Confidence in Public Speaking
The one thing needful in the development of self-confidence in public speaking is practice. In all first efforts, whether it be to swim, write, skate, or dance, we have crudeness, uncertainty, and limitations. The beginner in public speaking is on unfamiliar ground, and he can not help being self-conscious. This is a necessary part of his development. There can be no proper freedom in what he is saying so long as he has to think of how he is saying it. His first efforts should, for this reason, be simple. A few ideas, plainly spoken, are all he need here attempt. After he has gained some facility and self-reliance, he may, like the swimmer, venture into deeper water.
Let us assume that the reader of these pages is afflicted with an extreme form of fear and diffidence in attempting even this simple first effort. He may belong to that class described as “trembling at the knees,” or “glued to the chair,” when invited to address an audience. In short, what is a man to do if he can not bring himself to the point of facing an audience at all?
In such case he must begin by declaiming his speeches in the privacy of his room. He must become accustomed to “hearing himself talk.” These speeches may be his own, or selected models of others, but they are to be rendered aloud, while standing before a looking-glass, with suitable voice and gesture. He may imagine an audience before him, and speak as directly and earnestly as he would were they actually present. Next, he may invite a member of his family, or a friend, to listen to him. Gradually but surely he will find himself gaining in assurance, and at the proper time he will be ready for his “maiden effort” in public. No matter how slow the process may be, the ultimate results are certain.
Another excellent preparation for self-confidence in speaking is that of telling stories. We need hardly remind the reader that these stories should be as new as possible, have good points, and be told in an interesting manner. The speaker must concentrate his mind upon the story and really relish telling it, so that he will be sharing a pleasure with others. Here again he may begin with the members of his own family, who will be lenient with him if these first efforts are not wholly effective. Story-telling is not a difficult art, but consists chiefly of two things: Getting a good fund of stories, and telling them without self-consciousness.
A few short recitations, thoroughly memorized, may also be used as a means of accustoming the student to facing an audience. It may here be repeated that a frequent cause of timidity is a lack of proper knowledge of the subject. An audience becomes severely critical when a speaker appears not to have an adequate grasp of the facts. They will overlook his diffidence, setting it down to modesty, but they will not overlook palpable weakness and uncertainty in the subject-matter. A man who has the facts may readily be forgiven for lack of ability in presenting them, but one who stands to speak before others without proper knowledge of his subject is justly regarded as a pretender.
To become thoroughly self-confident a man should believe in his own ideas, live them, and advocate them with earnestness and conviction. He will be steadied by the consciousness of being in the right. All of which means that every man should spare no pains to ascertain the facts bearing upon his subject before attempting to give them to others. Getting the facts is the very foundation of self-confidence in speaking. We all know of men who boldly proclaim ideas of which they really are not certain, and then because of a slight contradiction suffer instant defeat and humiliation.
Next to having a solid foundation of facts, the speaker should know how to present them interestingly and effectively. He can not hope to do this without developing his powers of expression. A man, for example, who has no control of the pitch of his voice, but permits his earnestness to carry him into a high key or unduly loud tone, will not convince intelligent men as he should. Indistinctness of enunciation, a common fault with timid speakers, will tell seriously against him, since men grow inattentive if obliged long to strain themselves to hear. Un- gracefulness and violence of gesture will detract from the impression made by the speaker. In fact, any shortcoming in delivery, however slight, will have its share in producing an adverse effect.
Sometimes this nervousness in a public speaker, even in the case of experienced men, is due to over-anxiety. He wishes his speech to make a good impression, or his cause to succeed, or a sense of personal responsibility oppresses him. All these seem legitimate in themselves, but a sensible man should know that undue anxiety will possibly defeat the very purpose he has in view. When a man is over-anxious he is not at his best nor can he be. He lacks freedom and flexibility, and his real self is for the time in subjection. His mind is divided between his subject and the impression he is making, self- consciousness is inevitable, and his fear silently but surely communicates itself to the audience.
A slight nervousness at the beginning of a speech may act in favor of a speaker by enlisting the sympathy and good-will of his hearers, but he must be able to rise above this feeling as he enters into his subject, else he will fail to carry conviction. When Gladstone was asked if he was ever nervous in public speaking he said, “In opening a subject, often; in reply, never.” The assumption is that once a speaker is well started, he no longer thinks of himself, but pours into his delivery all the power, intensity, and courage that his subject demands.
The nervousness of many men in addressing an audience is due to lack of proper elocutionary training. They have no knowledge of the speaking voice and its use, no facility of musical expression, and no idea of what to do with their hands and arms. They do not come to realize the importance of this training until they have actually tested themselves before an audience. Then, perhaps, it dawns upon them that the art of speaking, like any other art, must be developed through study and practice.
A writer says, “My subject is not elocution, or emphasis, or dramatic reading, or gesticulation, but public speaking.'’ He forgets that he can not properly consider one without the other. The public speaker is deeply concerned with all the elements of elocution–of inflection, emphasis, pausing–and he can not be a good speaker if he disregard any one of these. In this study there must, of course, be taste and judgment. A man’s elocution, although important, is not to be prominent.
Proper expression will not attract attention to itself. The purpose of the study of elocution is ultimately so to free the speaker’s mind that he can safely abandon himself to spontaneous expression. This knowledge of technique is an essential part of all art. The painter, musician, sculptor, architect, writer, no less than the orator, must at first be conscious of the principles that underlie his work, since it is this knowledge that finally gives him perfect freedom.
A large working vocabulary is a valuable aid to self-confidence. The speaker is not hampered by lack of the right word, nor is he embarrassed by poverty of language. Should his memory fail regarding one set of words, he promptly brings forward others to take their places. One of the best ways to amass a fund of such words is to read aloud daily two or more pages from some master stylist, and carefully note his use of language. Beading aloud gives the additional advantage of hearing the words, and by fitting them to the mouth imparts to the organs of articulation both familiarity and flexibility.
The voice receives much of its quality from the lips, tongue, palate and throat. If these are held rigidly, the voice will be of like character. In very earnest argumentation the speaker should be cautious about contracting the muscles of the mouth and throat. This is the time to be particularly careful to give the vocal apparatus its greatest possible freedom, and to keep the key of the voice low. The speaker may be intense, but not loud; he may enforce, but not threaten; and, above all, his voice should accompany, not lead, his argument.
There are times when a speaker must express himself with unusual feeling. The power of the mind and the earnestness of the speaker will project themselves into his eyes, mouth, voice, gesture, perhaps into a single finger, and this passion made so manifest will the more likely become aroused in the hearer. But in whatever manner his subject may require him to speak, he must not violate elocutionary canons, but do all with becoming grace and skill. Cicero’s advice to the student may be followed to advantage:
“The qualities that attract favor to the orator are a soft tone of voice, a countenance expressive of modesty, a mild manner of speaking; so that if he attacks any one with severity, he may be seen to do so unwillingly and from compulsion. It is of peculiar advantage that indications of good nature, of liberality, of gentleness, of piety, of grateful feelings, free from selfishness and avarice, should appear in him; and everything that characterizes men of probity and humility, not acrimonious, nor pertinacious, nor litigious, nor harsh, very much conciliates benevolence, and alienates the affections from those in whom such qualities are not apparent.
The contrary qualities to these, therefore, are to be imputed to your opponents. This mode of address is extremely excellent in those causes in which the mind of the judge can not well be inflamed by ardent and vehement incitation; for energetic oratory is not always desirable, but often smooth, submissive, gentle language, which gains much favor for the defendants, a term by which I designate not only such as are accused, but all persons about whose affairs there is any litigation; for in that sense people formerly used the word.”
It can not be too often repeated that the style of one’s every-day conversation will largely determine what his public speaking will be. Here a speaker should form his best habits both of thought and expression. He should speak in the style he would employ when he speaks in public. He can state his arguments as clearly and precisely to one as he would to five hundred. It is true that, for the larger occasion, he must have larger vocal effects, but this must all be done naturally and symmetrically. A man should cultivate an ear for his own voice. He must know what he is about at all times, and suffer no occasion to permit of slovenly speech. A man makes a series of speeches every day of his life, and these should be the very best preparation for public effort.
To be thoroughly self-confident, a man must hold himself superior to his surroundings–not in the sense of pride or self-exaltation, but in the better sense of being superior through knowledge. He must dominate by the force of his strong personality and his thorough grasp of his subject. He must have himself well in hand, and know definitely the object of his speaking. No one has a right to speak in public unless he has something worth while to say. If he has something of the kind to say, let him say it distinctly, deliberately, and earnestly.
Deliberateness of speech will save the beginner from many pitfalls. The trouble with a rapid speaker is that he does not take time to breathe properly, pronounce his words distinctly, or to frame his sentences in his mind before giving them expression. All within is a jumble and the outward style follows as a matter of course. The effect of a slow and easy style in speaking is illustrated in a story of Lord Palmerston, who was known always to take his time.
While he was addressing an audience, a member of the audience, as is the custom in England, interrupted him, asking if he would give a plain answer to a plain question. When asked what the question was, the man said, “Will you vote for such-and-such measure of reform!” Lord Palmerston very slowly answered, “I will”–then. paused long, while some of the audience cheered, and added, “not,” while others cheered, and then he said, “tell you!” whereupon the whole audience broke forth into hearty and vociferous applause. Haste is not only waste, but means inferiority.
A man can not hope to be self-possessed in public speaking unless he is deliberate. A reasonably slow style of speaking gives increased weight to one’s words, and gains credit for depth and profundity, not always, however, wholly deserved. But more than this, it gives the speaker time in which properly to formulate his sentences, to observe their effect upon the audience, and to express exactly what he wishes to say. A rapid speaker is forever saying the wrong thing, or something he did not intend, or running off into dreary discursiveness.
A deliberate speaker is likely to be more careful and accurate, his words more particularly rounded out into clearness and fullness, and his whole style more emphatic and energetic. He must not drawl, nor give the impression of tardiness, since these, too, are faults to be avoided. The deliberateness of which we speak simply means that he be self-possessed, sincere, and deeply solicitous that everyone should understand him. What has been said must not be confounded with a monotonous delivery. Nothing is more uninteresting than to listen to an unvaried tone of voice, however good the speaker’s ideas may be. We are recommending energetic and expressive deliberateness, not drawling monotony or hesitation.
THE FOOT-PATH TO PEACE
To be glad of life because it gives you the chance to love and to work and to play and to look up at the stars; to be satisfied with your possessions but not contented with yourself until you have made the best of them; to despise nothing in the world except falsehood and meanness, and to fear nothing except cowardice; to be governed by your admirations rather than by your disgust; to covet nothing that is your neighbor’s except his kindness of heart and gentleness of manners; to think seldom of your enemies, often of your friends, and every day of Christ; and to spend as much time as you can, with body and with spirit, in God’s out-of-doors, these are little guide-posts on the foot-path to peace.
Henry Van Dyke.
*Reprinted from The Outlook. Copyright, 1900, by the Outlook Company. Permission of Henry van Dyke.