10 days before I was due to speak in London I caught a cold.  It started out as a sore throat then turned into a stuffed nose and just being really really tired.  So i slept as much as possible.  Loaded up on Emergen C and all the cold medication I could.

Two days before I was due to fly I booked an appointment at an IV therapy clinic.  I ordered the immune booster.  I went in on the tail end of this cold with just a lingering cough and sat next to two older women while they stuck the IV in me.  This elixir better work I told them.  My biggest fear was being on stage and having a massive coughing fit in the middle of my talk.  The lady next to me swore by the IV treatment.  “I’ve been doing this for the past year and it’s totally healed me of all my chronic pain.” She said. 

I crossed my fingers and said a prayer.  Lucky for me I had given this talk already earlier in the year in Florida and I had rehearsed extensively before I got sick.  My rehearsal process looked like standing in front of the mirror in my bedroom and recording myself then watching it back and then rehearsing all over again.  I staged and blocked the whole talk which meant I was very intentional about where to stand on stage at each section of my talk.  When I boarded my red eye flight to London I still had a lingering cough.  Not ideal at all.  Nightmares of me having a coughing fit plagued me in the days before my speech.

I landed in London at 7am and what immediately struck me was how quiet it was in the airport.  No loud American voices.  Just calm.  When I arrived at my hotel room I had a hot cup of tea with honey then went to sleep.  I was speaking in two days.  I was going to sleep as much as possible.  If you are planning to speak internationally I highly recommend arriving at least two days before your speaking gig.  This gives you time to get used to the time zone change.  

That first night in London I woke up several times in the night coughing.  The cough was always worse at night.  This was not good.  I was truly terrified it would all fall apart for me on stage.  But I was determined to fight this thing off.  And by some miracle the next day I finally took a turn for the better.  My cough went away.   It felt like a miracle.  

And once my cough was gone, I felt truly relaxed.  I knew my talk backwards and forwards.  In fact I didn’t even rehearse it the two days leading up to my talk.  I just knew it.  And I knew I’d be okay.  

On the day of my talk the only time I got nervous was when I was backstage getting mic’ed up.  Then the butterflies came.  But then the event organizer came backstage to wish me well.  He gave me a few words of encouragement and affirmation which was a kind and thoughtful thing to do.  Then there I was front and center on stage.  

Once I got onstage and started speaking the butterflies vanished.  The was home.  The bright lights, the big auditorium.  Me wearing a microphone.  My body felt safe and in my element.  A strange kind of peace washed over me.  

Then about halfway through my talk.  My mic went out.  I knew it instantly.  Yet somehow I just knew what to do.  I acknowledged to the audience that my mic went out and started talking louder.  I immediately asked the audience in the back to give me a thumbs up if they could hear me.  Once I saw the thumbs up I just kept going with my talk.  The thing that helped in this situation was that I knew my material backwards and forwards.  I wasn’t winging it.  I had rehearsed the entire speech until I knew the words and the staging and blocking by heart.  There isn’t a specific number of hours I could say that I rehearsed.  I just kept rehearsing until I didn’t need to look at my notes any more.  Then I rehearsed some more.  

Someone came on stage and brought me a hand held mic.  But that mic didn’t work either.  So I kept going with my talk.  Then, they told me to go and speak at the lectern.  Thankfully once I got to the lectern the microphone was working.  “Hallelujah!”  I quipped.  Then the mic immediately went out there too!  I was cursed! 

Yet I kept going.  It felt like forever but it was probably only two minutes of time.  Finally my lavalier mic went on.  I gave a little cheer and the audience clapped for me.  We were in this together.   

When I got off stage I felt a mixture of relief, pride and slight annoyance at the situation.  But mostly I was beaming inside.  I learned a lot about myself that day.  That when something goes wrong in the moment.  I rise to the challenge and I know how to figure it out on the fly without getting rattled.  This felt like a rite of passage for me as a speaker.  Because inevitably every speaker is going to face technical difficulties and have to power through.  

What I learned most of all is how important it is to be overly prepared in advance and not procrastinate with rehearsals.  Getting sick and having technical difficulties on stage could have thrown me.  But I had done the work beforehand and that gave me the confidence and peace of mind I needed to push through when curve balls came.