Evoke Greatness Podcast

From Stage Fright to Spotlight with Linda Ugelow (Part 1)

• Episode 151

Share episode

Send us a text

🎧 Episode 151: From Stage Fright to Spotlight with Linda Ugelow (Part 1)

In this episode, we dive deep with Linda Ugelow, presence and performance coach, into her remarkable journey from experiencing debilitating stage fright to helping others find their authentic voice and presence. From her background as a professional dancer to becoming an expert in transforming visibility fears, Linda shares insights that bridge somatic psychology with practical application.

We explore:

  • The journey from performer to presence coach
  • Understanding the deep roots of visibility fears
  • The powerful connection between body wisdom and authentic presence
  • How childhood experiences shape our relationship with being seen
  • The transformation from managing anxiety to eliminating it
  • The role of movement and somatic awareness in building confidence
  • Creating authentic presence on camera and stage
  • The importance of positive reflection in building confidence

🔑 Key takeaways:

  1. Fear of visibility often stems from past experiences that need to be identified and cleared
  2. Traditional anxiety management techniques may not address the root cause
  3. Authentic movement and body awareness can transform our relationship with being seen
  4. True performance power comes from removing fear rather than managing it
  5. Building presence is about practice and creating new automatic responses
  6. Positive reflection and speaking life into others can transform relationships and confidence

💡 Quotes to remember: 
"It is a gift to receive attention. Most people experience it as a scary thing because they are expecting judgment." - Linda Ugelow

"Children who are led to feel great about themselves, act out greatness." - Howard Glasser (quoted by Linda)

🌟 Featured Insights:

  • The importance of understanding the root causes of speaking anxiety
  • How past trauma creates barriers to authentic presence
  • The role of non-judgmental witnesses in building confidence
  • The power of positive reflection in building authentic presence

📚 Resources:

A rising tide raises all ships, and I invite you along on this journey to Evoke Greatness!

Check out my website: www.evokegreatness.com

Follow me on:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/sonnie-linebarger-899b9a52/

https://www.instagram.com/evoke.greatness/

https://www.tiktok.com/@evoke.greatness

http://www.youtube.com/@evokegreatness








Speaker 1:

Welcome to Evoke Greatness. We are officially entering year three of this podcast and I am filled with so much gratitude for each and every one of you who've joined me on this incredible journey of growth and self-discovery. I'm Sunny, your host and fellow traveler on this path of personal evolution. This podcast is a sanctuary for the curious, the ambitious and the introspective. It's for those of you who, like me, are captivated by the champion mindset and driven by an insatiable hunger for growth and knowledge. Whether you're just beginning your journey or you're well along your path, you're going to find stories here that resonate with your experiences and aspirations. Over the last two years, we've shared countless stories of triumph and challenge, of resilience and transformation. We've laughed, we've reflected and we've grown together. And as we've evolved, so too has this podcast. Remember, no matter what chapter you're on in your own story, you belong here. This community we've built together is a place of support, inspiration and shared growth. Where intention goes, energy flows, and the energy you bring to this space elevates us all. So, whether you're listening while commuting, working out or enjoying your morning coffee, perhaps from one of those motivational mugs I'm so fond of, know that you're a part of something special. Thank you for being here. Thank you for your curiosity, your openness and your commitment to personal growth. As we embark on year three, I invite you to lean in, to listen deeply and to let these stories resonate with your soul. I believe that a rising tide raises all ships and I invite you along in this journey to evoke greatness.

Speaker 1:

Welcome back to another episode of Evoke Greatness. Today, I'm thrilled to introduce you to a remarkable woman who's helped thousands transform their relationship with visibility and public speaking. Linda Ugalo is a presence and performance coach who knows firsthand the paralyzing grip of stage fright. A former professional dancer who once struggled with debilitating performance anxiety, linda has turned her personal journey into a powerful methodology that's liberating professionals, entrepreneurs and leaders from their fear of being seen as the author of Delight in the Limelight. Overcome your Fear of being Seen and Step Into your True Performance Power. Linda combines her background in somatic psychology, expressive arts and mindfulness to help clients move from self-doubt to radiant confidence. Her unique approach has been featured in Psychology Today, authority Magazine and numerous leadership forums. Today, we'll deep dive into Linda's revolutionary techniques for conquering visibility fears, explore the surprising connection between body wisdom and authentic presence, and discover how to tap into what she calls our natural performance power. Linda, I'm so glad to have you on.

Speaker 2:

I'm excited to be here and I'm excited about this introduction you gave me. It's like whoa. I like the way you said. All of that, then I'm doing my job you are Well.

Speaker 1:

I would love I always like to kind of go into a little bit of a backstory and your journey from experiencing stage fright as a dancer to becoming a presence coach is. It's fascinating when we think about those fears that come up in our body when we're doing something that is terrifying and can be paralyzing. I would love for you to share a little bit about your journey and how you realized your own struggles could actually become a gift to other people.

Speaker 2:

Well, I have to admit that it took me a long time to get from that place of figuring out some things for myself to helping other people. But I was a performer with a women's world music group, for now it's been was 40 years when I noticed that, even though I love to dance, it was all I ever wanted to do and I was their principal dancer. I noticed that I was very self-conscious and so I'd get out there, but there was part of me inside that was cringing or tight and you know like oh, and always, you know, wondering what other people thought. And during that time I think it was in my early thirties I came across a process of dance therapy that's called authentic movement. It's where you have your eyes closed and you are just listening for the impulses in your body to move and you allow whatever wants to come out to come out. Your eyes are closed and there's a witness, or there are many witnesses, and they're holding nonjudgmental space. Well, it's one thing to think okay, they're not judging me but it's another experience to really believe that and feel safe. So this was a process that over time and I think so I studied this, I did my master's degree on this. I taught it for seven years, doing it maybe four times a week with groups. So over time I realized I got to this place where I felt completely free from this process of being seen when I move. So then when I noticed, when I was on stage I felt a hundred percent at home. It was like I was connected with myself because I was so used to closing my eyes and connecting on a physical level and allowing myself to be seen. I could easily bring that to the stage and I completely let go of any kind of concern of what other people think and I was completely just in the experience of it and allowing myself to go as deep as I can so that people can have the best experience. And this translated to like we performed in India and Morocco and Bulgaria and all three places. We would at some point have like national TV on us and there'd be like five or seven huge camera guys going around with these honking cameras and I was aware of it but it did not faze me at all. So that was the first kind of like step. But then I do have to say and admit that even though I felt comfortable moving on stage and I had an intermediate experience around singing on stage.

Speaker 2:

I hated, hated having to speak from the stage, having to introduce a song. Just put me. It tied me up in knots and just knowing I was going to have to introduce a song, let's say, four songs later, I would be messing up my notes. I was a bass player and I would mess up on the bass and I just like keep losing my focus because I was thinking, oh my God, I'm going to have to do that soon. It's coming up, it's coming up and I just like build myself up into anxiety. So it wasn't something that I felt like I needed to really address because I thought, okay, I'm just going to white knuckle through it, it goes by quickly, no one's going to really care.

Speaker 2:

But in 2015, when I became an online coach and I had to put myself out there, that's when the speaking anxiety really came up for me. Because, you know, in order to I don't know how many people listening are self-employed, but in this online world that we live in now, if you want people to learn about you and follow you and hire you or buy from you, showing up and speaking directly to your audience is a huge advantage. I knew this and I tried it. I tried going out on a app called Periscope. It was the very first live stream app. All the marketing gurus said you got to get on daily if you want to build your following. And I thought, okay, I'm going to do this, even though I'm terrified and I figured you know doing it every day, I'll get over it in a few weeks. In the meantime, I'll do deep breathing and meditation and affirmations and power poses. I'll do all these tools you know reframe the fear as excitement and everything else that I could find online.

Speaker 2:

After 10 weeks it's day 75. I'm about to press broadcast and I'm noticing that my heart is racing still and I'm thinking why is this still happening? Why am I still afraid? I mean, I'd been managing it. I had gotten into a routine so I forgot that I was managing it. But all of a sudden it's like why am I still managing this? I just want to be rid of it and I decided that day I was going to get rid of my speaking anxiety. So, as you mentioned, I have a master's degree in expressive arts therapy and a background in movement studies, movement therapy, psychology. I made a long list of all the techniques that I had gathered that I still knew how to do on a sheet of paper. I looked at it and I said this is going to work. I know this is going to work.

Speaker 2:

And then I had the thought, before I get rid of it, what is this fear of speaking? So I closed my eyes to connect with it and I asked if the fear could talk, what would it say? And what came back was you're going to be attacked? And suddenly I remembered my sisters attacking me, my two older sisters. Every time my mom put me on a pedestal, saying why can't you girls be more like Linda? She's the only good one in the family. Of course they hated that. As soon as mom the family, of course they hated that. As soon as mom went in the next room, they attacked me. They'd kick me in the shins, hold me on the ground and torture, tickle me. They'd say shut up, stupid.

Speaker 2:

And then all of a comfortable being the center of attention, even though I worked it out through my dance. But there was part of me that remembered it was dangerous to be the center of attention. And you know, at this point I was really good friends with my sisters. We had, you know, passed that stage decades earlier and I thought, well, is this real? Is this still true for me? Do I believe that if I, if I shine, if I'm, you know, lifted up, if people look at me, that my sisters won't like me? And it felt true.

Speaker 2:

Still, I couldn't believe it. I could feel that it was still resonating with me, I was still hanging onto it and then I thought, okay, I've got stuff from my past that need to, that needs to be addressed and cleared away. What else is there? And then I thought of times I was bullied or that I had a mean teacher that didn't get me and I felt put in the spotlight and made to feel uncomfortable, and saw other kids get laughed at when they didn't know the answers to things. Traumas from earlier on in my life, I realized, had created this ball or a wall of anxiety that had led me to believe it's not safe to speak. That's when?

Speaker 1:

when I think back to what you just said, which is when you asked yourself if fear could talk. What would it if fear could speak? What would it say If go back listeners a minute and a half, two minutes, and listen to what Linda just said? You addressed full on what that fear was, and then you revisited all those times that a fear was deposited into your mind. I like that word deposited.

Speaker 2:

Yes, it was, and I think it happens. I think because things are going to happen all the time in our lives, but sometimes we have resources for it and sometimes we don't. Sometimes we have a parent that we can go mom or dad. This happened and then they're there to help you. In my case, it didn't even occur to me to. I mean, mom was part of the problem, right, she was the one who was doing this and she has. I always like to say she never had a reflective bone in her body. It just was how she was. I mean I, she was. I loved mom, she was a real character, but she had some flaws in her parenting toolbox and she didn't realize that she was creating this animosity in her kids with all this comparison, and I think a lot of parents can get into doing that. So we are left to without resources, without that parent or teacher or mentor. Or really's the story we tell ourselves about ourselves.

Speaker 1:

Just going back to that, two things came to mind, One of which is if you don't take the time to unpack what the fear is, and then where those deposits of fear were put into your mind or your life, you'll really struggle to get past them. So I think it's the courage to stop and actually take the time to unpack that. Then the other thing that came to mind for me was I know that there are a lot of women listening. I know there are a lot of entrepreneurial keynote speaking women who still have some of those fears inside. There's also a lot of parents listening.

Speaker 1:

And so, having the sense of self-awareness around, being mindful of what we say to our kids and the way in which we say it I mean there were about five gold nuggets that came out of those few minutes but I really think having the self-awareness to say what are the words and the language that we're using with our kids. And I always tell my two boys, I always tell them, I always tell my two boys, I always tell them speak life, the little things you say. Sometimes they're digs to each other and they're three and a half years apart and they're teenage boys and they go back and forth. I'm like no, no, no, no. Speak life. You have to speak life into people, because we forget how powerful our words are.

Speaker 2:

So what does that mean? When you say that to them, how do they take it?

Speaker 1:

Well, I mean again, they're teenage boys and so it's like they'll be razzing each other for some reason. And it's one thing to raz each other, it's another thing. When I recognize, it's the little things that I can see maybe have hurt the other person, and that's when I'm trying to tell them you have the power in your words to build someone up or tear someone down. That's not just in the house, that's as you grow up and become an adult. It's the things you say to yourself.

Speaker 1:

And so when you're speaking life, you're not doing something that is damaging somebody, even when you're angry, even when you're somebody, even when you're angry, even when you're frustrated, even if you don't mean for them to take it that way. We just have to be conscious of our words and our language. And I'm not being Pollyanna by any stretch. Right, I've got teenage boys. It's a very worldly world we live in, but I also want them to be conscious of the fact that they should be speaking life into one another, to be conscious of the fact that they should be speaking life into one another.

Speaker 2:

Yes, yes, I love the language of that. I haven't heard that kind of turn of phrase. There's a author named Howard Glasser who wrote a book I came across it first Transforming the Difficult Child. He has something called the nurtured heart approach and he has had a huge impact on the work that I do in that he says that children who are led to feel great about themselves act out greatness. And he was one of the people that modeled for me how to specifically give positive reflections that point to what kids are already doing great, what is really strong, what we like and appreciate about them.

Speaker 2:

And I started to use this when my daughter was young and if my daughter's listening to this, she wasn't the difficult child. I think she was, but no, she was not. But it still made for an amazing relationship that we developed. And then I realized from before when we can replace them with the newer, current comments from our peers and colleagues that are saying, wow, I love the way you smiled at the end of that video or I love that turn of phrase, or you engender trust Like if I was in, if I was coming to you for this. I would feel completely at ease, you know. And so when we feel, when we receive these kinds of reflections that point out what we're already doing, that's wonderful and that's strong. I feel that it allows, it expands our, our sense of self and we we lean into it more and we have this kind of culture.

Speaker 2:

I think that's based on this education which I would love to see remade that is always pointing to what we're not doing right. It's the red pen and he always like what are your mistakes? And we have this whole backward way of you know being programmed in school that we fear mistakes because the best thing is to never make mistakes. Then we become adults and we're being told actually it's okay to make mistakes, it's more how you handle making mistakes. But it's like where is that course in the middle that says, okay, we're changing the rules now, and so we have so many people. The middle that says, okay, we're changing the rules now, and so we have so many people, including myself.

Speaker 2:

I was terrified of making mistakes. I was a straight A student. Of course. I was afraid of making mistakes because I wouldn't have gotten those grades. I think it's a handicap that we create for our children and for ourselves to have this value of like. That is the highest value in school that we don't make mistakes Whereas what I would like to see is that we have more of an environment of experimentation and exploration and that things that don't work out is just information. Yeah, very different way to look at it. It would be a completely different experience, right?

Speaker 1:

Right In your book Delight in the Limelight, you talk about true performance power. How have you gone about the discovery of this power in an unexpected way, and what have the transformations taught you?

Speaker 2:

this power in an unexpected way, and what have the transformations taught you? You know, in my music group, as I mentioned, there were introductions to songs and there were some people in the group who were very comfortable introducing songs, and it would often go on for five minutes on occasion if they were like really on a roll. And so there you are, standing on stage and you're wanting, or I was wanting. We were all aware about holding the space. We don't want to detract from the person speaking, but we also want to stay present. So how do you do that? So I felt like I had many hours of practicing just standing on stage in front of an audience, receiving energy from the audience, giving energy to the audience, allowing the attention to fill me up with gratitude and love for the music, and it just kind of like created a cycle of energy, of being on the stage, receiving the energy and then giving it back. I felt like that was a huge education for me and practicum for me to get to both be standing on stage, not doing anything, just like being present, and I could look at in the audience, I could practice like okay, who has glasses on, who has short hair, who has long hair, who's smiling, who is not, what's the age, what are the ages, what's the gender or cultural mix here, and while at the same time maintaining a sense of presence. So it was interesting that after I got over the fear of speaking by clearing away this old stuff and cleaning out the stuff in my head that you mentioned that then there's this possibility of applying these, I guess, skills and awarenesses of performance and stage presence to the experience that allows you to make it into something that is a task, into something that is almost a peak experience, or many times a peak experience, because it is a gift to receive attention. Most people experience it as a scary thing because they are expecting judgment, but once you have removed that fear, you can receive it as the gift that it is and you can practice taking it in In my Comfy on Camera class, which is part of an upcoming program, the Delight in the Limelight Accelerator, the whole first week is about how to create presence on camera, where you simply practice connecting to yourself.

Speaker 2:

And then another prompt is where you simply practice connecting to yourself, and then another prompt is where you simply practice connecting to the lens and making friends with the lens, and then another prompt where you're just receiving the attention, and then another where you're just sending that energy out. So we're not even like necessarily talking about words yet, we're just talking about experience. Talking about words, yet we're just talking about experience. And once you the beauty of doing this is, once you have that experience kind of programmed in then it becomes automatic. That means that you start, you turn on the camera and all of a sudden you feel grounded and connected with yourself because you've been practicing that Right.

Speaker 2:

When, if, if, you're thinking, okay, I'm going to go out and speak on stage, you kind of like make your script and you practice what you're going to say, and then you think, oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah, I'm supposed to now look at people. What is my presence, what's my posture? It's like you're waiting to the end to do things that you would ultimately like to be automatic for you of feeling grounded and present, of feeling like open to the energy and open to receiving and expressing your open-hearted gratitude for them and appreciation for them.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and you can definitely tell when watching someone on stage or even on camera, those who feel that their movements are different, their movements are smoother, there's a sense of being present but almost like being natural in your own body. And the way that you're engaging, the way you're making eye contact or scanning or hand gestures, all of that you really can tell when someone and some people you know I think some people can probably fake it fairly well, but either way, I think you can tell when people have that sense of comfort and confidence around themselves.

Speaker 2:

Yes, yes, I think that's true and it's interesting that when we do this in a group and we witness one another, that people, really they can feel viscerally when somebody is like dropped into their body, like so, for instance, when we I ask people to connect with themselves and narrate what they're doing, so they'll close their eyes and they'll say, okay, I noticed my foot is on the floor, my elbows on the table, I'm feeling my breath flow in and out.

Speaker 2:

It's a little tight and actually now I'm like dropping into my body and all of a sudden it's like you can feel that and even though somebody isn't consciously aware of that happening, let's say, you're just on stage, you're just on camera, you feel it because we have mirror neurons in ourselves. So we sense when someone is grounded and we sense when they're agitated. And that doesn't mean now I just want to, I don't want to pass judgment here it doesn't mean that what you have to say is less valuable or that can't make an impact. We can make an impact even when we're nervous. But question is do you want to feel nervous all the time, and is that going to be the most motivating for you to put yourself out there, and is it going to be the most supportive way, or impactful way of being in our relationships.

Speaker 1:

All right, guys, you know the routine. This is where I hit the pause button. I hope you enjoyed part one. Make sure to check back next week for part two, where we talk about setting the stage in your own mind, before going on stage to speak, what she has discovered about the universal fear of being seen, reclaiming your own voice to use as an instrument and practices she recommends for maintaining presence during challenging moments. I know you're going to enjoy it, so hope to see you back next week. Thank you so much for listening and for being here on this journey with me. I hope you'll stick around If you liked this episode.

Speaker 1:

It would mean the world for me if you would rate and review the podcast or share it with someone you know. Many need to hear this message. I love to hear from you all and want you to know that you can leave me a voicemail directly. If you go to my website, evokegreatnesscom, and go to the contact me tab, you'll just hit the big old orange button and record your message. I love the feedback and comments that I've been getting, so please keep them coming. I'll leave you with the wise words of author Robin Sharma Greatness comes by doing a few small and smart things each and every day. It comes from taking little steps consistently. It comes from making a few small chips against everything in your professional and personal life that is ordinary, so that a day eventually arrives when all that's left is the extraordinary.

People on this episode

Head Shot

Sonnie Linebarger

Host