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Q&A How to "Show" and not "Tell" for nervousness?

I was told to ask this question here. There’s a saying in writing to “show; don’t tell”. For example instead of saying: “She was angry”, you would write: “Steam started coming out of her ears”, or:...

2 answers  ·  posted 7y ago by iiRosie1‭  ·  last activity 5y ago by System‭

#3: Attribution notice added by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-08T07:32:10Z (almost 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/q/32043
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision by user avatar iiRosie1‭ · 2019-12-08T07:32:10Z (almost 5 years ago)
I was told to ask this question here. There’s a saying in writing to [“show; don’t tell”](https://thewritepractice.com/show-dont-tell/). For example instead of saying: “She was angry”, you would write: “Steam started coming out of her ears”, or: “Her fists slowly clenched up”. So it’s being more specific when showing emotions, actions etc. happening.

I am looking for a “showing” phrase for being nervous. The only one I could think of was: “Her heart was pounding heavily.”

#1: Imported from external source by user avatar System‭ · 2017-12-17T17:03:48Z (almost 7 years ago)
Original score: 0