|
Hints
|
|
Words to Free
Small Group Conversation
|
September 2022
Hints
The Speaking by Monthly Newsletter
The Power of Commitment
Speaking by Heart is a journey from the world of the written word to the world of the spoken word. Like any journey, it begins with a commitment to start. Committing to something, a cause, a principle for living, or being part of a group puts energy in motion to take the first step without regard to distance.
My first committed steps on the journey to speak without notes came by surprise during my second year of parish ministry. I was in the sanctuary talking to my ministerial intern about preaching. I told her how late in my twelve years of national ministry I began doing talks and sometimes portions of sermons without a written text. Feeling my enthusiasm for those experiences, she simply asked, if that style is so good, Stephen, why don’t you speak that way here every Sunday? The question put me on the spot and forced a commitment from me to give it a try for a month. The response I received to my first few efforts was like feeding me salted peanuts – I wanted more. So, I committed to continue.
The backstory here is that I had tasted those peanuts from time to time during my years of public speaking and wanted more until it became addictive. At first, these were small bites, like introducing a program or event or going script-less at the opening or closing of a talk or sermon. During my national social justice ministry years, they grew more enticing because I regularly led workshops or advocacy training retreats. In these settings, I discovered the power of “just talking” from material I knew well. These, and other forays into speaking without a script, were done without an intentional commitment to go on a journey of script-less speaking.
Once I made that commitment, everything changed. I began discovering and utilizing new ways to remember what I planned to say. Mind-mapping and visualizing my talks gave me new confidence. I started finding the cues my body gave me for what I planned to say next and how I was relating to my audience. As I explored and experienced the difference between the written word well-read and the freely spoken word, I gave up writing my sermons and talk. None of this would have happened without my committing to regularly practicing speaking without a script.
In his book Disciplines of the Spirit, Howard Thurman shares his understanding of commitment as a spiritual discipline. His perspective reveals two essential dimensions of Speaking by Heart: Speaking this way brings me alive in the moments I am speaking. And it enables me to be a better agent for the purpose or reason greater than myself that motivates me to speak.
The meaning of commitment as a discipline of the spirit must take into account
that the mind and spirit cannot be separated from the body in any absolute sense.
What is true of plants and animals seems to be true for humans.
When the conditions are met, the energy of life is made available.
The only way we can be made whole in commitment is by finding something
big enough to demand our all.
The true purpose of all spiritual disciplines is to clear away whatever may block
our awareness of that which is God in us.
Thurman talks about yielding to a commitment, cause, or purpose greater than oneself. Living and advocating for peace, justice, and love in human relationships is such a commitment. Speaking without notes and a manuscript is not such a commitment, but speaking this way enables me to come “alive,” as Thurman said. It lets the energy I have for a purpose greater than myself flow through me and awaken others to its importance.
Words to Free the Spirit
The Thread
by Denise Levertov
Something is very gently,
Invisibly, silently,
Pulling at me- a thread
Or net of treads
Finer than cobwebs and as
Elastic. I haven’t tried
The strength of it. No barbed hook
Pierced and tore me. Was it
Not long ago this tread
Began to draw me? Or,
Wayback? Was I born with its knot about my
Neck, a bridle? Not fear
But a stirring
Of wonder makes me
Catch my breath when I feel
The tug of it when I thought
It had loosened itself and gone
Hints
May/June 2022
The Speaking by Heart Monthly Newsletter
Visit Our Website
Know Your Next Step
Speaking by Heart is a journey and a practice. The journey is best mindfully taking one step at a time. The practice is best done mindfully until it becomes habitual and enlivening. I’ve talked about this here before. I wanted to bring it up again because, at the June Speak by Heart small group zoom session, everyone was at different stages of either experimenting with or practicing Speaking by Heart. Some we’re addressing fear barriers. Others, and most people I’ve worked with, struggled to rid themselves of relying on the written word to create their talks. Still, others were learning to create and use mind maps to construct their presentation.
It's helpful to know where you are on your journey and in your practice. Knowing this, you will be able to celebrate your accomplishments and say " I did it. I know I can do it again.." Without such a marker, the journey may seem endlessly discouraging.
Here are the steps you might place on your journey:
First Step
Discover Your Story--Tell Your Story The first thing your audience wants to know is who you are, your relationship with the subject, and can they trust you. Put another way, are you authentic. Speaking by Heart asks you to know yourself so well, your history, emotions, and habits that you can relate them honestly to your subject and reveal them about yourself.
Come Alive with Your Story
There is a reason that the most successful TED Talks are 65% stories, and The Moth Radio Hour is so popular -- stories. Stories make the storyteller “come alive.” Your audience wants to feel what you are feeling, whether it is joy, sorrow, anger, or excitement. And you, in turn, will feel what they are feeling.
Step Two
Live in the "Spirit-Freeing Paradox. Simply put: your talk is all about you, your preparation, and, if you're speaking from your heart, not about you but the importance it holds in you.
Step Three
Saturate, Organize, Memorize
Saturate. When water is saturated with thermal energy, it boils. It becomes intense, bright, and pure. When air reaches the saturation point, it can’t absorb more water, and its temperature and dew point are equal. Saturation often means that some capacity is at its fullest, and anything beyond that point is superfluous or unnecessary. I have found that my best public speaking happens when I have reached the saturation point regarding the subject I am addressing.
Organize. Organize your material to make one main “takeaway point." Then memorize one word, phrase, or picture that summarizes each item you have selected to support your "takeaway point."
Memorize. Memorize poems, scriptures, stories, and traditional or inspirational writings. Each item you memorize becomes part of an inward reservoir you can draw upon as you speak and in your daily life.
Memorize poems, scriptures, stories, and traditional or inspirational writings. Each item you memorize becomes part of an inward reservoir you can draw upon as you speak and in your daily life.
Step Four
Befriending Fear & Finding Confidence
For most people, there is no greater fear than that of public speaking. Your spirit-freeing practices can help you reduce fear and build confidence.
Step Five
Practice, Practice, Practice
Psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi is widely known for his development of “flow theory” and his findings that link the result of practice to happiness and satisfaction. According to his theory, flow results when a high skill level is appropriately challenged and engaged.
Step 6
Sleep on It
In "The Committee of Sleep: How Artists, Scientists, and Athletes use dreams for creative problem-solving and how you can too," Deirdre Barrett documents examples of how the “committee.” Scientific studies are revealing more and more about the power of sleep to enhance and consolidate memory and help us solve complex problems.
Next Steps
Small-Group Discussion
In the safety of a small group zoom room Stephen Shick, founder of Speaking by Heart will facilitate a discussion on how to start or take your next steps in your practice of speaking without a script. Participation is limited to six.
Thursday, September 15, 2022
12-1:30 PM (ET)
Register Here
Words to Free the Spirit
One step at a time is all it takes
to get you there.
Emily Dickinson
January 2022
Speak in the Eternal Now
Every day, and every moment of each day, is a New Year. This phrase is familiar to those of us who try to live mindfully in the moment, fully aware of the infinite potential that each moment brings and mysteries awaiting to awaken us. After years of practice, I am still regularly distracted from this wisdom by the endless number of items on my “to-do list” or the goals or objectives I am seeking. At moments of distraction, I feel blessed when the words of the hymn The Ceaseless Flow of Endless come to mind. In my Unitarian Universalist faith, we sing these words at the turning of the year: “The past and future ever meet in the eternal now: to make each day a thing complete shall be our New Year vow.”
When you come alive in the eternal now” while speaking publicly, those listening feel your presence and sense you are together with them. If you’re not present in the moments before and during your talk, your audience won’t feel your presence, and they may even sense they are just an “object” to you. Reading to them what you wrote yesterday will not get you into the now. Yes, your audience may listen, even be inspired, but it will be harder for them to feel you are talking to them, that you are meeting them in the “eternal now.” In his classic book I and Thou, Existential philosopher Martin Buber makes the same point: “True beings are lived in the present, the life of an object is in the past” and “All real living is meeting.”
To arrive in the unfolding moments before and while speaking is a challenge equal to, or greater than, being present in your everyday life. Both require preparation. In everyday life, you need to put aside the past and the future. Knowledge of the past and visions of the future shape the moment, but they are not the now. When speaking without a script, all your preparation is in the past. From this perspective, if you read what you wrote yesterday, it will be part of the past. But if you speak without a script, the content you carefully prepared from your heart yesterday will come alive in the moment, and your living words will help your audience come alive.
The New Year is an excellent time to remind yourself that all your preparations are in the “past,” waiting to come alive in the moment. If you have done this work well, you can confidently enter the now. You can really be there with your audience. You will know what you are going to say. Your main “takeaway point” will be inside you. Your clearly structured stories and content will also be there, just waiting to be released. And your rehearsal will have given you confidence. For security, you may want to carry something from all this past work with you into the present, maybe some notes, a mind map of your talk, a poem or saying you have memorized, or something you have written yourself with you. But, remember all these “just in case I forget” items are from the past.
Martin Buber makes another critical point that gives perspective on speaking without a script in the “eternal now.” Buber emphasizes the importance of distinguishing between an I -Thou relationship and an I-It relationship. I-Thou relationships are dynamic, creative, and personal. Contrastingly, I-It relationships are static, pedantic, and impersonal. In an I-Thou relationship, the I and the Thou are subjects to one another. In an I-It relationship, they are subjects to each other. I want to establish an I-Thou relationship with the audience when I speak. I don’t want them to think of them as objects but rather as subjects. And that is, I hope, how they will feel about me. As I have mentioned in this space before, one of the most treasured compliments I ever received as a parish minister came after a Sunday worship when a parishioner said, “thanks for just talking with us this morning.”
Small Group Discussion
Thursday, February 10, 2022
12-1:30 PM (ET)
Register Here
In the safety of a small group zoom room Stephen Shick, founder of Speaking by Heart will facilitate a discussion on how to start or take your next steps in your practice of speaking without a script. Participation is limited to six.
Hints for Speak in the Eternal Now
While you are waiting to speak as yourself: “What am I saying with my body and facial expressions?” Do I feel engaged and relaxed, or isolated and tense? Am I thinking about what I will say or comfortably interactive with the space and those present?
While speaking, be continually mindful of relating to your audience. Ask yourself: “Is my body language inviting and engaging? Are my gestures drawing people in or pushing them away? Am I making continuous eye contact with the individuals listening and watching me?
Words to Free Your Spirit
Every real relation with a being or life in the world is exclusive. Its Thou is freed, steps forth, is single, and confronts you. It fills the heavens. This does not mean that nothing else exists; but all else lives in its light. As long as the presence of the relation continues, this its cosmic range is inviolable. But as soon as a Thoubecomes It, the cosmic range of the relation appears as an offense to the world, its exclusiveness as an exclusion of the universe. Martin Buber, I and Thou
Outwitted by Edwin Markham:
He drew a circle that shut me out-
Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout.
But love and I had the wit to win:
We drew a circle and took him in.
December 2021
Make Public Speaking a Spiritual Practice
Don't hide your heart but reveal it
so that mine might be revealed.
Rumi
These words by the 13th-century Sufi poet Rumi capture exactly what Speaking by Heart can help you do every time you speak publicly. Speaking without notes or a manuscript, you will reveal your heart and let your whole body become an invitation for others to reveal theirs. With nothing separating you from your audience, no notes, no manuscript, no inhibitions, or aggrandizements, you will open hearts to your message.
As I began moving away from the text, a young woman approached me after my talk on nuclear disarmament. I could tell by the sparkle in her eyes that she was excited to share something from her heart. "I have to tell you what I saw as you were speaking. Every time you looked up from your text and just talked to us, I saw a blue aura glowing around your head. When you went back to your text, that glow disappeared." I don't know much about auras, but I glimpsed the power of speaking without a script and using it as a spiritual disciple when she went on to say, "When you were looking at us, I felt you were talking to me and cared deeply about what you were saying."
Spirit-freeing practices, such as prayer, meditation, mindfulness, memorization of scriptures, poems, and stories, are pathways to becoming a more effective speaker. Whether religious or secular, these spiritual practices can guide your speech preparation and delivery and give you new insight into the meaning of your own life and why you have chosen to speak publicly. Such practices can take you on a journey of self-discovery and self-actualization that will require honesty and a willingness to be vulnerable. Spirit-freeing disciplines encourage you to face and overcome fears, practice gratitude and generosity, and engender trust in your abilities to communicate honestly with others. From this perspective, Speaking by Heart can become a spiritual discipline.
Here are a few spiritual practices I have applied to my speech preparation and delivery:
I memorize scripture, wisdom sayings, and poetry. I draw upon these words regularly through the day for guidance and inspiration. By internalizing self-selected items, I have also created a material reservoir that shapes and enriches my presentation. When I know them well, I recite them while speaking. Doing this always draws an audience’s attention.
Quieting myself before I go to sleep and then focusing on the order and content of my speech reinforces memory and enhances creativity. The time before sleeping is also ideal for letting your mind and spirit relax into the question, “Why am I speaking? Why is it important to me and my audience?
During preparation and in those moments before speaking, I practice meditation and mindfulness to encourage and enable me to minimize my ego’s fears and self-centered needs.
I developed Speaking by Heart because I felt a compelling need to share the transformation I experienced when I learned to connect my spiritual practices to my presentation preparation and delivery. By conducting workshops and retreats for clergy, laity, and social activists around the country, I have been privileged to witness this same transformation take place in others.
Next Steps
Small-Group Discussion
In the safety of a small group zoom room Stephen Shick, founder of Speaking by Heart will facilitate a discussion on how to start or take your next steps in your practice of speaking without a script. Participation is limited to six.
Thursday, January 13, 2022
12-1:30 PM (ET)
Register Here
Words to Free Your Spirit
If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.
If you build castles in the air your dreams need not be lost. Now put foundations under them.
Henry David Thoreau
November 2021
Your Inner Authority Speaks Clearly
Dr. Howard Thurman was the spiritual guide to many civil rights movement leaders in the United States, including King. Thurman's way of speaking, privately and in public, carried the authority of his life experience as a black man and the authenticity of how he owned his own life. Life Magazine selected Thurman as one of the twelve "Great Preachers" of the twentieth century. His effectiveness as a speaker came from an inner authority that he and his audiences could feel. Thurman's appeal to civil rights activists was his deeply centered sense of worth and purpose. He knew the movement for human rights depended on individuals having an inward sense of their authority. To acquire this, he advised: "Don't ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive, and then go do that. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive." In his meditation The Inward Sea, Thurman draws upon the biblical symbol of the "angel with the flaming sword" that God placed at the gate of the Garden of Eden after expelling Adam and Eve. He asserts that when you find your "inner authority," you will freely pass that angel and enter a new realm of being. I have taken this challenge to mean that I am called upon to discover the authority of my voice every time I speak.
Thurman's recognition of the importance of taking an inward journey to discover your authority relates directly to your relationship with your audience. Put another way, the power you find on your journey inward will flow freely to others. One of the ways you will experience this is the comfort and confidence you feel when you make eye contact while speaking.
A religious educator once told me of an experience she had while speaking without notes that revealed the power of the connection you can make with your audience. She remarked, "I was speaking to the congregation on Sunday morning and consciously trying to make eye contact with everyone when I saw a tear in the eye of a young woman. That awareness made me pause momentarily. I then mindfully, but only momentarily, looked deeply into her eyes. Instantly, I could feel her pain in my heart. Our connection was private and heartfelt, yet it was happening in a public setting."
As you prepare your next talk, remember your authority comes from both your knowledge of your subject and your "inner authority."
Hints For Your Practice
Ask these questions to reveal your authentic voice:
What is it about the subject that brings me most alive?
What are some personal heart-revealing stories that connect me to my topic?
Ask these questions to discover your connection with your audience:
What do I have in common with my audience?
What personal stories can I share to demonstrate that commonality?
Ask these questions to understand how your speaking relates to the meaning of your life or a transcendent purpose:
Why am I speaking at all?
How does what I have to say relate to the meaning of my life?
Words to Free Your Spirit
The Inward Sea
There is in every person an inward sea, and in that sea there is an island
and on that island there is an altar and standing guard before that altar is
the "angel with the flaming sword." Nothing can get by that angel to be placed
upon that altar unless it has the mark of your inner authority. Nothing passes
"the angel with the flaming sword" to be placed upon your altar unless it be a
part of "the fluid area of your consent." This is your crucial link with the eternal.
Next Steps
Small-Group Discussion
In the safety of a small group zoom room Stephen Shick, founder of Speaking by Heart will facilitate a discussion on how to start or take your next steps in your practice of speaking without a script. Participation is limited to six.
Thursday, December 9, 2021
12-1:30 PM (ET)
Register Here
Hints For Your Practice
Ask these questions to reveal your authentic voice:
What is it about the subject that brings me most alive?
What are some personal heart-revealing stories that connect me to my topic?
Ask these questions to discover your connection with your audience:
What do I have in common with my audience?
What personal stories can I share to demonstrate that commonality?
Ask these questions to understand how your speaking relates to the meaning of your life or a transcendent purpose:
Why am I speaking at all?
How does what I have to say relate to the meaning of my life?
October 2021
Beyond the Written Word
Moving beyond the written word can be a challenging process for those who have centered their lives around the authority of the written word. Written scriptures may be at the center of our religious or spiritual traditions. Our educational systems teach us to think logically and ponder meaning by writing out our words. Acquiring new knowledge from within authoritative texts and publications holds significant value in higher education as well. So fundamental is the written word that we have codified our values and norms into carefully formulated and inscribed words of law.
A few years after I had begun delivering my weekly sermons without using a script, I felt forced to use a written sermon. What happened because of that choice helped me see more clearly the difference between speaking from a written text and speaking without a script. It was one of those weeks when I had too many public speaking events and memorial services. I was simply too tired to prepare something new. So, I chose one of my best-written sermons, which I had never preached before to the congregation. I practiced reading it a few times that morning and felt it worked. What happened after I delivered it confirmed the difference between the written and spoken word. In the greeting line after the service, most folks said the expected “good sermon, Stephen.” Then Joan held out her hand, and suddenly with both hands, grabbed mine tightly. She looked me in the eye and said with great disapproval, “Rev. Stephen, don’t ever do that again.” Instantly I knew what she meant. “I don’t like it when you read that way to us,” she admonished.
Joan had joined the church after I had started speaking without a text. She had quickly become an active member and congregational leader. A few weeks before, Joan had brought some friends to church. During fellowship hour that day, I heard one of her guests ask, “Are Rev. Stephen’s sermons always so conversational?” Joan’s reply was filled with enthusiasm, “Yes,” she remarked, “he just talks to us, and we like it that way.” This memory came back to me as she let go of my hand.
I wrote the sermon Joan disliked in a conversational style that wove poetry, stories, and commentary into a well-designed essay. Joan reminded me of the simple truth that beautiful words written and then read are not the same as words mindfully spoken while talking. People know the difference. That’s one of the main reasons TED Talks and the Moth Radio Hour have grown so popular. People like to listen to a person who can “just talk” to them.
Here are three practices that can help you begin creating and delivering your presentations without relying on the printed word.
Saturate and Memorize
Saturation and memorization are two practices that can help you move beyond the written word. As your mind fills to the brim with information, illustrations, stories, poems, and scriptures or wisdom sayings that relate to your talk, you will grow confident that words will come as you speak. All the notes you will need will be in your mind.
Visualize
The educational practice of mind mapping is a visual diagram showing the relationship of items within a presentation. Usually, the main subject or takeaway is placed in the center of the page with related keywords or images radiating outward. Likewise, a concept map uses lines to connect ideas in boxes or circles, generally starting in the middle of a page and expanding outward. Both share the power of visualization, allowing the creator to hold an overview of the presentation in their mind. Because our brain likes to think and remember in pictures mind-mapping is a powerful tool that helps us see how facts, ideas and stories are related. Unlike linear thought, mind-mapping relies on the free multi-directional flow of ideas that nurture creativity and problem solving.
Rehearse until Flow Happens
Recall the mind map of your talk, story, poem. Select words or images for each part, then picture these together as a complete visual. Speak to your visualized words or images in sequence. Do this at random times during the week before your presentation.
Rehearse your entire speech or remarks without interruption as close to the time of presentation as possible. Do this several times until you feel confident that you know your mind map. Note how your transitions flow and how your words change from one rehearsal to the next. Accept that you may forget something or add something each time you practice.
Hints For Your Practice
Saturate Get up from your reading chair and speak aloud what you just read. Talk to yourself about the subject continually for two or three days before your presentation. The result: unexpectedly, information or perspectives will flow naturally into your talk. Enjoy the surprise!
Memorize Take a moment right now and list the songs, sayings, or scriptures you “know by heart.” Select one or two to incorporate into the mind map of your next talk. This will help build comfort with using other people’s words to express or contrast with your thoughts. Memorize items that move your heart. Incorporate these into your secular, religious, or spiritual practice, such as meditations, prayers, or centering rituals.
Visualize Create a mind map of your talk. Be creative, use your imagination, and have fun. You may want to choose from the many available software options, such as TheBrain, MindMapper, Imindmap, Mind Manager, Novamind, and Visual Mind, or simply use sticky notes, pen, pencils, markers, scissors, etc., as I do. I place my main point at the top left or right of a page and extend the flow of my talk downward.
Words to Free Your Spirit
Essays are, by their nature, complicated statements; sermons preached
without notes, by their nature, cannot be complicated statements.
Essays are meant to be read in private as words on a page; sermons
are meant to be heard as spoken events. When one decides to make
that public address without script or notes, the need for that single controlling
idea is not only important, it is essential.
Joseph Webb, Preaching without Notes
without notes, by their nature, cannot be complicated statements.
Essays are meant to be read in private as words on a page; sermons
are meant to be heard as spoken events. When one decides to make
that public address without script or notes, the need for that single controlling
idea is not only important, it is essential.
Joseph Webb, Preaching without Notes
September 2021
A Speaking by Heart Lesson I learned on 9/11
If you are old enough to remember 9/11, you probably can recall where you were when you heard terrorists had attacked the Twin Towers in New York City. I was at an Interfaith Clergy Association meeting that morning. Time slowed as we listened to the news, abandoned our agenda, rolled in a TV, and began watching what was happening. Then, after a period of numbness, a sense of urgency arose as we realized this was not just a New York City tragedy but rather a national disaster. That awareness led us to a decision to hold a city-wide interfaith service at my church that evening. Typically, such a service involves weeks of planning; we had only a few hours. As president of the clergy association, I called the mayor. He was pleased to hear what we were proposing. I felt a sense of honor to host this event and a responsibility to give myself that task. Years later, when I looked back on what happened at that service, I discovered a lesson that has served me well when practicing speaking without a script.
As I watched the sanctuary fill, I was afraid, not of speaking, but of the possibility of other attacks in small cities like ours. That fear began to subside when I looked at the mayor, a profoundly religious man, who was sitting in the front pew. His Catholic faith lit the darkness and reminded me that my faith called me to be a light in dark times. Wisdom and religious traditions worldwide teach followers that positive energy is released when you freely give yourself to help others. The Buddist Sutra of Forty-two Sections puts the opportunity clearly:
The Buddha said, “When you see someone practicing the Way of giving, aid him joyously and you will obtain vast and great blessing.” A shramana asked, Is there an end to those blessings?” The Buddha said, “Consider the flame of a single lamp. Though a hundred thousand people come and light their own lamp from it so that they can cook their food and ward off the darkness, the first lamp remains the same as before.
The mayor’s pastoral presence and words, spoken from his heart without a text, were a gift to everyone in the sanctuary. As I received his gift, my sense of gratitude deepened, and I felt honored to serve as pastor and pass a comforting light to others. This simple awareness allowed me to focus on giving that gift away. As I left the sanctuary that evening, I told myself I would try to think of every speaking engagement as an opportunity to share the positive energy that flows from the spiritual practice of grateful giving.
Hints For Your Practice
Practice Grateful Giving
Visualize the setting for your next presentation and center yourself there with these questions:
Why was I asked to speak to this group? Answer this by recalling your mentors and teachers and how they prepared you to speak. What do I know and appreciate about those who invited me? Do I consider it a privilege to talk to them and, if so, why? What qualities of personal generosity (giving freely of oneself) do I want to bring to my preparation and delivery?
Center yourself with a poem, reading, or scripture that calls you to be grateful and generous. Refer to it as you prepare. Select a single phrase or line and reflect on it briefly before going to sleep.
Create a few lines of personal and heartfelt gratitude and generosity and share these in your presentation, instead of the predictable “it’s a privilege to be here.”
Next Steps
Small-Group Discussion
In the safety of a small group zoom room Stephen Shick, founder of Speaking by Heart will facilitate a discussion on how to start or take your next steps in your practice of speaking without a script. Participation is limited to six.
Wednesday, October 13
12-1:30 PM (ET)
Register Here
Words to Free Your Spirit
The Sun Never Says
Even
After
All this time
The sun never says to the earth,
“You owe
Me”
Look
What happens
With a love like that,
It lights the
Whole
Sky.
Hafiz
If you are old enough to remember 9/11, you probably can recall where you were when you heard terrorists had attacked the Twin Towers in New York City. I was at an Interfaith Clergy Association meeting that morning. Time slowed as we listened to the news, abandoned our agenda, rolled in a TV, and began watching what was happening. Then, after a period of numbness, a sense of urgency arose as we realized this was not just a New York City tragedy but rather a national disaster. That awareness led us to a decision to hold a city-wide interfaith service at my church that evening. Typically, such a service involves weeks of planning; we had only a few hours. As president of the clergy association, I called the mayor. He was pleased to hear what we were proposing. I felt a sense of honor to host this event and a responsibility to give myself that task. Years later, when I looked back on what happened at that service, I discovered a lesson that has served me well when practicing speaking without a script.
As I watched the sanctuary fill, I was afraid, not of speaking, but of the possibility of other attacks in small cities like ours. That fear began to subside when I looked at the mayor, a profoundly religious man, who was sitting in the front pew. His Catholic faith lit the darkness and reminded me that my faith called me to be a light in dark times. Wisdom and religious traditions worldwide teach followers that positive energy is released when you freely give yourself to help others. The Buddist Sutra of Forty-two Sections puts the opportunity clearly:
The Buddha said, “When you see someone practicing the Way of giving, aid him joyously and you will obtain vast and great blessing.” A shramana asked, Is there an end to those blessings?” The Buddha said, “Consider the flame of a single lamp. Though a hundred thousand people come and light their own lamp from it so that they can cook their food and ward off the darkness, the first lamp remains the same as before.
The mayor’s pastoral presence and words, spoken from his heart without a text, were a gift to everyone in the sanctuary. As I received his gift, my sense of gratitude deepened, and I felt honored to serve as pastor and pass a comforting light to others. This simple awareness allowed me to focus on giving that gift away. As I left the sanctuary that evening, I told myself I would try to think of every speaking engagement as an opportunity to share the positive energy that flows from the spiritual practice of grateful giving.
Hints For Your Practice
Practice Grateful Giving
Visualize the setting for your next presentation and center yourself there with these questions:
Why was I asked to speak to this group? Answer this by recalling your mentors and teachers and how they prepared you to speak. What do I know and appreciate about those who invited me? Do I consider it a privilege to talk to them and, if so, why? What qualities of personal generosity (giving freely of oneself) do I want to bring to my preparation and delivery?
Center yourself with a poem, reading, or scripture that calls you to be grateful and generous. Refer to it as you prepare. Select a single phrase or line and reflect on it briefly before going to sleep.
Create a few lines of personal and heartfelt gratitude and generosity and share these in your presentation, instead of the predictable “it’s a privilege to be here.”
Next Steps
Small-Group Discussion
In the safety of a small group zoom room Stephen Shick, founder of Speaking by Heart will facilitate a discussion on how to start or take your next steps in your practice of speaking without a script. Participation is limited to six.
Wednesday, October 13
12-1:30 PM (ET)
Register Here
Words to Free Your Spirit
The Sun Never Says
Even
After
All this time
The sun never says to the earth,
“You owe
Me”
Look
What happens
With a love like that,
It lights the
Whole
Sky.
Hafiz
July 2021
Wandering
a spiritual practice for public speakers
I mostly walk on well-trodden paths. This is true whether I am walking in the woods or reading in my study. I have encountered new places that excite me and thoughts that challenge and comfort me on these paths. In the woods, the contours of the path predetermine where I place my next steps. In my study, words and categories of thought guide me. I have found enjoyment and insight in traveling this way. When preparing for a speech, I saturate myself in the subject, stories, studies, perspectives, and poetry. When my head and heart are brimming, I sit down and combine and distill all I have collected onto a mind-map that will guide me while speaking.
In the woods, with no thought of my next task, I wander. Lured by the morning sunlight moving leaves and branches, I change my direction to gain perspective. There, in unmarked territory, growing liches on a beetle-infested ash tree beckon my examination. On my way to see them, I catch a glimpse of a Lady Slipper. Kneeling next to it, touching its delicate beauty with my eyes, time and purpose vanish into awe and wonder.
Wandering among my books, I often kneel or stretch to reach to what calls out “read me again.” And I do. I spot an old friend, Meditations of the Heart by Howard Thurman, and read. And then, while reflecting on a well-marked passage, I see Robin Wall Kimmmerer’s Braiding Sweetgrass on the corner of my desk. “Come read a little more of me,” it says. Without purpose or task, I read for a while until the next distraction arrives unannounced.
In Rooted: Life at the Crossroads of Science, Nature, and Spirit, Lyanda Lynn Haupt shares a new perspective on wandering offered by psychologist and molecular biologist Jon Kabat-Zinn. Kabat-Zinn’s widely acknowledged mindfulness-based stress reduction work is a practical health application of the sitting meditation and daily mindfulness practices of Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh. Haupt comments:
In newer studies, Kabat-Zinn and other clinical psychologists are turning the question around: what if, instead of working to focus on the present moment, it is just as mindful to follow the mind where it wants to go, to let it wander? Kabat-Zinn adopted Krishnamurti’s phrase "choiceless awareness" to describe this more meandering meditation. The practitioner is encouraged to follow her distractions during meditation and so, ironically, not become distracted by them. Instead of intense focus, aimless wandering of both mind and body allow a renewed sense of calm responsiveness to our lives and world.
Speaking by Heart encourages the use of mindful spiritual practices to accomplish speaking without a manuscript. Wandering is another mindful practice you might want to consider during your speech preparation. Simply set aside all the thoughts and considerations you have about your presentation and wander for a while. I’ll be doing that in August and will be writing this newsletter. The next issue of Hints will be in September. Enjoy your wandering.
Hints For Your Practice
Use this poem as preparation for wandering.
Do Nothing
Practice doing nothing each day.
Not the whole day
but that part of it when your soul feels pinched and shoved
and crammed into the end your pen, pressed against a deadline
or the cushion of your computer chair, or hanging on the request
from someone who wants one more thing from you and you can’t say no.
Practice doing nothing each day.
Make it a religious thing that binds you to a truth that can only be
experienced, like when you breathe out and it empties you
of all that presses against your chest from the inside until it spills out of you
in angry words or impatient deeds.
Practice doing nothing each day.
Fill your day with moments of nothingness, little ones at first, then stretch them,
pull them until the muscles of all your undoing ache, like that time you felt
them collapse after a long run, a hard swim, a heavy lift—as you heaved
the last time before you said, “Enough.”
Practice doing nothing each day.
Until all your doings yield to a new habit that demand you do nothing
and do it consciously, with your eyes wide open,
mindfully, without attachment,
skillfully, with balanced acts of waiting,
before you return to the world of all your doing.
From Be the Change
Stephen Shick
Next Steps
Small-Group Discussion
In the safety of a small group zoom room Stephen Shick, founder of Speaking by Heart will facilitate a discussion on how to start or take your next steps in your practice of speaking without a script. Participation is limited to six.
Thursday, September 9th
12-1:30 PM (ET)
Register Here
Words to Free Your Spirit
When I am Among the Trees
Mary Oliver
When I am among the trees,
especially the willow and honey locust,
equally the beech, the oak and the pines,
they give off such hints of gladness,
I would almost say they save me,
and daily.
I am so distant from the hope of myself,
in which I have goodness, and discernment,
and never hurry through the world
but walk slowly, and bow often.
Around me the trees stir in their leaves
and call out, ‘Stay awhile.”
The light flows from their branches.
And they call again, “Its simple,” they say,
“and you too have come into the world
to do this, to go easy,
to be filled with light, and to shine.”
from Thirst,
Beacon Press 2007
I mostly walk on well-trodden paths. This is true whether I am walking in the woods or reading in my study. I have encountered new places that excite me and thoughts that challenge and comfort me on these paths. In the woods, the contours of the path predetermine where I place my next steps. In my study, words and categories of thought guide me. I have found enjoyment and insight in traveling this way. When preparing for a speech, I saturate myself in the subject, stories, studies, perspectives, and poetry. When my head and heart are brimming, I sit down and combine and distill all I have collected onto a mind-map that will guide me while speaking.
In the woods, with no thought of my next task, I wander. Lured by the morning sunlight moving leaves and branches, I change my direction to gain perspective. There, in unmarked territory, growing liches on a beetle-infested ash tree beckon my examination. On my way to see them, I catch a glimpse of a Lady Slipper. Kneeling next to it, touching its delicate beauty with my eyes, time and purpose vanish into awe and wonder.
Wandering among my books, I often kneel or stretch to reach to what calls out “read me again.” And I do. I spot an old friend, Meditations of the Heart by Howard Thurman, and read. And then, while reflecting on a well-marked passage, I see Robin Wall Kimmmerer’s Braiding Sweetgrass on the corner of my desk. “Come read a little more of me,” it says. Without purpose or task, I read for a while until the next distraction arrives unannounced.
In Rooted: Life at the Crossroads of Science, Nature, and Spirit, Lyanda Lynn Haupt shares a new perspective on wandering offered by psychologist and molecular biologist Jon Kabat-Zinn. Kabat-Zinn’s widely acknowledged mindfulness-based stress reduction work is a practical health application of the sitting meditation and daily mindfulness practices of Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh. Haupt comments:
In newer studies, Kabat-Zinn and other clinical psychologists are turning the question around: what if, instead of working to focus on the present moment, it is just as mindful to follow the mind where it wants to go, to let it wander? Kabat-Zinn adopted Krishnamurti’s phrase "choiceless awareness" to describe this more meandering meditation. The practitioner is encouraged to follow her distractions during meditation and so, ironically, not become distracted by them. Instead of intense focus, aimless wandering of both mind and body allow a renewed sense of calm responsiveness to our lives and world.
Speaking by Heart encourages the use of mindful spiritual practices to accomplish speaking without a manuscript. Wandering is another mindful practice you might want to consider during your speech preparation. Simply set aside all the thoughts and considerations you have about your presentation and wander for a while. I’ll be doing that in August and will be writing this newsletter. The next issue of Hints will be in September. Enjoy your wandering.
Hints For Your Practice
Use this poem as preparation for wandering.
Do Nothing
Practice doing nothing each day.
Not the whole day
but that part of it when your soul feels pinched and shoved
and crammed into the end your pen, pressed against a deadline
or the cushion of your computer chair, or hanging on the request
from someone who wants one more thing from you and you can’t say no.
Practice doing nothing each day.
Make it a religious thing that binds you to a truth that can only be
experienced, like when you breathe out and it empties you
of all that presses against your chest from the inside until it spills out of you
in angry words or impatient deeds.
Practice doing nothing each day.
Fill your day with moments of nothingness, little ones at first, then stretch them,
pull them until the muscles of all your undoing ache, like that time you felt
them collapse after a long run, a hard swim, a heavy lift—as you heaved
the last time before you said, “Enough.”
Practice doing nothing each day.
Until all your doings yield to a new habit that demand you do nothing
and do it consciously, with your eyes wide open,
mindfully, without attachment,
skillfully, with balanced acts of waiting,
before you return to the world of all your doing.
From Be the Change
Stephen Shick
Next Steps
Small-Group Discussion
In the safety of a small group zoom room Stephen Shick, founder of Speaking by Heart will facilitate a discussion on how to start or take your next steps in your practice of speaking without a script. Participation is limited to six.
Thursday, September 9th
12-1:30 PM (ET)
Register Here
Words to Free Your Spirit
When I am Among the Trees
Mary Oliver
When I am among the trees,
especially the willow and honey locust,
equally the beech, the oak and the pines,
they give off such hints of gladness,
I would almost say they save me,
and daily.
I am so distant from the hope of myself,
in which I have goodness, and discernment,
and never hurry through the world
but walk slowly, and bow often.
Around me the trees stir in their leaves
and call out, ‘Stay awhile.”
The light flows from their branches.
And they call again, “Its simple,” they say,
“and you too have come into the world
to do this, to go easy,
to be filled with light, and to shine.”
from Thirst,
Beacon Press 2007
Hints
June 2021
The Speaking by Heart Monthly Newsletter
Memorization
a spiritual discipline for Speaking by Heart
a spiritual discipline for Speaking by Heart
Memorization is a spirit freeing discipline that can lift you off the written page when speaking publicly. Not only will memorizing enable you to insert poems, scriptures, and wisdom sayings into your talk, but the practice will fill your mind with images and phrases that will flow as you speak.
I recently pulled a treasured journal off my shelf filled with over a hundred poems, scriptures, and wisdom literature I have memorized. Some are long, like Maya Angelou’s On the Pulse of Morning that takes five minutes to recite. Others are short, this one, for example, by Rumi that I recently wrote into that journal.
My soul is a furnace
happy with the fire.
Love, too, is a furnace,
and ego its fuel.
Rumi, Mathnawi II 1376-1377
I memorized most pieces in this collection during the last twenty years while I was a parish ministry. Others stretch further back. As I read them now, I recall some of the circumstances where I used them. For example, early in my ministry, I recited May Sarton’s The Phoenix Again at the close of a graveside memorial service. I had not planned to use it that day, but it rushed into my heart, demanding to be set free. The positive comments I received encouraged me to memorize more.
When you consciously memorize to enhance your speaking, you travel the path of those peripatetic prophets that taught their followers in the oral tradition before the arrival of the printed word. Without a gigabyte of digitized memory, they electrified eager audiences with their wisdom and memorized stories. Through standard formulas and well-worn rhythmic patterns, these elegant orators drew listeners in and opened their hearts.
In the Islamic tradition, a Hafiz or Hafiza is someone who has memorized the Qur’an and is, therefore, considered the guardian of the faith. Reciting the Qur’an is placed alongside the most important acts of worship. By reciting scripture, a person accumulates eternal reward. Anyone aspiring to such challenging memorization is encouraged to practice recitation wherever they are: driving, cooking, walking, or simply sitting. Rumi certainly had memorized portions, if not the entire Qu’ran. That internalization shaped his poetry. I can imagine those in Rumi’s Mevlevi Order whirling their sacred dances with memorized words from the Qur’an flowing from their lips. Scribes, the legend goes, caught Rumi’s words in this way and put them on paper.
Each of us has moments in our day when we can memorize items for long- and short-term storage. Cleaning the refrigerator, doing the dishes, waiting for an appointment, or commuting to work are all moments to memorize. I swim each morning. There in the pool, while doing my warm-up laps, I recite and learn poetry. When I reach full speed and am “in the zone,” I abandon my thoughts and words. While slowing down, the items I am memorizing come back. Then I begin reciting them again.
Take a moment right now and list the songs, sayings, or scriptures you “know by heart.” Then, select one or two to incorporate into the mind map of your next talk. This will help build comfort with using other people’s words to express or contrast with your thoughts.
Memorizing selected elements will benefit you in three ways:
1.) You will take in beautiful words to guide your day-to-day living while quieting your mind from all other distractions.
2.) These words are ready to be taken out any time you speak.
3.) Memorized words will influence your speech or remarks’ descriptive color, rhythm, and flow. This will happen without planning.
4.) Memorize items that move your heart. Incorporate these into your secular, religious, or spiritual practice, such as meditations, prayers, or centering rituals.
Hints For Your Practice
Use these tried and proven memorization aids:
Practice, practice, practice. Recall, repeat, recite.
Draw or place a picture on your mind map. Then put your map down and see how easily you remember the picture. Images provide one of the most potent memory tools.
Use alliterations (repetition of usually the initial consonant sounds in two or more neighboring words or syllables, e.g., Black bug bit a big black bear). And use acronyms (a word created from the initial letter or letters of other words, e.g., NATO) to remember subheadings on your mind map.
Break the piece you are memorizing into sections and work on one section at a time.
Use rhythms and rhyming to remember and connect items.
Words to Free Your Spirit
If you’re serious about being spiritually strong and mature, the greatest habit you can develop is memorizing scripture. You don’t want to be a spiritual baby anymore. It’s time to grow up and live the blessed life you’re meant to live. Hiding God’s Word in your heart is an important way to start…you will always have God’s Word with you and you can meditate on it wherever you go..
Rev. Rick Warren
Rev. Rick Warren
Next Steps
Small-Group Discussion
In the safety of a small group zoom room Stephen Shick, founder of Speaking by Heart will facilitate a discussion on how to start or take your next steps in your practice of speaking without a script. Participation is limited to six.
Thursday, September 9th
12-1:30 PM (ET)
Register Here
Small-Group Discussion
In the safety of a small group zoom room Stephen Shick, founder of Speaking by Heart will facilitate a discussion on how to start or take your next steps in your practice of speaking without a script. Participation is limited to six.
Thursday, September 9th
12-1:30 PM (ET)
Register Here
Words to Free Your Spirit
If you’re serious about being spiritually strong and mature, the greatest habit you can develop is memorizing scripture. You don’t want to be a spiritual baby anymore. It’s time to grow up and live the blessed life you’re meant to live. Hiding God’s Word in your heart is an important way to start…you will always have God’s Word with you and you can meditate on it wherever you go..
Rev. Rick Warren
If you’re serious about being spiritually strong and mature, the greatest habit you can develop is memorizing scripture. You don’t want to be a spiritual baby anymore. It’s time to grow up and live the blessed life you’re meant to live. Hiding God’s Word in your heart is an important way to start…you will always have God’s Word with you and you can meditate on it wherever you go..
Rev. Rick Warren
Hints
May 2021
The Speaking by Heart Monthly Newsletter
May 2021
The Speaking by Heart Monthly Newsletter
Purposeful Waiting
In the waiting moments before you speak, before you say a word, your body is speaking to your audience. Picture this: There you are waiting to be introduced and those gathered are looking at you. Those waiting to hear you are making instant judgments based on their own set of experiences and perspectives. They like your clothes. They don't like your nose. They like your hair but are not sure about your shoes. Your rigid or casual posture puts them on edge. You remind them of their much-despised uncle, or if you are lucky, their loving aunt. Scientists tell us all this happens in milliseconds. Whether their impressions are right or wrong, you cannot change them. You can, however, control your own body and use it mindfully. Awareness of your whole body in these waiting moments will help you come alive for your audience when you start to speak.
There are three considerations to keep in mind in the waiting moments. First, detach from those anticipatory anxieties about what you will say by taking a few slow deep breaths and telling yourself the simple truth that all has been done that can be done, and you are ready to speak. Remind yourself that those "butterflies" you may be feeling are gifts of the spirit that will help you fly once you start talking. As you continue mindful breathing, you might want to recite a brief prayer, poem, or mantra. Second, be aware and engaged with the setting and everyone around you. Enjoy yourself. Look at those gathered, not with a general gaze above their heads. Instead, touch them individually with your eyes and facial expressions. Feel the two-way flow of energy from their bodies to yours and back again.
Finally, assess how visible you will be from the designated location of your speech. If you feel that the lectern or podium conceals too much of you and you see a space where you can stand and still be seen, by all means, make the bold move. Do this slowly and deliberately. This is where you will state your appreciation for the opportunity to speak, make your first point, or tell your first story.
I once watched a young climate change activist gracefully conquer a stage set-up that was concealing her. Everyone was to speak from behind a podium where only their heads and shoulders were visible to the audience. When her turn came, she went to the podium as expected and started her talk. Then, with confidence, she walked from behind the podium and stood center stage. That changed everything. She was no longer "the next speaker" or "next talking head." Instead, she was now directly engaged with her audience. You could feel the energy in the room become two-directional, flowing from the audience to her and back again.
Not everyone can physically do what this young woman did, and some settings are impossible to change. Don't assume, however, that there are no alternatives. If possible, explore options with your host before the program begins. Your goal is to maximize your visibility and energy flow between you and your audience. This energy flow is part of the mystery of human communication. I consider 'staying aware of this flow' while speaking a spiritual discipline, a practice that helps me and my message come alive in the moment.
Hints for Your Practice
Make “waiting moments” part of your rehearsal. Sit quietly and imagine the setting for your upcoming speech. Doing this for two or three minutes will help you be more comfortable and relaxed while waiting. If you know your audience imagine their faces and personalities.
Small Group
Practice Session
Thursday, May 27th
12-1:30 PM (ET)
Last Session until September
Registration limited
Come prepared to share a 3-4 minute script-less talk in the safety of a small group zoom room. Stephen Shick, founder of Speaking by Heart, will facilitate this informal session that will prepare you to use the power that is within you to speak without notes or manuscript. Whether you're just beginning, or have been practicing for a while, this session will give you techniques and build your confidence. It will help you make your speech preparation and delivery a spiritual discipline that will help you share your heart's passions with others.
Participation limited to six.
Register Here
Words to Free Your Spirit
Whenever we are between here and there, whenever one thing has ended and we’re waiting for the next thing to begin, whenever we’re tempted to distract ourselves or look for an escape route, we can instead let ourselves be open, curious, tentative, vulnerable.
Pema Chodron, Welcoming the Unwelcome
Hints
April 2021
The Speaking by Heart Monthly Newsletter
April 2021
The Speaking by Heart Monthly Newsletter
The Meaning of Your Life
Is In Your Next Presentation
He made it so far with his research manuscript hidden in his clothing. It traveled with him several days among 80 others crammed into a train car. His carefully craft words were in his clothing when someone read, then yelled, the name on the sign seen out the window – Auschwitz. He kept those papers hidden as he stood before the man who pointed him to the right, those who went left went directly to the ovens. Then in the disinfecting chamber all possession were collected by the guards including Viktor Frankl’s concealed manuscript.
Frankl’s best-selling book Man’s Search for Meaning captured what he discovered in that Nazi concentration camp when everything that had given his life meaning was stripped from him. "Man's search for meaning,” he wrote, “is a primary force in his life and not a secondary rationalization of instinctual drives. This meaning is unique and specific in that it must and can be fulfilled by him alone; only then does it achieve a significance that will satisfy his own will to meaning.” Frankl understood this will or quest for meaning to be an integral part of being human that could not be generalized. Rather, meaning could only be discovered in the lived and changing moments of life. He purposefully separated this dynamic force within us from religious concepts and thought of it as a spiritual dimension that gave us both the freedom and the responsibility to discover meaning in every circumstance, even in a death camp.
Recently, as I was preparing a memorial service for a much loved nephew, elements of Frankl’s logotherapy (meaning therapy) came to mind. While relating them to my task I began to see how they applied to Speaking by Heart. I offer what I found for your reflection as you practice the art of speaking without a script.
Frankl observed three ways meaning can be discovered in life:
1) by doing, accomplishing, or achieving something. Frankl makes a strong distinction between doing something that makes “self-actualization or accomplishment” an end goal and something that is done as a means to something that has a transcending purpose. My purpose for carefully preparing that memorial service was not just to apply the skills I had learned and practiced for years, but to be fully present in the moment in order to create a space for others to grieve and heal. In that sense, the meaning I wanted to create transcended the meaning of my accomplishments and allowed me to know that what I was doing was “all about me, and not about me at all.”
2) experiencing a value such as an inspiration from nature or the love of others. Frankl’s logo therapy fosters awareness that every situations presents an opportunity to discover meaning. This choice remains even when you are standing naked in a “disinfecting chamber.” The spirit of love is a meaning creating human power that resides in everyone. Love is, Frankl says, “. . .the only way to grasp another human being in the inmost core of his personality. . . the loving person enables the beloved person to actualize. . .potentialities.” Reading those lines while preparing the service for my nephew was a reminder that expressing love to those gathered could release the power of healing love. Personally, I also found a related meaning in another part of Frankl’s story. While separated from his wife, who died in the camp, Frankl experienced the meaning making power of her love.
3) by suffering. Suffering, as all life’s experiences, has the meaning we find in it. On that rainy morning when the casket of my nephew was approaching the gave site, there was no happiness to be found among those gathered. What was present was inescapable sadness and suffering. Frankl made clear, however, that even at such moment we are called upon to choose meaning, the meaning suffering pulls from us. Speaking publicly in the midst of personal or societal suffering we are asked to discover meaning in suffering. “ Suffering ceases to be suffering in some way,” Frankl says, “at the moment it finds a meaning. . .”
The preparation and delivery of your next public speech is an opportunity to explore and express the meaning you find in your subject and the circumstance of your presentation.
Hints for Your Practice
Ask these questions to understand how your speaking relates to the “meaning of your life” or your relationship with a transcendent purpose or God.
Why am I speaking at all?
How does what I have to say relate to the “meaning of my life?”
Small Group
Zoom Session
Thursday April 15th
12-1:30 PM (ET)
Register Here
In the safety of a small group zoom room Stephen Shick, founder of Speaking by Heart will facilitate a discussion on how to start, or take your next steps, in your practice of speaking without a script. Participation limited to six.
Words To Free Your Spirit*
Love goes very far beyond the physical person of the beloved. It finds its deepest meaning in his spiritual being, his inner self. Whether or not he is actually present, whether or not he is still alive at all, ceases somehow to be of importance.
********
By declaring that man is a responsible creature and must actualize the potential meaning of his life, I wish to stress that the true meaning of life is to be found in the world rather than within manor or his own psyche, as though it were a closed system. By the same token, the real aim of human existence cannot be found in what is called self-actualization. Human existence is essentially self-transcendence rather than self-actualization. Self-actualization is not a possible aim at all, for the simple reason that the more a man would strive for it, the more he would miss it. For only to the extent to which man commits to the fulfillment of his life’s meaning, to this extent he also actualizes himself. In other words, self-actualization cannot be attained if it is made and end in itself, but only as a side effect of self-transcendence.
Viktor Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning
*please read with your own inclusive language
Hints
April 2021
The Speaking by Heart Monthly Newsletter
Visit Our Website
The Meaning of Your Life
Is In Your Next Presentation
He made it so far with his research manuscript hidden in his clothing. It traveled with him several days among 80 others crammed into a train car. His carefully craft words were in his clothing when someone read, then yelled, the name on the sign seen out the window – Auschwitz. He kept those papers hidden as he stood before the man who pointed him to the right, those who went left went directly to the ovens. Then in the disinfecting chamber all possession were collected by the guards including Viktor Frankl’s concealed manuscript.
Frankl’s best-selling book Man’s Search for Meaning captured what he discovered in that Nazi concentration camp when everything that had given his life meaning was stripped from him. "Man's search for meaning,” he wrote, “is a primary force in his life and not a secondary rationalization of instinctual drives. This meaning is unique and specific in that it must and can be fulfilled by him alone; only then does it achieve a significance that will satisfy his own will to meaning.” Frankl understood this will or quest for meaning to be an integral part of being human that could not be generalized. Rather, meaning could only be discovered in the lived and changing moments of life. He purposefully separated this dynamic force within us from religious concepts and thought of it as a spiritual dimension that gave us both the freedom and the responsibility to discover meaning in every circumstance, even in a death camp.
Recently, as I was preparing a memorial service for a much loved nephew, elements of Frankl’s logotherapy (meaning therapy) came to mind. While relating them to my task I began to see how they applied to Speaking by Heart. I offer what I found for your reflection as you practice the art of speaking without a script.
Frankl observed three ways meaning can be discovered in life:
1) by doing, accomplishing, or achieving something. Frankl makes a strong distinction between doing something that makes “self-actualization or accomplishment” an end goal and something that is done as a means to something that has a transcending purpose. My purpose for carefully preparing that memorial service was not just to apply the skills I had learned and practiced for years, but to be fully present in the moment in order to create a space for others to grieve and heal. In that sense, the meaning I wanted to create transcended the meaning of my accomplishments and allowed me to know that what I was doing was “all about me, and not about me at all.”
2) experiencing a value such as an inspiration from nature or the love of others. Frankl’s logo therapy fosters awareness that every situations presents an opportunity to discover meaning. This choice remains even when you are standing naked in a “disinfecting chamber.” The spirit of love is a meaning creating human power that resides in everyone. Love is, Frankl says, “. . .the only way to grasp another human being in the inmost core of his personality. . . the loving person enables the beloved person to actualize. . .potentialities.” Reading those lines while preparing the service for my nephew was a reminder that expressing love to those gathered could release the power of healing love. Personally, I also found a related meaning in another part of Frankl’s story. While separated from his wife, who died in the camp, Frankl experienced the meaning making power of her love.
3) by suffering. Suffering, as all life’s experiences, has the meaning we find in it. On that rainy morning when the casket of my nephew was approaching the gave site, there was no happiness to be found among those gathered. What was present was inescapable sadness and suffering. Frankl made clear, however, that even at such moment we are called upon to choose meaning, the meaning suffering pulls from us. Speaking publicly in the midst of personal or societal suffering we are asked to discover meaning in suffering. “ Suffering ceases to be suffering in some way,” Frankl says, “at the moment it finds a meaning. . .”
The preparation and delivery of your next public speech is an opportunity to explore and express the meaning you find in your subject and the circumstance of your presentation.
Hints for Your Practice
Ask these questions to understand how your speaking relates to the “meaning of your life” or your relationship with a transcendent purpose or God.
Why am I speaking at all?
How does what I have to say relate to the “meaning of my life?”
Small Group
Zoom Session
Thursday April 15th
12-1:30 PM (ET)
Register Here
In the safety of a small group zoom room Stephen Shick, founder of Speaking by Heart will facilitate a discussion on how to start, or take your next steps, in your practice of speaking without a script. Participation limited to six.
Words To Free Your Spirit*
Love goes very far beyond the physical person of the beloved. It finds its deepest meaning in his spiritual being, his inner self. Whether or not he is actually present, whether or not he is still alive at all, ceases somehow to be of importance.
********
By declaring that man is a responsible creature and must actualize the potential meaning of his life, I wish to stress that the true meaning of life is to be found in the world rather than within manor or his own psyche, as though it were a closed system. By the same token, the real aim of human existence cannot be found in what is called self-actualization. Human existence is essentially self-transcendence rather than self-actualization. Self-actualization is not a possible aim at all, for the simple reason that the more a man would strive for it, the more he would miss it. For only to the extent to which man commits to the fulfillment of his life’s meaning, to this extent he also actualizes himself. In other words, self-actualization cannot be attained if it is made and end in itself, but only as a side effect of self-transcendence.
Viktor Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning
*please read with your own inclusive language
Hints
March 2021
March 2021
Face Your Fear with Love
There you are on the stage, platform, or at eye-level speaking to your audience. There you are alone, so it seems, and vulnerable. For millions of people just speaking publicly, let alone speaking without at a script, is a fate worse, or equal to, death.
Honestly facing your fear can release the confidence needed to speak effectively without a manuscript. Consider this an act of love, a spiritual discipline. James Baldwin linked fear and love this way:
Love takes off the masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within. I use the word “love” here not merely in the personal sense but as a state of being, or a state of grace – not in the infantile American sense of being made happy but in the tough and universal sense of quest and daring and growth.
Chogyam Trungpa, founder of Naropa University in Boulder, Colorado, the first Buddhist-inspired university in North America, points us to a mindful state for facing and reducing fear that is useful for speakers: When we connect with other human beings, we touch into our creativity as human beings, we begin to expand our world. That is the expression of fearlessness. We are being encouraged here to feel an intimate connection with our audience. From this perspective fearfulness is an expression of a closed heart that feels the need for protection. Fearfully you close your heart to the compassionate connections you could make with your audience. Out of fear you don’t see that your audience wants to connect with you, wants you to be real, and wants you to succeed.
In When Women Were Birds author and conservation activist Terry Tempest Williams confesses that “I still tremble each time I stand up to speak.” This fear, she explains, comes from deep within me as I remembers a childhood lisp. But then she opens her “quivering heart” and connects with her audience which changes everything.
I pause, look around the room, find whose eyes are present, and orient myself like a compass, remembering that words are much stronger than I am. I take a deep breath and side-step my fear and begin speaking from the place where beauty and bravery meet – within the chamber of a quivering heart.
From a Christian perspective you might say, as the writer of John did, “There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear” (I John 4:20). From these words the Christian tradition teaches a compassionate, selfless, and self-respecting love. With love like this, protecting your ego is unnecessary and counterproductive. In both Christian and Buddhist traditions love and loving-kindness have the power to transform fear of speaking without a script by breaking down all sense of separation.
In his classic book The Art of Loving, Jewish psychologist Erich Fromm notes, “The awareness of human separation, without reunion by love—is the source of shame. It is at the same time the source of guilt and anxiety.” Fromm asserts that overcoming separation is a universal challenge presented and answered by all cultures. Further, he believes it is the question of “how to achieve union, how to transcend one’s own individual life and find atonement.” Some call this “at-one-ment.”
Transforming public speaking fears into life-affirming love that unifies you with your audience requires practice, experience and positive thinking. Begin now to think of your next opportunity to speak without a script as an act of love.
Hints for Your Practice
Begin facing your fear by ask yourself: What am I afraid of when speaking? Make a list. Hold it to your heart and say “holy, holy.” Look at the list again and divide it into three categories:
1) fear of not being a good communicator, i.e. not having the skills and knowledge to share with others. These fears can be addressed by further study and knowledge and deepening your commitment to skillfully share what you know.
2) fear of being judged and evaluated by your audience. These fears are generally more anxiety producing because they are about your ego’s view of who you are. Use spiritual practices like prayer and meditation to help you to vanish as an end and remain purely as a means.
3) other sources for your fear of speaking
Quiet yourself and breathe deeply. Breathe in your anxiety and fear. Breathe out peace and joy.
Say: “It will be so!” and mean it. This statement of your intention to speak without a script can change the outcome. Talk to yourself only with words of encouragement. Be your own cheerleader. Avoid reviewing any list of “don’ts” you may have created, especially during the days right before you speak.
Gather a group of friends and colleagues and do the Befriending Fear Small Group exercise found on the Speaking by Heart website.
Small Group Zoom Session
Thursday April 15, 2021
12-1:30 PM (ET)
Register Here
In the safety of a small group zoom room Stephen Shick, founder of Speaking by Heart will facilitate a discussion on how to start, or take your next steps, in your practice of speaking without a script.
Participation limited to six.
Thursday April 15, 2021
12-1:30 PM (ET)
Register Here
In the safety of a small group zoom room Stephen Shick, founder of Speaking by Heart will facilitate a discussion on how to start, or take your next steps, in your practice of speaking without a script.
Participation limited to six.
Words To Free Your Spirit
The encouraging thing is that every time you meet a situation, though you may think at the time it is an impossibility and you go through the tortures of the dammed, once you have met it and lived through it you find that forever after you are freer than you ever were before. If you can live through that you can live through anything. You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, 'I lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.
Eleanor Roosevelt
Hints
February 2021
Would You "say a few words"?
Saturating yourself in your subject, memorize images and words on your mind map and practicing until you are confident that your words will flow naturally from your thoughts are spirit-freeing practices that can help you prepare and deliver your speech without a script. These Speaking by Heart practices can also help you when you are called upon to make impromptu remarks or give spontaneous prayers.
One of the best ways to be ready for that impromptu invitation to “say a few words” is to have a simple formula in mind that has a beginning, middle and end. Your beginning might be to express your gratitude for being asked to speak and for being with those who are gathered. Your middle could be comments on something you share in common with your audience (something that is heartfelt), or a thought on the theme or subject of the gathering. Your conclusion can be a restatement of your gratitude and the importance of the gathering. If you are asked to pray “on the spot” you might use a similar formula. Begin by asking those gathered to join you in the spirit of prayer, then pause and say some opening words. I use “Spirit of Life, God of Love.” Next, describe with heartfelt words and images the moment, the occasion, or the common interest you share with those gathered. Finally conclude with words of gratitude and a repetition of the theme or subject of the gathering.
Your formula you is the container for the content you carry in your heart and mind. Jazz performers offer a good way to think about the content of your impromptu words. These musicians have a repertoire of musical phrases and notes that they have practiced over and over again which they can draw upon and blend together at a moment’s notice. In The Jazz of Preaching, Kirk Byron Jones compares extemporaneous speaking to the jazz of Wynton Marsalis: “The best jazz improvisers draw from wells of notes, phrases, songs, and performances that they have played over and over again, alone and with others. Such practicing in the jazz world is called shedding or wood-shedding. Such arduous preparation creates a sense of musical fitness or “rightness.”
Bass player and singer Esperanza Spalding rose to stardom when she became the first jazz performer to win a Grammy Award for Best New Artist in 2011. In a January 2020 interview with Walter Isaacson, President of the Aspen Institute, she equates jazz preparation with spiritual practices:
You can say the same way that we strive to maintain a certain kind of
spiritual hygiene, you know, you meditate, you go to church, you pray,
you study, we strive to develop that spirit that we all are imbued with. I
think jazz is similar. It’s a spirit. It’s an energy and it’s our responsibility
as practitioners to steward it and to have good hygiene and good practice.
To make sure that it’s moving through us at a high resonance that it is
doing good when it comes out of our body or as we hold it in our body. . .
The deeper your well of spirit-freeing practices, memorized words, scriptures, wisdom sayings and thought-provoking images the better prepared you will be when someone asks you, on a moment’s notice, to “say a few words,” or “offer a prayer.”
With your formula in mind and your repertoire established you are almost ready to speak whenever asked. The only thing needed is the ability to be fully present in the moment. Imagine you have just received an invitation to say something right now. The moments between when you are asked and when you start speaking are important. You can fill them with fear, anxiety and self-doubt, or take a deep breath and follow Pema Chodron’s advice: “Whenever we are between here and there, whenever one thing has ended and we’re waiting for the next thing to begin, whenever we’re tempted to distract ourselves or look for an escape route, we can instead let ourselves be open, curious, tentative, vulnerable.”
These in-between moments are often as brief as the time it takes for someone to hand you the microphone or for you to move to a speaking location. The challenge is to be fully present and aware that you have been asked to speak because others believe you have something important to share or have a role to fulfill. In that sense what you will say is “all about you” -who you are, what you bring with you in mind and spirit, and who others perceive you to be. At the same time you are being called upon to speak because the group needs your information, perspectives, or presence. These reasons are not about you at all but are about how you can help others or speak to something that transcends the current moment. Moving through these in-between moments you are given the opportunity to entered a sacred spirit-freeing paradox that will help you speak effectively with no advanced notice. In that space you will know this truth “what you have to say is “all about you and not about you at all”. This perspective will empower you to “to say a few words.”
One of the best ways to be ready for that impromptu invitation to “say a few words” is to have a simple formula in mind that has a beginning, middle and end. Your beginning might be to express your gratitude for being asked to speak and for being with those who are gathered. Your middle could be comments on something you share in common with your audience (something that is heartfelt), or a thought on the theme or subject of the gathering. Your conclusion can be a restatement of your gratitude and the importance of the gathering. If you are asked to pray “on the spot” you might use a similar formula. Begin by asking those gathered to join you in the spirit of prayer, then pause and say some opening words. I use “Spirit of Life, God of Love.” Next, describe with heartfelt words and images the moment, the occasion, or the common interest you share with those gathered. Finally conclude with words of gratitude and a repetition of the theme or subject of the gathering.
Your formula you is the container for the content you carry in your heart and mind. Jazz performers offer a good way to think about the content of your impromptu words. These musicians have a repertoire of musical phrases and notes that they have practiced over and over again which they can draw upon and blend together at a moment’s notice. In The Jazz of Preaching, Kirk Byron Jones compares extemporaneous speaking to the jazz of Wynton Marsalis: “The best jazz improvisers draw from wells of notes, phrases, songs, and performances that they have played over and over again, alone and with others. Such practicing in the jazz world is called shedding or wood-shedding. Such arduous preparation creates a sense of musical fitness or “rightness.”
Bass player and singer Esperanza Spalding rose to stardom when she became the first jazz performer to win a Grammy Award for Best New Artist in 2011. In a January 2020 interview with Walter Isaacson, President of the Aspen Institute, she equates jazz preparation with spiritual practices:
You can say the same way that we strive to maintain a certain kind of
spiritual hygiene, you know, you meditate, you go to church, you pray,
you study, we strive to develop that spirit that we all are imbued with. I
think jazz is similar. It’s a spirit. It’s an energy and it’s our responsibility
as practitioners to steward it and to have good hygiene and good practice.
To make sure that it’s moving through us at a high resonance that it is
doing good when it comes out of our body or as we hold it in our body. . .
The deeper your well of spirit-freeing practices, memorized words, scriptures, wisdom sayings and thought-provoking images the better prepared you will be when someone asks you, on a moment’s notice, to “say a few words,” or “offer a prayer.”
With your formula in mind and your repertoire established you are almost ready to speak whenever asked. The only thing needed is the ability to be fully present in the moment. Imagine you have just received an invitation to say something right now. The moments between when you are asked and when you start speaking are important. You can fill them with fear, anxiety and self-doubt, or take a deep breath and follow Pema Chodron’s advice: “Whenever we are between here and there, whenever one thing has ended and we’re waiting for the next thing to begin, whenever we’re tempted to distract ourselves or look for an escape route, we can instead let ourselves be open, curious, tentative, vulnerable.”
These in-between moments are often as brief as the time it takes for someone to hand you the microphone or for you to move to a speaking location. The challenge is to be fully present and aware that you have been asked to speak because others believe you have something important to share or have a role to fulfill. In that sense what you will say is “all about you” -who you are, what you bring with you in mind and spirit, and who others perceive you to be. At the same time you are being called upon to speak because the group needs your information, perspectives, or presence. These reasons are not about you at all but are about how you can help others or speak to something that transcends the current moment. Moving through these in-between moments you are given the opportunity to entered a sacred spirit-freeing paradox that will help you speak effectively with no advanced notice. In that space you will know this truth “what you have to say is “all about you and not about you at all”. This perspective will empower you to “to say a few words.”
Hints for Your Practice
After studying or reading, stand up and speak aloud a summary of what you’ve learned. Organize your thought into a container that has a beginning, middle and end. Then ask yourself:
In what way is my presentation all about me?
How am I uniquely qualified to talk to this audience?
With the answers to the above questions in mind, ask yourself:
How is my subject more important than me?
How can I transcend my ego concerns?
Small Group Zoom Session
Thursday March 4, 2021
12-1:30 PM (ET)
Register Here
In the safety of a small group zoom room Stephen Shick, founder of Speaking by Heart will facilitate a discussion on how to start, or take your next steps, in your practice of speaking without a script.
Participation limited to six.
Words to Free Your Spirit
. . . There are times when the love of God burns so powerfully within your heart that the words of prayers seem to rush forth quickly and without deliberation. At such times it is not you yourself who speaks; rather it is through you that the words are spoken
.
Rabbi Israel Baal Shem Tov, the founder of Hasidism
January 2021
"I have a dream"
Lessons for Speakers
Above the cacophony of hate and violence echoing across our country today there needs to arise a chorus of voices calling us to engage the power of non-violence and democracy. Who better to teach us to sing in that chorus than Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.?
Dr. King spoke from the heart with passion and power to large and small audiences. He did this, biographer David Garrow tells us,"almost always extemporaneously." Like any well practiced speaker he fine-tuned his voice to fit the occasion. A close look at his famous “I have a dream” speech reveals the formula that made him a gifted orator and can help you give voice to what needs to be said in the public square today.
Careful preparation and a deep trust that beautiful and powerful words can flow extemporaneously where at the core of Dr. King’s speech at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom on August 28, 1963. The evening before he gathered seven of his top advisors to suggest what to include in his speech. Clarence B. Jones was given the task of taking notes and drafting the speech from the range of diverse opinions he heard at that meeting. In his book Behind the Dream, Jones tells what happened when Dr. King started to speak. The first part of the speech pleased Jones for Dr. King was reading his words. Then, during a long pause, Jones recounts, he and others heard gospel singer Mahalia Jackson shout out “tell ‘em about the ‘dream”. At that moment, Jones says, Dr. King pushed his text aside and began speaking extemporaneously. He drew upon years of study and memorization, of listening and speaking. He trusted that words would come if the spirits of love and hope were set free. Jones had not included the famous lines “ I have a dream”, nor Dr. King’s anaphoric use of the phrase. Those unplanned words came from his heart and now define the message of his ministry. Listen to the speech and see what happens the moment he takes up Mahalia Jackson’s suggestion, then ask yourself how you might set your spirit free the next time you speak.
Link to Speech
Dr. King’s words were powerful and moving throughout his speech that day. Yet, something extraordinary happened when he “pushed his text aside.” From that moment on he drew upon the oral tradition of his Baptist faith that had taught him to give voice to the words in his heart not those on his manuscript. As a result his whole body moved more freely. His pauses between words and phrases seemed more natural as he drew from a reservoir of passion, knowledge and memorized stories and scripture. Mahalia Jackson’s words seemed to have given him permission to trust that words would come if he just told the people his dream. That advice was familiar to him. Ten years before, as he was about to begin his ministry at the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery Alabama, the Choir Director of that church, Joseph T. Brook’s, told him “Plan a sermon which will not require too much dependency on a manuscript.” On August 28, 1963 he took that advice.
Dr. King’s style of speaking is firmly rooted in the oral tradition he inherited. This is important to keep in mind as you consider how his speaking style might instruct your efforts to speak without a script. Dr. Keith Miller has researched Dr. King’s speeches and offers this helpful observation: “Oral culture fails to define the word as a commodity. . .(rather) “words are shared assets, not personal belongings.” This is a challenging concept for those of us who have been raised to center the written word and treasure the carefully crafted words we put in the manuscripts of our speeches. Those words are our possessions, they are not “shared assets” that freely and naturally come to mind when you are communicating with others.
Hints for Your Practice
Learning to create your presentations without writing is one way to being speaking from the heart as Dr. King did. Here are five practices to consider (for more information see the Getting Started pages on the Speaking by Heart website):
1) have one clear take-away thought, e.g.. “I have a dream"
2) learn to trust that words will come when you visualize your mind-map or recall a story you want to tell,
3) make a practice of memorizing words that move your spirit (poems, scriptures, wisdom sayings). Over time these will become a reservoir of material to be drawn upon while speaking.
4) rehearse your talk until the words flow like music from a jazz performers instrument.
5) keep in mind what I call the Spirit-Freeing Paradox, that is, your speech is all about you (your preparation and your authentic voice), and not about you at all, but about a purpose that transcends you (why you are talking).
1) have one clear take-away thought, e.g.. “I have a dream"
2) learn to trust that words will come when you visualize your mind-map or recall a story you want to tell,
3) make a practice of memorizing words that move your spirit (poems, scriptures, wisdom sayings). Over time these will become a reservoir of material to be drawn upon while speaking.
4) rehearse your talk until the words flow like music from a jazz performers instrument.
5) keep in mind what I call the Spirit-Freeing Paradox, that is, your speech is all about you (your preparation and your authentic voice), and not about you at all, but about a purpose that transcends you (why you are talking).
Small Group Zoom Session
Thursday January 28
12-1:30 PM (ET) Registration limited
Register Here
In the safety of a small group zoom room Stephen Shick, founder of Speaking by Heart will facilitate a discussion on how to start, or take your next steps, in your practice of speaking without a script.
Participation limited to six.
12-1:30 PM (ET) Registration limited
Register Here
In the safety of a small group zoom room Stephen Shick, founder of Speaking by Heart will facilitate a discussion on how to start, or take your next steps, in your practice of speaking without a script.
Participation limited to six.
Words to Move Your Spirit
. . .there are three dimensions of any complete life to which we can fitly give the words of this text: length, breadth, and height. (Yes) Now the length of life as we shall use it here is the inward concern for one’s own welfare. (Yes) In other words, it is that inward concern that causes one to push forward, to achieve his own goals and ambitions. (All right) The breadth of life as we shall use it here is the outward concern for the welfare of others. (All right) And the height of life is the upward reach for God. (All right) Now you got to have all three of these to have a complete life. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
The three dimensions Dr. King outlines where at the core his ministry and the theme of a sermon entitled Three Dimensions of a Complete Life that he used throughout his ministry including his sermon at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London when he was on his way to Norway to receive the Nobel Peace Prize.
Hint on how to apply these three dimensions to your practice of can be found on the Speaking by Heart Website