Performance Anxiety: Processing Fear in Storytelling

So, this evening, as I lie here in bed -sick as a dog yet unable to sleep- it occurred to me that blogging might be a natural sedative.  So here it goes...FEAR.

According to Doug Lipman, author of our second reading in Communications 490, "Fear is unnecessary and tends to hinder [a storyteller]."  If this is true, then the logical aim of any storyteller worth his or her salt would be to try and figure out the best way to eliminate (or at least reduce) fear before a story-telling performance.  What I found to be perhaps the best advice in this reading is the following: if we process fear as it comes, it can have no profound, long-term impact upon us.  If, on the other hand, we do not process fear as it comes up, it mutates into a huge, insidious monster.  

Storytelling aside, I can easily testify to this truth in my own life.  By nature, I would say, I am a fear-based person.  When fear comes up, I do anything and everything to distract myself from it rather than face it.  It doesn't serve me well, and to operate differently takes an exceptional amount of effort on my part.  I have been extremely sick recently and do to my complicated health insurance situation (basically, I don't have it), have not been able to visit a doctor and have missed a ridiculous amount of school.  This, of course, terrifies me.  I am terrified that I won't be able to salvage my grades, not to mention terrified that I have some life-threatening illness.  So, instead of  confronting the fear -emailing the necessary professors, figuring out a way to get into a free clinic, etc.- I just sit in it.  From experience, though, I know that it is better to do quite the opposite.  And I know what it feels like to do the opposite (believe me, I have stared down some monstrous fear in my lifetime), but that doesn't always mean  I do it.

But I digress.

In storytelling, Lipman explains, it is important to engage in enough comforting, self-talk so that the speaker can reach a place of mental safety.  In my personal life, due to my involvement in certain "extracurricular activities" (which shall remain anonymous), I am frequently asked to speak for twenty to forty minutes at a time in front of large groups.  After eight years of involvement in this particular activity, one would assume that I would no longer get nervous or afraid prior to any of these speaking engagements.  The fact remains, though, that I do get intensely nervous, perhaps because of the highly personal content of the speeches I give.  Much like what Lipman suggests, I just ask myself beforehand, what is the worst thing that could possibly happen here?  The answer to that question is, usually, the audience will hate what I have to say.  And then what?  Nothing.  So what?  If the audience hates what I have to say, so be it.  I'm still alive, I've still set out and done what I said I was going to do (or was asked to do), and that is that.  No big deal.    If I were to add anything to Lipman's list of suggestions, I would also recommend some straight-up, unfettered self-esteem boosting.  Remind yourself that the audience is before you because they have either chosen to be there and listen to you or, as is the case in our class, because they have to be.  In either situation, the audience wants you to succeed.  As egomaniacal as it might is might sound, I remind myself that I am indeed an intelligent woman and, subsequently, have something worthwhile to say...doing so usually prevents me from vomiting all over my shoes when I go up to speak.  Usually :)

Rachel

My First Bloggity Blog: The Zone of Proximal Development & Storytelling

So, for my very first blog as a COMM 490 student, I would like to examine the relationship between the (perhaps alleged) existence of the "zone of proximal development" and storytelling. Thus, I suppose it would be helpful to define the zone of proximal development before I explore it any further. According to my admittedly limited understanding of this concept, the zone of proximal development encompasses all tasks that a child, someone whose brain is still developing, can perform with the help of an adult, someone whose brain has already developed. Conversely, there also exists a set of tasks that a child can perform 100% independently, as well as a set of tasks that a child cannot perform at all. The question is then, what does storytelling have to do with any of this? As I see it, storytelling relates to the zone of proximal development in the sense that it expands it.

On the most basic level, storytelling acts as a vehicle for clarifying language -even individual words- for children. It helps to clarify words, phrases, and concepts that the child would only be able to understand (and then use themselves in his or her own speech and relational skills) with help. In storytelling, this help comes in the form of illustration -- not literal illustration, but oral and physical illustration. As we discovered in this week's reading, the first chapter of Livo & Rietz's Storytelling: Process & Practice, various aural indicators (such as intonation and rate) and physical indicators (such as eye contact and props) push concepts that children are indeed capable of understanding out of the realm of the unknown and into the realm of the known or understood. Hence, a particular word, phrase, or concept is processed through the zone of proximal development and, eventually, into the child's zone of independent understanding...if I may call it that!

If I were to tell a three-year-old a story involving the word "cauldron," and the child does not know this word, I can establish a context through which I can clarify that word. If I begin my story by saying, "The witch filled her giant cauldron with water and set it over the fire," the child then knows a cauldron can be filled and is therefore probably some form of container. I continue on, "As soon as the water began to boil, the witch tossed in a fistful of worms, a newt's foot, and some cauliflower and began to cook herself a delicious soup." Here, I clarify that a cauldron is something you cook in. Perhaps, if I am a good storyteller, I can even mime these actions or use props so that the child gets a very complete, engaging picture of what a cauldron is and where it fits into this story. Just like that, a new word that, again, the child once only had the possibility of understanding (lying in the zone of proximal development) is now understood. With a few more tellings, the story could eventually encourage aromaticity with this word and its meaning. There are, of course, words (and concepts - this works for concepts, too!) that a three-year-old simply cannot understand even with help, as the words lie far outside the zone of proximal development. Clearly, though, storytelling possesses some magical linguistic powers!*

(*perhaps not-so-magical...but crucial and interesting nonetheless :-)