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S2 EP45 From Hiding to Being Seen: Find Your Voice & Speak with Confidence with Lucy Devi Hall
•Juliette Karaman•Season 2•Episode 45
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Welcome
Hello, lovelies. It’s Juliette here, and today I’m joined once again by the incredible Lucy Devi Hall, a sound engineer and speaker mentor who helps women find their voice, speak with confidence, and feel safe being seen on stage and on camera.
Lucy and I have known each other for around 15 years, and in this conversation, we explore what it really means to find your voice and allow yourself to be seen.
Lucy shares a deeply personal moment that happened when she wore her natural Afro out in public after years of straightening her hair and wearing weaves. What should have been a simple trip to the shop brought up an intense physical response and revealed just how deeply old experiences of racism, shame, and hiding were still living within her.
From there, we explore the invisible layers so many women place over their voices: expectations, comparison, misogyny, racism, self-judgement, fear of criticism, and the conditioning that teaches us to make ourselves smaller.
We talk about public speaking, confidence, speaking on camera, nervous system safety, body awareness, visibility, and authentic self-expression, and why becoming a powerful speaker isn’t simply about learning the perfect technique.
Sometimes, it’s about finally feeling safe enough to be fully yourself.
This episode is an invitation to stop hiding.
To let yourself take up space.
And to remember that your voice is needed exactly as it is.
📝 Episode Summary
In this episode, Lucy Devi Hall and I explore finding your voice, overcoming the fear of being seen, public speaking confidence, speaking on camera, self-expression, and creating safety in the body around visibility.
After more than 20 years working as a sound engineer at Sky, Lucy has watched thousands of people speak on stage and in front of cameras. One pattern has become impossible for her to ignore: women often make themselves quieter.
She shares how she regularly finds herself turning women’s microphones up and how even the physical act of holding a microphone can reveal how uncomfortable someone feels taking up space and allowing their voice to be heard.
We explore why traditional public speaking advice can sometimes miss something essential. You can learn body language, vocal techniques, pauses, presentation skills, and how to deliver the perfect keynote, but if your body does not feel safe being seen, those techniques can only take you so far.
Lucy introduces her 30-Day Anti-Cringe Challenge, which encourages women to record themselves speaking, watch themselves back with “loving eyes,” and deliberately notice what they like instead of immediately searching for flaws.
We also talk about the power of speaking honestly when your mind goes blank, allowing nervousness to exist instead of hiding it, and staying connected to your body while speaking.
From corporate stages to social media and intimate relationships, this conversation explores what happens when we stop performing who we think we should be and allow people to experience who we actually are.
Because confidence doesn’t have to mean becoming louder, bigger, or more polished.
It can mean becoming more you.
🔎 Key Takeaways
Your Voice Is Needed You do not need another qualification, certificate, perfect funnel, or perfectly polished version of yourself before you are allowed to speak. Lucy reminds us that you already have something valuable to offer.
Fear Of Being Seen Can Live In The Body Lucy’s experience of wearing her natural hair in public revealed how old experiences and conditioning can continue to shape the body’s response to visibility, even years later.
Public Speaking Is More Than Technique Great communication isn’t only about volume, intonation, posture, body language, or memorising the perfect speech. Feeling safe enough to express yourself authentically can completely change how people experience you.
Women Are Often Conditioned To Make Themselves Smaller After decades working with speakers, Lucy has repeatedly noticed women lowering their voices, pulling microphones away, and unconsciously reducing their presence.
Watch Yourself With Loving Eyes Instead of immediately criticising how you look or sound on camera, Lucy encourages women to intentionally identify what they like about themselves. Her 30-Day Anti-Cringe Challenge is designed to help retrain that automatic self-criticism.
Your Body Is Part Of Your Voice Speaking is not simply an intellectual exercise. Breath, tension, sensation, emotion, and nervous system responses are all part of how we communicate.
Authenticity Creates Connection When someone’s words and body feel congruent, people notice. Instead of trying to perform confidence, allowing your natural tenderness, passion, humour, vulnerability, or intensity to be present can make communication more magnetic.
Being Seen Doesn’t Require Perfection Whether you’re speaking on stage, recording a video, sharing on social media, or expressing yourself in a relationship, visibility begins with allowing yourself to show up before everything feels perfectly polished.
Start Before You Feel Completely Ready Record the video. Speak the words. Notice what you like about yourself. Your confidence can grow through the experience of expressing yourself rather than waiting for confidence to arrive first.
⧋ About Lucy Devi Hall
Lucy Devi Hall is a sound engineer and speaker mentor who helps women find their voice, feel more comfortable being seen, and communicate authentically on stage and on camera.
After more than two decades working in sound engineering at Sky, Lucy has witnessed thousands of speakers and developed a unique perspective on the relationship between voice, body language, confidence, visibility, and genuine human connection.
Her work goes beyond traditional public speaking techniques, helping women explore what may be sitting “on top” of their voice so they can express themselves more freely and be seen as who they truly are.
This episode explores finding your voice, public speaking confidence, speaking on camera, fear of being seen, visibility, authentic self-expression, nervous system regulation, women’s confidence, self-worth, body awareness, communication skills, overcoming self-doubt, and becoming comfortable being seen.
Let’s keep the conversation going over on Instagram.
If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a review and share your thoughts. I love hearing your stories. And remember, you are scrumptious just as you are, inside and out.
Don't forget to Rate and leave a review so more people can tune in and the ripple effect spreads further.
SPEAKER_01
Welcome to the Scrumptious Woman podcast. Once again, I have with me the most incredible woman that I've known for what 15 years now, pretty much?
SPEAKER_00
Something like that, yeah.
SPEAKER_01
Lucy Debbie Haw. Welcome, welcome, welcome. Wow, we have been through a little bit of a journey together. And I love that you help. Is it only woman or is it also men?
SPEAKER_00
It's woman.
SPEAKER_01
Woman with speaking on stages, speaking on camera. You're also a sound engineer, and so you know all the nitty-bitty gritty. And you've moved through, I don't know, five lifetimes, at least. So pleased that you're here. I really wanted to to just dial it back a little bit and start with your story.
SPEAKER_00
Okay. There's a couple of things. I want to start first of all with something that's happened this year, really. It's funny because before we joined the call, we're talking about weaves. You commented on my hair. I've been hiding my hair since probably when I was first time I got it straightened was I was 13. Yeah. I went to see my dad in Nigeria and my auntie took me to a hairdresser and got it straightened. And so that's been the kind of relationship with my hair. And so I've been wearing weave for about 20 years. I had a blot long my hair looked like yours, actually, long blonde hair. And I took my weave out in December last year, but I was still hiding this. I was still straightening it and pulling it back. And then one Friday evening in March, I decided to wash my hair and just have it like fill out afro like this. And then I was sitting in the living room and I heard this right, and I opened the curtains. It's my foxes. And they're like, Lizzie, feed us. So I went to the kitchen, opened the fridge. There's no chicken. I thought, right, I'm gonna have to run down to to Lidl. And I put my jacket on, stepped out the door, and suddenly I froze because I remembered, oh my god, my hair. I've got my hair out. Wow. Yeah. And I thought, fuck it, just just go to Lidl. So I came out of my cul-de-sac, I came into the main street, and I got hit by this total paranoia. And you know what I did? I hid behind a car, ducked behind a car. Right? And I thought, what am I doing? I stood up, and then I got paranoia again, and I ducked behind another car, and I pretty much did that all the way to Lidl. And not only that, I went the back way to avoid people.
SPEAKER_02
Right?
SPEAKER_01
Such a visceral response for having taken something off your safety blanket. And then knowing that you're like, fuck it. But hiding behind the cars and not wanting to be seen. It's so visceral, we don't even know that we're not even aware that this is running in your system.
SPEAKER_00
It's I mean, it's that's the thing, you know. When I got actually got into Liddle, my body felt like I walked in and everything went quiet and everybody turned their heads and was staring like that. That's the feeling that I had, right? And then I felt this heat rise up through me into my face. I could feel my face was the colour of a beetroot. I felt so ashamed. I put my head down, I just ran in, grabbed a chicken, and ran back up home. And I came in the door and I thought, oh god, thank God that's over. I felt like I'd been through this traumatic experience because in my brain I had. And that's when I realized like all this stuff that had happened to me a long time ago, you know, all the racism called the N-word and all that. I was still keeping that alive in my brain. My body was that was still alive, that was still the reality I was living in.
SPEAKER_01
I want to actually add to it, like, I love that you help the foxes and you're also vegans for you to go and get chicken and actually feed it to the foxes. Good for you. But the beauty of what you're saying is that some of us, like I just said, like, oh, I just got this little weft or weave, whatever you got.
SPEAKER_02
I was like, Great, I've never had you know thick hair ever in my life. So I'm like, oh, this is kind of cool.
SPEAKER_01
But I'm also just recognizing it's like, oh, this is just like an addition. This is not me. This is not the fool me. I don't hide behind it. But then we also look at Botox and fillers and everything else. It's like that is going to make me happy. Like, if only I get to that point. And we don't recognize that that is the masks that we put on. And actually, by taking all of that off, we get more sensation in the body. And it can be hella uncomfortable, like you just said.
SPEAKER_00
Exactly. I call it you have something on top of your voice, whether it's you know, racism, patriarchy, misogyny, whether it's self-hate, whether it's something you're learning, you're com being compared to your siblings. We put all these things on top of our voice, and it like helping someone to see that so you can take it off and put it back. Because when I got in back from that that shop, I stood in the hallway and I had that realization, okay, hold on a minute. This is me. I'm the biggest racist to myself now. And I'm giving it all back to them.
SPEAKER_01
Beautiful.
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01
So really like breaking that probably generational hold.
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01
Right? I mean, your auntie took you to get your hair straightened, so that was subconsciously programmed into you. That's what you should look like. How often have we heard it's like, oh, don't you don't wear that? Or stand up straight, or like my mother used to tell me, sucking your tummy and your butt. And I'm like, so you're walking around clenched half your lifetime. And she's like, hey, this doesn't feel comfortable. And it's abiding by what other people have taught us.
SPEAKER_00
Do you know what makes me really sad? Because I've been at Sky for 22 years. I've seen thousands of speakers in front of the camera like this, you know, speaking to camera. I've seen also on stage. And as a sound engineer, I'm sitting and I'm making people louder or quieter. Guess what? I make the woman louder. The majority of women I have to make louder because they've quietened their voice and they've quietened their, you know, their bodies and them theirselves. And I yesterday there was a woman on stage yesterday. I couldn't believe how quiet she was. And I'm sitting there and I'm thinking, you've just learned that, that's not your voice. I mean, that's a learned behavior. And I see over and over again, it's crazy, you're right.
SPEAKER_01
And I don't know, have you gone into the science of the voice and how that actually cultivates our vegan nerve? And I mean, I'm I'm a bit of a geek, so I go all the bits, and I'm sure you as a sound technician as well. It's interesting that you have to push up the volume on the woman's voices. And is was this in conjunction with a man speaking or just her alone?
SPEAKER_00
There was a man on stage with her, but also another woman. But it it's just, you know, also we had someone was handed, there was a two woman I think were handed the microphone in the audience. And it's almost as soon as they take the microphone, I watch all this and I watch the body language. I watch them, they take the mic and then they take it away from them as the their voice their mouth as well. Even though they want to speak, they go like that unconsciously, they move the mic away.
SPEAKER_01
Isn't that interesting, right? Yeah. Beautiful, such beautiful awareness of what is happening in our body. Yes, we want to speak about this. But I mean for me, it's like when this podcast went really viral, I was like, wow, this is cool. But then I'm like, whoa, whoa, okay, I'm not sure I want to go that vial. I like the same on social media. One of my reels got over two and a half million views, and I'm when it's you know, Alex is touching my jaw. Yeah, so I'm getting DMs like God will strike you down, isn't it? And it's like, wow, okay, this is like yay. I wanted to help people, but like, do I want this part as well? And that's that's the bit, right? Where it's like you open and then it's like you've been told a few things, or you've been given that response from some people. That's where you close off again. Or you're like, okay, maybe it's not safe to be seen. Have my voice out there.
SPEAKER_00
And that's I think that's a good point you make, Juliet, because I think a lot of when people go to work on their voice public speaking courses, often they focus on external, the technique and the volume and intonation and body language, and standing there and walking to the side three steps and then making a point. All that stuff. And actually, what you want is to make it safe for your body and safe for yourself to be yourself, to speak your truth. And that's an internal job, it's not, you know, body language.
SPEAKER_01
Isn't it funny, right? Because I was going to say there are so many people that teach you how to speak on stages, how to do your TEDx, etc. etc. And exactly that. The mechanics behind it. And I know that they talk about mindset as well, but I'm not sure how many people have actually linked it to the vagus nerve and to the body and what past experiences we're holding on to.
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01
So I love this. Tell me how do you take people through this? What and then we'll let me do that first. I've got like five thoughts.
SPEAKER_00
Well, the first thing I do, I always get people to go through the 30 days of the anti-quinge challenge. Say more. Anti-cringe, I love it. Because this came out of I did what's it called? A type form. I did a survey of a hundred over a hundred women, and I got them to say, tell me what you think about yourself when you see yourself on camera. Every single one of them said something negative. Wow. I look too old, my face is funny, my lips are this, my da-da-da-da-da. And I was like, wow, that is we need to work on that, you know what I mean? And that meant some not just like one little video, oh there you go, tell something nice to yourself. It was almost like a reprogramming. Of course. So for 30 days, I asked people to record just a short video, 90 seconds, and then watch it back. And I talk about having loving eyes, watch it back with loving eyes and find three things that you love about yourself. And if you can't go as far as love's three things you like about yourself, and it can be really small, something, even I love that yellow colour on me, I love that pink colour, but it's you're training your mind and your brain to look positively on yourself. And that in itself is very powerful. Completely.
SPEAKER_01
I love that because yeah, this is what I see in partnership, and then the couples that come to me is like, he always does that, and he never does this, and he's doing that. And they're tracking so much what is going wrong and what's happening with him, that they have no cognitive awareness of what's happening in their body. And after for me, it's usually three months that they can really start tracking that. And one day the the light comes on, it's like, oh my god, this is what you mean with what you feel in your body. I'm like, yeah. Because very often they'll say, Oh, I'm angry at here, or I'm annoyed. I'm like, that's an emotion. What's the body sensation? I'm like, Well, I'm I'm angry. I got he's he's overstepping my boundaries. I'm like, yes, that's a story, and that's beautiful. And I want you just to focus on what is actually happening in your body. Is there a tightness? Is there a contraction? Is there an expansion? Is there heat? Is there this? And they're just like, what are you talking about? And then after doing it for 30 days, I do the same 30 days, and then recognizing that they're safe and they can say these things out loud because voicing it also helps, are like, holy crap, I've been so focused on what's going wrong outside that I haven't focused on what's inside. Yeah. With you saying, look back at yourself and just put on your loving cap, your loving eyes. I like that.
SPEAKER_00
Yeah. And I give women language because it really hit me that we're not trained to give ourselves or anything positive feedback. We're trained, you know, I could ask someone, what don't you like about that? And they would give me a whole thesis. Oh, there's this, there's this, there's this, there's this. But we don't actually have the language to say what we liked about someone. So when I ask someone to look at yourself speaking, what is it you like? And they don't understand the intonation I'm using here. I'm using short sentences here, and that's creating a certain impact. They don't have the language to point out what they like. Teach women that as well.
SPEAKER_01
Oh, that is so brilliant. I love this. So after their 30-day loving eyes, or what was it? Anti-cringe challenge. You're giving them language, then you see I'm already slowing down because I'm like, okay, so they'll want two, and then the slowing down because I recognize this is probably the piece that you're giving them some more felt experience.
SPEAKER_00
When they're standing up speaking, what people often do is they get freaked out. Oh my god, I don't know where I am, I don't know what to say. And we actually, everything that's happening in your body, they panic at that. Teach them to just, it's okay. I call it a talk-through video, do a talk-through video and talk us through everything that's happening. Right now, my brain's gone blank, now I'm judging myself, now I don't know what to say, now I feel really shy. Now I you know what I mean? Instead of trying to hide it and push it away, we bring it into the light. And the more they do that, they realize, oh, this isn't a problem.
SPEAKER_01
And I love actually, yeah, I speak on stages and I get on and I'll be like, there's a lot of eyes on me. And oftentimes I'll just say that out loud. I'm like, whoo, okay. I jumped on here and I was like really excited and roaring to go. And now I'm looking at all those faces, looking at me. I'm like, whoop, my bottom just clenched. I'm like, oh it's a little bit intense. And then everyone just kind of laughs because they can all imagine what it feels like.
SPEAKER_00
I love that. One something else I teach people to do is to just take a breath in and just take all that energy in, be an anchor for that energy. Imagine it just coming through you and just going down your body and into the ground. Beautiful. Acknowledge what that feels like in your body. This is the thing. Often we want to cut off from the body when speaking. Speaking is a bodily experience. It's not just your words and your brain, it's the whole bodies involved and becoming friends with that.
SPEAKER_01
This is the beauty because you do see some speakers that are really engaging. You like, you just like you lean forward, you're like, yeah, you're rooting for them. And that's because there is congruence between what they're saying and what their body is doing. There may be some studied things there as well, that they're doing a pause, etc., going up and down and slowing it down. But it's also they're really pulling you in. And you can see the people that are on social media and or on stages, and they're boring as fuck because they've trained their keynote up to an inch with its life. And they're disconnected from the body, so I'm like, okay, so your mind just goes somewhere else. You're thinking, like, oh, what am I what am I feeding him tonight? And this is where it's like, for me, it's like this is what we do in sex as well.
SPEAKER_00
That's a great um analogy for that. This is the thing, I see this in work. I'm standing at the back as a sound engineer and I'm watching people. And when someone is not congruent, when someone is put cut off, puts the mask on, I literally see people pick up their phones or their laptops and start, you know, doing something else. Doing something else. But when the person on stage is what they're saying in their body is the same thing, people lean in. And this is the thing, the person on stage, people often think, I want to be confident and I want to And it's not about that. It's about, you know, are you a tender person? Then just be a tender speaker. Are you like loud and then be that? It's like whatever you are, whatever's true to you, just be that on stage. And then that is what's magnetic for people. I love that.
SPEAKER_01
And I remember when we were in that coaching program together, or I was teaching and my sister had just passed away. And I got on the stage to teach the I don't know how many states of orgasm, and I just had this I could not speak. It was just tears coming down my eyes. And looking at every single person in the room, and it got really quiet, like you could hear a pin drop, and everyone was feeling me. And this is where, you know, our nervous systems can start to co-regulate and start feeding each other. And then when I did speak, yeah, I don't know even what I said. I have no memory of it, but I do know that people 15 years later still come up to me and say, Hey, that was such a beautiful transmission because we really understood your rawness of where you're at.
SPEAKER_00
I like that word transmission because that is what you're doing. At work in corporate, so even if you're talking about the accounts, you can still transmit, hey, I'm a human, I'm going to connect with you. Honestly, Juliet, the corporate world is so hungry for this. They're hungry for connection and real human-to-human connection, you know.
SPEAKER_01
And with the rise of AI and the AI videos and everything, there's a slight disconnect that we can feel. We can feel something is slightly off. Even how good they are and they're mimicked completely, and you don't even know what's real or what's what's what's not real, what's AI anymore. It also gets our mind and our bodies to kind of like wonder, is that real? Can we connect with that? Or is that AI?
SPEAKER_00
And and are we just being trained? People are hungry for it. When I put the microphone on someone, I have a moment like I get to connect with them as a human. Yeah. And I love that because it can also put them at ease, connect with them. And she was saying that she's having a hard time because her sister was ill. And I said, Well, it's okay to share that, you know. And she got up on stage and she shared it, and everybody was just there for her. And she started to cry. And people went up to her, and it was the whole atmosphere in the room changed because of that. Because she took that, she was allowed herself to be real. I love that.
SPEAKER_01
It's it's that realness, that connection. And I think that's the one human emotion that we're all looking for. Whether it's in getting on in front of a camera or getting on stages or connecting one-to-one with your partner, or even connecting with your own body, taking off the hair, the mask, everything, and like, you know, take the makeup off, and you go outside and you're like, oh shit, forgot.
SPEAKER_00
But yeah, it's the most joyful thing though. I I'm because I'm the more and more layers I put down, the more it's just an unbelievable feeling to be myself.
SPEAKER_02
Isn't it?
SPEAKER_00
And this is what I want to help other women do, is because honestly, you're a unique individual. There is nobody else like you, and this celebrate that. Let people meet that, you know.
SPEAKER_01
Love it. Where can people find you? And then I'm gonna ask you one last thing. Best place to find me is on Instagram. Okay. Give us your Instagram handle, it will be in the show notes. Yeah, it's Lucy Debbie Hall. It's just my name. Excellent. And then people can reach out to you, send you a DM, and you'll explain how they can work with you. Yep. Now, to the women listening that think, shit, I've got some things. And we didn't even go into the deep trauma that you've uncovered and how you've moved through that because that has been so moving to witness.
SPEAKER_00
What are three things that you would say to them? I would say that their voice is needed in the world, especially the way it is right now. You're ready right now. Often women think, I need another certificate or I need something else. Where you are right now, you have something to offer. Honestly, you do. And just start, start to speak. Even if you make videos just for yourself, just start to do it, you know, and then find something that you like about yourself. Train your brain to see what you like. Love it.
SPEAKER_01
Such concrete and small little steps. And I completely agree with you. It's so easy to get more certifications and only if I have the excellent funnel, then I'll put my product out there. Or, you know, if I know this. Oh, but who's gonna ask me if I am this certified? It's like, no. And sometimes it's just like reaching out a hand saying, Hey, I can teach you this part.
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_01
Beautiful. Lucy, thank you so much. This was an absolute pleasure. Thank you, Juliet.
