Your First Open Mic: A Guide from Stage Fright to Applause

You want to take the stage. Or almost want to. Or you've already decided but don't know where to start. This is for you. Not a rulebook, not a checklist. Just a conversation about what it's actually like and what helps. Step by step, from the moment you're only thinking about it to the moment you walk off stage and something inside has shifted.

Step One. The Text: What Do You Actually Want to Say

Don't start with rehearsal. Don't start with breathing exercises. Start with a question: what do you want to say? Not "what poem sounds better" and not "what will the room respond to." What matters to you, right now?

Choose the text you feel. The one that makes something tighten or open up inside. The room picks up on that before you realize it yourself. A technically polished piece read from a distance is worse than an honest piece delivered with a trembling voice.

If you have several options, read each one out loud in silence. The one after which you sit for an extra second without moving — that's probably the one.

Step Two. Rehearsal: Voice, Not Memory

Rehearsal means out loud. Not in your head, not in a whisper — out loud, full voice. Text in your head and text in the air are different things. You'll be surprised how pauses, intonation, and breath all shift when the words actually sound.

A few concrete techniques: read standing up — your body will be standing on stage, let it get used to that early. Sitting posture reads differently. Know your first and last lines well, not the whole thing by heart. The opening gives you confidence to enter, the ending gives you confidence to exit. The middle usually finds itself. Read slower than you think you need to — on stage everything speeds up from nerves; if you've been practicing slow, you'll land somewhere right. Record yourself at least once, not to critique but to hear yourself from the outside — often what feels too quiet or too slow sounds exactly right on playback.

Step Three. Right Before You Go On: Body and Mind

Heart faster, hands maybe a little damp, the thought "why did I come here" appearing right on schedule — that's normal. And that's workable.

Breathing: inhale for 4, hold for 4, exhale for 8. Three or four rounds. The long exhale activates the parasympathetic nervous system — your body literally starts to calm down. Not metaphor, physiology.

Warm your voice: quietly hum a low tone, then a few open vowels — ah, oh, oo. A voice that has been silent for an hour and suddenly needs to fill a room is not the most cooperative instrument.

Don't re-read the text in the final minute. It creates the feeling you don't know it. Better to just be. Look at the room from a distance, feel the atmosphere. You're already ready. Reminding yourself of the text in the last minute is panic, not preparation.

Find one person with an open face in the room. Before you go up — not to perform the whole text to them, but to shift from "me vs the room" to "I'm talking with people." It changes the mode entirely.

Step Four. On Stage: Three Things That Help

When you walk out something important happens: the room is already on your side. People came to listen. They want things to work out for you, even if they don't know you.

Pause before you begin. Stand up, look at the room, take a breath. Don't start reading the second you step out. This pause is not awkwardness. It is presence. The room feels it.

Read for someone, not for everyone. Pick two or three people in different parts of the room and return to them periodically. This makes contact feel alive and removes the sensation of "everyone looking at me at once."

If you stumble — pause, breathe, continue. The room almost never notices what you think is a mistake. And if they do notice — a calm pause looks far more composed than an apology.

And the main thing: you don't have to be perfect. You have to be present.

Step Five. After: How to Process the Experience

When you walk off stage there may be anything inside — a rush, relief, "why did I say that," the desire to do it again. All of that is normal and all of it is part of the process.

Don't analyze right away. Give yourself at least an hour just to exist. The impression in the first minutes is adrenaline, not an objective assessment.

Write down what you feel, not a verdict. Not "good or bad" but — what's happening inside. That's valuable material. Sometimes the next poem comes from it.

Accept the response. If someone comes over and says something good — let yourself take it in. Don't brush it off with "I read badly though." Just say thank you. The response of a living person after a live performance is real.

Decide what comes next. You can go up again. You can take a pause and rethink. You can write something new and come back with a different text. The first time doesn't commit you to anything, except one thing: now you know it's possible.

Poet Not Dead Open Mic: Where the First Time Happens for Real

If you're in Bali and looking for a place for your first performance — the Poet Not Dead open mic was built exactly for this. No jury, no grades, no competition. A real room, a microphone, and people who came to listen. Not to judge — to hear.

You can come first as an audience member — feel the room, see how it works. And then take the stage. Or go up right away. Both work.

Announcements and schedule at poetnotdead.com and on Telegram at @poetnotdead.