Oh, that moment when you’ve said something you wish you hadn’t. In public. To a big audience.

It’s doubly tricky because the adrenaline starts squirting into your bloodstream and your judgement is suddenly impaired. There are a lot of times when your instincts will serve you well, but this may not be one of them. Your fight-or-flight mechanism may well be tempting you to wrap your comments quickly, get the hell off the stage and then hide… or, worse, to double down. “Yeah, that’s right! I just said I support shooting Canada Geese! What’s more, I support locking up kindly old people who toss out bread crumbs for them! And I think every youth between the ages of 12 and 17 ought to be conscripted into an army whose sole purpose is to wipe out the little lawn-soiling bastards! Uh, the geese. Not the elderly.”

Take a breath. Take two. Assess what you’ve just said. And consider telling your audience something like “You know, that didn’t come out the way I intended. Here’s what I actually think…”