by Sudhanshu Prashar

I want to share my latest experiment with you all. At my work place, we have a cultural club in our LOB wherein we have all the activities whenever time permits. Activities are like singing competition, extempores, Group discussions, free speeches etc. The group of people in my LOB is around 80-90. So I took initiative and told my Team leader who organizes such activities that i want to say something in front of the group. I thought that with a small introduction of mine, it would be a good idea if i create some awareness about stammering. Office would be a great place to tell people about speech therapy as many of them do not know about speech therapy.

When i came to know that today get together was going to take place when the mail was being floated , I was very much tense about my speech. My heart beat became very fast and felt as if there were butterflies in my stomach. I have faced a group of 15-25 people during group therapies so facing a group of 80-90 people is a big task. But i knew I had to do it if have to take big steps in improving my speech. When my team leader called me up for my chance. and remember, there was no podium. I started off slowly and after completing my introduction, I spoke about speech therapy (I have bad habit of stammering for which I am taking speech therapy for the last 4 years and i have improved a lot. Earlier I could not even speak a single sentence without blocks but after taking therapy i am in much better control of my speech. I have gained a lot of confidence and fluency from speech therapy and I am still working on my speech. There are two parts of speech therapy, first is the individual therapy which consists of speech organs and breathing exercises and second is group therapies in which you need to speak in front of a group, practice your skills and improve).

I spoke continuously for around 5-7 minutes in front of those 80-90 people. The atmosphere was very tense for me. I started off very slowly. There was a bit of hesitation but still i was speaking slowly. After a minute or two i was a bit more comfortable and speech was pretty good. I wanted to speak a lot more than what i actually did but i guess it happens with most people. This is another aspect of public speaking that i need to work on. Even though i spoke for only 5-7 minutes. What i wanted to achieve was actually achieved. I took initiative, gathered courage and spoke in front of those 80-90 people and i thought i controlled my speech pretty well in that tense situation as i have not spoken in front of such a large group before. Hope to do these kind of experiments more frequently as you can see your confidence going sky high when you do these kind of experiments.