Roberto Armenteros
September 16, 1999

How To Survive Embarrassing Moments

It has been proven that embarrassing moments constitute the main reason for million

of people to act in a very ridicule and inappropriate way in certain moments of self-frustration.

From a famous singer who fell down on stage in one of his routine performances, and then

decided not to perform in that same place again, to the well-respected professor of Humanities

who was caught by one of his students picking his nose, and then created this whole scene of

this lost insect that jumped into one of his nasal openings. All these are example of people who

after being surprised by a non-expected action, let their most prominent emotions take over their

nervous system, making things worse that they already are. How many people in everyday life

feel intimidated when they are going to do something in public, just because of the possibility of

doing something wrong and becoming the main target of laugh and mockery! How can we avoid

or survive an embarrassing moments in a way that attracts the least possible public attention?

How should we perform after such incidents in order not to make things worse than they are?

Here is where the necessity to create a series of logical steps to avoid major conflicts when facing

an embarrassing moment appeared.

In an embarrassing moment, people tend to get very nervous and even frustrated, losing

control. The following steps have been created with two purposes. First, to avoid facing the most

common embarrassing moments in everyday life. Second, to avoid nervous system over-reaction

when such tragedies happen. If followed properly, these steps can help you avoid and survive these

discomforting moments without major complications. So, read carefully.

Avoiding an unwanted incident

Since embarrassing moments arrive from unwanted incidents, a good way to avoid them is by

avoiding such incidents especially when you are in front of a group of people. How can you possibly

accomplish that? It's very simple. First we have to consider the most important troublemaker, the way

you walk. Many people walk and walk and they just don't realize how dangerous and risky it could

be if some precautions aren't taken with anticipation. Such negligence may bring fatal consequences

like falling in front of many people due to a defect on the walk side or even stepping on a basketball

spilling your soda all over your new suit, as you make your way to the floor. Of course you don't want

this to happen, so you really have to work on your walking habits. First, when you are approaching a

group of people slow down, this will give more time to reason and make things well. Once at moderate

speed you should watch your steps, which should be around 16" long for more precision (This number

can change according to height). A good technique would be to stop and pretend you are checking

the time every now and then, so you take your time to inspect the surroundings in detail, making

sure there are no objects in the way, which can make you trip or even fall.


Avoid the pressure by people around you

This second suggestion is of extremely importance: "people's influence." When walking among

a packed crowd, avoid looking at one person for a long time, no matter how funny he/she looks or how

extravagant he/she is dressed. This may cause you to lose control over yourself. Then incidents like striking

a table in front of you taking everything down, or missing a "please do not enter sign" are very likely to

happen. Instead, try to find an easy path among the crowd to avoid a major disaster. Also notice how

people stop doing whatever they are doing to check you out when you just arrived from the outside. At

this time if you don't take close attention and act carefully, it will be a good opportunity for an embarrassing

moment to happen. Remember this is time for perfection. Slow down, take a deep breath, and then go on.

If someone calls out your name don't respond immediately, wait until he calls you again. This will give you

time to remember the person's name in case you forgot, and maybe, who knows, he does not call you

again, which means it was not that important. If he calls you a second time, you should turn around, act

polite and join the person or group of people. If you are planning to stay in that area for a while it is

essential that you stick around with some people. In this way, if you do something that could lead to

an embarrassing moment, people would interpret it as a group action, so all the pressure, laughs and

expressions will fall on the entire group, not on you. That's what you are looking for.

In case you are attending a job meeting or a school activity and someone asks you to say

something in front of a whole bunch of people, it may seem intimidating and a great opportunity to

be screamed and laughed at. You have to consider that the first mispronounced and empty word or

meaningless phrase can make people explode in eternal laugh. Try not to bore the audience with

cheesy stories of your senior year in HS when you were the leader of the football team. After a

while people will start leaving the place in a desperate way until you, the microphone and the owner

of the microphone are the only three individuals inside that room. And that could be embarrassing!

Try also not to make numerous unexpected pauses as you talk, people will start feeling sorry for

you and you may feel really discomfited. However, there is something you can do in order to

succeed in this task. Get yourself a bottle of water. This will take care of 50% of the situation.

The other 50% if what you do with it. In fact, it will translate in more time to think about what

you are going to say, and it will give you a much more professional appearance. When you don't

find the right word or expression and you need more time, then smile nicely, drink some water

in a confident manner, and take this time to find something to talk about. This can be done easier

if there is a table next to you, so you don't have to hold the glass all the time, in case you drop it.

Once it happened…

If for any reason you could not avoid the incident and experienced and an embarrassing

moment, which can vary from dropping a glass of wine on someone else's shirt, to making a dumb

suggestion in a topic out of your scope, then you may consider yourself in a critical moment.

Nevertheless, there is still something you can do to reduce the dreadful feeling of an such moment.

As soon as you commit your imprudence, you have to know that more than 97% of the people

will be looking at you. Again, this is time for perfection. Your only goal at this time is to turn the

way in which this imprudence happened into something casual, in other words, less embarrassing.

In order to do this, there are three things you can do.

First, once everyone is aware of what you've done, don't look at anyone's face. This could

make you feel more nervous and desperate, increasing the possibilities to do it again. At this time

it would be helpful to think that an hour after the incident, most of the people will have already

forgotten the incident. Second, if you caused anything to fall or to break "like a pitcher filled with

water", or maybe you stepped on and old woman's toes, this time for you to act in the very well

known "Hollywood Manner." As a result, people would think you did it on purpose just to let

them know you are there. In the case of the old woman's toes, it would not hurt that much if Sharon

Stone or Brad Pitt step on your foot? Third and last, in case you have to assume complete responsibility

of what just happened, act as natural as possible, showing an attitude of self-confidence and high

self-esteem. This will help alleviate the pain you feel in these unwanted moments.

As you can see there are many things we can do to avoid embarrassing moments. Some

of them may seem a little off the wall, but they could save you from experiencing humiliations that

can crush the fragile teen ego. In conclusion, my suggestions you already know. If possible,

memorize them and know them by heart. If for any reason you fail to follow these steps correctly

and you experience millions of embarrassing times, then do what my father, a very happily married,

professional and successful person, does. He goes oops, and keeps walking. Maybe we have to

learn that in life nothing is a big deal after all.