The hardest thing about speaking in front of 10 or 50 or 300 people isn’t the random faces of strangers staring back at you, or the pressure to fill somewhere between 10 to 60 minutes; it’s wrestling with the concept that you are on that stage because you are the best person to talk about a subject. That you are worthy of the cost of admission, of attention, of time for everyone in attendance. All of which makes finding a topic that hasn’t been discussed by someone else far better than you excruciating.
My goal is always to speak about a topic that is at the very least entertaining, informative, and perhaps even educational. I don’t want anyone in the audience to feel like I wasted their time, intelligence, or patience. And each time you get on stage, each time you fumble through what you want to say and rush through words, each time you do not connect with the crowd, you learn to get better.