Thoughts on Public Speaking

I was recently talking with someone and the conversation turned to public speaking. The entity of this particular conversation isn’t so important, so much as it allows me to launch into my real purpose for blogging today.

Public speaking is a widely feared activity. There are many would rather do just about anything to get out of standing in front of a crowd of people, be they familiar or strangers, and speak. It is both a persistent and staggeringly paralyzing fear.

I’m sure there is some psychology-based reason for this fear, but quite frankly I am not hosting a lecture on psychology here and so I’ll spare you that conversation.

Moving right along, I don’t fall into the category of people that fear speaking in public. While I do become obscenely terrified in the presence of spiders, I don’t mind getting up in front of a crowd of people. Give me a room full of people as opposed to one itty-bitty spider any day.

Regardless of any of the above ponderings, my true point in writing this evening is that the conversation I originally mentioned has lead to my recalling an essay that I wrote, and later spoke about, my senior year of high school. The essay was written as a creative piece for my Advanced Placement English class, presenting it happened purely by chance.

We were scheduled to have a Senior Academic Awards night, and at the last minute, quite literally a couple of day’s prior, they decided that they wanted to have a student speaker at the event. Naturally they turned to the AP English class. When they pitched the opportunity no one immediately jumped at the chance, which now that I think about it is a bit strange, even stranger though was that I found myself raising my hand and volunteering to speak at the event in a room full of fellow seniors, their parents, and several staff members.

At any rate, this is the piece that I ended up sharing with those at the event:

The following is based on this prompt: What is your favorite word and why?

“Spoken Definition”

Words are exceptionally powerful. While we have all heard some variation of the saying “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me”, I can guarantee that no matter how many times you repeat it, the saying will never come any closer to the truth. In fact, the things that we say are often more powerful and, depending on the situation, have the capability to do more damage or good than our actions. This is why when speaking we must choose our words carefully; it is also one of the reasons why choice is my favorite word.

Choice is important to me because the ability to choose allows me to control certain aspects of my life, whether it is as simple as what shirt I wear in the morning or something larger, such as my future career. After all, it is the choices that we make that not only determine where we end up, but more importantly define who we are. I rely heavily on my ability to make my own choices in order to establish who I am and to allow myself the opportunity to become the person that I want to be.

The importance of choice also comes into play when I am speaking with other people or trying to express myself in some way. If my words are ill chosen, then the message I am trying to convey is more susceptible to being misconstrued or lost completely. Choice becomes increasingly important when people’s ability to understand where I am coming from and what I am talking about is left hanging in the balance.

Choice is my favorite word because it embodies the idea that I am in control of the direction of my life it is a powerful word that, to me, signifies that my choices define who I am, despite the opinions of others. In another respect, words are powerful and they should be chosen carefully. Word choice, and good choices in general, become increasingly important when I am attempting to convey a particular message. Ultimately, choice is my favorite word, because the choice’s that I make are the largest reflection of who I am, and who I one day wish to become.

What about you? How do you feel about public speaking? Is there a particular word that resonates with you?

BTW

If you have, by chance, made it this far, I’d like to let you know that this year’s blogging goal is to blog once a month. I fully intend to hold up to this goal better than I did last years. Please feel free to keep me accountable.

Week 40: Lost For Words, Just Trust Me

Last night I finished reading Maureen Johnson's latest book, "The Name of the Star" which is the first book in her new series "Shades of London". It's such a good book, and I'm SO excited for future books in the series.

I have just spent a solid ten minutes trying to find the proper words to explain just how good this book is, and quite frankly I've found that in that department I am a little lost for words, so until I figure out how to effectively sell you on the series you'll just have to trust me, the books awesome and you need to check it out!

Aside from that I'm on disc 2 of the fourth season of 'How I Met Your Mother' and LOVIN' it. I wish I had gotten into this show when it originally aired because it is hilarious.


At any rate my day has been uneventful but productive and relaxing, and that's ok because you need those kind of days every once and a while.

I'll talk to you soon.

A Change in Plans

The plans that God has for us don’t always match up with those that we had for ourselves. Had you asked me a year ago where I expected to be today, that answer would be quite different from my present reality. This time a year ago I had just gotten into Michigan State University. I had transferred there from Washtenaw Community College with the intent to pursue a Bachelor’s degree in Journalism.

I wanted to be a writer. It was a plan that made a lot of sense. After all, MSU has a wonderful J-school. But the more I consider that career choice, the more I feel that it was solely my plan and not necessarily God’s plan. Yes, I was pursuing Journalism with the intention to help people, but how far can words go in helping people?

I have always believed that words carry a lot of power, and I continue to believe that. But I don’t feel that my true passions lie in putting words down on paper like I may have once thought. While I enjoy writing, and I could probably be suitably happy writing for the rest of my life, I don’t think that it would ultimately satisfy my passion for helping people.

I feel that being an EMT allows me to be instrumental in helping those that are in crisis.

I realize that writer and EMT are drastically different career paths, but… it’s where I feel like I need to be. It’s where I feel called to be. I have a broad idea of what my future has in store for me, but I think that’s all we can have. A broad idea.

It’s best to live in the present, be cognizant of the role the past has played and to be open to what the future has in store. At the present this is where I am. I am grateful for the experiences that now reside in my past, and I am remaining open to what each new day has to offer me.

Sometimes Words Fail

It was nearly four in the morning before I even considered going to sleep, therefore I feel that can honestly say that writing this blog entry has been on my mind all day. I considering going ahead and writing it earlier, and then didn't. There was no particular reasoning behind this decision. So, at around three in the morning rather than blog, or you know sleep, I opted to attempt to work on my novel.

I hate to mention my novel too often because generally when you mention such a thing people become curious and curiosity leads them to asking, "Oh yeah? What's it about?" Yeah, see I don't quite have an answer to that yet. I mean, OK sure I'm the one writing it so presumably I should know what it's about. Notice I say presumably...

At any rate my early morning hours were spent attempting to fill a blank screen with words that would adequately describe the scene that I could so clearly see in my mind. It was proving difficult this morning and I haven't since sought to work through whatever mess I created. Sometimes words fail us, they hide just beyond our grasp even when we know with absolute certainty what we mean to say we cannot find the words to express our sentiment.

Essentially what I am saying here is that my early morning writing session was an exercise in futility because no matter how hard I fought with myself to come up with the proper words to depict the scene that was so vivid to me, those words just wouldn't present themselves.

As far as what my novel is about, the only potential answer I have come up with so far is that it is about our struggles with our sense self in dealing with the world that surrounds us, it is about coming to terms in various senses of the word. I know this is vague, and therefore fairly lame but it's all that I've got. Anyway, don't expect too much to come of this novel in the too near future since I've been cultivating the idea since at least my sophomore year of high school.

Yeah, exactly.

A Day of Leisure

My day hasn't actually been much to blog about. I am nearly finished reading the book that I began this morning. It goes without saying that I'm loving it. It will be finished before I go to sleep tonight.

The bulk of my day has been devoted to this book, and surfing my usual haunts on the Internet. For a while earlier my niece wandered in and commandeered my computer. We blasted Fall Out Boy as I sat here reading and she surfed around her myspace.

Surprisingly Darcy has been my near constant companion. I think she hung around me largely for my air conditioning and the can of food that I had dished out for her. She briefly abandoned me when she deemed hunting down an errant fly to be more interesting. Alas, such is life it seems.

There was also the moment in which I finally recalled the answer to a question that had been posed to me two days ago. I went and got ice cream with my friend and at some point in the conversation used the work, uncouth. First she asked me what that meant and then scolded me for using words that she wasn't sure what the meaning was. Now of course, in that moment while I could visualize what I was saying I could not actually think of any word that would convey that meaning aside from the one that I had used. Randomly today I thought up a few and promptly texted my friend. That is just the way my brain tends to work.

Perhaps the highlight of my day was the trip to walmart about a half an hour ago. Darcy was out of dry food, and she's been sending scathing looks my way all day. I imagine she will be much appeased now that she is in possession of food.