I’ve been doing more speaking over these last few months than I have in the past — mostly smallish events, women’s retreats and church conferences and the like around the greater Lincoln area. When I looked back at my 2015 calendar last week I realized I’d spoken at seven events this past year, which seems like a whole lot for someone who regularly tells herself that she doesn’t like public speaking.
I realized something important as I looked at the list of churches and retreats I’ve spoken at these last several months. I realized that without my even noticing it, God has been growing me, gently, softly, a little bit at a time throughout this past year.
I still don’t love to speak in front of an audience. I still get nervous. My heart still pounds, my feet still sweat, I still get breathless, I still have to apply multiple layers of high-powered deodorant in the morning and wear short sleeves, even in the dead of winter. I still have to prepare for each event weeks in advance. I still have to practice out loud, standing in my kitchen talking to myself with my dog stretched out at my feet. I still use notes when I speak, and I still like to stand behind a podium.
Yet I realized this weekend that something hardly discernible and yet at the same time hugely powerful has changed in me. I am trusting. I am trusting the process and the fact that God meets me in it every single time.
This doesn’t mean that every single speaking event I do is perfect. Not by a long shot. People in the audience still fall asleep. They check their phones and rummage through their purses in search of Lifesavers and gaze off into the middle distance, thinking about how they forgot to refill the cat dish before they left the house that morning.
Sometimes the stories I share that I expect will bring a big laugh or at least heads nodding in recognition fall flat.
Sometimes I lose my place in my notes and say “um,” and forget to turn on the clicker doo-hickey and panic a little bit when my PowerPoint slides refuse to budge.
Sometimes when I am finished at an event, I sit in my car in the parking lot, draw in a deep breath and think, “Well, I have no idea how that went.”
Yet with each subsequent event, I have leaned into the process a little more easily. I’ve become okay with the sleepers and the purse rummagers and all the little details I can’t control. I’ve come to accept the fact that I don’t know, can’t know, if what I say has resonated in any way. I’ve come to rest in the fact that God is in charge; that who listens and who thinks about their hungry cat, who stays awake and who nods off, who hears him in my words and who misses him entirely is in his realm, not mine.
I’ve come to realize that my job is to listen to God, to prepare, to apply my high-powered deodorant and to show up confident in his ability to speak through me.
Our God is such a gentle, loving, sweet God. He’s taken my hand and led me step by step through this terrifying process, one small event at a time. It’s taken me nearly a whole year to notice it, but God has quietly and steadfastly grown me in ways I didn’t even think were possible. Sometimes, it seems, you only notice how much you’ve grown when you look back and see how far you’ve come.
I forgot to feed MY cat! Ha… love this Michelle and love you!!! I’ll have to come hear you speak soon!!! So proud of you my friend!!!
So excited to see you here in the comment box, Janine – that made my whole day! I would love to see your smiling face in the audience some day – that would make me so happy! Now good feed your hungry cat!
Michelle, This is such a great post. Each time I have heard you speak in public I have been blessed and encouraged and challenged. You ARE growing in this area and I like it that you were doing the growing without noticing! Thanks for sharing your life with us.
You are so kind and so generous, Jan. Every time I see you radiate God’s grace with your encouragement and generosity. Thank you for this.
Love this, Michelle. I don’t like to speak, either. I’d much rather stay home and write. I can so relate to this and I’ve enjoyed following your blog. Jesus is so faithful. Thanks for making me smile this morning.
I always think it’s highly ironic and kind of an unfair joke that writers, the people who are least likely to want to get up in front of an audience, are expected to speak these days. On a positive note though, stepping out of our familiar, comfortable routine grows us in ways we probably wouldn’t ordinarily, so I suspect God is up to something with that. 🙂 Thanks for your kind words here today, Paula – I really appreciate that.
Hi Michelle,
This is a great post, and I can relate. I love that God comes along and starts growing us in ways we don’t even realize until we’re far enough along that we can look back and see where we were and where we are now. Maybe He has to do it that way…there’s less resistance on our part. LOL!
BEST kind of growth, because it reinforces the truth that it’s all gift!
Blessings!
This is a powerful post, Michelle!! Thank you! It is so true and I am going to be coming back to this one.
Amen, Michelle! I can hear God saying to you, “Goodness, my child, how you have grown! Thanks for listening to me.”
Blessings, and keep on speaking to the sleepers and the cat whisperers. 🙂
This is encouraging as I speak too and often really wonder about the impact. Got the nicest note though yesterday from the organizer at the retreat I gave last weekend. I don’t think people realized the value of that type of feedback for a speaker. Since I talk a lot about the spiritual journey listeners often grow pensive and quiet – I had to learn they are internalizing what I am saying. Also learned to sprinkle in some humor and like you said something that doesn’t work. Yes we are all works in progress. Thanks Michelle.