gift of gab

aidanki

hi all,

small bit of advise needed, is there any therapist in the country that is able to help with developing the gift of the gab, as im struggling to overcome a natual shyness, coupled with too many years of giving into it

Im 33 and sick of being told Im v quite, the gift of the gab doesn't come naturally to me, hence I could do with the help

based in limerick btw, but could travel if necessary

my mind just goes blank when im put in social situations

ancapailldorcha

aidanki wrote: »

hi all,

small bit of advise needed, is there any therapist in the country that is able to help with developing the gift of the gab, as im struggling to overcome a natual shyness, coupled with too many years of giving into it

Im 33 and sick of being told Im v quite, the gift of the gab doesn't come naturally to me, hence I could do with the help

based in limerick btw, but could travel if necessary

my mind just goes blank when im put in social situations

Could you speak to your GP about this and get a recommendation?

Some people are naturally shy and quiet. It may be social anxiety though a medical professional is the best person to speak to.

I am sure any therapist will help you with shyness issues and the like. Or any feelings of self worth issues that might be feeding that shyness. I am not aware of any myself that specifically deal with communication.

As I alluded to in the other thread - but I could expand upon a little here if you think it would help - the first step in this alleged "gift of the gab" for many is simply to _have_ something interesting to talk about. It starts within yourself to ensure you fill yourself with events - knowledge - pursuits - and other things that are engaging to talk about for you - and hence could be engaging to other people to listen to.

There is of course natural comedians who can make observations about the world and people - that gives them an edge in conversation and engaging people in listening to what they want to hear. The rest of us mere mortals however simply have to rely on the quality of our conversation being based on having something of quality to actually talk about.

Other than that - as I said in your other thread - practice does help. Public speaking highlighted this to me - but having had it highlighted it to me there - I have noticed it as part of normal social interaction too. The more you talk to people the more you observe what gets responded to - what tones of voice - what topics - what way of phrasing some things - that generally work more often than others.

Start small. Engage with people where possible - even on mundane or short topics. Try to engage people without any agenda other than to engage - therefore you never feel like a failure for having done it as there was no "success criteria" in the first place.

And actively pursue interests that put you in social situations where communication is not an option but necessary. Debates. Speed Dating. Walking clubs. Book clubs. Anything where the situation itself changes communication from an option to an onus. These will help develop you too.

lazybones32

Forget your therapist, Toastmasters is a group to help people increase their confidence with Public-speaking. It is either annual membership or pay every session and if you're willing to work and partake, you will reap enormous dividends. A lot cheaper than visiting someone who will charge you min. 50 euro an hour.

I first went to learn how to deliver a presentation more effectively but I stayed to help hone the art that is conversation. I talk so much sh*t these days, I can hardly believe it!

Spend a bit of time reflecting on why you are shy- are you afraid of saying something stupid? maybe you're not a man for small-talk? If it comes from a low sense of self-worth, etc, then maybe a therapist could be of more benefit than my bs.

http://www.limericktoastmasters.com/

Wibbs

Funny enough I can and do talk to the wall, men, women, young, old, cats and dogs. I'd be very much an extreme in that regard. However I'm pure shíte at public speaking. I wouldn't be particularly nervous of it(other than knowing I'm crap at it), but I would clam up significantly more than in a one to one or in a social group. For me anyway the two are very different dynamics. Conversation from one on one to larger groups is off the cuff, improvisation, winging it, like jazz riffing as it were(and a buzz when you're in the zone), whereas public speaking would be more like a classical recital, it's more scripted and rehearsed I suppose. Though I could certainly see how it would improve someone's confidence.

aidanki

lazybones32 wrote: »

Forget your therapist, Toastmasters is a group to help people increase their confidence with Public-speaking. It is either annual membership or pay every session and if you're willing to work and partake, you will reap enormous dividends. A lot cheaper than visiting someone who will charge you min. 50 euro an hour.

I first went to learn how to deliver a presentation more effectively but I stayed to help hone the art that is conversation. I talk so much sh*t these days, I can hardly believe it!

Spend a bit of time reflecting on why you are shy- are you afraid of saying something stupid? maybe you're not a man for small-talk? If it comes from a low sense of self-worth, etc, then maybe a therapist could be of more benefit than my bs.

http://www.limericktoastmasters.com/

Im actually going to toastmasters would you believe, started two weeks ago and have to do my icebreaker speech in two weeks time

how long did it take before you saw an improvement if u don't mind me asking

Wibbs

Wibbs wrote: »

Funny enough I can and do talk to the wall, men, women, young, old, cats and dogs. I'd be very much an extreme in that regard. However I'm pure shíte at public speaking. I wouldn't be particularly nervous of it(other than knowing I'm crap at it), but I would clam up significantly more than in a one to one or in a social group. For me anyway the two are very different dynamics.

Practice works in both cases - but public speaking is one where practice has more of an effect. The reason for this is obvious though so I hope it is not insulting to point it out. But people are individuals - what works with one fails with the next. But the bigger the crowd in front of you - I have learned - the more formulaic a response you get. Especially given the bigger a crowd the bigger the INTER crowd affect becomes. From the stage you notice - much more than from the crowd - the effect of parts of the crowd laughing - will awaken the rest of the crowd to the fact there is something to laugh at they missed - so they laugh too. And the bigger the crowd you appear in front of the more pronounced this effect becomes.

So the ability to work a crowd actually becomes easier the bigger a crowd becomes. Generally that is. There are people who seem to have a knack for influencing only more intimate crowds. I have studied this dynamic in singer songwriters like Glen Hansard for example. His power over a room actually goes DOWN with the size of a crowd. I have speculated as to why this might be but it is only guess work - one theory being that a lot of his personal charisma comes from his facial features in a lot of ways - he has that irish mischievous personality in his face and so the bigger the crowd - the less people who have an intimate proximity to that.

But in general it is a truism I think. We have great respect for people who can work large crowds - forgetting that large crowds can be easier to work in many ways.

The true terror for me has never been when I had to speak to 300 or 500 people. Or 1 or 2 people. But somewhere around the 10 to 30 people range. You have hardly any crowd dynamics in your favor there - and you really have to work that crowd. I have found when working a crowd of that size that involving the audience heavily works for me - because it shifts the focus from me a lot. And I was heavily interested to note this dynamic in - of all things - a Richard Dawkins video I watched recently.

In this recent video Dawkins was in a class room in front of around 15 teen students in a religious school. In the earlier parts of the video dawkins was working the room. But with my eye for the crowd dynamic I noticed that half way into the video he did a large shift of focus. He started responding to questions with things like "Well what do the rest of you here think about this question - and how do you imagine I am going to answer that". My suspicion is his experience of crowds - and his discomfort with how this relatively raw and under produced video was going for him - he shifted into the same dynamic that I have learned - which is to pit medium crowds against each other - to shift the focus from the floor.

Anyway you are the MOD so you are probably going to infract my cute little ass for going WAY off topic here into my experience with speaking - so in the effort to go back on topic to preempt that hehehehehe - I think an exploration of different conversation dynamics between different people and configurations of people can certainly have a feedback into all other configurations. And experience in crowds will feed back heavily into speaking to individuals - and vice versa. The key is to remember we are a social animal and we live in a society and simply being social in any form adds "Experience points" that you can "level up" with like a computer game. It certainly rarely goes against you.

I have found myself - more than most users on here - in the past wondering if you conduct yourself in 1-1 like you do online 1-"1". How much of it is "you" and how much supported by google and all the data we have at our finger tips when we are making on line posts. Perhaps I will get a chance to find out at one of the many boards meetups.

Wibbs

Deleted User wrote: »

I have found myself - more than most users on here - in the past wondering if you conduct yourself in 1-1 like you do online 1-"1". How much of it is "you" and how much supported by google and all the data we have at our finger tips when we are making on line posts.

Me? TBH I'm a worse know it all and chatterbox in Real Life(tm) than on here(a fair few on Boards have met me at beers so they can chime in on this). I honestly never or almost never use google and the like. I'd rather be "Me" wrong, than "Google" right as it were. Exceptions might be in the middle of a debate where someone states something that I've never heard of before(and they don't post links as backup) and then I'd google it to see if it holds up, but that frankly would be rare enough. I've a somewhat eidetic memory going on, particularly in subjects that interest me. I do use google and the like to increase my knowledge in those areas, just like I'd use books. The interwebs has been fantastic in that way.

lazybones32

aidanki wrote: »

Im actually going to toastmasters would you believe, started two weeks ago and have to do my icebreaker speech in two weeks time

how long did it take before you saw an improvement if u don't mind me asking

A matter of weeks. But I really threw myself into it...for me, it is down to knowing what I'm talking about. If I know the topic I'm sorted and can babble on and on and on...

Practice the sh*t out of that speech at home, in the car, wherever you can and you will grow in no time.