In order to get the most out of
your efforts to become a good speaker and to get it with rapidly and dispatch,
three things are essential:
FIRST: START WITH A STRONG AND PERSISTANT DESIRE
This is of far more importance
than you probably realize. If an instructor could look into your mind and heart
now and ascertain the depth of your desires he could foretell, almost with
certainty, the swiftness of progress you will make. If your desire is pale and
flabby, your achievements will also take on that hue and consistency but, if
you go after your subject with persistence, and with the energy of bulldog
after a cat, nothing underneath the Milky Way will defeat you think of what it
may mean to you socially. It will increase your personal influence, of the
leadership it will give you. And it will give you leadership more rapidly than
almost any activity you can think of or imagine.
It will give you a sense of
strength, a feeling of power. It will appeal to your pride of persona; accomplishment.
It will set you off from and raise you above your fellow man. There is magic
init and a never to be forgotten thrill.
SECOND: KNOW THOROUGHLY WHAT YOU ARE GOING TO TALK
Unless a person has thought out
and planned his talk and knows what he is going to say, he can’t feel very
comfortable when he faces his audience. He is like the blind leading the blind
under such circumstances, your speaker ought to be self confidence, ought to
fell repentant, and ought to be ashamed of his negligence.
THIRD: ACT WITH CONFIDENCE
One of the most famous
psychologists that America has produced Professor William James wrote as
follows: “Action seems to follow feeling, but action and feeling go together,
and by regulating the action, which is under the more direct control of will,
we can indirectly regulate the feeling which is not.”
Draw yourself upto your full
height, look your audience straight in the eyes, and begin to talk as
confidently as if every one of them owed your money. Imagine that they do.
Imagine that they have assembled there to beg you for an extension of credit.
The psychological effect on you will be beneficial.
Do not nervously button and
unbutton your coat, play with your beads, or fumble with your hands. If you
must make nervous movements place your hands behind your back and twist your
fingers there where no one can see the performance or wiggle your toes.
As a general rule it is bad for a
speaker to hide behind furniture, but it may give you a little courage. Soon
you will be master of occasion and master of yourself.
