At a recent Lodge Inspection, the District Deputy shared with us a short talk on “Nerves”. The topic was timely, and especially seeing that it was inspection season there were many brothers just a little nervous about performing their duties for degree work. It is normal for people to be nervous and nothing to be ashamed about. You need to recognize it, and then act accordingly to help yourself through your nerves.
Even the most veteran member of the lodge can get the butterflies just before the perform their parts. But hopefully, with a little understanding and proactive measure they can be better prepared to conquer their nervousness.
The District Deputy mentioned three things to help. Study, Prepare and Practice. I would like to suggest one more, Greet.
The first thing you need to do, before attempting to start memorizing the words is to actually find out what the words mean. Go to the dictionary and look up the various meanings for a word and also understand the pronunciation. Go to https://www.dictionary.com and enter the word in the search bar to get word meanings and you will also find a spoken example that you can listen and learn the pronunciation for. Also, type in key phrases into a web search to see if there are any historical references to the passage you are studying. You may get better context of how and why this passage is used in our ritual. Only after studying the word meanings and reviewing any historical references will you be better enabled to perform your part with confidence that you know what you are talking about.
Preparing is not an easy task, as most of your practicing will likely be in the comfort of your own home. In order to better prepare for your part, you need to put yourself into the situation where you can be with the rest of the members that will be performing the work with you. You need to practice in the building where the work will be performed. You need to get a feel for the acoustics and the amount of space you have to work with.
Practice makes perfect, is what they seem to always say. I would both agree and also disagree with that statement. I disagree, because if you try to memorize a passage and you do not use the exact words you will remember the passage incorrectly. But I guess that does mean you will be perfect, just not perfect in the words that should be memorized. To really practice correctly, you need to read, reread and read again straight from the book (assuming you have already decoded the cipher correctly). We are not allowed to write the words, so you will have to refer to the book as often as possible. Then when you feel comfortable, have a partner read along as you recite your passage and stop you along the way to get the correct words. You want to practice with the correct wording. However, sometimes it is just as easy to get a general consensus of the idea of the passage and then work the words out later. But I only recommend that for brothers that can have the flexibility to relearn the correct words later.
Greeting and meeting your brothers is very important as well. Some occurrences of “The Nerves” has to do with speaking in front of people you do not know. Even a brother that has been a member for over 25 years and knows everybody in the room can still have butterflies when it comes to performing, but in other cases you can help eliminate that type of nervousness by getting to know your brothers. Before and after every meeting, make sure to say hello and spend a little quality time getting to know something new about every brother. When you have new visitors from other lodges, make sure to introduce yourself and ask about one thing about each person. It does not really matter what you ask each person, nor will it matter if you actually remember two weeks later what was said, it is the interaction that counts. Once you start to feel like you have some sort of a connection with a person, it becomes that much easier to stand in front of a crowd of brothers and perform your parts.
While each of these topics is not a guarantee that you will not be nervous, you will start to grasp a better understanding of your part in the ritual and how better to stand in front of a group and recite your portion to the best of your ability. Nerves are a real thing, and most of us experience this often. It is not the fact that you are dealing with your nerves, but how you choose to recognize and process your feelings to be a better speaker.