How to: Six Steps to Better Public Speaking

I could never understand why some people have no idea how to speak in front of a public audience. So, without further ado, I present: A Guide to Public Speaking.

Step 1. Ask yourself if you suck at public speaking. You can usually tell if you suck at public speaking, are amazing at it, or are just… mediocre.

Step 2. If you know you can’t make speeches to save your life, make sure you never talk for longer than fifteen minutes. Do you already give speeches that are fifteen minutes long? No? Then you don’t know how to give a speech.

Step 3. Make sure your speech is full of decent content. I don’t want to listen to you talk for thirty minutes about how your grandmother made a great apple pie (don’t get me wrong, though — I have nothing against cute grandmothers who make phenomenal pies).

Step 4. Please, PLEASE, I beg of you — sound like you’re actually a human being talking to other human beings and not like one of those high school speech and debate kids who practice their monologues by speaking to brick walls for hours on end.

Step 5. Your speeches better be at least a little bit funny.

Step 6. If you suck at jokes, make them anyways. When no one laughs make fun of yourself for having no idea how to make anyone laugh because you’re a terrible human being (which you actually are for being unable to make other people laugh) and you will probably elicit a few chuckles.

Step 7. Don’t spend thirty minutes telling me how 2 + 2 = 4 when 1. I already know that and 2. nobody really cares and 3. it only takes 15 seconds to tell me that 2+2=4.

Congratulations! You now know how to speak in front of an audience.