https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dGQRFPJQg3ajg3THhxejR1NE0/edit
In response to what you read, write a 200-300 word reflection (1-2 pages double-spaced) on the reading answering these key questions:
- What was the main idea of the reading?
- What did you find to be the best advice for new public speakers?
- What was a key quote from the reading and why did you choose this quote?
After reading chapter one of Confessions of a Public Speaker I determined that the main idea of the reading was about the mistakes we make that we always seem to make a big deal about, whether it is in our minds, or verbally. However in real life many people never even notice we made the mistake to begin with, because like the writer said "they're mistakes we commonly ignore because we're incredibly forgiving of spoken language." Additionally, say for example you are giving a speech, no one who you are giving that speech to knows exactly how you intended it to go, so if a few parts are changed or you forget to bring up a point many times the mistake will go unnoticed to the audience but become a huge catastrophe in your mind. So with this in mind I think that best advice that I found for new public speakers like myself would be to make sure that you plan ways to make your points relative to the audience, as well as think clearly about the point or points you are going to be bringing up ahead of time, and to have an interesting opinion about these specific points. This is essentially important advice for new public speakers because our goal is to keep the audience entertained and to refrain from noticing our mistakes and this is one of the best ways to go about this. Lastly, one key quote I took from this reading was "…stop being perfect because obsessing about perfection stops you from growing. You stop taking chances, which means you stop learning. I don't want to be perfect. I want to be useful…" I chose this specific quote because it is extremely relatable. I have learned from previous experience that the more I try to be perfect at everything I do, the less likely I am to take risks during a presentation. I am also less likely to take the mistakes I made and turn them into a learning experience or something positive if I expected everything ahead of time to turn out perfectly.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading this article, it is propelling to learn from the mind inside a public speaker/writer. The biggest idea that I gathered from reading this piece was public speaking is a fear brought on to oneself and it all starts with the mindset. We all fear being embarrassed or making mistakes while speaking in public. However, once we understand we all are not perfect and make mistakes and learn how to cope with that, we can turn ourselves into better, confident, comfortable “normal” speaker. The article points out that even the best public speakers of all time such as Martin Luther King Jr., Malcom X, and Winston Churchill have all made mistakes in their speeches but it doesn’t denote their messages.
ReplyDeleteThe best advice for new public speakers that I found after reading this article is to understand that mistakes are going to happen when you speak and before we even take the stage to talk, mistakes have already been made. The audience is not looking to see you fail, make a mistake, or see you struggle. The audience wants to you succeed and learn from your information. The author even mentions of past experiences such as sitting in a class in high school or in a row at an auditorium, they all aren’t judging you because they all want it to end nor care as much as people think.
The key quote that I took away was “If you’d like to be good at something, the first thing to go out the window is the notion of perfection.” I choose this quote because it shows not everyone is going to be perfect in what they do and it needs to be understood that mistakes are going to happen and we learn that it is fine to make mistakes and learn from it.
After reading chapter one of Confessions of a Public Speaker, I realized that the main idea was about how we dwell on the things that went wrong when we speak. Burken also discusses how he usually makes light of the situation when something that was not planned occurs. When we make an embarrassing mistake, like tripping in front of a crowd while speaking, it makes the speech more memorable and grabs the audience’s attention. Burken says that whatever is said in the next couple of minutes after something embarrassing happens is what the audience will take away from the speech. It is important to use an embarrassing moment as an advantage while public speaking.
ReplyDeleteThe best advice Burken gave for new public speakers was to not imagine everyone in the room naked. Contrary to popular belief, imagining everyone in the room naked makes the situation more complicated. If you start to imagine everyone in the audience naked, you end up focusing more on that unpleasant image rather than your speech. This can cause you to possibly stumble over your words or forget your main focus.
The key quote from this reading was, “The secret to coping with these [embarrassing] events is to realize everyone forgets about them after they happen—except for one person: me. No one else really cares that much.” It is important not to dwell on mistakes that were made or presentations that did not go as planned. The audience does not judge as much as most people think because they are just waiting for the presentation to be over. This idea is important because when we public speak, we judge ourselves too harshly and worry about everything that went wrong and what the audience thought of us. In reality, most of the time the audience will not realize the mistakes you made.
The main point of this reading is to inform the reader that no one is perfect, especially when it comes to public speaking. In other words, we all make mistakes and should learn to accept those mistakes and continue on with our lives; or in this case our speech. For example, it was stated that all of us, in one way or another, makes a mistake on every tenth word that comes out of our mouths; even prominent figures in history have had speech impediments of one kind or another: Lincoln had a high-pitched voice, Cicero hyperventilated, and Winston Churchill stuttered. A key quote that really captured me was “Mistakes will happen- what matters more is how you frame your mistakes”. This is basically saying that how you respond to your mistakes is what really matters, as compared to making the mistakes in the first place. For instance, maybe you trip or stumble when you walk onto the stage or platform that you will be speaking from. Rather than turn flush red and become self conscious, you could laugh it off and maybe announce to the audience that your over excitement gets the better of you sometimes. The best advice that he offers has to be to that embarrassing moments can actually benefit your speech as a whole. For example, many people become bored and are un-passionate when it comes to taking up the role of an active audience member. An embarrassing moment, a trip or stutter, can draw them back to you; especially if you are able to keep your cool and laugh it off.
ReplyDeleteThe main idea of this reading is to open the eyes of the reader to some of the common misconceptions about public speaking. One of the major misconceptions he talked about is making mistakes. He stressed that making a mistake while speaking in front of an audience may seem like a disaster and a disappointment to the speaker, however, to the audience it is really not a big deal. The audience may not even notice the mistake or will empathize with the speaker because they understand the difficulties of performing in front of an audience and that no one is perfect and mistake are inevitable.
ReplyDeleteI think the best advice from this reading is to be passionate about what you are talking about, engage the audience, and deliver a speech that will inform people on the topic being discussed. He stressed that it is okay for the written speech and the actual oral speech can have differences as long as the point of the speech reached the audience. He also stressed that not everyone is perfect and it is okay to make mistakes. I think one of the most common fears of public speaking is the fear of messing up and making a fool of yourself. However, he states it is okay to make mistakes and that how to react to these mistakes will determine how the audience reacts.
"Whatever mistakes and imperfections exists, they're larger in my head than in yours" is a key quote from this reading. This also stresses the fact that mistakes are inevitable and that no one is perfect. It also demonstrates how we are our worst critics. We may think one mistake ruined our whole speech and will be disappointed that despite practice and preparation we made a mistake. However, the audience may not even notice the mistake and realizes that we are humans and we are not perfect and we will make mistakes and it is okay to make mistakes. We cannot be afraid to make mistakes because they are inevitable but how we handle and react to these mistakes will determine how the audience reacts.
After reading the first chapter of Confessions of a Public Speaker, I noticed a theme centralized on mistakes. More specifically, that mistakes are unavoidable, no matter how hard we try to prepare, is the main idea. I could compare it to nursing and medicine, how something unexpected can happen at any time, and it is important to be as flexible as possible in order to deal with these situations graciously as they arise. When giving advice to new speakers, I find the tip on knowing how to respond to a mistake to be quite useful. To paraphrase a quote I heard in the past, life is 10% what happens to us and 90% how we react to it. If we can play off a mistake or find something humorous, the audience will as well, and life consequently goes on. I find "Avoid the mistake of trying to make no mistakes" to be a good quote to remember. I find this quote important because it is applicable to not only public speaking, but various pieces of the college experience. Mistakes simply cannot be avoided, no matter how we try to avoid them. It is important to practice and insure we understand whatever material we are presenting. However, we need to also understand that when we make a mistake, it is not the end of the world, as most people will not likely remember or even notice. Once we learn to manage our mistakes, we can increase our confidence as public speakers.
ReplyDeleteIn my opinion, the main idea of this reading is summarized in the quote: "It's often the case that the things speakers obsess about are the opposite of what the audience cares about." In other words, while the speaker is presenting, his/her mind is over exaggerating the errors that they make, but in reality no one in the audience bothers or cares to notice these errors. For example, one may be contemplating whether or not they are speaking to fast, stuttering, etc... This speaker should be aware that every speaker makes mistakes no matter how many presentations they have given or how many times they have practiced beforehand. I chose the key quote to be "They're mistakes we commonly ignore because we're incredibly forgiven of spoken language," because it shows how many mistakes and errors are not noticed or insignificant during presentations because it's made in everyday life in every language. Our brain tries to connect sentences together and care only for the meaning. According to the reading, the audience cares to be entertained. I think the best advice given to public speakers is to not rely on myths such as "picturing the audience naked" but instead rely on one's own public speaking experiences. In addition, public speakers should not only physically prepare but also mentally prepare before speeches.
ReplyDeleteIn the first chapter of Scott Berkun’s Confessions of a Public speaker he writes about mistakes. When speaking in public mistakes happen to everyone even the greatest speaker. He talks about a hypothetical scenario where he falls when presenting. This would attract more attention to him at that moment than for the majority of the presentation. He points out how most people at events are hoping for their speaker to end his or her presentation and that they do not care too much about what you are saying. Using the extra attention right after a mistake is what is important because people are more likely to remember what you said, this was his best advice in the chapter. He also goes on to say that making mistakes in your speech usually goes unnoticed, even famous speakers stuttered or had other speech issues. Berkun writes, “If you’d like to be good at something, the first thing to go out the window is the notion of perfection.” This quote from the chapter is very important, again nobody is perfect at anything. If you want to do something perfectly it can hold you back from making a leap and doing something great because you were too focused on not making a mistake. If you don’t make any mistakes you also will not learn as well or even anything at all in what you are doing.
ReplyDeleteBerkun’s Confessions of a Public Speaker tackled the commonly questioned fears and provided advice about public speaking. The main idea of this reading is you are your worst critique. Berkun discusses that focusing on the potential or perseverating negatively on a mistake is not what an audience cares about. By accepting mistakes will happen and realizing that when they do, your reaction to them will impact how your main point will get across. One of the best advices given in this reading was his question to the utilization of imaging the crowd to be naked and supported why it’s is not a good idea. For instance, Berkun challenged this familiar yet useless advice by identifying that not one public-speaking expert would recommend this thought. Additionally he feels imagining others naked complicates things and distracts you from focusing on the importance of the speech. Another key advice given was: “You stop taking chances, which means you stop learning. I don't want to be perfect. I want be useful, I want to be good, and I want to sound like myself. Trying to be perfect gets in the way of all three” (p.5). I selected this quote because it summarizes how I feel about several different aspects in life. I do not want to stop learning nor do I not want to teach people who are interested in topics I may have specialty in, now or in the future of my Occupational Therapist career. Relative to public speaking, if I am interested to present on a topic that promotes my profession and increases awareness of it’s importance to my profession and others, I do not want to sit back and wait for another professional to present the information because who knows how long that may be.
ReplyDelete1) The main idea of this reading was to advise the reader to not worry about being perfect but to be their authentic selves when speaking in public. The most important thing for you to have when speaking in public is an interesting opinion, the ability to think clearly about points and a plan to make those points relevant to the audience.
ReplyDelete2) The best advice for the new public speaker is to “avoid the mistake of trying to make no mistakes” because so many people including myself have stressed out about trying to be perfect when speaking in public. Often, when I speak out loud I mispronounce words beginning with the letters “Q” “Cu” and “F”. I find myself trying to focus on the correct pronunciation of those words so much that I forget about the point that I was trying to make. Thankfully, I have noticed that my brain will get back on track but other times it does not and then that is when the worry sets in and then I begin to think that I look like a fool. I will try to keep in mind that as long as my recovery from a mistake is good, the audience will see it the same way…………(hopefully).
3) “We all have a reserve tank of strength that helps us cope when things go wrong”. I have found this quote to be relevant to my personal life right now. Thus far, this has been my most stressful semester at school. I have a busy schedule with school, work, being the care giver to my mother and guardian of my brother. I have contemplated on taking a leave of absence from school or work or both to make sure that I am giving my mother the best care she could possibly have and my brother as much attention he needs but because my mother do not want me to put a hold on my life for her, I find a way to keep pressing on.
After reading this article about what it is really like being a public speaker, and what public speaking is really about, the part that stood out to me as the main idea of the article is that public speaking is not about perfection, not even slightly about perfection, and that trying for perfection is in fact one of the most common mistakes you can make. The best advice that I thought the author gave is that a good speech is almost entirely decided by what you have to say about the topic you are speaking on and the message that you are trying to convey to your audience, that if your topic is interesting and you can convey your point to the audience in a way that keeps them relatively engaged, then it was a good speech. “As superficial as public speaking can seem, history bears out that people with clear ideas and strong points are the ones we remember.” It doesn’t matter if you made a mistake like the example the author gave, such as missing several slides because of the remote, as long as the ideas you are trying to convey are well formed and delivered in an understandable way. I also liked the point that the author made that the delivery is almost irrelevant to the audience simply because they don’t care that much. And that when you realize this, it makes public speaking much easier because you are not afraid to make mistakes and can just go up there and say what you need to say.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading the first chapter of “Confessions of a Public Speaker,” I found the main idea to be that no one is perfect at public speaking, and that you are your worst critic when analyzing your public speaking performance. In reality, people find you more relatable when you make the occasional blunder in pronunciation or hesitation in your discussion. This actually works in your favor because when you are more relatable to your audience, they will be more receptive to you and the message that you are trying to deliver. In addition, most of the time nobody is even paying attention that closely, besides yourself; to realize that you have made mistakes, so don’t allow those mistakes to cloud your head for the rest of your speech. Furthermore, I found the most important piece of advice from the reading to be that being perfect in public speaking is boring, and that your audience will appreciate you more if you make mistakes. This is because nobody likes it when somebody sounds like they are so scripted to the point of being robotic. When you become inhuman to the audience, they lose their attention span faster and won’t comprehend the message you are delivering. This leads to the key quote of the reading, “If you’d like to be good at something, the first thing to go out the window is the notion of perfection.” Let’s face it, no matter how much you practice and rehearse, nobody is perfect, which is what makes us human. Instead, become comfortable with the fact that you are going to make mistakes. Once you overcome the idea that there is no such thing as perfection, you will become a better public speaker and lose the anxiety that comes with the fear of making mistakes.
ReplyDeleteThe main idea of Chapter 1, was trying to figure out how much of a speaking anxiety you have. There were four different groups, there was the very high speaking anxiety, high speaking anxiety, some speaking anxiety, and low speaking anxiety. The very high speaking anxiety group, was likely to be someone he becomes highly nervous about speaking in public and who tries to go great lengths to avoid public speaking. The high speaking anxiety group was likely to avoid many situations altogether and to suffer through some other ones. Public speaking was likely to cause a significant amount of discomfort to this group. The some speaking anxiety group, have some situations that are anxiety provoking to them, while they are most likely to feel more comfortable in other situations. The low speaking anxiety group, has some aspects of public speaking that can make them a little uncomfortable, but in general they are not too nervous about speaking. Another main idea was the Four Horseman of Anxiety. The four major components are biology, mood, behavior, and thinking. They play together to get the anxiety started, and then the anxiety can be off to the races.
ReplyDeleteThe best advice that I found for new public speakers was trying not to do the overcompensating behaviors to hide your nervousness. Overcompensating behaviors occur when we try to minimize the scary aspects of the situation, try to control the anxiety, or try to hide our fear from others. In reality, these behaviors maintain or increase the distress we feel about talking to or in front of people.
A key quote from this chapter would be, “As you learn how to change you thought patterns, practice, polish, and confidence, these negative feelings will subside.” I chose this quote because I think it is so true. With more and more practice public speaking will get easier. And once it becomes easier to you, you will become more confident.
The main idea of the reading was that you are your own worst critic. The author explains how he was the only one who noticed his errors in his 10 minute speech and pointed out that throughout the day we commonly make mistakes in speech. He explained that some of the greatest speakers (Abraham Lincoln, for example) had flaws in the way they delivered speeches. However, because they had a legitimate message behind their speech and the topic was one of interest, no one seemed to notice or if they did notice they didn't care. I think the author's best advice is to just expect that your speech will not be perfect and you will make mistakes. Also it is important to realize that you are more than likely the only person who will notice these mistakes. The audience has never heard this speech before so they don't have a template to compare it to. The audience doesn't know how you planned to the deliver the speech so any lapse in your plan goes unnoticed. You have to simply forgive yourself as we are our own worst critics and it's very true. Also, the author explained how the majority of the time the audience really isn't listening to you if it's just a speech about a random topic. But if a noticeable mistake does occur and grasps the audience's attention, then you can use that to your advantage as the audience feels like they're involved or almost part of the story.
ReplyDeleteMy favorite quote from this article is "avoid the mistake of trying to make no mistakes". Like most things in life we have to accept that they will not be perfect. We have to forgive ourselves and just move on and not try to deliver a perfect speech. Just as the author stated there is usually more than one version of the speech that is delivered. It is a legitimate waste of time to obsess over delivering a perfect speech because we as humans are imperfect and mistakes happen. You just have to accept them and go with it. Just as no one noticed the speaker skipping over a slide. You just have to improvise and roll with your mistakes at times.