Learn Hardcore Russian: Иногда мне трудно решаться говорить по-русски перед публикой. - Sometimes it is hard for me to dare to speak Russian in front of an audience.

Formally, трудно is a short neuter form of the adjective трудный (“difficult”), but in modern Russian it behaves very much like an adverbial predicate – a word used to say “it is hard / it is difficult”.

It appears in impersonal sentences:

Трудно решаться говорить по-русски. – It is hard to bring oneself to speak Russian.
Мне трудно вставать рано. – It is hard for me to get up early.

So you can think of it as the Russian equivalent of English “it’s hard”, used with infinitives and often with a dative experiencer (мне, ему, ей, etc.).

Why do we need решаться at all? Could we just say:
Иногда мне трудно говорить по-русски перед публикой?

Yes, you can say:

Иногда мне трудно говорить по-русски перед публикой.

This is perfectly correct and means:
“Sometimes it’s hard for me to speak Russian in front of an audience.”

Adding решаться changes the nuance:

говорить по-русски – to speak Russian (the act itself is hard).
решаться говорить по-русски – to bring oneself / dare / make up one’s mind to speak Russian.

So:

Иногда мне трудно говорить по-русски перед публикой.
→ The actual process of speaking Russian in public is hard (maybe lack of vocabulary, grammar problems, etc.).
Иногда мне трудно решаться говорить по-русски перед публикой.
→ The psychological step of starting to speak Russian in public is hard (shyness, fear, embarrassment).

The original sentence emphasizes the inner hesitation more than the linguistic difficulty.

What does the reflexive ending -ся in решаться mean here? How is решаться different from решать?

The suffix -ся (or -сь) makes a verb reflexive and often changes its meaning.

решать (non‑reflexive) usually means:
- to decide something (решать проблему – to solve a problem,
  решать, куда поехать – to decide where to go),
- to solve (a problem, a task).
решаться (reflexive) in the pattern решаться + infinitive means:
- to dare to,
- to bring oneself to,
- to pluck up the courage to.

For example:

Я долго не решался заговорить с ней.
I couldn’t bring myself to start talking to her for a long time.

So решаться говорить ≈ to dare / to bring oneself to speak.

You cannot simply remove -ся here.
Мне трудно решать говорить по-русски is wrong and doesn’t mean what you want.

What’s the difference between решаться and решиться? Could we say
Иногда мне трудно решиться говорить по-русски перед публикой?

решаться / решиться is an imperfective / perfective pair.

решаться (imperfective):
- focuses on the process / repeated situation,
- “to be (trying to) dare”, “to generally have trouble daring”.
решиться (perfective):
- focuses on the moment of finally deciding/daring,
- “to finally dare / to make up one’s mind (once)”.

In your sentence:

Иногда мне трудно решаться говорить по-русски перед публикой.
→ Now and then, I have difficulty (in general) bringing myself to speak Russian in public (repeated, habitual problem).
Иногда мне трудно решиться говорить по-русски перед публикой.
→ Sometimes it’s hard for me to finally decide to speak Russian in public (focus on each act of decision).

Both versions are grammatically correct.
Imperfective sounds more like a general ongoing difficulty, while perfective highlights the moment of “OK, I’ll do it” for each occasion.

Why is it говорить, not сказать or another perfective verb?

говорить is imperfective and usually refers to:

a process of speaking,
speaking in general, as an ability or habit.

сказать is perfective and normally refers to:

saying something once, a single speech act.

In combinations like говорить по-русски, Russian almost always uses the imperfective:

Я плохо говорю по-русски. – I don’t speak Russian well.
Ему трудно говорить по-английски. – It’s hard for him to speak English.

Using сказать here would shift the meaning to “to say (something) in Russian (once)”, which doesn’t fit the idea of general fear of speaking in public.

So говорить is the natural choice in this context.

What is по-русски, and why is it written with a hyphen? Could I say на русском instead?

по-русски is an adverb meaning “in Russian / in the Russian way”.

Form & spelling

It’s formed from the adjective русский:

по-
- adjective/adverb-like form → adverb
  - по-русски – in Russian
  - по-английски – in English
  - по-новому – in a new way

These по- adverbs are normally written with a hyphen: по-русски, по-старому, по-другому.

Use with “to speak”

Both of these are correct:

говорить по-русски
говорить на русском (языке)

Difference in nuance is small:

говорить по-русски – very common, compact; emphasizes how you speak.
говорить на русском языке – a bit more explicit/formal; literally “to speak in the Russian language”.

In your sentence, you can safely use either:

Иногда мне трудно решаться говорить по-русски перед публикой.
Иногда мне трудно решаться говорить на русском перед публикой.

The first is more idiomatic in casual speech.

Why is it перед публикой and why is публикой in this form?

The preposition перед (“in front of / before”) usually takes the instrumental case when it means in front of / before (someone/something), both literally and figuratively:

перед домом – in front of the house
перед классом – in front of the class
перед публикой – in front of the audience / in public

публика (audience) has instrumental singular публикой:

Nom. sg.: публика
Inst. sg.: публикой

So перед публикой literally means “before / in front of the audience”.

You could also say:

перед людьми – in front of people
перед аудиторией – in front of the audience (more formal/academic context).

Is the word order fixed? Can I say
Мне иногда трудно решаться говорить по-русски перед публикой
or
Иногда трудно мне решаться говорить по-русски перед публикой?

Russian word order is fairly flexible, but some orders sound more natural.

The most neutral possibilities here:

Иногда мне трудно решаться говорить по-русски перед публикой.
Мне иногда трудно решаться говорить по-русски перед публикой.

Both are good and common.
In (1) you first set the time frame (Иногда), then say for whom it’s hard.
In (2) you start with the person (Мне), then mention that this sometimes happens.

The version:

Иногда трудно мне решаться говорить по-русски перед публикой.

is grammatically possible, but it sounds a bit marked or poetic; putting мне after трудно gives it extra emphasis (like “It is sometimes hard for me, in particular, to…”). In normal spoken Russian, people would usually put мне right after иногда or at the beginning.

So, preferred for everyday use:

Мне иногда трудно…
Иногда мне трудно…

Could the sentence be made more natural by slightly changing the verbs, for example:
Иногда мне трудно решиться заговорить по-русски перед публикой?

Yes, this version is very natural and idiomatic:

Иногда мне трудно решиться заговорить по-русски перед публикой.

Here:

решиться (perfective) – to finally decide, to dare once,
заговорить (perfective) – to start talking / to begin to speak.

This combination focuses strongly on the moment of starting to speak:

Sometimes it’s hard for me to bring myself to start speaking Russian in front of an audience.

Nuances:

Original: трудно решаться говорить – hard in general to bring oneself to speak (process, habit).
New: трудно решиться заговорить – hard at that key moment to finally decide to start talking.

Both are correct; the second sounds very idiomatic when you want to emphasize initial shyness / first words in public.