By 
It’s been said that if you are afraid of public speaking, you should picture the audience naked.
But yeah, don’t do that. As a terrible public speaker, even I can see this is a bad idea, and the reasons why are obvious.
First, picturing the gender you’re attracted to naked while trying to speak to them is just asking for trouble. I would know. It’s how I spent most of my teen years. You spend the entire time focusing on not staring inappropriately, and then you forget what you’re talking about, and then you get so lost in your own head that you accidentally tell a fully clothed librarian she has first class nipples. It’s not good. It ends poorly.
And regardless, I don’t know how you try to picture a guy’s penis that you haven’t seen. Is it guess work? Do you try to get an idea from his bulge? Do you get racist with it? By this point, do you even remember what you were talking about? Of course you don’t.
Nudity is too distracting, but the idea behind it makes sense. It theoretically makes you feel less intimidated by your audience because let’s face it: objectively, the human body looks fucking stupid.
I mean how can you be intimidated by something as silly as a man with his dick and balls out? Have you seen those things? A man has an otherwise sensibly built body and then these grotesque tumor-like things are just dangling off of him right in the middle–growing gross wiry hair and morphing shapes at unfortunate times. If you didn’t know how mammals worked, and you saw a naked man, you’d think “Oh, you should really get that shit removed.”
Women have their own issues. They have big clunky hunks of flesh hanging off the top of their torso with one biological purpose that’s good for a few months of your life that aren’t even entirely necessary. Otherwise they just sit there, bouncing, causing a ruckus, waiting to be used. And then after they’re used, they just hang aimlessly. After a while, they get so ashamed of how pointless they are, they begin to look down at the ground.
What aesthetically weird, poorly put together beings we are. Nudity really would be a great way to knock your audience down a peg…if not for the distraction issues. So what’s the solution to this? How can speakers remind themselves that their listeners are shitty, gross, flawed people just like them without distracting the speaker? Here’s my idea.
If you have to speak publicly, or if you have to deal with people in any way that makes you feel nervous or intimidated–imagine whoever you’re talking to is pooping in a public restroom.
I’m not telling you to get gross with it. Don’t imagine the poo crowning, or a gratuitous number of farts, or a dirty wipe. Don’t think about any of that. That’s not what this is about. Just imagine them sitting there, with their pants around their ankles. Maybe they occasionally let out a fart that’s louder than they intend, and they look embarrassed about it. They have their knees together and their hands clasped.
Think of the vulnerability, the discomfort, the sameness. How can that person intimidate you? Nobody can kick your ass while they’re pooping, they can’t fire you when they’re pooping, and they can’t embarrass you when they’re pooping. They’re just stuck there, being human, and awkward, and absolutely fucking disgusting. All of them.
It reminds me of the classic children’s book: Everyone Poops.
Everybody does poop, and there’s an important life lesson in that. If everybody poops, then nobody can really be above anybody else. Let that notion sink in, because that’s true, and it’s actually a powerful way to see things.
Imagine your boss right now, your teacher, your abusive father. Think of all of them pooping in stalls side by side, afraid of being heard by their neighbor. They’re not alone. Donald Trump poops. Emma Watson poops. Gandhi? Huge messy Indian food poops.
Jay-Z and Beyonce–yes. Imagine Jay-Z pooping. His jeans are at his ankles, his Brooklyn Nets hat is tilted to the side, he has some gold chains around his neck, and he looks downright uncomfortable.
We have a tendency to deify people like this–to see them as something above us. But this is a mistake, because no matter who it is, pooping is fucking gross. It’s the most revolting thing we all do. It’s an immediate reminder that no matter how cool somebody seems, how rich, how attractive, how powerful–we’re all hunks of flesh that look horrendous under a microscope. We’re all weird, disgusting beings that fall woefully short of perfection.
So this goes beyond public speaking. This is a reminder to not take people so seriously–a reminder that you shouldn’t be intimidated by anyone ever. You’re not beneath anyone. So the next time you see some genius professor or thinker, or a beautiful underwear model, or an amazing pro athlete and you feel insignificant, look at them, and say to yourself, “you take shits.”
Nobody is out of your league, because we’re all in the league of people who poop. So guess what? If one gross animal can launch a person to the moon, or another repugnant pile of organs can write Bohemian Rhapsody, then maybe you can do something amazing too.
Eleanor Roosevelt once said “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent,” and I like to think if she thought about it, she would have also included, “also because they poop and ew,” in that statement. So don’t you dare feel inferior to anyone. Don’t be intimidated. Don’t be afraid. Stand proud and look at everyone in the eye. Laugh at them. They deserve it. They makes gross brown stuff with their butt.
