking were
| it not for the physical problems you face - perhaps you should
| give beta blockers a shot? Side effects are uncommon, risks are
| low, addictive potential is low, so doctors are generally willing
| to prescribe them if the patient requests it.
|
| It sounds like you're just experiencing stage fright. Many
| professional performers get this way, and beta blockers have been
| shown to help reduce the physical symptoms of stage
| fright(tachycardia, sweating, etc):
| https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/6129674/
|
| I had zero problem public speaking in school, or in casual public
| speaking (ie addressing participants in a sports league I help
| run), but I learned when I was 25 that I actually do have public
| speaking anxiety from a professional perspective. Perhaps it is
| because school/sports were low-stake activities in my mind,
| whereas I know that my professional performance is directly tied
| to my ability to support my family. So now I occasionally take a
| beta blocker before a big presentation, and they go as smoothly
| as my public speaking did back in college.
| alexfromapex wrote:
| I have tried beta blockers and they really just get rid of the
| thumping heart sensation but you're still sweating and
| terrified. I have had some good success with taking full B
| complex and D vitamins before speaking though.
| IsopropylMalbec wrote:
| I've had success with Valerian, it is a quite mild sedative
| and anti-anxiety root. It's just enough to get over the pre-
| presentation anxiety and get in to the flow.
| oh_sigh wrote:
| Yes, if you have mental problems with public speaking, then
| beta blockers will not help you. They only mitigate the
| physical symptoms of stage fright.
| Wistar wrote:
| In the concert piano world, 5mg of Inderal (Propranolol) is a
| common pre-performance dose.
|
| My doctor, who treated a lot of Microsoft folks, told me that
| he prescribed a lot of Inderal for those who did a lot of
| public speaking.
| nr2x wrote:
| https://youtu.be/DW5juaLAg28
| cableshaft wrote:
| Sure, he could pursue that...or he could just not do the thing
| that he hates in the first place, instead of putting foreign
| substances (with potential risks and side effects) in his body,
| so he can power through it and keep forcing it to happen.
|
| Not all of us have that luxury, but he seems to.
| oh_sigh wrote:
| From my understanding of the article, it appears that he
| enjoys public speaking, but doesn't enjoy the physical side
| effects of it.
| hogFeast wrote:
| Taking medication doesn't make the problem go away.
|
| I understand why people do it if their job relies on it...but
| the point of taking medication is so you can expose yourself to
| the fear, and then don't need the medication at all at some
| point...not using it as a coping strategy.
|
| I have gone through something similar, unfortunately something
| significantly more disruptive. And I have succeeded and failed
| more than anyone over ten plus years...medication isn't
| anything. Your choices are: expose yourself to the situation
| and hope it goes away, or avoid it totally (and btw, both are
| fine choices...I think people assume that the latter is failure
| but life is complicated, sometimes it isn't possible to get
| over it...choosing not to do public speaking and talk openly
| about why, imo, takes some guts).
| xyzelement wrote:
| An interesting difference between the original post and a few
| comments here is what people did about their anxiety.
|
| Fowler has powered through it, and although unpleasant he was
| able to deliver. He says he felt no right to complain because he
| understood that many people do much more objectively risky and
| painful things and he was too proud a professional to quit.
|
| I think the above is a good insight into what success looks like.
| It's not that all the right things are easy, it's that the idea
| of not doing them scares you more than the pain of doing them.
|
| Then it seems like he finally got to a place where he knows he's
| accomplished and impactful and no longer needs to do the thing he
| doesn't like, which is awesome as well. The important thing is
| that this happens after success, not before.
|
| The important thing is "to do." I think in many cases, anxiety
| evaporates once you prove to yourself through experience that you
| can handle the situation (it's hard to fear something you
| survived a thousand times). In his case, the anxiety continued to
| be painful but at least he had the intellectual strength to say
| "I know this sucks but I know it's not real" and power through.
| Which again, powering through - grit - is really important.
|
| I never had it that hard but I did have massive social anxiety.
| If I had to be in a social situation, much less public speaking,
| I'd dread and overthink it. And probably if I stayed an IC
| engineer i would be able to continue to have this problem
| forever. What happened instead is I started to do management and
| recruiting and sales - all of which forced me to talk to people
| one on one and in groups constantly. I didn't notice when it
| happened but one day I realized that my anxiety was gone because
| I had disproved its thesis.
|
| It was funny a few years ago at our wedding, my wife and I forgot
| to prepare a speech. We realized this with a few mins to go and
| my wife (who is actually very social) went into "oh shit, can you
| do this cuz I can't?" mode. I quickly drafted a few points in my
| head and delivered a speech I was proud of. It was amazing to
| reflect on this as something I could just do, which would have
| paralyzed me a few years earlier.
|
| The point is, do things that genuinely scare you. There's a good
| chance you'll realize they are not scary. Or at least like in
| Fowlers case you'll recognize that you are able to power through
| and get success.
| admissionsguy wrote:
| I dropped out of my PhD because I could not stand the pressure of
| having to do talks regularly. Even though I was pretty decent at
| it (I was told my delivery was fine and clarity was superb), and
| sometimes felt good ("powerful" for lack of a better word) while
| on stage, I would worry for months before every presentation,
| then basically get physically sick for weeks before, and take
| some weeks more to recover.
|
| Then one poster I submitted got upgraded to a talk, which brought
| me over the tipping point, and I quit.
|
| I keep wondering if I could have done more to desensitise myself
| to it, but the anxiety was never decreasing, if anything, it was
| getting worse each time. I tried therapy, medication,
| Toastmasters, martial arts classes and dance lessons (which
| became my hobby, incidentally), and even vocal lessons (since I
| was particularly self-conscious about my voice), all to no avail.
|
| So now I have a co-founder to do all and any public speaking, and
| I do not plan to put myself in front of a crowd ever again. But I
| feel I'm missing a part of life by it.
| Syzygies wrote:
| Six weeks before my thesis defense, I gave a talk at MIT's
| combinatorics seminar on Grobner bases.
|
| We came up with an abstract intended to attract computer
| scientists. I was a bit naive about complexity analysis. The
| computer scientists came, were quite generous and kind to me as
| a graduate student who didn't know, but they were out for blood
| when it came to protecting basic concepts.
|
| I was asked to explain algebraic geometry to complete
| beginners, to set the stage for my talk. At the same time, an
| algebraic geometry seminar was to meet down the hall. The
| speaker was from the university that had just hired me. Two
| attendees drew this ridiculous conclusion that my efforts to
| computerize algebraic geometry might be the future. They
| convinced the organizers to postpone the algebraic geometry
| seminar so that they could attend my talk.
|
| 80 or so of the world's 300 experts in algebraic geometry
| showed up with nothing to do for an hour. Guess what they did?
| We had to move my room, so they could hear me explain algebraic
| geometry to complete beginners.
|
| Yes I felt ill afterwards.
| pyuser583 wrote:
| Wow. I'm so sorry.
| pbronez wrote:
| Organizing an excellent event is hard. There's fundamental
| uncertainty about what each presenter will say, and what the
| audience needs to hear. The best you can do is try to think
| of a high quality theme, get good abstracts from your
| speakers, and cobble together an agenda tries to cater to
| your audience. From there, it's a crap shoot.
|
| Don't beat yourself up. You were in a no-win scenario.
| Honestly, the best option might have been to go COMPLETELY
| off script. Admit to your audience that they know more than
| you about the core subject. Just give that to them. Then talk
| about why you find the subject interesting, and how it
| relates to your work. Maybe even open it up to a Q&A with the
| expectation that you'll look kinda dumb but learn a lot.
|
| Of course, I've stayed far away from academia, so what do I
| know.
| Syzygies wrote:
| Yes. In the years since I've learned that it is better to
| go off script. Preparation is so one can react, like a
| tennis match.
|
| After that trial by fire, I've been comfortable before
| audiences of a thousand multiple times. Once, asked how I
| became the math consultant for "A Beautiful Mind", I looked
| out and managed to sell "Every audience is an audience of
| one".
|
| For anxiety, it helps to remember that public speaking is a
| cultural ritual. It's not about you, you're playing a role.
|
| When one gives academic job talks, most professors in the
| room don't understand your subject. What they can tell is
| whether you listen to questions. How well you answer
| questions is everyone's best gauge as to how smart you are.
| If the people who know you are already on your side, the
| talk itself is a Macguffin. Be truly present at each
| question, consider it honestly.
| enriquto wrote:
| > I would worry for months before every presentation, then
| basically get physically sick for weeks before, and take some
| weeks more to recover.
|
| That was _exactly_ me. Fortunately, my PhD advisor noticed the
| trend and solved it in a severe but functional way. Starting
| from my second year, I was assigned to teach calculus to first-
| year computer science undergrads (three groups of about 80
| students each). It was absolutely terrifying. At the beginning
| I vomited, had diarrhea, anxiety, the whole pack. But since the
| schedule was so intense, somehow my body got used to it. After
| a couple of months, I had become desensitized to it, and
| actually started enjoying it.
|
| It may be unusual, but my advisor coached me quite well on how
| to teach, and that helped me a lot. A couple of days before my
| first class, he asked me how was it going, and I told him that
| it was quite bad... then he asked me casually if I had already
| prepared my first class (of course, I had spent the entire
| summer preparing for it!), and to remind him what was it about,
| since it had been a few years since he last taught it. Then I
| told him the whole contents of the first session in about 20
| minutes, even reaching for the blackboard to write a couple of
| formulas. After that, I said "the way I'm going to explain all
| that is...", and he cut me: "no! forget about your preparation.
| The informal explanation you just gave is actually a good first
| class, just repeat it a bit slowly and call it a day". I knew
| he was fucking with me just to calm me down, but this actually
| gave me a confidence boost.
|
| When I had to speak at my first somewhat major conference
| venue, I had similar concerns, and he told me "remember the
| first course you taught? do exactly the same thing: explain
| your stuff to fellow scientists as you would do if you found
| them by the coffee machine".
|
| > But I feel I'm missing a part of life by it.
|
| Surely not! If you really don't like speaking in public, it's
| alright. There's plenty of other things that you are not doing,
| and that are not either "a part of life". Nobody can do
| everything.
| avg_dev wrote:
| This is a great story and I think well of your PhD advisor.
| dilyevsky wrote:
| Used to perform live regularly in front of audiences of up to
| 100+ (piano). Never really got over it. In fact it got worse as
| I got older. The only thing that ever worked for me is have
| everything on muscle memory so I could basically plug my brain
| off. I heard people had good experience with beta blockers
| tho...
| reducesuffering wrote:
| Might be worth looking into a beta blocker if it's adversely
| affecting your life that much.
|
| "Musicians, public speakers, actors, and professional dancers
| have been known to use beta-blockers to avoid performance
| anxiety, stage fright, and tremor during both auditions and
| public performances."
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beta_blocker#Anxiety
| busyant wrote:
| Do you find that you give fewer/zero presentations now with
| your current occupation?
|
| I ask because it seems like many of us still need to give
| presentations even outside of academia.
|
| Hopefully, you're in a position where it's no longer affecting
| your health.
|
| Also, was it the size of the audience? For example, are you
| comfortable presenting to a smallish group (e.g., < 10 people)?
|
| In grad school, I used to memorize my talks (complete with
| pauses, "ums...", "uhhs...", etc.). I did this because I was
| paranoid that I would forget specific details. It took a while,
| but eventually I got comfortable with making presentation
| errors. I think my presentations got better as a result, too.
| admissionsguy wrote:
| I don't have to do any as a web development individual
| contributor contractor, nor have I had to do any as part of
| my own company so far. I am fairly certain I can avoid it for
| the rest of my life, but do not necessarily want to avoid it.
|
| My anxiety scales with the audience size like it does for
| most people, but in a manageable way. For me, the
| overwhelming anxiety depends on how much the audience (or the
| venue!) reminds my brain of my middle & high school.
|
| It's much less of a problem for me when the audience is
| older. I had no problem presenting/interviewing in front of a
| panel of PIs, for example, even got some praise for it, nor
| do I find job interviews particularly stressful. Presenting
| in front of other students was particularly difficult. It was
| really difficult if in addition the room resembled my old
| school classrooms (low ceiling, bright, particular chair
| design). It didn't help that absent venue information, I
| would always imagine the setting to be exactly that.
| busyant wrote:
| > It was really difficult if in addition the room resembled
| my old school classrooms
|
| My opinion is uninformed here, but it seems like some kind
| of therapy (e.g., cbt) might be helpful.
|
| Thank you for the conversation.
| jakobdabo wrote:
| Is it really _required_ to do talks? Does that mean that, for
| example, people who can 't speak (muteness and similar
| disabilities) can not become PhD?
| jurassic wrote:
| Public speaking is certainly expected. Accommodations might
| be possible for somebody with an obvious and documented
| disability like muteness, but most people just experience
| different levels of anxiety which is considered "normal" and
| something you have to get over. You have to realize the PhD
| isn't useful on its own; it's just an entry ticket to a
| community where you will be in continuous collaboration /
| idea exchange for decades. Really difficult to do that
| successfully if you have crippling anxiety. It's just not the
| right fit for everybody.
|
| Full disclosure: I also quit my PhD, for different reasons.
| alexfromapex wrote:
| I think this goes hand-in-hand with recent research about
| psychological safety at work. If you are forced to give the
| talks, you don't feel psychologically safe because your
| livelihood is being used as leverage to make you give talks. If,
| on the other hand, they encourage you to give talks but don't
| force it it's much easier to cope with and less stressful.
| binaryanomaly wrote:
| Do more of what makes you happy. All the best!
| stadium wrote:
| Appreciate the vulnerability. "Powering through" mental health
| problems is so common, maybe even expected in some cultures. Your
| courage to talk publicly about your personal struggles with
| anxiety will surely help others to set boundaries and manage
| their own struggles in healthy ways.
| [deleted]
| kentonv wrote:
| I get this too.
|
| Meanwhile, I wonder: are talks even worth it? A blog post can
| reach orders of magnitude more people, can be edited to
| perfection in advance, and is much easier for most people to
| consume (supports searching, skimming, quoting, out-of-order
| reading etc.). Even the Q&A part is much better conducted on a
| site like HN than live.
|
| It seems to me that a good blog post is strictly better than a
| talk. Yet we're willing to spend way more money and effort on
| talks, for some reason?
| campbel wrote:
| Yes! part of my speech anxiety is because the REASON to do it
| is so lacking. When I feel the importance of what I'm
| communicating it's almost entirely gone, but when I'm just up
| there spewing them same tired shit I can't get out of my head.
| adimitrov wrote:
| I disagree. I prefer talks, most of the time, especially on
| stuff that isn't nitty gritty technical. Do I want someone
| explaining to me on stage how to install minikube and deploy a
| container? Hell no.
|
| But take what Fowler did, namely talking about refactoring,
| organizing and structuring your code - the broad strokes stuff.
| I think it's a lot more enjoyable and effective to listen to a
| talk (esp in person) for that, than it is to read about it.
|
| Humans are social creatures, and I do enjoy the human aspect of
| learning from another human. Teaching is performative. I don't
| get that from a text as much as from a talk.
|
| Of course, everyone's different, and that's why it's good it
| doesn't have to be either or.
| flakiness wrote:
| "As I steadily get more disconnected from the day-to-day of
| software development, I feel I provide my greatest value by
| helping improve communication from those who have that
| connection."
|
| I'm a big fan of his writing, including the "Refactoring" book
| [1], which has changed my life. So it's a bit sad to read this
| admission. But I appreciate his honesty. Wondering if this
| "detached" feeling is attributed to the anxiety he has felt on
| the speaking side.
|
| Anyway, I hope he keeps writing. It doesn't have to be a great
| hit like, say "Microsevices" [2]. I believe it can be more
| personal. I'd like to learn what experienced people like him
| think about things happening in the software development world.
|
| (Probably I'll even enjoy reading about what he does on his
| "indulge" time. That's what the fandom is like.)
|
| [1] https://www.amazon.com/Refactoring-Improving-Existing-
| Addiso...
|
| [2] https://martinfowler.com/articles/microservices.html
| nickkell wrote:
| Wow, he really hid it well. I remember thinking how composed he
| was and how clearly he communicated whilst watching videos of him
| speak
| foobarbazetc wrote:
| FWIW, these are classic panic attacks.
|
| Usually the stressor is obvious, but sometimes it's not and it's
| something you've left unresolved that your subconscious gets
| caught up on from time to time.
|
| It might not be the talks themselves. It could be anything.
|
| If you've never had a panic attack before and start getting
| these, it literally feels like you're going to die the first time
| you get one. Then you get used to them and start adjusting.
|
| I went through a period of panic attacks after acquisition talks
| with a giant corp fell through. I was messed up for years after
| that, with random panic attacks at all times of day.
|
| I worked on returning myself to my previously chill demeanor and
| haven't had one for many years now.
|
| I also stopped answering any VC/BizDev/CorpDev emails though.
| lol. But mostly out of a desire to optimize my time use for
| things that actually matter.
|
| Good luck Martin. Covid has certainly put the value of living the
| life you truly want for yourself into perspective and I hope you
| achieve that.
| MeinBlutIstBlau wrote:
| The key to anxiety issues related to speaking is not to worry
| about making a mistake or a faux pas. I don't know but my whole
| life, anytime anybody asked me to do something in front of others
| it was never an issue. The odd thing was, the more impromptu the
| easier. That's because there is absolutely no expectations by the
| audience then at that point. Prepared stuff nobody cares if you
| come reading off of a paper, so long as you aren't staring at it
| but glance at it from time to time.
|
| The ultimate way to do this though is go out and try new things.
| Feel vulnerable and interact with the world, and others, with a
| sort of whimsy. And have fun with it. Remember that the audience
| is being held hostage in the situation too!
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| I've done a lot of public speaking. Not really keynote stuff, and
| probably not to audiences more than a couple hundred, and I've
| never been paid for it.
|
| I've not gotten particularly good at it. As I often say: "I'm
| quite comfortable, speaking in public, but I'm not very good at
| it. That's a really bad combination."
| drkrab wrote:
| Thanks for all the talks Martin
|
| https://youtu.be/qI_g07C_Q5I
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