There are many great tips for how to refine public speaking talents using appropriate visual aids and gestures to add impact to your subject matter. It takes practice, talent, conscious effort and a pretty thick skin to deliver a good speech. One of the most significant advances anyone can make in refining their speaking skills is to learn the art of tongue control. Even professionals sometimes struggle when it comes to managing what comes out of their mouth when they are struggling for something meaningful to say. Uttering useless sounds to cover uncomfortable moments is one of the worst habits anyone can acquire when it comes to expressing themselves. These noises take the form of words like uh or um or other similar drawn out vocal stammers. Some speakers use you know as a brain pause sequence to buy time for the next sentence. Most people may not notice these stumbling foibles of a nervous speaker until they become extreme, but whether your audience pays any attention to using these sounds or not, they definitely detract from the focus of your intent. Believe it or not, the most effective alternative to making noises like these is a pause. It is better to take a moment of silence to allow your brain to catch up with your mouth than it is to stand there and say you know four or five times before continuing. I can remember listening to one of my school teachers using uh so often in their presentation, we started making a game of counting how many times the person said it in a half hour. We stopped counting after fifty. Allowing your mind to stay in synchronization with your mouth is the next best thing to using inflection, and effective gestures. Your credibility will be improved in both public speaking and regular conversation if you work consciously to eliminate the static from your delivery. Learning to keep silent when you have nothing to say is difficult to learn at first. You may even feel uncomfortable with pausing for a moment, but silence can become a powerful tool to work in your favor, because it can also be attention getting. Pausing can wake an audience up from their own thoughts, and tune them back toward paying attention to what they are not hearing. In negotiations, if you do not respond immediately when answering questions, the people you are talking with might begin to feel the pressure of silence. If you cannot think of anything else to say other than uh, try adopting some trigger phrases you can use for those awkward moments. You can say things like, Thats interesting. I think I am going to have to think about that before I can answer your question. As a general rule, it is always better to say nothing than it is to blurt out a meaningless response. |
