Taking your body with you when you speak

By Max Dixon

“The will to win means nothing if you haven’t the will to prepare.”
Juma Ikanga, Marathon runner

Your bodily behaviour is a concrete external manifestation of your core beliefs. It is the subtext upon which your words stand. It either supports your message of contradicts it.

Audiences are suspicious of stiffness and rigidity. A little nervousness is acceptable and expected, but tension results in redundant, limited gestures and movement.

Undertake a program of stretching and flexibility. The improved results in your presentation will amaze you.  Hatha Yoga can be very beneficial and the Alexander Technique will show you the way to much more ease. You can find several books on each of these at any large bookstore.

Breathe fully – exhale completely – pause to do it. It is crucial to keep anxiety to a minimum and oxygen supply to a maximum.

Practice using gestures in a way that clarifies or emphasizes the specific content and mood of the speech. Often we punch and poke the air and repeat those movements and gestures that are familiar and comfortable for us.

Develop gestures that are smooth and unbroken. They stimulate positive emotions in yourself and in your listeners. You may not always want smooth, unbroken gestures, but most people habitually choose rapid, jerky gestures. Over the course of a presentation this can encourage a feeling of contention and unsettledness.

Get some feedback on your walk. Find out what kind of information you send out when you walk into a room – down the hall – in front of a group giving a presentation. Do you tend to collapse as your feet strike the floor? Do your shoulders rise up to your ears or come forward in tension? Does your chest cave in revealing a non-vital energy? Do you puff up your chest and ask for more space and power – contentious, again?

Explore gestures in far reach space. This refers to arm movements that involve the elbows being away from the body. You want to have this kind of movement in your repertoire to go with more usual gestures we see that involve near reach space (hands close to body) and middle reach space (forearm distance from body).

“There is no question that the type of leadership communication I am calling for involves more than a little showmanship. If you want to be an effective leader, you cannot be shy or reticent. Knowing how to appear before large audiences and persuade them ‘to buy’ your message is a crucial attribute of leadership – almost as crucial as being able to calculate or plan.”
Jan Carlzon, Moments of Truth

“Fear is excitement without breath.”  Fritz Perles

As you conclude a sentence to make a point, learn to be comfortable with looking at a face in your audience for a second or two beyond the conclusion of the sentence. This is called ‘landing your message’ and is the opposite of what often happens; frequently we speak and rather generally ‘spray’ our audience with our words, never really touching the people with genuineness or specificity.

Ask a friend to look for any bodily movements, gestures, or behaviour that could be interpreted as apologetic or in any way self-minimizing. People are paying to hear you and it is foolish to make non-verbal statements that reduce your impact. 

Sometimes we are afraid we will be intimidating. We may feel, on some level, we aren’t really worth the audience’s respect. Whatever the cause of ‘aw shucks’, it won’t work in the long run except for occasional humour. Don’t confuse low self-esteem with relating to what is the universal element of your audience.

Own the space you occupy!

“Success is going from failure to failure without loosing enthusiasm.” Winston Churchill

Copyright 1996-2002 Max Dixon. Used with permission of the author. Max Dixon is a professional presentation/performance coach and public speaker. Max Dixon Communication is located at 1268 NE 69th St. Seattle, Wash. 98115; (206) 522-1236

Article brought to you courtesy Bob ‘Idea Man’ Hooey and Ideas At Work! www.ideaman.net