I have nothing to say. Well, bad luck then, you do need to have something to say. I think that public speaking is mostly about private thinking. You need to think about your material. You need to think about your goals, you need to think about the needs of your audience. You need to have something to say, I'm afraid there's no way around that. And I think this is a very important, shall I say, stage or a milestone in the development of a public speaker, to refuse, despite pressure, to refuse to speak if you have nothing to say. I know there are all kinds of people saying, go, do it, just have this experience, train yourself, this is a good training for you. But I think there's an ethical problem here. Does the audience know that you are training yourself at their expense? You are taking away their precious time, I think you have to give them something in return. You have to have something to say to them, you have to want something from them. That said, I need to point out to you one thing. When people say, I have nothing to say, sometimes what they mean is, I have nothing new to say, which isn't exactly the same thing. Because, you don't have to have something new to say, you have to have something. Well, for one thing, systematization counts, if you come up with the same material, but rearranged in some interesting manner. Maybe you were able to build some interesting resume or matrix or scheme for your material, that would do the trick. You don't have to produce a lot of new materials. You don't have to come up with new material every time you come up on stage, but maybe try to rearrange it. Maybe come up with a way to present it in a more memorable, emotional, and persuasive way. So this would work. Secondly, consider running a preliminary survey. Consider surveying the audience, asking them questions whether they actually know anything about what you are about to say them. And you might be surprised about how little they actually know. I often do this first thing when I come to the audience. I start by asking questions, and sometimes I'm really surprised about how little people know. Thing number 3, sometimes people just need a reminder. Most of the sermons we hear are not new. People are just recycling age old wisdoms. In a sense, they're telling you the same sermon for the last, I don't know, 2,000 years or something. Sometimes what you need to say is what people already know very well, but for some reason they don't do it. Sometimes you just need to come and remind them about some few important things in their lives. And finally, sometimes it is about delivery. Most of the time I think it's about content, most of the time I think that good public speaking does require great private thinking. But sometimes it is about the energy, sometimes it is about your passion that you bring into the room, sometimes it's about your anxiety reappraised as excitement. Tom Peters, perhaps the most energetic speakers I ever heard in my life, says in the beginning of his speech, I promise you, ironclad promise, that in the next 90 minutes, duration of the speech, I won't tell you a single thing you don't know. Not only rocket science, but nothing new. Secrets, come on, let's grow up, we're old enough to know there ain't no secrets. And I don't agree with him 100%. I mean sometimes there are secrets, but this works. I mean, his presentation style was described as a blinding flash of the obvious. And sometimes people do need this blinding flash of the obvious. Sometimes you need to point at the elephant in the room, standing right there. Sometimes it's about passion and it's about those age old wisdoms. So it might as well work, don't beat yourself too hard. You do have something to say. Sometimes I tell this to my audience at my workshops. I say, you know what, you are a very intelligent audience. I'm not going to tell you anything you can't deduce for yourself, if you sit there and think about it for a while. But, I'm going to save you some time and effort. And this is something I am bringing in the room, those hours of me sitting and thinking. So you don't have to have ton of new material, but you do have to have something to say. You do have to have a message for the audience, a message you are really, really passionate about.
