A huge number of articles and trainings are devoted to the problem of how to learn to talk with people. This skill should be given special attention, because without it it is impossible to gain self-confidence, win the respect of others, or get a good job.
Fear of communication
According to statistics, most people experience fear when talking to strangers. Communication psychology explains this by subconscious tension and self-inflation. Often a huge number of thoughts slip into our minds that make us feel awkward and constrained.
There are 2 effective ways to help overcome the fear of communication and learn how to talk correctly with other people:
- We get a positive experience - in an unfamiliar company, at first it is difficult to find topics for conversation, since everyone is unfamiliar and it is not known what to expect from each other. In the future, each interlocutor opens up, and it turns out that they are pleasant people. Communication ceases to cause discomfort, because a positive communication experience has been gained. In psychology, various trainings have been developed in which interlocutors learn to receive only positive experiences from communication. Learning to talk with members of the opposite sex is problematic for many, so there are various tasks for building a dialogue with strangers.
- We lower the importance - when the importance of a certain person or event is overestimated in the mind, constraint in conversation and a feeling of awkwardness automatically occur. Special therapy helps to overcome this condition, which is aimed at overcoming complexes and changing behavioral attitudes.
Doubts about one’s eloquence or lack of self-confidence lead to the fact that when talking with others, a person feels constrained and psychologically withdrawn, when even speaking is difficult.
Although it has been proven that at first people pay attention not to the appearance of the interlocutor, but to his speech. Only when the conversation becomes uninteresting do the interlocutors begin to look for flaws in the speaker.
Learning to speak competently
The art of communicating with others is an acquired skill. To be able to speak competently, it is not at all necessary to grow up in a professorial family. Not everyone has the gift of eloquence, but everyone can develop the art of oratory well. Those who work in the humanitarian field develop a rich vocabulary over time. Representatives of technical professions will have to study a lot and put in a lot of effort to develop their speech.
What is competent speech
Before starting public speaking classes, you should decide what is included in the concept of competent speech. This is not only the correct construction of sentences. The definition itself is much broader and includes the following components:
- the correct combination of words according to their meaning;
- the ability to logically construct sentences;
- know the rules for setting accents;
- use word forms correctly.
When developing your speaking skills, it is important to take into account the many nuances that the Russian language is rich in. You can learn how to speak competently on your own or seek help from specialists who will help you improve your theory and select the best option for teaching public speaking.
Speaking beautifully and culturally is a whole science, so you should start with the basics. You need to repeat the entire Russian language course (morphology, syntax, phonetics, vocabulary). For this you will need an explanatory and spelling dictionary, reference books on speech culture, rhetoric, and ethics.
To learn to speak competently and confidently, you need to pay special attention to classical literature. Daily reading of works of fiction allows you to significantly expand your vocabulary and enrich your speech. Methods for beautifully linking sentences will be regularly stored in your head. Moreover, it is recommended to read aloud, while simultaneously practicing your own diction.
Learning to listen
Before you learn to speak competently, you need to learn the golden rule: it is important not only to be able to speak beautifully, but also to listen carefully.
When communicating, you should not interrupt your interlocutor, show your own boredom, or not get to the point. Several people should participate in the conversation, rather than just one speaking. Clarifying questions will help show the interlocutor the significance of his story.
You should remember to have a sense of tact and avoid touching on painful or unpleasant topics. Therefore, before talking with your interlocutor, you should carefully consider the structure of the conversation.
Many people believe that a Russian language course taken at school is enough for a lifetime. To achieve success in adult life and gain self-confidence when communicating with people around you, you need to constantly improve yourself. The ability to keep your speech under control and conduct a conversation correctly will always make a person stand out from the crowd.
What is the difference between a pleasant and a repulsive interlocutor? Is it all down to an innate inclination to communicate? In fact, in 90% of cases, it is not talent that saves, but resourcefulness, self-discipline and continuous work on oneself. It's no secret: every detail is important - posture, facial expressions, gestures, tone. And if these components can be quickly mastered with the help of physical effort, competent speech requires something more. How to speak correctly and be a great storyteller?
1. Use verified data.
Spreading gossip damages the reputation of a decent person. Any unverified or dubious information is considered gossip. To avoid awkward moments and to avoid putting yourself in a bad light, it is better to use only reliable facts in your story.
However, there are situations in which any detail is important, even the unlikely one. Then, in order not to mislead the opponent, sentences begin with the phrases:
- “I’m not sure if this is true, but...”;
- “I heard such information from neighbors/acquaintances/passers-by, but I don’t know how true it is...”;
- “I don’t have a definite answer to this question, but there are several hypothetical versions...”;
- “I think so, but it’s quite possible that I’m wrong. Double-check the information in reference books or with specialists.”
In other words, these statements have only a speculative, hypothetical connotation. The interlocutor clearly understands: the information may not correspond to the truth. However, the details will help you find the answer and give you direction.
2. Arm yourself with arguments.
This concerns controversial issues. Even if a question has an irrefutable answer, the interlocutor may not know about it. In such situations, you cannot insult your opponent, laugh at him, or accuse him of ignorance. Attempts to insist on an answer without proper argumentation will also be useless. Therefore, the best solution would be a detailed explanation with the announcement or demonstration of evidence. They may be:
- scientific research results;
- real examples from ;
- material evidence - video or audio recordings, photographs, samples;
- authoritative literary sources - reference books, encyclopedias, textbooks;
- statistics, experiments, logical conclusions.
3. Maintain clean speech.
Fashion even affected spoken language. Therefore, words of foreign origin have become the norm. Sometimes they really come to the rescue, as they save time and help to briefly describe phenomena and objects that are difficult to translate into your native language in one phrase. However, sometimes these “linguistic foreigners” sound ridiculous.
“We will use a beauty center to demonstrate the fashion collection.”
“Team building will be held at Open Air Place.”
“There is no connection with the cleaning worker.”
How to explain to a person accustomed to normal speech that these sentences talk about a fashion show, a corporate party and a cleaning lady? To avoid semantic errors and misunderstandings, it is better to use Russian analogues whenever possible.
A few more problems of modern “fashionable” language- slang, jargon, deliberate abbreviation of words. The phrase “grandmothers spin like this”, uttered by the financial director, will not add to his confidence. And the words “hey, cool chick, don’t you want to ride in a car?” are unlikely to help you develop a healthy romantic relationship. Funny? Nevertheless, these are realities; to confirm them, it is enough to listen to the conversations of others. The result will be rather disastrous.
Serves as a huge ulcer on the body of speech obscene language. It is most often used for three reasons:
- an attempt to attract attention, appear older, and “fit in” with the company (for teenagers);
- creating a comic or emotionally rich effect;
- expression of negative .
To speak correctly and beautifully, so that you are understood, you need to speak!
Try to talk more with people (especially on topics that you want to speak about clearly and beautifully): discuss, argue, criticize, explain, defend yourself;
Try to listen carefully to those whom you like to listen to, talk to them, even if at first not everything goes well - adrenaline often helps when choosing the right words.
Read aloud. Practice your diction, because speaking is the result of the work of air and the muscles of the vocal cords. In some cases, it doesn’t even matter what exactly you read or whether you understand it. (I heard that the most useful thing is to read plays).
Read interesting books that could tune your brain to the thinking from which your speech would be born. (In my case, these were various textbooks and scientific articles, the purpose of which was to explain something clearly and clearly. A couple of books from the 80s were especially difficult, but after a while I began to understand them too).
It wouldn’t hurt to learn the basics of speech culture, the rules of arguing, etc. (We had several lectures in the curriculum.)
Learn to argue your opinion. When you are confident in something and rely not only on your own views/intuition, but also on objective facts, the opinions of experts, when you understand the topic of conversation, it is easiest to speak!
If possible and necessary, use all opportunities to demonstrate yourself as a speaker: whether you are giving a toast to unfamiliar relatives or retelling an essay (sometimes also unfamiliar) - this is a powerful training against the fear of speaking.
Learn to see the narrative script. If it is possible and necessary to prepare a speech, you always need to clearly understand the structure: how to greet, where to start, how to move on to relevance, to problems, to conclusions, to proposals, and how to summarize and finish this whole thing before they interrupt you and start to ask questions. You can make up cheat sheets with a structure, but no prepared phrases (!), otherwise your brain will try to somehow cram them into your speech, and your presentation will look torn into coherent pieces and “something in between.”
There are many helper phrases that structure your story and your opponent’s attention. Use them. “The task was” “Thus”, “In other words”, “According to experts” “In conclusion we can say”, etc.
Figurative thinking, epithets, allegories, comparisons, hyperboles - our language is full of means of expression. Remind yourself what this is and try to decorate your speech with emotional inserts and, perhaps, small lyrical digressions. If you are planning a “lyrical digression”, do not forget to mentally leave an “anchor” at the moment to which you plan to return, otherwise you may find yourself in the awkward position of “so what am I talking about...”.
I set myself the goal of speaking coherently on the eve of defending my thesis project, where I had to tell a year of hard work in 15 minutes. But for the first time, I asked myself the question of beautiful speech, as I wrote at the beginning, no less than two years earlier. This was due to the fact that I was not going to do this “on purpose”, I wanted to combine business (and not so much) with business, since I believe that speech can and should flow on its own, and it only needs to be guided a little.
A pleasant voice, correct diction and the ability to construct beautiful sentences are the basics of effective communication with people. It is no secret that our voice influences the feelings of the interlocutor, and figurative and competent speech easily reaches his consciousness and convinces. Therefore, it is so important to learn to speak beautifully and competently, correctly and clearly expressing your thoughts.
In everyday life, the ability to speak beautifully will also give you and help you solve any problems easily.
The human voice is a powerful tool in the development of interpersonal relationships. With its help you can work wonders: repel or charm, attract attention, invigorate or lull. As a rule, the gift of eloquence is rarely given to someone by nature; usually there is a lot of work behind it. Therefore, if you want to speak beautifully so that people want to listen to you, you will have to practice.
Below are tips and techniques that will help you get rid of dialect, master the basics of oratory and learn to speak beautifully and correctly. First, try recording your voice on a voice recorder. Did you listen and how did you like it? Probably not very... Stuttering, swallowing of endings, unnecessary pauses and many other unpleasant moments are noticeable. Now it’s clear what needs to be changed and what needs to be worked on to achieve beautiful speech. So let's get started.
Speech technique
It is divided into four subsections:
1. Breathing
The key to successful communication is perfectly executed deep breathing from the diaphragm. This must be learned in order to reduce the pressure on the speech apparatus, then the voice will be deep and sound beautiful. Many breathe shallowly, while the voice weakens, acquires a hoarse tone, becomes silent, quickly gets tired and sometimes even sits down.
When you manage to breathe properly, a healthy glow will appear on your cheeks and your overall well-being will improve.
2. Diction
Good diction is the first condition for beautiful speech. When you eat endings or sounds, speech sounds unintelligible. This happens due to lethargy and immobility of the lips. Because of this, burring, lisping and lisping appear. Speaking beautifully means pronouncing each word smoothly, opening your mouth well for clear pronunciation. You need to learn not to pronounce phrases too quickly or too quickly, since the speed of thinking of your interlocutor may differ from yours, and it will seem to him that you are speaking unintelligibly.
3. Voice
And again breathing, because this is the basis of the sonority of the voice. To create a voice, you need to learn to breathe with your diaphragm and understand how to use resonators correctly. Sometimes you notice when you communicate a lot, your voice shrinks, becomes hoarse, a sore throat appears, it becomes difficult for you to speak and you lower your tone. But it can be made strong, sonorous, flexible, with a wide range of sound. But for this you will need to improve your speaking technique, strengthen it and develop it.
4. Orthoepia
This science studies the laws and rules of correct pronunciation. Deviation from the rules leads to problems in communication; the listener ceases to understand what you are telling him and does not perceive the information that you want to convey to him. Spend a little time on spelling and your ability to beautifully express your thoughts, correctly placing emphasis even on complex words, will definitely be appreciated by those around you.
Important! Before you start doing speech development exercises, do some exercises. Physical exercise improves blood circulation, warms up the muscles, relieves physical and emotional tension, relaxes the forearms, shoulders and neck, and all the muscles that affect the voice.
Exercises:
- tilting the head in different directions, rotating the head in a circle;
- swings and circular movements of the arms;
- we turn and tilt the body in different directions, drawing circles with the hips.
After charging, you need to lie down on the mat and relax. Imagine a beautiful landscape, feel a light breeze, feel how the sun warms you and you take a deep breath of fresh air.
Now you are ready to practice.
Learning to breathe correctly
If you want to communicate beautifully and for a long time, so that your voice sounds and does not break, you just need to learn how to include the diaphragm in the sound production process. It is located in the solar plexus area.
To get started, practice maintaining your posture using the “wall” exercise, doing it every day for 5 minutes for several weeks. Press your back against the wall with your entire body from head to toe. Inhale through your nose, exhale through your mouth. 6 very deep breaths. Inhale at 1,2,3,4 and exhale at 5,6,7,8. Then walk around the house at different speeds, while keeping your back position the same. Tell yourself more often: “I am brave and determined!” Your body will automatically react to these words of conviction with a straight back.
Exercises to train breathing from the diaphragm
The ability to express your thoughts beautifully is only half the success. You've probably noticed that some people want to listen, but others, even very smart ones, don't. What's the matter then? You will be surprised, but in fact it is not what a person says that matters, but how he does it. A pleasant timbre, correct abdominal breathing and the ability to pronounce phrases with different intonations can turn even the most boring report into an exciting show. Below are 3 exercises, after practicing which you will become the master of your voice.
Candle– trains slow breathing. Imagine that you are blowing on a candle; if it’s hard to imagine, then light a real one. Concentrate your attention on your stomach. Exhale slowly, try to keep the flame tilted.
Stubborn candle- take a deep breath, hold your breath a little, and then start blowing sharply and forcefully, trying to fit several such energetic exhalations into one breath.
Extinguish 10 candles– the principle is the same as in the previous exercise, only we increase the number of candles from 3 to 10, spending less and less air on blowing out the candles, and leaving the amount of inhaled air the same.
After a few weeks of these exercises, you will notice how your diaphragmatic breathing has become automatic.
Let's vote
To make your voice big and sound beautiful, you need to learn how to use the upper (skull, mouth and nose) and lower (chest) resonator systems. Take ten shallow breaths into your belly. Short inhalation and slow exhalation. And you can start exercising.
Moan– don’t forget about posture. Say the sound “M” with your lips closed. Say it as you exhale, without straining. Now start changing the position of your head while making the same sound. Gradually you will begin to feel vibration in the upper resonator. Having mastered the sound “M”, start adding other vowels: o-a-i-y-u, so that they sound like “mmmm-e-mmm-o-mmm-a-mmm-i-mmm-u-mmm-y” " When you have mastered this practice, move on to the continuous pronunciation of different variations of these sounds.
Tongue Twisters. Pronouncing tongue twisters is a truly great way to hone your speech and master the art of speaking beautifully, pronouncing each letter clearly. Try saying the phrase: “broke,.. broke, broke,.. broke, broke, broke,” while rubbing your forehead. We do the same with the words “we are lazy” - rubbing the nasal cartilage, “we caught burbot” - rubbing the cheeks.
Horn– straight posture, lips in a tube, pronounce the sound “U” as you exhale. Next, combine it with other vowel sounds. The main thing is not to change the position of your lips.
Poetry– read them out loud and with intonation, using a medium tone. At the end of each line, inhale and say the line as you exhale. I recommend finding the poem “Reading Rules” on the Internet, which was written by A.V. Pryanishnikov. It is ideal for performing this exercise correctly.
Training diction
First, do a warm-up with your speech apparatus. Perform all these exercises 5-7 times.
- We close our mouth and relax. Say the “U” sound a couple of times, drawing out the “uuuuuu” sound. Now A, slowly opening his mouth vertically, no more than 3 centimeters.
- Show your teeth. Clench your jaw and stretch your lips in an unnatural smile.
- Fold your lips into a tube, jaws closed. Make circular movements with your lips up and down, from left to right. With the tip of the tongue we touch the lower row of teeth, open the mouth no wider than 3 cm. Now lift it to the upper palate, then to the left and right cheeks.
Now you can do articular gymnastics.
- Say the vowels on one exhale, trying to use all your muscles: I-E-A-O-U-Y. Gradually increase the speed of pronunciation and put several ligaments into one exhalation. After you master this combination, start experimenting with others.
- Do the same with vowel sounds, substituting consonants for them. Example: Bi, ba, bo…. , beep..., beep, beep..., beep, bep..., then with the sound P, TD, KG, FV, M, N, L, R. Gbdi.., Bdgi.., Ftki.., Mi-mi.., Mrli... You do the same with whistling and hissing sounds S, Z, Zh, Sh, Shch: Si-zis.., Zissi.., Zdi.., Sti.. etc. By connecting them into groups and combining them.
And also read as many tongue twisters as possible, they will perfectly help you practice your speech apparatus.
Orthoepy
The science that studies the set of rules of normative literary pronunciation, emphasis in words, the beauty and sound of speech, as well as the rules of articulation of sounds and phrases. Since there are countless rules in orthoepy, if you want to speak beautifully, pronouncing words correctly, you need to turn to the relevant literature.
Working with speech
You need to be able to correctly set intonation in your speech, in order to learn this, the best way to train is by expressively reading literary texts aloud, recording them on a dictaphone. Listen, analyze how correct it is, correct the shortcomings and read again. Do the same with an article from a newspaper, technical literature or any other source. Bring life and brightness to your voice - start speaking correctly!