Have you ever gone to a technical talk or presentation excited about the topic, only to be frustrated by the speaker’s technical jargon and stiff delivery?

If you’re a tax professional, you’ve likely been to more of these presentations than you care to remember (perhaps even reluctantly if you had perilously waited until the eleventh hour to earn your CPE credit).

Let’s face it. Tax is not one of the most enthralling topics to listen to. It does not captivate an audience and draw them to the edge of their seats like the inspirational story of a famous person who overcame adversity in order to achieve success. And when the speaker drones on and on in a monotone voice for what feels like an eternity, you might sooner be stuck on the tarmac of Newark International Airport seated between two toddlers with the seat in front of you reclined as far back as it will go.

Like science and technology, tax is very technical. Taking complicated ideas and simplifying them so that they can be understood by lay audiences is no small feat.

As one tax professional was brave enough to admit, “When I looked out into the audience and saw people’s heads bobbing and weaving, I realized that I had become a human tranquilizer.”

Even those who are experts in the field – having published scholarly articles in prestigious academic journals – have failed at this pursuit.

But as a famous physicist named Albert Einstein once said: “If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough.” As tax professionals, we must strive to communicate more clearly and effectively with our audiences.

Unfortunately, simplifying technical subject matter is not the only challenge that confronts technical public speakers. There is yet another obstacle to overcome, one that plagues even the most seasoned public speakers: the fear of speaking in public.

In fact, our fear of standing up in front of a group and talking is so great that, according to surveys, we fear it more than death. As Jerry Seinfeld once said, “… [P]eople’s number one fear is public speaking. Number two is death. Death is number two. Does that sound right? This means to the average person, if you go to a funeral, you’re better off in the casket than doing the eulogy.”

I’d like to share with you my personal experience when it comes to public speaking. I’m not going to sugarcoat anything. In order to be completely forthcoming, I must “tell all.” There was a time, not so long ago, when I was deathly afraid of speaking in public.

Now, that presented somewhat of a problem for me. How so, you ask? Well, for starters, I’m a lawyer. But not just any lawyer. I suppose that if I was a transactional attorney, I could potentially make it through my entire career without ever getting up in front of an audience to speak.

But that was not the path I chose. My first job out of law school was working in the Public Defender’s Office – a high volume Public Defender’s Office no less. As you might expect, trying cases was an essential part of the job. I guess you could say that it came with the territory.

Those who think that avoidance was an option could not be more wrong. If a client wants to have his day in court, then he gets it. Indeed, under the Sixth Amendment, a defendant in a criminal case has the absolute right to a trial by an impartial jury.

And therein lies the problem: trying cases is synonymous with public speaking. Very simply, if I couldn’t stand up in front of a jury and speak, then I couldn’t persuade. And if I couldn’t persuade, then I couldn’t defend my clients zealously. Public speaking was an integral part of the job.

I’d like to share with you a personal story about how I dealt with my fear.

The date was October 2007. I was fresh out of law school and, like most ambitious law school grads who have chosen to start their careers in public service, ready to stand up for the poor, the damned, and the forgotten. It did not take long for that wish to come true. Just two weeks into the job, I found myself trying my first case. It was a felony case – a serious felony case – one in which I was defending a man accused of robbing a convenience store at gunpoint.

I was about to make my closing argument. The next thirty years of my client’s life depended upon how convincingly I could make my argument. The judge had called a five-minute recess before I was to begin. I was pacing up and down the hallway, cramps in my stomach, my nerves tangled and raw.

As I paced the hallway, I began to carry on a quiet conversation with myself about covering up the pain of my fear. How could I cover it?

Could I cover it with bravado? My “left brain” shot that idea down faster than The Road Runner leaving Wile E. Coyote in his dust (Meep, Meep!): “Who loves a swaggering and cocky huckster looking to take advantage of a naïve and vulnerable customer?” Could I cover it with the same cold, stoic, detached demeanor epitomized by Alan Rickman’s character, Severus Snape, in “Harry Potter?” Who cares for the callous, the insensitive, the apathetic? Who would believe them?

Could I withdraw like a turtle into its shell? Who trusts those who hold back from us? Could I attack the way the lion attacks? Who is open to such a fearsome beast? Could I run for my hole like a rabbit? Who believes those who hide?

The turtle when it retracts into its shell, the lion when it charges, and the rabbit when it hops into its hole are all reacting to the very same emotion: fear. No doubt that primordial fear was inspired by thousands of years of evolution. But nonetheless, it’s fear.

I watched the jury walk in. I heard the judge utter those fateful words that have haunted me to this day: “Ladies and gentlemen you will now hear closing arguments. Mr. DeBlis, you may begin.” Once more the fear shot through my body, pressing against my ribs on each side. I glanced quickly at the jury. They were all watching me as I walked toward them, with piercing stares, waiting to hear me, and then, to judge me. Could I measure up? I felt like running. My heart was racing.

I placed my notes on top of the lectern and held onto it for dear life. I had prepared my argument, even to the point of memorizing it. But now all I could do was read it. I was afraid to look up for fear I’d lose my place. Suddenly, my papers fell from the lectern and went flying across the courtroom floor, as if they had been blown to the ground by a gust of wind. Red with embarrassment, and sweating, I began to pick them up – one by one. The seconds felt like minutes. All the while, the silence in the courtroom was deafening.

In that moment, I wished that the ground would have opened up and swallowed me whole. The thought of enduring another second of embarrassment was simply too much to bear. But the worst had yet to come. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see my client’s face frozen in horror. Not only was I dealing with feelings of guilt and shame, but now a much bigger problem was looming: the feeling that I had let my client down.

When I had finally retrieved my papers, they were in hopeless disarray. So many thoughts rushed into and out of my brain that it felt like the floodgates of a damn had burst open giving way to a massive torrent of water. Regaining my composure and finding where I had left off had become a monumental challenge.

In terror, I looked at the jurors and they looked back. In that brief second, the first thing to come out of my mouth was a meek apology. “Sorry,” I mumbled as my voice cracked like a teenager’s. And then it came blurting out: “Ladies and gentlemen,” I began. “I wish that I weren’t so afraid.”

Suddenly, I was vaguely aware that something was happening. I was, as actors like to call it, “in the moment.”

The expression on the faces of the jurors was that of astonishment. Here was this lawyer who had fearlessly guided his client’s case through the cross-examination of countless hostile witnesses – from detectives to forensic experts – now confessing that he was afraid. They watched. They waited. Their tentacles were out – feeling, probing.

I continued. “Let me tell you at the very beginning what my fear is, why my heart pounds and my heart skips beats. My fear is that I will fail because I care a great deal about Johnny. What will happen if I fail him? I have a task of defending Johnny. My goal is, when we leave here, for us all to walk out together. This is the purpose of my final argument. When the foreman comes in and hands your verdict to the clerk, I want that verdict to be so that Johnny can step right up and never have to put a shackle on again, never have to be taken to a prison and put in a cell. I want him to walk out and be free with Maggie and the grandchildren that love him so much that they call him ‘Poppa.’ So my task is to get a not guilty verdict. And how can I do that? That’s why I am afraid.”

The fear slowly began to recede and the argument began to take on a life of its own. Some mysterious force had taken over, picked the words, and formed the thoughts. The same mysterious force directed the words to a climax, knew when to stop and even how to construct a perfect ending. When I finished, I sat down, sweating and exhausted (and yes, even trembling), but nonetheless proud.

What happened to my fear? I looked it in the eye. I stared it down. And what did it do? It retreated like a whimpering hyena with its tail between its legs after attempting to make dinner out of a defenseless fawn, when its mother made a “guest appearance.”

To argue in the face of our fear is the very essence of being courageous. Argument springs out of our authority. It escapes from us as our thought and feeling, as our sounds, our music, our rhythms. When we give ourselves permission, the argument bursts out of our lungs, our throats, and yes, even our hearts.

While I didn’t know it at the time, stories like this are so common to the human experience that they have inspired more than just a few plays and musicals. In fact, in the theater, actors have reduced it to a formula, with four stages: Identity, Struggle, Discovery, Surprise.

The key parts of every story are the “struggle” and the “discovery.” Not everyone is willing to be vulnerable, but vulnerability creates trust. In the identity and struggle stages, the more willing you are to be vulnerable, the more you will create trust. Who can forget the epoch performances of Dustin Hoffman in “Rain Man,” Sylvester Stallone in “Rocky,” Tom Hanks in “Forrest Gump,” and Morgan Freeman in “The Shawshank Redemption?”

When the people you’re speaking with trust you, they will trust the result you share too and you’ll create a tremendous bond.

If we accept the fact that it is impossible to overcome our fear completely – that there will always be times when it rears its ugly head – then we will make an important discovery. What is that discovery?

If fear can’t be conquered, then there are only two ways left of dealing with it: surrendering to it or embracing it. What would happen if you took a huge risk and decided to embrace your fear? Since fear is nothing more than energy, to embrace your fear would be to feel its power – its raw power.

Connecting to your fear on a visceral level will enable you to do something that you may have never thought possible: change its power to your power. By re-channeling the energy, you can transform your fear from friend to foe. Once you master this, you will successfully harness the power of fear in public speaking.

It’s no different than our ancestors when they learned how to make fire. They were able to take what was then one of the most dangerous elements and harness its power for many useful purposes – from cooking and navigating in the darkness to providing heat in the cold – to the benefit of all Mankind.

As for me, I have learned not to be ashamed of my fear, but to embrace it. In the courtroom, I sometimes carry on a silent conversation with myself about my fear.

My conversation with myself goes something like this:

“How are you feeling, Mike?” I ask.

“How the hell do you think I’m feeling? The jury is watching, waiting for me to begin my argument and I can’t think of anything to say,” I reply. “I can’t just stand here saying nothing.”

“I asked you, how are you feeling?”

“You know how I feel.”

“What is the feeling?”

“You know what it is.”

“Are you afraid to say it?”

“All right. I’m afraid.”

“Well, you should be. This is a high-stakes case. The prosecutor wants to bury your client. He wants to puts his face in the center of a bulls-eye and plaster it on the wall.”

“Don’t remind me. Not now. Not standing here.”

“It’s alright to be afraid. You should be afraid. Go ahead. Feel it.”

“But the jury’s watching.”

“They can wait a few seconds more.”

Suddenly, I look up at the jury. I clear my throat. And in a clear, confident voice I say: “Ladies and gentlemen …”

Several years ago, I had the unique opportunity of training under the late Donald Fiedler, a legendary criminal defense attorney who was also a professional actor. He shared with me a tip that has inspired me throughout my career.

The tip came from a play written by Gerald Uelman, entitled “Bryan.” The play explores the life of William Jennings Bryan, Clarence Darrow’s adversary in the Scopes Monkey Trial.

Mr. Uelman’s theme was that history had not been kind to the three-time Democratic nominee for President. He clearly was the most charismatic figure of his time.

In the play, there is a scene when he discovers the magic he has over audiences. William told his beloved wife his secret:

 “…Mary, last night I found I have power over an audience. I can move them as I please. It was an incredible feeling. The whole room was focused on me, waiting for my next word. I spoke from my heart, and realized my audience was listening with their hearts. Knowing what is in a person’s heart gives you enormous power. It is a power that can move people and inspire them.”

The question that you need to ask yourself next time you are preparing for a presentation is whether you have the courage to be emotionally vulnerable in front of your audience. The answer to that question could mean the very difference between an outstanding presentation or a mediocre one.