It’s my last fall semester until I graduate and as a business communication minor. It is a requirement to take a class called “Art Of The Pitch” and it is exactly as it sounds. A class where you learn how to pitch and present for businesses and yourself. Well, I am an introvert and when an introvert pitches… I get anxious to the point where I have to tell myself to breathe and to relax.
I get anxious enough to the point where time flies by, yet at the same time everything feels slowed down except my heart rate. My eyes scan the room because one of the objectives is to keep contact with your audience and hold it there for a second but at the same time, I must talk to the entire room.
That’s all it is, talking. Talking at ease and with a wave of pitched vocals to keep the conversation animated. Use hand gestures and walk around but in a way that looks natural. Talk and start out with a story so that it feels natural for the audience.
The main objective is to keep it natural, animated, and to know what you want your audience to feel with each and every word that you say. You don’t want to be boring. You want to be memorable. It’s smiling and talking with your hands, making every person in the room feel special and included yet talking to everyone at once.
Pitching may come natural to some, but as an introvert it only comes natural mentally. As soon as I step in front of entire class of my peers and tell them whatever I am pitching—that’s when that mental ease slips away. I feel my breath hitch as my throat tighten, the constant urge to drum my fingers as I feel my skin nearly crawling from being antsy and filled to the brim with nerves.
A three-minute-pitch goes by in a flash to the audience but as an introverted pitcher who pitches with no physical ease and instead a constant stumbling of words, time doesn’t exist. All that exists is getting what you have in your mind out into the open and hopefully, winning the audience over with your pitch. Despite the class being a requirement, I remain excited and hopeful to become great at pitching and to feel confident with my words, to saying them aloud with fluidity and to moving my hands naturally, I plan to bring my inner confidence to the open and I, an introvert, will learn the art of the pitch.