Table Topics is a chance for you to speak, without thinking too much.

The Table Topics session was a blast last night. Since it was an Open House, there were a lot of guests who have heard about Toastmasters (usually from Internet or from their spouses), but never participated before. As I said yesterday, the table topics I came up with are related to superheores. It turned out that a lot of guests wanted to talk about their superheroes!

It's definitely easier to say something that you are interested or familiar of.

Since there were people never heard of Table Topics before, I had to give a brief intro of what Table Topics was at the beginning. I said, "Table Topics is a chance for you to speak- without thinking too much, which is what I am doing here ;). "

"Well, the cliche of "think before you speak" doesn't really work too well in this session. Here's what you are going to do- pick a piece of paper from this Ziploc bag, read the message in the paper (you can read it to yourself or read it to us, either way is fine). Then you have 30 seconds to think about what you are going to say. Usually a table topics is between 1 to 2 min. And now, the stage is yours and we are waiting to hear your stories. Any volunteer?"

Here are some of the highlights:

Q: Which superhero would you like to go out for dinner/a date with?

A: The guest said he didn't want to get into trouble since his wife was there at the meeting, he would consider going out with the Invisible Woman in the Fantastic Four. ;)

Q: Tell us about your favorite superhero.

A. Another Toastmasters said it was Fantastic Four as well- because she was intrigued by the Fantastic Four comics books in high school. Then she started to read other comic books. Later on, she found out she actually liked reading books. So, Fantastic Four introduced the fun of reading to her.

Table Topics- Superheroes

I was checking the agenda for the Toastmasters meeting a few days ago and I found out I am the "Madam Table Topics" for tonight. Weird, I didn't remember I signed up for that. Actually, T, another Toastmasters friend thought I would be interested and so he put my name there. (Anyway, nobody was going to volunteer for the task.)

Like I said last time, the table topics is like the fortune in the fortune cookies. So take it easy, imagine you are sharing that piece of fortune and your stories with your friends and family after a Chinese dinner.

I always wanted to talk about superheroes in the Toastmasters meeting. (Most of my friends know it already, I can talk about superheroes all day long and they know how much the superheroes mean to me ;)) So the Table Topics that I created this time are about superheroes. I think it will be a lot of fun to hear about other's favourite superheroes, what superpower they want to have, and what they are going to do with the superpower etc.

Table Topics and Fortune Cookies

I kept my word again-- I gave a speech and a table topic at the Toastmasters meeting today. One of my New Year resolution is to give a speech every time when I attend the meeting. As usual, I didn't really follow the rules of Table Topics, I did my own mini-improv speech for two minutes. Actually it wasn't really an improv since I used most the materials which I blogged yesterday.

This is how I began (I thought it was quite a good opening since everyone laughed about it ;), I said, "Every time when I volunteer for the Table Topics, the act of drawing and reading this little piece of paper always reminds me of breaking the fortune from a fortune cookie. So let''s talk about a fortune today. And let me be a little bit more specific---my New Year Fortune...."

Actually I am not as scared of public speaking as I used to be. Indeed, I'm quite looking forward to the Toastmasters meeting. Sometimes it's good to have a break to use some humors and share stories with a group of people. Since I'm crunching numbers in benefit calculations and dealing with the pension accounting rules 1/3 of my day (Yeah, how fun is that?!), I just want to do something creative to feel alive.

If you ever get a chance to attend a Toastmasters meeting, or if you ever wonder if you should ask a question or speak up during your office meeting, remember this quote:

"Do one thing everyday that scares you."--Eleanor Roosevelt

In addition, I would suggest "Do one thing everyday that makes you smile." :)

Table Topics and My Subconscious Mind

I did it! Since I promised myself to make an mini-impromptu speech at every toastmasters meeting, I had to do it.

I was the second person who volunteered. As usual, I picked up a small piece of paper from the Ziploc bag that T prepared. Gosh, I didn't really understand what's written on the paper at all! Anyway, it's a bizzard question. So I made up a question and read it out loud as if it's written on the paper. I said, "2007 is coming, what is your new year resolution?"

So I went on and talked about my new year resolution for 2 minutes. Though the material I said was somewhat similar to that blog post, the way I presented it was quite different (which I was surprised). I ended the speech with this, "I committed to speak every time when I'm here. However, to show up or not to show up, that's another question." (Well, I guess you really have to be there. People were cracking up when I said that!)

After the meeting, I told G that I felt less nervous this time. Since G was a grammarian, he said I used some good phrases. I told him I never really thought about using those phrases, but when I was speaking, it just came out naturally.

G thought most of the things we learn and see every day are stored in our subconscious mind. Sometimes, when we say we don't remember, it just means we cannot retrieve the information from the subconscious mind at that moment. However, the more you use your brain, the faster you can retrieve the information. (Just like a muscle, the more you use it, the stronger it will become).

Finally he added, "sometimes you just need to trust yourself, believe that all you have learned before is always with you and believe that you have the capability to create something new."

Hm, perhaps,after all, all the books, magazines and blogs that I read do have an influence to me.

Early New Year Resolution-- Speak at the Table Topics session

After almost two months of slacking (reasons/excuses: busy with studying ;)) from Toastmasters, I went to the meeting again last Thursday. Geeze, I really think the saying "use it or lose it"is true in public speaking (at least for beginners). Since I didn't schedule for a speech, I was thinking of doing a table topic (for those who are not familiar with Toastmasters, table topic is a 2 minute impromptu speech session. You have 30 seconds to think about the questions you received and then give a 1-3 min mini speech right there!).

However, when I was there, and the Mr. Table Topics was waiting for volunteer, I was just totally "immobilized" by my fear. All I was thinking at the moment was,"Oh, there are so many people here, I don't want to embarrass myself!... I don't think I'm ready yet, there's always a next time right?"

D (the ex-president of the club) saw no one wanted to volunteer and he was annoyed by this. He said, "If impromptu speaking is something you hesitate to do, probably that's something you should do it now to conquer your fear."

After the meeting, I told G (the most experienced speaker in our group) that I would make an early new year resolution---do one table topic at every meeting. Then G said, "practicing your public speaking skill for merely 2 minutes every two weeks is very minimal, yet this will get you started. You just have to keep doing it until you are used to it."

I think the most challenging part of Table Topics is receiving a question that I have no interest in it at all. Or sometimes I just couldn't think on my feet to come up with something witty/interesting/creative to say.

So what can I do?

I'm going to break the rules a little bit. If I really had no insights on the particular table topics, I might start talking about things that I'm interested in (i.e. things I blog about here). For starters, I think that will ease my nervousness.

How about the fear of embarrassment?

Hm....since people at Toastmasters share the same goal-- to improve their public speaking skill, I think it is okay to make mistakes in front of them. Besides, it is necessary to have the courage and feel comfortable to speak in front of a group of people!

There's a meeting coming up this Thursday. Wish me luck!