This is where I tell you how the speech went!!!

Hehehe! This is where I tell you how the speech went!!! :)) :))
This morning when I walked into the church and after I greeted Rick, he started asking me what it was I was doing. No one knew what I was doing with the exception of Jeff, the elder. All I told Rick was that I wanted him to be at church this weekend. So After I called him he emailed me the rest of the week asking what it was I was doing. So this morning it continued on from the previous nights. He bugged and bugged for a whole hour almost!! Does it have to do with this?? Give me a hint! So to that I told him what books he could find what I was talking about it in. In response he looked up the first but then shut his book because when he asked if it was this or that I replied that he’ll just have to wait.

When church began, Kimberly, on of my very dear friends, we had opening service before we had the sermon. During the sermon, which actually sorta pertained to what I was going to make a speech on, I spilled and gave Kimberly what I was going to say to get some more advice on it. My elder told me it was fine and I just wasn’t happy with that I wanted criticism and I wanted to hear a trusted and wise person’s thoughts on it. So in my Kimberly and Nikki notebook we discussed what and whys and with that I was satisfied. She was very impressed that I had the motive to do this and asked what inspired me to do so. I told her and in reply she said that I was very much like her at when she was my age (she’s not old, not old at all really, actually quite young. She’s maybe.. 33- she just started to come back to church after a dispute a while back). She said that I was very opinionated, which is a good thing, she said.

My speech was soon too come! And with it coming I started to feel the nervousness/ excitement hit. I was fine up until maybe 5 minutes before I went up to the pulpit to speak.

I added a few things to it so its not as short as it was when I presented it to ya’ll.  When I was up there we had prayer before we began and I asked them to please open their bibles to read some text before we really began. For the first, maybe paragraph, I was really shaky. I took a breath..2 breaths… ok…3 breaths and went into my second and 3rd paragraph. I was completely relaxed by that 3rd paragraph, although I was still quite conscious of my reading, knowing how fast I can read and speak. I received a couple ‘amens’ here and there several pleased looks with the people I did look at that wouldn’t make me nervous again.
In the end I gave them a challenge. This week I’m going to try to work on making some ribbins for something then I found in my lesson for next week. It was something a teacher used on her kids and I thought the challenge in itself was pretty good. So that will be added onto the list of school projects I’m currently working on.

When I was done, I was shaky once again going down the four steps I had. I seem quite vulnerable after I stepped away from the protection of the pulpit and thus felt like people could see right through me and I was layed out for them so they could eat me alive. I am personally not real fond of public speaking but only because I get really nervous in the beginning although I enjoy speaking very much for large groups. I love to feel in charge in a way. :P Anyway, I went back to my seat getting ready for Sabbath school to begin and got some more reassurance from my oh so dear Kimberly just filled with love filled hugs today. :D:D:D (Very good bonding time today between the two of us)

The rest of the day, many people seemed to avoid me, esp. the females. The guys didn’t have as much of a problem speaking to me and it made me feel more comfortable. I really think I got a mix of feelings. Most of the congregation avoided me, but then again, I was expecting to get bombarded with I don’t know what. My grandma really tried to avoid me, both of them at that! But hey, I guess it’s better than being scolded for doing that and not telling her or something like that!  One of the people who missed it due to a project she was setting up for upstairs asked to read it so I handed her that along with my notebook filled with the other half of my ‘speech’. Nobody really said anything about it besides Kimberly, Deb and Pat. With pat it was more like lots of hugs and kisses and she said that we really needed that.

On the way home, however, the conversation that I was trying to keep tabs on while listening to my Christian music mix that I was missing soo much since I left it at church the week before, Grandma talked nothing of anyone else and no gossiping of any kind. So I’m glad it really had an effect in that aspect so far. :)