In what feels like short order, two of my best mates are getting married. Not to each other. That would be amazing though. It'd be like some sort of LOTR slash fic because they're both beardy hobbits.

No, they're each marrying wonderful women who are truly well-suited to them and vice versa, genuinely good stuff. One wedding is happening in July of this year, so about 3 months from now, and the other is 'scheduled' for the year 2020.

I've been asked to be Best Man at both, which is a very touching honour. It means I get to plan two Stag Parties, which I'm very excited about (I love planning things like that)!

It also means I have two speeches to write. Speeches which matter; which will be to a room full of people, most of whom I won't know; which must be well received by all, while still being funny, slightly mean to my pal, but heartfelt and congratulatory to the Bridge and Groom. So...no pressure...


To some people, the idea of speaking to a crowd is terrifying. They'll actively avoid it at all cost, and if forced into it will go to pieces. 'Stage fright' doesn't need a stage.

Others seem to handle it with ease, without a second thought. Politicians, training providers, actors and comedians/-ennes, and those who find it thrust upon them in the heat of the moment, such as emergency services personnel.

It seems to me that these people who find it easier are split into two groups, and while there will certainly be some overlap, each group has a different reason for success and/or comfort in their oratory role.


Preparation, and Distraction.


Preparation:

Benjamin Franklin, a Founding Father of the USA and generally clever chap

"By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail," Benjamin Franklin.

If one finds oneself having to give a speech in a couple of weeks to a team, or a board, or a congregation, one will most likely rehearse the speech several times in private, time it, and perhaps amend the written copy with notes such as "pause for emphasis", "take a breath here" etc. One will also probably find a friend/relative or two to take on the role of a dummy audience. By the time the real speech is to be delivered, every conceivable angle has been analysed and tweaks have been tweaked. There remains no logical reason to be worried. Now, our amygdala and the emotional responses it elicits from us tend to laugh at logic and make rude gestures towards it, but nevertheless preparedness is a very strong crutch to lean on when nerves might otherwise be one's undoing.

Distraction:

Douglas Adams, The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy

"You have to have your attention suddenly distracted by something else when you're halfway there, so that you are no longer thinking about falling, or about the ground, or about how much it's going to hurt if you fail to miss it," Douglas Adams, in The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

Distraction has a lot going for it as a method of avoiding nerves. I'm not suggesting that by being distracted while falling we can instead become able to fly, but who am I to argue with the great Mr Adams?
Obviously, if what you're most focused on is something other than the address you must make to the crowd of people before you, your fear of making that address will be lessened. We are simple creatures, and we prioritise our concerns subconsciously. We're so good at harnessing distraction, at utilising 'Mind Over Matter', that we can fool our own proprioception, we can be made to feel better with a placebo, we can even walk on hot coals (no, I haven't tried this myself yet but I probably will at some point). If you are first on scene at a traffic collision there will be so much going through your head that the gathering throng of onlookers won't even rank as a concern. At best they'll register as an annoyance, and you'll have no problem announcing to them that they must keep back a safe distance. In less extreme circumstances, there are those who must deliver a line or a running commentary as they carry out a complicated task, perhaps talking to a camera whilst driving or giving a combined tutorial and demonstration in the use of a piece of equipment or software. The act of giving the speech is lessened in it's associated intimidation by the other things going on around the speaker which demand more of their attention. You might be thinking that the example of speaking to a camera ought to be less scary in and of itself regardless of distracting activity, but do you think George VI was any happier speaking into a microphone in a cosy enclosed room than he would have been standing at a pulpit when he made Britain's declaration of war on Germany?


If one is accustomed to public speaking, through repetition and long practice, much of the trepidation of a first-timer is dulled. One has learnt, through experience, that the things one might dread going wrong generally do not. One has improved pacing, volume, language, and has become more relaxed overall (which tends to be picked up on by the audience, forming a little positive feedback loop).

I began public speaking properly when I was 13 or 14, reading from Scripture to a congregation during Mass (church service). Obviously I engaged in a great deal of preparation for this, memorising what I had to say and rehearsing endlessly. I continued to give such readings until just a few years ago, and never put in any less preparation time, even though I felt increasingly confident. I have headed innumerable presentations and demonstrations, addressed teams and groups, boards and shareholders, and companies of soldiers. I have given speeches in eulogy, in congratulation at awards ceremonies, and at weddings. I have performed the duties of a Master of Ceremonies at several events and for a couple of years ran a very well-attended pub quiz.
I could definitely be said to be accustomed to public speaking.

I still, every now and then, have to stifle a little tremor of nerves or a catch in my voice.

Bloody amygdala.

First post, about my first 10k

So here we are, my first blog post. Not the first post I've ever written on a blog, because I've populated a blog page on a company website for various things before, but the first time I've ever had a personal blog. Yes, that's the sort of sentence length and structure you can expect from me. Strap in.

My general thought is to chuck stuff on here as and when I feel like it. This might mean we get stuff on a whole host of random topics but that might work.

I have no plan for this first post, but something had to break the ice.

One of the main things occupying me at the moment is running. I started running about 3 years ago, certainly with no particular future in mind for it as a pastime. My boss at the time had signed up to run the BUPA 10k in London, promptly forgotten about it, remembered 2 or 3 weeks ahead of the date and then panicked that he wasn't fit enough. He didn't want to ditch his responsibilities completely so he asked someone to take his place. I agreed, and promptly forgot about it. A couple of weeks later, at about 4am, at the end of a 13 hour pub shift, said boss turns to me as we sat down with a pint and says, "Isn't that BUPA thing tomorrow?"

It is. Of course at this point 'tomorrow' is really 'today'. The race starts in 4.5 hours.

3 hours later I've had a couple of hours' sleep on the sofa of a mate who lived very near both the pub and the railway station and I'm on a train to London.

In all honesty I hadn't put a great deal of energy or effort into it anyway. I'd made a point of jogging around Stoke Park a bit, a couple of times, when I first agreed to it. I certainly didn't have any proper running gear or anything like that, so the tracksuit bottoms I borrowed from a mate and the tshirt I'd had in my bag, teamed with my basic trainers, comprised my professional athlete attire du jour. I hadn't heaped too much expectation on myself either, as it was my first attempt at such a thing and I'd done no training. I'd had a quick look online and found that a proper athlete person might do their 10k in 30 minutes, the average runny person was probably looking for 45 minutes ish, and anything quicker than an hour was at least not going to be embarrassing. I had resolved to do better than an hour. Minimal stress thanks.

I knew one other person who would be doing it too, who had signed up with my boss and kept flipping between being amused that he'd wussed-out and being annoyed that he might have been left doing it on his own. He had been training, by the way. He mentioned it a few times in the half hour or so between meeting him at the park and the beginning of the race. While he was casually dropping tidbits about his gruelling training regimen I was increasingly surrounded by people who looked...what's the word...fit. They were stretching. All I was stretching was the meaning of 'minimal' in regards to those stress levels of mine.

BUPA 10k Start (Birdcage Walk)

"Screw it, I'm here now, how hard can it be? What am I gonna do, die?" Off to the start line. No, it's not as simple as that, there are half a dozen different start lines, right, OK. Locate my start 'segment'. Wait for the 'Go' call. Packed in like a rush hour Central Line carriage but it's only for a minute. "Go!" Spend several agonising minutes shuffling along like a rush hour Central Line carriage have all been instructed to move down even though there isn't any space. Then we're jogging. No real speed yet but that's fine by me, although I am feeling cheated of those 3 or 4 minutes, unable to get the 'an hour is embarrassing' thought out of my head.

BUPA 10k action shot

The thing itself went ok-ish. Ran most of it, walked a bit a couple of times. The first time I broke down into a walk I felt like a complete failure. The second time I realised a lot of people were doing the same. It also helps that my walking pace is quicker than some peoples' jog. One other observation is that however good you think you are judging distance, the mile markers on a race always seem to be wildly inaccurate, leaving you angry that the next one hasn't come up yet, or unshakeably certain that you've missed one somehow. Anyway, I finished in 54 minutes ish, which was nothing to shout about but was fine.

What was I talking about? Yes, running's on my mind again now. Between that 10k and today, I've run quite a lot of races of various distances, but in this last year I haven't done very much, largely due to old injuries acting up a bit. In two days' time though I'm running my first race of 2019, the Hillingdon Half Marathon. I'm hoping it'll fire me up and encourage me to train hard for some big races later in the year. It'd be helpful if it went well.

I might write about it.