July/August 2012

I hope you have been having a productive summer, and have managed to keep cool! I have been busy teaching at American University and meeting with private clients. And much of my time this past month has been taken up with details related to producing my play, Becoming Calvin.

So, even though there is no real news here, I invite you to visit my blog, Talk the Talk. There you can read posts about speaking, leadership, and communications issues.

If you will be in the D.C. area mid-September, I hope you will consider coming to Becoming Calvin. Our PayPal box office will be open soon, so bookmark the links below and come back to reserve your seat!

See you at the theatre!

Tips you can use!

Is everything a question?
"Upspeak" - that annoying habit of ending sentences with an upward inflection - is no longer an affliction limited to Valley Girls or teens. It kills your credibility. Don't do it!

Siddown, you're rockin' the boat!
When you get up to speak, stand firmly on both feet, planted hips' width apart. Stand tall and don't sway or rock. Such movement, at best, distracts from your message. At worst, it can make your audience seasick!

Read your speech - aloud
It seems so simple, yet how often do you do it? And once generally isn't enough. For those who do a lot of speaking (and are good at it) seven is the magic number.

June 2012

Back to basics!

I am a firm believer in the importance of going back to the beginning every once in a while. When you have reached a certain level of mastery, it is often useful to go back to an earlier exercise and apply your improved technique to its execution. Many disciplines realize this is important, and include such drills as part of their preparation. Singers begin every lesson or rehearsal with vocal exercises. Instrumentalists always play their scales -- at least "run through them quickly" -- at the beginning of a practice session. And of course athletes warm up before any game or competition.

But getting back to basics involves more than rote repetition of a set of exercises, useful as that may be for limbering up the fingers or calf muscles. It requires a more mindful way of doing something that has become foundational to your practice. A way to see what you have learned, and what you need to revisit in order to understand how you do what you do and why.

Oh, now I get it!

A couple of my adult acting students, upon finishing their intermediate level class this spring, said they were thinking about enrolling in the beginning class again. They said they would now be able to really understand the value of those first lessons.

That is the dilemma for those of us who teach or coach adults. Our students and clients come to us with lots of life experience and a certain knowledge base. But they also have a reluctance to move outside well-established comfort zones -- even if they have enrolled in a class or called a consultant to help them do just that! And so they often tune out the initial training for a discipline or practice. Later on they realize the need for that beginning instruction. Some of them double-back and pick it up then. Progress is usually much faster after that.

Riding the learning curve

At various times of our lives we are so open to new things that new ways of seeing and being in the world take root almost instantly. When we are that receptive we learn faster. Other times. . . not so much. We are defensive, or we think we know it all already: Hey, if kids are such good actors, how hard can it be?

We can rediscover our creative receptivity by returning to a more elementary form of what we are currently doing. Playing a song from the Notebook for Anna Magdalena Bach. Taking a batting clinic to analyze the swing. Singing that uncomplicated tune that sounds so pure and simple -- and is so hard to do without relying on tricks or "style."

It sometimes takes courage to get back to basics, embrace the fundamentals, and find out what is really foundational to your current practice or level of skill. But it is well worth it.

Tips you can use!

It's OK to say "I don't know"
In the information age you can't be expected to know everything at any given second. If you make something up, chances are someone else in the room will have Googled the real answer by the time you've finished.

Don't stick your neck out
Tip your chin down to avoid showing off that unsightly expanse of flesh when you video chat. You may decide you don't need that chin implant after all. And your voice will sound less strained.  

Wear sunblock
Always, but especially in the summer. Just running around between appointments exposes your skin to lots of harmful rays. To keep those pesky wrinkles at bay, at least use a good facial moisturizer with SPF 30. And reapply!

May 2012

Talk to the hand . .

A question my clients frequently ask when we have our initial session is: What should I do with my hands?  This is a universal worry -- my acting students have it, as have generations of novice actors before them. In a famous scene from Act IV of Anton Chekov's The Seagull, Nina describes her failed attempts on the professional stage "... really, my acting was so amateurish... I didn't know what to do with my hands, I didn't know how to stand on the stage, I wasn't in control of my voice. You have no idea how awful it is when you know you're acting badly." Yes, Nina, people who speak publicly often do have an idea.

Whether onstage, behind the podium, or around the conference table, we all suffer from self-consciousness if we are not physically grounded. A funny, yet instructive, example of this lack of groundedness can be found in an episode of Up All Night. Chris (played by the brilliantly comic Will Arnett) guests as a law expert on Ava's TV show. His first appearance does not go well. His "untethered" arms flail all over the place, ending with floppy hands. Ava declares him a "disaster" and his on-camera career seems doomed. He is oblivious. We laugh because we recognize not only the underlying anxiety that causes his behavior, but also because we know we would never be that clueless!

Harness the power of gesture

It's not just your hands; your whole body needs to be engaged in your message. Before you speak, get your instrument ready to communicate by doing physical and vocal warm-ups. Then breathe. If you are relaxed and physically expressive your entire body supports your content. Remember, you are not just a talking head. If you were, what should I do with my hands? would be a non-issue.

Politicians in particular show us how gesture can enhance or detract from a message. Australia's Prime Minister Julia Gillard a good example of a political leader whose physical engagement reinforces her verbal message. In this clip of her visit to our local high school with President Obama, we see two leaders who are physically at ease in front of a dozen international cameras and high school students. A combination that would strike fear in the hearts of many!

But be sure you're saying something

Avoid the "Clinton thumb" It is a purely political construct, a gesture no one uses outside the political arena. Real people just do not do it. It is a gesture devised to simulate sincerity without going out on a limb and really committing, a marker of feigned authenticity. People have told me that Clinton adapted the gesture from his hero JFK. But I ask: "Just because JFK did it, and Bill Clinton did it, does that mean you have to do it, too?"

Tips you can use!

Use both your lips
Aside from making it difficult to understand what you are saying,"keeping a stiff upper lip" sends a message that you are withholding something, and are not altogether trustworthy.

If you don't know, ask questions
When preparing for a speaking engagement, make sure you know who you are speaking to, what the occasion is,and why you've been asked to speak. If you don't know, ask. Because if you assume, you know what that makes you.

"Step into those leadership shoes"
I often give use this as an image for physicalizing your leadership persona. When you actually put those shoes on, though, you need to practice walking in them before you "go public." You can't be perceived as a leader if you're off balance or clomping around like a horse.