Confession: I don’t love public speaking.

It’s not because I’m bad at it. It’s not because I’m shy. It’s because usually, when a cartoonist is invited to speak somewhere, it’s to talk about himself and his work. And talking about myself to a crowd of people who probably have more interesting stories to tell than I do makes me feel like a jackass.

Lemont shares my anxiety. And it’s always ended badly for him.

This past weekend, I spoke at two events. The first, a sold-out “members” event at the San Francisco Chronicle, the second at the Daily Cal Alumni Association’s Alumnus of the Year award ceremony. Both went very well. No projectile-vomiting to report. And the more it doesn’t happen, the more I realize it’s never going to, probably because I’ve channeled all my anxiety into poor Lemont. The most underrated benefit of drawing a comic strip for a living is it doubles as free therapy.

There are a number of techniques for conquering your fear of public speaking. I’ll rank them in order of efficacy:

Candorville’s Top Ten List of Ways To Conquer Your Fear of Public-Speaking:

10. Join Toastmasters.

9. Invite your best friends to the speech and focus only on them.

8. Spot someone sexy in the crowd, focus on that person, and talk to them as if they’ve been flirting with you.

7. Forget trying to be funny, just try to be honest. Imagine it’s a confession about how much your topic means to you and why.

6. Rehearse your speech in front of the most sarcastic jackass you know. Once you’ve been through that, you’ll realize you still did it, and he’s still a jackass.

5. Breathe.

4. Tell yourself that your nervousness is actually excitement. Because odds are, it is. When  you’re smiling, you’ve convinced yourself.

3. Do not write your speech word for word, just write bullet points and speak extemporaneously.

2. Hire an actor to play you.

1. Don’t do it.