Notice when you switch into performance mode. The applause voice in your head isn’t you.

There is a version of you that comes online when you sense an audience, and it has a different voice, a different laugh, a slightly different set of opinions. It is not fake exactly, more like a manager who takes over when you feel watched. The trouble is that it starts making choices for you, and its only measure of success is how a room reacted.

Catch the switch happening rather than trying to stop it. Notice the tightening, the extra energy, the way your sentences start reaching. Then ask what you would actually say if you were talking to one person you trust.