stammering mind

Hypnosis

2010-06-01T11:05:00.000-07:00

It occurs to me that folk try hypnosis and then say, 'It didn't work', but the more accurate statement is that the therapist mostly or yourself failed to make the most of the situation. There are lots of ways of hynotising as there are lots of ways of signing your name and there are lots of different hypnotists.

So don't throw the baby out with the bath water.

Might be worth a try with someone else!

And another thing

2010-04-23T13:02:00.000-07:00

If any of you think this is a worthwhile blog then please let anyone who might have got fed up over the past year know that we are back in business.

Also comments and particularly questions would be good. It is better to address particular concerns than to just wait till I have something to say. You might feel I am missing the point and remember you don't stammer in writing.

McGuire

2010-04-23T12:57:00.000-07:00

I watched the channel 4 program on the McGuire method and it was good but limited information due to editing.

I wonder what the follow up is and if it is just to encourage and coach breath techniques. If it works for you that is excellent and keep it up.

If you can control stammering by behaviour then it supports my view. I would do it a different way.

If anyone is interested in a workshop for a day let me know and I will see what I can do.

Out for a while

2010-03-29T04:31:00.000-07:00

I have been out of circulation over the last year but hope to get on with more posts now.

As a start, another good book is The Luck Factor by Richard Wiseman. It is entertainingly written and contains much good advice for people who stammer and the rest of us.

I haven't changed my mind on any of the topics I have written about before.

Another book - highly recommended

2009-03-31T09:16:00.000-07:00

The How of Happiness - Sonja Lyubomisrsky. This is a 'how to' book as it says on the cover and it delivers what it promises.

She is a psychology professor and writes well. Scientific basis is excellent and provides multiple approaches.

Well worth a read.

Good book

2009-03-26T01:21:00.000-07:00

Zimbardo, the famous psychologist of the Stanford prison experiment has written on the psychology of Time.

The Time Paradox. Really good and useful.

Good speaking podcast

2009-02-12T04:22:00.000-08:00

The Public Speaker's Quick and Dirty Tips for improving your communication skills.

Good short podcasts.

Recommended.

Deliberate dysfluency? Just the ticket

2008-12-17T00:31:00.000-08:00

http://www.stammering.org/deliberatedysfluency.html

Have a read. Note particularly the emphasis on 'desire to be seen as a fluent speaker'.

Again the attention is on self. And with lots of monitoring.

The classic example of this is described in Matt McGinn's song: The Wee Kirkcudbright Centipede

http://www.traditionalmusic.co.uk/folk-song-lyrics/Wee_Kirkcudbright_Centipede.htm

Enjoy

Loss vs Gain

2008-12-16T11:10:00.000-08:00

The psychologists tell us that we feel the pain of loss twice as much as the pleasure of gain and that is why we worry more about losing than gaining.

If you lose your stammer you could always go back and pick it up when you wanted like Ash talks about in his comment. That is really managing speech.

What about forgetting to stammer? Can that be done? Absolutely, I have seen and heard people forgetting to stammer and, I suspect, so have many of you.

Would not stammering be to deny your identity?

2008-12-12T09:02:00.000-08:00

Wanting to stop a behaviour is a widespread aspiration eg smoking, drinking, swearing, fearing etc.

Is wanting to change a behaviour to say to ourselves I am not good enough?

Is what is required to continue the behaviour and just feel ok with it?

Some people change their behaviours and are ok with it eg learing to sing, voice improvement, speaking in public, becoming a parent, going to further education, learning to dance etc. I suspect that they feel that they are ok in themselves but want to improve, in a particular way, and work at it.

Listen to an old recording of Billy Connolly and then a more recent one - big change in direction but not a different person in a total sense. Also Kirsty Wark. Done them both a bit of good!!

Excellent article

2008-11-15T10:06:00.000-08:00

This is an excellent article by Martin Brough:

http://www.stammering.org/goingbythebook.htmlhttp://www.stammering.org/goingbythebook.html

Try copying what he says he did.

Phone

2008-11-08T13:47:00.000-08:00

It is interesting how many people see the phone as a threat. Really the phone is just a tool, like a pen or screwdriver or handkerchief, but with the advantage that the other person can't see you or what condition you are in, eg unshaven, in pyjamas or wearing a rose in your hair!

Also, you are in charge of the conversation. The other person will have to wait for you to reply to questions or wait for you to tell them what you are calling about. And you can limit the conversation to the issues or anything else you want. You can go at your own speed just like in a car.

I don't stammer, but since I have deliberately taken the view that I will assume the other person is just like me, then the stress is less. ' I wonder if you can help me?' or 'What can I do for you, or what would you like?' life on the phone has been easier.
You may have noticed some people have a 'telephone voice'. showing they can be who they want to be and that is a useful tool. Try being the you that enjoys using the phone, it is just a role you play after all like the many other roles you play in life without thinking about them - write them out and you will be surprised at how many there are!!

I have noticed that people don't listen, because they are rushing ahead, and for the past few years I have talked a lot less and listened more, and if someone interrupts me I just stop , even in mid sentence on the phone or not. I let them have their say and then have the space to make a useful contribution to the conversation. I just wait for the space, that always comes, and that is fine by me. When they finally stop they have made the space to listen. I don't take interruptions personally: they are about the speaker not me. If I don't get my say then that is their loss. Also ' I would just like to say .............." is a helpful entry to a statement.

If the other person sounds aggressive then at least they are at a distance and I can keep aware of that distance during the call and keep them out there away from me.

Most people just want things better and have worked themselves up about an issue, or several, just like you have yourself eg about using the phone, because that is what we all do.
They may be exasperated and want to sound off so if you can just let them talk and ask questions till you have a plan, then you are managing yourself in the constantly changing situation, and that is what you do in the car.

Remember. unless this is a cold call the person wants something from you or will likely want to help you help them. So it is 'us together'

Also, if something isn't your fault don't take it personally. Ask for clarification and try to come up with a plan that will actually address the core problem, as best you can, and involve the other person in coming to a solution.

If you keep all of the above in mind you won't have the mental space to pay much attention to yourself as you will be thinking of the other person and their difficulties. If you do this I suspect you will stammer less and be able to get on more with
your life.

If you take the view that it is 'us-together' discussing something then it takes away from 'them and me' and is much more comfortable.

Try rehearsing in your mind's eye and ear and notice how changing your point of view changes how you approach the phone. Muscular changes or denial don't tend to work. Acknowledging shared values is a good way of keeping a perspective on other people ie they are not all bad. Keep the other person realistic but notice that if he is aggressive it is his emotion, and you don't have to take it on, but you can be quietly curious about it.
Mental rehearsal, where you change your thinking as a setup, is useful - back to the Dog Whisperer!!

Also, to look for, and acknowledge, small changes and improvements is really important.
Keep a journal and write it all down each night - get the habit. That way you can go back and see how today went compared to how things were going some time ago eg a year. Last week doesn't give enough perspective.

Maturity

2008-11-02T10:25:00.000-08:00

When you stammer what age do you feel?

Try reminding yourself that you are older, wiser, more experienced and that you are pretty good at handling yourself in many different contexts and use the generalisation as a setup for every experience in the future.
If you are unsure how someone of your age behaves there are no end of role models in literature and TV. Remember you are not being someone else you are still you but identifying with other qualities and behaviours.

Positions

2008-10-15T12:54:00.000-07:00

When someone on question time is listening to another speaker put yourself in their place: what are they thinking? How are they thinking it?

Listening

2008-10-01T02:09:00.000-07:00

When someone is speaking to you, or you are listening to someone you don't know, what do you do?
Do you just listen?
Are you sensitised to rubbish they might speak?
Are you waiting for them to slip up?
Are you open to what might come up?
Are you more interested in them, at that point, than anything else?

I suspect you are just waiting and trying to make sense of the chat. Same as anyone else!!
So what makes you think that others are doing most of the negative things above.

Help

2008-09-21T14:34:00.000-07:00

I have some time to work with anyone in Central Scotland who is interested in this approach.
No charge.
Please get in touch but you must be willing to put some effort in.
It will not be a quick fix.
But for how long have you been trying to do it yourself?

Role

2008-09-21T14:17:00.000-07:00

We do play roles and changing the role of a PWS might be worthwhile.

Ask yourself: If I was a calm person - not the same as timid - how would I react to a situation or manage myself.
There are lots of people you can emulate or archetypes you can model.
How would you approach the day, others, situations, if you were a:

buddhist monk
christian monk
banker
comedian
adviser
counsellor
dad
mum
lawyer
doctor
nurse
actor
politician
TV interviewer
radio interviewer
etc

all

Have a go. You don't have to keep it up for long and notice that no one else notices!!

Maestro

2008-08-22T08:49:00.000-07:00

BBC TV program Maestro.

Recommended as an illustration of how we can learn and improve.

What is needed? What would you need?

Fake it till you make it, and building on strengths.

Als, even skilled and experienced celebrities in one arena are not up to rapid change in another.

Also the program Faking It is excellent for the same reason.

4 more Maestros to go. Well worth watching.

What lessons are in it for you? What would you need?

Management

2008-08-19T14:52:00.000-07:00

Do you manage yourself in your daily life?

Do you manage WHAT you do?
Do you manage HOW you do it?
Do you manage WHY you do things?

Or do you just react to circumstances and other people?

No, you don't just react; you have already managed your response. Even if you opt out you have managed the opt-out.

So you can't not manage; but you can manage yourself better.

Dog Whisperer

2008-08-06T02:14:00.000-07:00

Do you watch Dog Whisperer?

Brilliant.

The owners are the ones who get in a stew and have to learn how to change.

This is good behavioural change stuff for all of us.

Use it as metaphor.

Genes again

2008-08-03T09:37:00.000-07:00

If you believe the stuff on BSA about genetics? Read on.

The Wellcome Trust is an independent research-funding charity established in 1936 under the will of tropical medicine pioneer Sir Henry Wellcome. The Trust's mission is to promote research with the aim of improving human and animal health. It currently spends more than £400 million per annum.

The world's first audio collection of examples of stammered speech has been set-up by scientists funded by the Wellcome Trust, the UK's biggest biomedical research charity - 2004.

The article quoted below is on population genetics:

http://www.wellcome.ac.uk/News/News-archive/Browse-by-date/2004/Features/WTX022535.htm

'Time and again, an association between a gene and a disease was reported, but when other researchers looked for the same effect, they could not reproduce the result. “About 10 years ago, geneticists got very nervous about these kinds of studies,” says Professor Cardon. “They were afraid that differences in population structure were leading to the irreproducible results – and there are examples where population structure is known to have caused problems. But it was not only lack of attention to broad ethnic differences, but small samples that led to the confusion. We now know that if we are to find the genes that have small effects on common diseases, such as heart disease, diabetes, and osteoporosis, we need to study large numbers of people and we need to know, at a fine level, the genetic structure of that sample of people.”'

There is something about real scientists. Don't you think?

Brain disruption

2008-08-03T01:18:00.000-07:00

Jack Welch the tough CEO of GE who, though retired now, is still big time in management stammered as a younger man.

He has joined the happy band of Bruce Willis et al. since clearly a miracle has occurred and his disrupted brain has healed because he doesn't stammer now.

So, defective genetic complexes and physical brain disruption can randomly and spontaneously resolve by some miracle.

I don't believe it.

BSA articles

2008-07-31T10:54:00.000-07:00

If you search for 'sensitive' on the BSA website you will find a critique by Per Alm of a 2005 article. Basically he tells us the figures are rubbish. Don't stop there though: go on to the article below about adults being sensitive. No figures given but the ideas are well worth looking at.

For people who give statistical probabilities on very small numbers be very sceptical and always ask the sample size. Freak waves happen. You can flip 10 heads in a row: it is possible - watch Derren Brown. Lightening does strike twice. Also worth asking what exactly do the figures mean.

Be careful of what I say just as I am usually sceptical of Per Alm's conclusions.

By the way: is any of the stuff on this blog helpful on a daily basis rather than just occasionally interesting?

Mind over white matter???

2008-07-14T12:30:00.000-07:00

Further to my last post:

Have any of you read Mind Over White Matter on the BSA site?

The scientists have jumped from mapping water to mapping nerve bundles. These are not the same but the conclusions depend on their being the same. Then an exciting jump is made to stating that nerve bundles are 'disrupted: this is logical bilge and shows that some folk will believe anything the MR sales people tell them. Remember MR reconstruction relies on computers and what has been your experience of computer sales staff?

There is no way, at present, of mapping nerve bundles.

And another piece of nonsense is to equate mind and brain. Not the same. But a nice selling headline for the article - MR salesmen do the same thing.

Don't believe everything you read in the literature; scientific or sales.

Another book - highly recommended

2008-07-13T11:31:00.000-07:00

Gerd Gigerenzer: Gut Feelings. About heuristics or underlying rules we have for doing things.
Good few pages on the idea of trusting the unconscious mind and not second guessing. If we get an expert to think about what she is doing as she is doing it it goes haywire. Remind you of anything? Well worth reading for anyone PWS or not. Not technical but properly scientifically based and an easy read.

Get it from the library or Amazon.

He also has a really good one called Reckoning with Risk about statistics, which should be compulsory reading for those of us who assume that scientists who make up conclusions on very, very little evidence. can be trusted. Should be required reading for those who believe the latest research on the BSA website. You will tear your hair out!

Control vs Managing

2008-07-04T14:45:00.000-07:00

Control is fixed and digital and confining. We actually have very little control of ourselves or anyone else.

Management is moment to moment, more analogue and both proactive and reactive: we can, and do, manage ourselves and others to a greater or lesser extent.

More useful and accurate to think in terms of managing than control.

Forgiveness

2008-06-29T07:12:00.000-07:00

Which of us has not felt the burden lighten when we forgive someone who has done us a disservice.

What about forgiving ourselves?

Remind yourself that you are only human; you will make errors of judgment; you will get things wrong or inaccurate; you will let yourself down.

If you forgive other people who do the above why not yourself.

Make a list

I forgive myself for:
looking stupid - either stammering or not!!
being worried about how others will see me
being too sensitive
obsessing rather than moving on
not being able to get out of a rut
etc etc etc

Do it live too. In the moment when about to speak or speaking, in the pauses, forgive yourself for being concerned or nervous. Forgive yourself for 'not being good enough'- whatever that is. Forgive yourself for being a perfectionist. Forgive yourself for attending more to your own problems than to the other person as an interesting human being like yourself. Forgive yourself for being worried about what the other person thinking of you.

Get the idea? But put it in print first to establish the pattern. Take one issue at a time.

This doesn't give anyone carte blanche for bad behaviour but there are unhelpful patterns that are best recognised and reassessed. Do this after forgiving yourself and others.

Identity

2008-06-28T10:36:00.000-07:00

Do I have an identity?
or
Do I identify with values, ways of doing things, standards etc.

Think about it.

We actually do the second but limit ourselves by thinking that we have an identity.

Actors identify with a character and while doing so can't have their own identity.

Identity is a behaviour too.

Where does this take you with stammering?

Don't stop

2008-05-31T02:17:00.000-07:00

If you want to stop a behaviour then focus on doing something else and realise that anything worth doing is worth getting wrong at the beginning.
Did you drive well the first time?

The way to stop being Self Conscious is to practice 'Other Consciousness'

Block

2008-05-02T10:42:00.000-07:00

What is your block made of?

If it is a mirror or wall why not make it a window and experiment experiment with expanding or changing the metaphor.

If you explore your metaphor look inside it to see how well it is formed: is it complete, look beyond to see if you can add to it and enrich it and notice how it changes and how you feel about it. Can be very powerful.

Self Talk - again

2008-05-01T12:24:00.000-07:00

How we talk to ourselves is really important. Any hypnotist or someone who does self hypnosis will tell you that.
If I say that ' I am an idiot' then I am listening to that statement at both a conscious and unconscious level. At a conscious level I know what I mean but the message gets through unconsciously especially if I have a habit of saying it without the added value.
'My stammer' - suggests that this is a separate thing and to talk of 'cure' is to presuppose a disease.
Blushing is a good substitute for thinking about stammering.
Would you talk of 'my blush' No, these are things we do and it is worthwhile just catching ourselves up and taking issue with ourselves when we say anything to ourselves that we would not like to hear from anyone else.

Worth a look

2008-04-28T04:48:00.000-07:00

I have just come across this article from the Oxford Disfluency Conference 2002:

http://www.theoryofstammering.com/Sims.pdf

Management problem?

2008-04-28T03:53:00.000-07:00

It was a commonplace, when being left-handed was deemed to be bad for you, that children who were made to write with their right hand stammered. Not all of course.

How does this fit with my theories?

Well, I think that trying to manage too much is the big issue for PWS and that this mostly applies to how PWS think about what is important about other people. So I don't have a problem with it.

I came across a paper earlier today which described a child who stammered badly in two languages http://fla.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/12/36/255. The child stopped stammering when the second language was dropped.

Trying to do too much at one time or more than is required is one of the biggest problems we have in getting things done well. How the child was thinking at the time is what interests me.

I mentioned in an earlier post that when writing is extraordinarily important my hand stammers. Eh? I hear you say. When I am signing a passport application form for someone and the signature has to be legible and be contained within a box and if I get it wrong the form will be sent back and it will delay their processing and it will be my fault and they have left the application late - all of this is happening at the same time in my mind - not sequentially. I have to step back mentally and and carefully attend to altering my normal scrawl which I have difficulty reading at times.

So to mentally step back and ask ourselves 'What else do I need to know?' before launching could be a start in managing how we deal with situations or people.

Brain research

2008-04-24T11:46:00.000-07:00

Norbert ( see links ) writes on 14 April:
'I heard about this research on the radio today - researchers in Berlin have found that our brains have already made up our minds for us well in advance of our own, conscious decision-making. A bit scary in many respects.

What’s the impact this has on stammering? Do we already know in advance when we are going to speak and what we are going to say, without being consciously aware of it? Can our brains adjust - in this unconscious knowledge - and anticipate where we will have problems, build up anticipatory struggle and launch into a full-blown block by the time we are consciously aware of having made the decision to speak?'

Well, where is your walking as you sit here reading this? or your writing, or your speaking? or your memory of your last holiday?

Sounds daft eh?

But that is what this kind of research illustrates: the immanence for our behaviours is there but only apparent when we act them out.

The more I work with PWS the more I am certain that in the majority of cases speaking isn't the problem. How the PWS sees himself in relation to others and sometimes to himself is the issue. And, importantly, that view is prior to stammering and completely separate from it. It is at the level of beliefs or identity.

Mind emerges from brain; mind isn't brain.

Measuring

2008-04-07T06:43:00.000-07:00

Standards are about measuring ourselves against our values.

Some PWS measure themselves against an ideal in relation to other people.
Some PWS measure themselves against the perfect speech with no erms... or ehs.... or ahs.....
Some PWS measure themselves against some perfection they see in others that they will never measure up to
Some PWS measure themselves against how they think others see them

All of the above are not useful and most other people are getting on with their lives and don't even notice the folk around them.

In a shopping mall sit and watch other people - no one notices strangers - they don't matter unless they come into contact.
If you catch someone's eye for too long it may be taken as a threat or a come-on!! so look away or smile depending on your inclinations. You will notice their reaction anyway.

Do you notice or care about other people in a Mall the way you think they notice and care about you?

If you think they notice you an know anything about you what is your evidence?

What is the problem?

2008-03-22T02:20:00.000-07:00

Formulating any problem is really important to stop going off at a tangent and imposing 'solutions' which don't connect to the original problem.

Is getting the words out the core problem? Attempted advice - take time, breath deeply etc - you've been there - sticking plaster stuff and we do need sticking plasters at times! Gene stuff and pagoclone.

Is the presence of other people the problem? Different problem - values, standards, attitudes, beliefs, identity but all of these can be usefully updated.

What may have started as the first may have evolved into the second very quickly.

You may see them as connected but it is important to clarify the issues, and they are not the same: some therapies go for one some the other. To improve the cake we need to INVESTIGATE what is involved and can be changed in order to know what to change and then change it.

Know Thyself

2008-03-21T10:01:00.000-07:00

The Spoonerism in the last post was accidental and I haven't seen one in print before.
Onward!

'Who am I?' is not a useful question to ask. What am I? How am I? Why am I? are more useful.
The answer to the first question is ' You are you'. The other take you into much more interesting territory.

When you think about other people what age do you feel and who, or what, are you measuring yourself against? A specific person: a type of person, an ideal?

Do you think other people notice you when you are in a public place and not particularly drawing attention to yourself?

Other people

2008-03-19T13:57:00.000-07:00

We sALL peak one way when we are alone, another when we are with good friends and another when we are with strangers: why?

If we were to teach someone else HOW, ie in what way NOT why, we do what we do, and what is different, what would we need to tell them? What makes the difference?

I don't think.............

2008-03-11T10:09:00.000-07:00

'I don't think I can do that'.
What does that mean?
Is it about what 'I think' or 'that'. These are two different objects of attention.
'I think I can't' vs 'I can't'
It is too easy to get lost in what 'I think' when things have changed, without our realising it, and we actually could do the behaviour we want to do.
I used to think that I couldn't sing because of name calling at school and I didn't try for years: but I wondered if I could NOW and found I can and I do - a few lessons helped.

Social Phobia follow-up

2008-03-06T11:47:00.000-08:00

As a followup to the previous post: if you onto google and look up 'shyness Zimbardo' and you will get the inside track on the top academic chap on shyness: he of the famous torture and prison experiments, his book is a great read, and use the links to get some quality stuff. Also the links on the site in the post.

Also, the Dummies books on psychology are pretty good for advice. I have a couple and could recommend looking the series up on Amazon or your local book shop and finding what suits you.

Aso worth noting that shyness and panic attacks are two separate things but may coexist. Zimbardo has a shyness scale in his book.

Social Phobia

2008-03-04T13:45:00.000-08:00

Good BBC program on Social Phobia.

What is it? Fear of what others will think of me. Recognise the situation?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/science/am_i_normal.shtml

Go to listen again box: should be available for the next week at least.

Structure and Function

2008-02-01T09:44:00.000-08:00

'Having a stammer', suggests a structure that is part of the person, just as I have green eyes or feet, not easy to get rid of - a demon.

What about the other side of structure ie function, or the functional aspects of the thinking structures involved in stammering?

Right to Speak

2008-01-23T13:50:00.001-08:00

I have just read the book Right to Speak, again by Patsy Rodenburg, and the first 100 pages are about the influences on the voice and style of speaking. You might think that voice is simple - anything but, and she gives lots of examples and cases. Exercises and advice too in the second half. Buy it for the first half and go onto the second if you feel challenged. Excellent.

Book - highly recommended

2008-01-18T23:49:00.000-08:00

Presence by Patsy Rodenburg. Excellent, with lots of insights and exercises and new ways to think about speech and direction of attention. Written for self help.

I couldn't disagree more with her idea of 'energy' which permeats the book but if I substitute 'attention', 'enthusiasm', 'engagement', then it is fine. She has an unrivalled experience of speech coaching all sorts of people. Check out her website.
I have previously recommended the tapes of 'Right to Speak'. She has a nice voice!

Maybe use the book as a framework for self - help groups?

Speech Coach on radio

2008-01-12T08:53:00.000-08:00

The first 10 minutes of the In Business program on Leadership gives some excellent insights into how to change the way we speak and the effect that this change in how we use our body can have beneficial effects on our thinking. Top speech coaches give examples of their work. The rest of the prog is also worth listening to.

So, listen again at:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/news/inbusiness/inbusiness_20080103.shtml

Scepticism

2008-01-03T13:54:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year.

I posted a comment on http://closetstutterer.blogspot.com/ and Sophie replied that one reason for not pushing the idea of copying others is that it may open prejudice against PWS in some professions. True. But that is not a reason for denying the power of copying or modelling in stammering. The first is social bigotry the second is a possible association with a state of affairs.

If you want to learn some scepticism about Genetics and brain imaging I would recommend The Language of the Genes by Steve Jones. Reckoning with Risk: Learning to Live with Uncertainty by Gerd Gigerenzer and Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion by Robert Cialdini - particularly his explanation of Captainitis.

In terms of genetics it really is important to go to the original papers and look at the numbers involved and ask yourself if there could be another explanation. Don’t be too impressed by titles or qualifications. Remember that the experimenter cannot be evaluated out of his context: just as a stammer requires a context. Just remembered; The Pleasure of Finding Things Out: The Best Short Works of Richard Feynman, what science should be about and usually isn’t.

Recently in UK an innocent lady was jailed on the evidence of an expert who wasn’t cross-examined with proper skepticism because he was an expert. The expert who didn’t know his statistics but didn’t know he didn’t know ( Donald Rumsfeldism ) was ultimately vilified. If he was properly challenged the outcome might have been different for all concerned and he would have found out that he didn’t know what he was talking about ie that he didn't know he didn't know.

You should also be sceptical about my notions. Ask yourself if I want you to believe things on my word or if I want you to search your own experience to verify my propositions and do yourself some good. Go back to the territory!

Causes of Stammering

2007-12-23T06:40:00.000-08:00

There is a good discussion going on the excellent http://closetstutterer.blogspot.com/ about the causes of stammering.
My contribution to the comments is the request for an update on Sophie's progress. The posts then get a bit out of sync.

Rather than joining that discussion I thought to let you know of it and add my own view here.

When I was 6yrs old I copied a boy in my class who stammered. My mother told me to speak properly and that was the end of that. The point is I copied one of my peer group. The lad was popular in the class and we were friends. I copied his way of speaking and we all do that.

I live in a town where there are a lot of parents with English accents and their children have Scottish accents. Who have the children modelled? When I was small I went on holiday to Ireland every year for 4-5 weeks and came back with an Irish accent.

Children unconsciously copy other people. It is worthwhile being clear about the difference between learning, copying or modelling, and teaching. Children copy others: parents, peer group - this is often passive learning. They are also taught actively and both mechanisms result in learning.

As a teenager I deliberately copied a stammering TV character for a few months till the benefit of not stammering was made clear to me. We emulate TV personalities in terms of other behaviours, language and dress: so why not how they speak - stammering?

I am not convinced that stammering that 'runs in families' cannot be explained by children copying adults. Copying others is what children and adults do.

Just watch people at a cafe and look how one mirrors the others' behaviour. This isn't deliberate. It is part of the cybernetics of rapport . Drop an unusual but sensible word into a conversation at a meeting and notice how long it takes someone to take it up and how often it is repeated. Rapport again. Subconscious. Why should stammering be different?

This is not to say that stammering is always a result of copying or modelling others' behaviour. I think stammering emerges as a behaviour and will have multiple ingredients that will be specific to the PWS. But copying can be one of the ingredients.

From the previous posts you will realise that I don't believe in cause-effect: so I would speculate that habit, self perception, shame and guilt, self consciousness and feelings of victimisation will eventually be added to the mix. All of this directs the PWSs attention back onto herself - just the state of affairs that perpetuates the problem ie the attempt at the solution becomes the problem - see previous posts.

And a Happy Christmas to all my Readers!

What stops me

2007-12-14T09:21:00.000-08:00

If speech has to be effortless, what is the prior effort about and how are you making the effort?

Reading the articles on stammering sites it is clear that attention is focussed on fear of stammering. So investigating these fears is a good way of starting, and writing the findings down is the only way of separating the ingredients if you are working by yourself.

Having identified them are the fears reasonable or are they fears that have no real substance? Do other people actually care about your stammer as much as you think? What is your evidence?

However, concerns about stammering don't actually deal with the original situation from which the stammer emerged and how the ingredients are being brought together ie The 'why me?' question. What was going on in your life when you started stammering. If you were at school or before hand could you have copied someone elses stammer? What were the school or family circumstances going on when you began stammering?

Other suggested questions:

What am I thinking when I stammer?

What is the effort attempting to solve?

Am I making the effort as a child would or as an adult?

Am I seeing the world, in terms of speaking, as a child or adult?

Pick a single episode where you stammered and investigate that, otherwise it is too easy to theorise or rely on myth to explain your thinking. The theory and the myth will have major errors. It is your actual thinking that is important and if you can't be clear about that then try to guess but be clear that you are guessing and treat the result tentatively.

The judgment should follow the description and don't be in too much of a hurry to converge on the answers.

If you don't write the answers out you will be doing yourself a disservice.

Effortless speech

2007-12-04T11:37:00.000-08:00

What did I learn from my visit to the Glasgow group?

That stammering is unbelievably effortful and that speaking is effortless.

Why?

Because the PWS is doing a great many things in their head, and when pushed and given no time to think the internal dialogue has to stop and so, like the rest of us, the PWS speaks effortlessly to get his point across.

I have also noticed this before with PWS. When not given the luxury of time to plan and second guess and go internal: speaking becomes effortless. When the attention is directed beyond, to the topic or the other person or group, speech becomes effortless.

I think we should stop talking about fluency or ‘normal’ speech and instead look to EFFORTLESSLY SPEAK. You have to work to be fluent but you can speak effortlessly - toddlers do and so did most PWS did before they didn't.

As with blushing: we can’t effortfully not blush, it has to be effortless and when we don’t make an effort we don’t blush!!

Identity

2007-11-30T09:58:00.000-08:00

I have just come across a very interesting article at http://www.stammering.org/heidi4.html and Heidi who has had some success with the SpeechEasy device says, 'therapy support has been vital for me, in order to explore who I am now that I don't stammer so much'.

This supports my last post, I think.

But use anything that helps apart from drugs.

As for the rest of the article: I have reservations about how people interpret brain imaging - I do it for a living. The main thing to remember is that evidence of association is not evidence of causation. What comes first: the function or the structure? And imaging may show which structures are associated, or not, with a behaviour. Occasionally there is a structural abnormality which is clearly seen: as in some cases of epilepsy and tumours.

Shyness, anger and depression may show changes in in imaging but does that mean there is a 'causal' relationship? Very rarely.

What is there to lose?

2007-11-28T10:15:00.000-08:00

If you could speak without stammering what would you have to lose?

Seems a daft question but please take it seriously.

You might think in terms of regret about the missed opportunities, the fear of losing the excuses you have had not to do things, of not knowing who you would be - a biggy! or many other things - all legitimate.

How much of your identity is involved in your stammering or vice versa?

At first you may think you have nothing to lose but remember your stammering is part of your behaviour and our behaviour is our evidence for who we think we are. And it is a cybernetic relationship. We are what we do.

I am a smoker ( I actually wouldn't be seen dead smoking) therefore if I smoke I confirm my identity as a smoker. I may be a non-smoker and occasionally smoke, or a smoker who doesn't smoke. The latter is very hard work. Easier not to smoke if a non-smoker but this requires an identity change - not impossible if recognised but can be a big hurdle if unconscious.

The hard work of the covert PWS comes to mind.

Good book INFLUENCE by Robert Cialdini. How do we influence ourselves? Our behaviour is our feedback.

So, what do you have to lose?

safety in stumblers

2007-11-25T13:17:00.000-08:00

Safety in Stumblers has kindly given me an opportunity to attend the meeting on 3rd December.

I don't know yet what I will do at the meeeting. The last time I spoke to them, 2 years ago, I gave an overview of modelling which might be applied to stammering.

What kind of folk do I hope will be there?

One of the things I have found dealing with academics and others who have thought deeply and long about their condition, whether it be stammering or dyslexia or fear of flying, is that the more baggage they bring to the table the harder it is to convince them of any change. I worked with a dyslexic girl who could spell long words easily when I showed her how but remained unconvinced that it was how she was doing spelling that was the problem and so didn't practice or improve. It was too simple. I only had one session with her so a convincer session was missing!

One of the things thinking about a problem over a period of time does is build up a myth about it. My problem is special and complex and meaningful and so it should be impossible to change easily. I have had PWS tell me that they can see what I am getting at but not actually doing what I ask them to do. Yes, theory is interesting but if I don't taste a food no amount of description will substitute.

I am a practical chap. If I try something and it works then I don't second guess it. I try to use it and think about it later not at the time. I want to do the whatever it is as well as I can, at the time of the work. I don't want to be distracted by extraneous thoughts.

I might look for a volunteer to work with or talk about my working with PWS. Depends what they want on the night, I suppose. It will be sharing rather than preaching. The stuff on this blog is about life in general and I use stammering as an application. But the models and ways of thinking have universal applications.

Some meanderings about what makes PWS try therapy?

2007-11-19T11:38:00.000-08:00

Most of the PWS I have met have been very intelligent and getting on with their lives and successfully too. They may feel that stammering has held them back but doing something about it is a challenge and requires disruption to the way they have organised their lives.

My ideas about stammering have only been tested once and that was successful in that after 5 sessions the client could speak his name, answer the phone and hold a conversation without stammering. A situation which has held for over a year now. He tells me that when he has the occasional lapse he knows how to deal with the situation. The sessions cost him nothing apart from time and there was no homework, just insight.

I have worked with several PWS who felt in enough crisis to do something about it . They seemed to gain insights into their thinking and how they stammered but life caught up with them and after 3 or 4 times the sessions lapsed.

There is a world of difference between someone who doesn't want to be poor and one who wants to be rich. They will stop trying at different points on the continuum of making money. Keeping a sense of crisis is difficult and can be exhausting especially when there is no immediate improvement in speech.

Starting again is not actually restarting because the person will start from a different point of view or context. It is renewing the re-learing of speech. To see things as a journey is a useful metaphor and it is worth noting how far one has come.

Stammering emerges and so does normal speech. To change the way things emerge the necessary conditions need to be assembled and organised and this takes time. I tend to give mayself 5 sessions to make some impact.

And there is no one approach: if one is in the cat skinning business one should at least know a few ways of approaching the job. Change often takes effort but the journey can be interesting and fun.

As I read in one article in the BSA site: anyone can help a PWS to stop stammering for a week. My cred is that, given the chance, that week, 18 months ago, has lasted till now. Fast cures like NLP ( I have a practitioner cert. ) are very unlikely to provide long lasting change in a session: good for recent onset phobias, not generalised fears where the person has built up a structure to explain the problem.

I make time to work with PWS because stammering interests me. One problem I have is that apart from the client mentioned above I have no continual history of success and folk don't want to waste their time. I cannot promise to resolve anyones speech difficulties. I do expect to have a significant impact on how speech emerges, in a reasonable time and to provide some personal insights along the way.

Maybe I should call what I do insight therapy.

Standards

2007-11-04T09:42:00.000-08:00

We operate out of our standards in almost everything we do: what we should do or be, what other people should do, what the world should be like.

We apply our standards in an ‘either / or’ way or in a ‘more or less way’ and some things may be one and some the other. Or we apply them as a mature adult or a young kid! And we do it unconsciously.

It is very useful to know what standards we are operating from and how we are using them. A good way to find out is to ask ourselves what makes us angry or uncomfortable.

If someone cuts me up on the motorway I can either get angry or move back to let him in and the judgment about the driver will depend on what standards of courtesy I apply to myself or expect from other road users. How I am feeling in general will affect my judgment too: sometimes I am easy with such behaviour sometimes very judgmental. When I start to judge other drivers negatively I ask myself what else is bothering me because often there is something that needs attention and this helps to shine the spotlight on it.

Rather than wanting a bad feeling to go away it is more useful to ask ourselves which of our standards are being violated and how. Use a notebook to grab the moment and reflect on it later.

If stammering is an expression of what is going on in us then looking at our standards is a useful way of finding out the unconscious judgments about ourselves and the world that provide a back story for the stammer i.e. our behaviour.

Some of the standards may be out of date and need reassessed and some are ok but being applied in a less than useful way.
Ask yourself would you want a young kid to grow up with the particular standard and if so how would you want him to apply the standard and when.

Think 'useful' rather than 'right or wrong'. Remember many of our standards are formed when we were 5 or 6 years old.

Performance Anxiety

2007-10-28T11:06:00.000-07:00

Stage Fright is a startling description of what is now called Performance Anxiety. We can be anxious about anything we do and usually it is about looking bad to ourselves or others, fear of failure to achieve what we want and we don't like the feeling we get so we fight, fly or freeze.

We can alter the feeling with relaxation or distraction techniques.

We can examine our disaster scenarios and see how mythical they are.

We can attend to the bigger picture and move the spotlight away from ourseves while still keeping in the conversation.

What is ideal and what is realistic?

To use this stuff a diary or journal or notebook is really essential to objectify the content.

Stage Fright

2007-10-26T09:07:00.000-07:00

Speaking in public is one of the commonest fears we have.

We are on show and vulnerable. Our self-esteem can be dented and we will never recover! We may blush and look childish. Our uncertainty may show and we will look silly. But tomorrow the sun will shine!

We may be second guessing ourselves and attend to the detail of the conversation rather than the whole thing: getting the overall point across and having the odd reminder to associate to gets lost in the detail.

A bit like trying to pay attention to every point of paint in an impressionist painting while looking at each figure and shape and the whole composition at the same time – can’t be done.
But we can sequence the attention and allow our unconscious to enrich each part for us.

The stage-frightened actor tries to watch himself and all the detail of his role, rehearse each word immediately before it is uttered, the overall script and to second guess the audience judgment rather than just doing the play and seeing how it works out afterwards and making any adjustments for the next performance.

Point of View

2007-10-13T01:23:00.000-07:00

We can take a point of view about the world or topics, and we are all used to having a sense of this.
But what is taking a point of view. Where are we thinking from and to? Also, seeing things in a different light adds qualities to the thing, person or idea being considered.

How does this affect stammering? Well, if you re-read Ash's post he shifted his point of view and now thinks from a different position. We have all done this when we change our minds and noticed the shift in our emotions that accompanies the changed viewpoint. If you are into photography you will have a very visual idea of what is going on here.

Ask yourself 'How else can I look at this?' Actors use this kind of thinking to play a particular role in a different way, sympathetic, dizzy blonde, serious parent, fussy batchelor, self-centered, open etc.

Each one of us has different parents because, among other things, our parents see each of us from different point of view.

Books

2007-09-20T13:21:00.000-07:00

I thought it an idea to mention some books that I think are useful for everyone but, I think, particularly for PWS.

I suggest them because they are helpful for appreciating what is going on with other people and ourselves when we are in company and for practicing speaking.

The Book of Tells, Peter Collet. Good for letting you know what other people are thinking. Try using the information in a cafe when people watching. Good fun.

The Quick and Easy Way to Effective Speaking, Dale Carnegie. Loads of hints and tips. Excellent. Style a bit dated but humans have been talking for a lot of years now and nothing changes.

Confident Conversation, Lillian Glass. Lots of tips and there is always something you can use. Buy second hand.

Confident Speaking, Godefroy &Barrat. Really about business presentations but the odd tip is worth the money . Buy second hand.

Also books by Cicily Berry, Sewart Pearce and Patsy Rodenburg and tape by Carol Fleming. Mostly for actors, except the last.
These are about articulation and speaking clearly.

Rodenburg's tapes: 'The right to Speak' are excellent and for everyone not specifically for actors. Might be easier to try the tapes first to hear the exercises.

Won't resolve the stammering but will add to confidence and give the PWS a goal while speaking. I have books and tapes by all of the above and ransacked the bookshelves to find them for this blog. They are for everyone not just PWS. Look them up on Amazon.

Hope you enjoy

Let me, and others, know

Learning Curve

2007-09-13T13:14:00.000-07:00

How do we think we learn to do something, over time? Sometimes it is instant and we know how to do it and at other times we try again and again and sometimes succeed and sometimes fail.

Learning is 3 steps forward and 2 back, or 3 forward and 3 back so need to start over. Or it feels that way.

How we look at learning and the metaphors we use to support ourselves in learning are very important.

When we fail to do as well as we hope, we can feel bad and give up on ourselves, give ourselves a severe talking to, tell ourselves we will never learn, that we are hopeless that trying is too much trouble. So we start again, maybe.

What is the reality? In the past when we learned to write, use a keyboard, walk, run, drive a car, eat with knife and fork, dance formally were we as good at our first attempt as we are now. I doubt it, but we persevered, and now it is like falling off a log.

We tell ourselves we are back at square one and we have a big job to get back to where we were yesterday or this morning. But if we use failure to wonder what was different in the case of failure and success and learn from each and adjust our behaviour earlier – and again it won’t be perfect, but we keep at it then our attitude has improved immeasurably.

George Soros one of the richest traders in the world has a 85% failure rate in his trades but the magnitude of the few successful trades overwhelms the losses on the losers. He expects to lose.
If he didn’t learn from his failures he would be the loser.

Former PWS

2007-09-06T10:50:00.000-07:00

Ash is an adult and normal speaker now.

He kindly commented on Self Talk:

I used to have an intermittent stammer around ages 11-14. One day (I recall it quite well) I discovered a way to "think over it". It now recurs rarely, in moments of stress where I'm attending to what I'm saying.

It's a little hard to describe what I did... subjectively, part of it was that I moved my centre of consciousness - the point within my body which I think from, measure the world from - from my mouth/throat to higher up my head, behind my eyes. That's where the "over" bit comes from.

And I can bring it back at will (not that I often want to). Mostly by reversing the process described above, plus a bit of body tension, and directing my attention to my speaking/hearing.

I wanted to bring this to your attention rather than let it languish in a comment.

Self Talk

2007-09-04T12:30:00.000-07:00

How do I set myself up to speak?

Take each of the words and emphasise them in turn so:

HOW do I set myself up to speak?

How DO I set myself up to speak? etc.

Different meaning eh?

Now do it with the rest.

What did you learn?

What we say is important but how we say it is very important and I wonder if that is an element in actors who don't stammer on stage eg Bruce Willis and Rowan Atkinson.

2007-08-31T00:48:00.000-07:00

EMERGENCE

In her excellent site http://closetstutterer.blogspot.com/ ; Closet stutterer Sophie mentions working on what doesn’t immediately seem to be her stammering but to work on other issues. An excellent idea. It gets away from the chicken and egg situation I wrote of earlier.

Think of a cake, I like a rich fruitcake like a Christmas cake. What is the cause of the cake?
Not the baker who only brings the ingredients together in a time and tested way to allow the cake to emerge. Not the ingredients as each stands. There is no cause in raisins where the effect is a cake, and so on. The ingredients are brought together and mixed in a bowl. Now try to get the sugar out or the eggs; can’t be done. The mix is different to the sum of each ingredient. Not more than, just different – it can be an unwanted result!!

Also, to think of each ingredient: how fresh is it; how much is needed – we don’t want too much of any single part; what is the balance between the parts – we don’t want it overcooked.

Sometimes only one ingredient is overdone, sometimes they can be overdone in different proportions but the result is often unwanted and we can change what we employ and how we use it.

We can't look at the ingredients and say what they will cause; only a coming together of ingredients will allow a cake to emerge.

You get the idea.

To think that any behaviour is simple is to miss a lot and if we don’t look we wont see.

Stammering isn't curable any more than blushing is curable, we need to think differently and then it isn’t an issue and doesn’t emerge. But I agree with Sophie it is easier said than done.

Chicken or Egg

2007-08-24T15:24:00.000-07:00

Stammering is interesting because the performance of the speech seems to cause the nervousness that accompanies the stammer. Or being nervous causes the stammer; or knowing that one might stammer causes the nervousness that causes the stammer.

If we take the view that there is no such thing as cause-effect then what?

The stammering speech is the nervousness. Neither causes the other. They are the same thing. The nervousness is the stammering speech. Is it not?

Comfortable rather than fluent?

2007-08-14T14:53:00.000-07:00

What do I mean by comfortable? Well, to be unaware of discomfort.
Do you feel comfortable when looking in the mirror?
Can you comfortably speak out loud when you are looking in the mirror?
Can you speak comfortably when alone?

If that is the case and you speak comfortably and not stammeringly then is your response to other people the big issue?

Hesitation

2007-08-01T13:03:00.000-07:00

My mother used to describe PWS as people having a hesitation and I wondered if mothers’ wisdom might be worth looking into.

The wonderful www.onelook.com online dictionary (add the link to your favourites) describes hesitation as:

noun: the act of pausing uncertainly
noun: indecision in speech or action
noun: a certain degree of unwillingness

and

to hesitate as:

verb: pause or hold back in uncertainty or unwillingness

verb: interrupt temporarily an activity before continuing

Uncertainty, indecision, unwillingness and interruption: all of these suggest being in two minds or changing what is being thought about, at least.

Watch people speaking in a non-scripted program on TV or listen on the radio. Do they speak their minds literally or do they mentally rehearse the sentence before they say it?
No, they don’t have time for rehearsal they just say what comes to mind. When they think they simultaneously speak. They speak their thoughts and don’t second guess themselves or what is going on. There is a place for second guessing but it isn’t while speaking.

Our brains works too fast for our bodies so just doing one thing at a time allows us to keep up. I am typing this and if I start to think of where the letters are on the typewriter and at the same time wonder if I am getting them right even before I touch them, not to mention keeping to my train of thought, my failure rate rockets and I hesitate repeatedly!

If we attempt to rehearse each sentence before we speak we will speak in the same way as we think - all over the place - after all, when will we know that the rehearsal is complete.

When alone try looking in the mirror and speak about your feelings to the person looking back.

I could try to polish this post till I thought it was perfect for purpose but good enough for purpose will have to do. And I can always come back to the topic and clarify anything I think needs it. Similarities for speech?

Pagoclone

2007-07-31T15:08:00.000-07:00

The BSA site http://www.stammering.org/pagoclone.html
tells us, ‘Indevus Pharmaceuticals, Inc. announced results from a phase II trial of pagoclone in 132 adults with persistent developmental stuttering, with 44 receiving the active compound at low doses, 44 at high doses, and 44 receiving a placebo. Objective fluency improved (videotaped and scored by independent raters blinded) and so did subjective assessment scores (made by the participants in the trial). They were measured twice before the start of the trial, after 4 weeks and again after 8 weeks of treatment. 55% of the pagoclone treated patients had improved at week 8 compared to 36% of placebo treated patients’.

Now, if this is accurate: of 100 PWS who take pagoclone 55 will improve overall but 36 would have improved anyway ( placebo response ) leaving 19 who will benefit from pagoclone. This means that it is half as good as a placebo 19/36.

Bear in mind the placebo doesn’t have side effects.

Am I missing something? Or how do people get lauded for bad science, never mind arithmetic?

Old Joke

2007-07-30T12:32:00.000-07:00

The last post was obviously a poor retelling of an old joke.

But as with many jokes it harbours an uncomfortable truth: how we set ourselves up determines to a large extent how we interpret what happens to us and how we behave in those states of affairs we meet continually each day.

The meaning and significance we give to events makes a difference and the fact that we give them their meaning means we can reinterpret events - not change how we remember what happened but re-evaluate, not through rose-tinted spectacles.

Bad things and bad people are just that: what matters is that their influence on us is appropriate to a particular time in our life and doesn't continue to dominate our thinking.

How did we learn to keep away from open flames when we were young and how do we think about fire now?

Hammer

2007-07-28T03:15:00.000-07:00

The other night I had a particular job to do in the house which needed a hammer. I thought of my neighbour, whom I get on well with: I know he has a hammer of just the right size. But I put off going round as I don’t really like borrowing things. Time moved on and eventually came to the point when I just couldn’t put it off any longer.

As I walked around to his door I thought:

I’m sure he will let me have the hammer after all I loaned him things before.
But he didn’t get round to giving me back the spanner I loaned him and he might feel bad about that now.
But I only want the hammer for a short time.
But he might think I won’t bring the hammer back just after I’ve finished with it.
But it is a new hammer and he might not have used it himself yet.
But he might want to use the hammer and I will feel stupid if he says ‘No’.
He will feel embarrassed if he has to say ‘No’
But I will have made him embarrassed and he will resent me for it.
We have been good neighbours but this might end it
And so on……………………

As you can imagine I was becoming more and more emotional, embarrassed, anxious and ashamed that I had to ask to borrow something and didn't have it myself. Self righteousness came into it too.

So, when I got to his house he opened the door and said a smiling ‘Hi!’

I told him he could keep his damned hammer and where to put it.

Speech Devices

2007-07-23T12:34:00.000-07:00

What do these things do? Well it seems they delay us hearing the sound of our voices and so interrupt the feedback we normally expect. This upsets the applecart and we speak differently. I say we speak differently because although they disrupt the PWS and so make it harder to keep up the self monitoring that goes with stammering, DAF machines also lead those who don’t stammer to speak stammeringly.

I know someone who took part in an undergraduate experiment with a DAF machine. He saw how others stammered and decided to ignore the feedback and keep talking. He didn’t stammer. The lecturer was upset.

We attend to novelty because the world becomes more interesting or less safe.

By attending to something other than what we normally attend to we behave differently.

If we don't want what we have always got then we have to behave differently.

Feelings

2007-07-07T02:24:00.000-07:00

We use our feelings to monitor how we are in the world.

Usually uncomfortable feelings are the ones we attend to and think about more. Because we associate discomfort with being unsafe the feeling remains until it is replaced by a sense of safety. And feelings arise instantly.

We use our feelings to supervise what and how we are doing and we pay attention to them rather than ask, ‘Ah, what is that feeling about?’ and then respond in the world to that state of affairs.

If we think of our feelings as feedback then we can use them to explore our thinking on what is going on for us more objectively. But if we get lost in the intensity of our feelings then they become overwhelming and the world becomes unsafe, we get to the flight, fright or freeze reaction. The feeling becomes the issue not the state of affairs and distracts us from the world as it is and puts our focus on ourselves.

We cannot trust our feelings. If you think you can: then remember the people you met that you liked and later came to know better and disliked. Did you trust your feelings, or intuitions at the time? Were they trustworthy. What about the opposite scenario?

Using a journal to explore our feelings is good because it objectifies the issues.

The Listener

2007-07-01T12:13:00.000-07:00

Folk who speak stammeringly also listen and as listeners we need some attention too.

When someone is speaking to me:

I need him to speak in short simple sentences that I can relate to easily. Out with longwinded complicated sentences with lots of subclauses. It is hard enough in print but very difficult to keep up with in speech. Simple past present and future tenses will do nicely.

I need him to speak at a rate that allows me to put my thoughts about what he is saying in some sort of context. When people are nervous they often speak too fast.

I need a little thinking time between sentences.

I need to hear clearly what the person is saying and for him not to mumble. Most people mumble when they are not sure of themselves.

I need to see the speaker’s mouth moving. We lip read more than we think. I also need him to keep his hands, cup or drinking glass away from his mouth. We tend to cover our mouths when we are nervous.

I need him to face me, otherwise I can’t hear him and may be unaware that he is speaking to me.

I need him to articulate as clearly as they can manage so that I can distinguish words and sentences.

Now, I know that someone stammering might be doing all of the above and, if that is so, I will be able to make out what he is saying. I won’t have to feel I need to ask for a repeat: ‘Sorry. I didn’t catch that?’

Don’t take my word for it. Ask yourself what you need as a listener. Use the news or interviews to investigate what you need: not what they are giving you – not the content but the delivery. Good newsreaders will be trained to think in terms of the audience’s needs and to find ways to meet them.

When I am trying to listen to what someone is saying and he mumbles, the first thing I think is that I have missed something. I want to hear him and I can’t. I am confused: and being confused feels very uncomfortable.

Deep or quiet voices can be particularly difficult for me to make out.

Now, I know that real people, rather than actors, don’t choose to stammer but we are all listeners and although PWS will know the difficulties of speaking, as listeners they can appreciate the hearer’s needs too.

Digital or Analogue

2007-06-27T12:03:00.000-07:00

With digital processing the controlling switch is on or off, either–or, with analogue processing the communication which the switch controls can be on a little or a lot. Which is best to use depends on the circumstances. But there is more flexibility with the analogue switch: just like a dimmer.

You are only as good as the last time you spoke. You either get it right or wrong. People are either good or bad. There is no second chance. Either it will go well or it will be a disaster. Unless you speak like a politician on TV or a newsreader you are not good enough. All of the above discount a complex life for one incident, which is often trivial in the scale of things.

These are among the daftest types of judgments we can make. And they are digital.

People might make much or little of a lapse depending on whether they think digitally or not. Better to see things in a wider framework, it comes with a different feeling.

When we are small the world is digital and too often we keep the feeling and the way of judging for an unhappy lifetime.
We present the world digitally to our kids and we were those kids once upon a time. Fairy tales and stories, films and cartoons have good guys and bad guys - clear distinctions.

Not so in adult life. Folk are a mixture, both good and bad: analogue.

There is a continuum and we can be anywhere along it depending on the circumstances and how we feel.

What we remember and how we remember it depends on our feelings at the time of enquiry, so false memories are an everyday occurrence. We really shouldn’t be so sure of ourselves.

Thinking: both ...and... is better than either......or........ usually.

Are you a black and white sort of person; or a shades of gray sort of person?

Distraction

2007-06-24T12:23:00.000-07:00

Distraction isn’t enough. When I want to distract myself, at the back of my mind there is a kind of supervisory function goes on which keeps gnawing away and won’t let me forget the thing I would rather put off. So deliberate distraction won’t do. But when I am at work and am torn between several things of equal importance that I want to get done, it is easy to forget one or two, in all honesty.

Are there lessons here? I think so.

Rather than thinking of distraction, which actually turns my attention on me, I look for interest and ask myself, ‘I wonder what I can find interesting about this person?’ and concentrate on investigating them, at some level. It is a bit like looking at a painting and being satisfied with whether I like it or not, or looking at it and wondering about the composition, technique, colours used, the artists use of colour, genre, the frame, the setting of the work in the room, the history of the work itself, the artist and her history. If I don't like it that doesn’t mean I can’t find something of interest in it.

When I have got to know people or paintings I have sometimes changed my first impressions, for better or worse, and I’m sure you have too.

Importantly, if I am think about someone asking me if I like a painting or need to justify my judgments about it then the investigation becomes focused on me not the painting, and I lose my calm.

There is a difference between worrying about not failing an exam and wanting the best mark I can get. Wanting not to be poor is different from wanting to be rich. Wanting not to look unfashionable is different from wanting to be dressed fashionably.

So we can travel in a different direction. Allowing ourselves to be distracted by what interests us is easy: so, rather than making it a chore, make other people the focus of your interest and attention. I like watching people: what shapes they are, how they are dressed, what they look as if they are doing, wondering what they do for a living, whether they are harassed, and how I might be totally wrong about my assessment of them, do they look scary and I wonder why I think that. One thing can lead to another and the light the picture is seen in changes.

When my attention is on me I get flustered. But I am flattered to have someone give me their whole attention.

These suggestions have to be acted on to explore and ultimately change habits through practice. Try them and see what happens.

Obsession

2007-06-23T08:28:00.000-07:00

St Paul tells us in Romans 7,19: For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.

Substitute for St Paul’s dilemma: The way that I would like to speak I don’t and the way I don’t want to speak is how my speech comes out.

Why is this the case? St Paul attributes it to sinful nature, but psychology has given us some useful insights into this particular phenomenon

In his excellent book The Happiness Hypothesis, Jonathan Haidt reports Dan Wegner’s work suggesting that when we want to avoid something we set up unconscious monitoring for what we want not to happen. When we have tried to suppress these thoughts and have failed, they become intrusive and obsessive. Test it for yourself: try not to think of chocolate for 3 hours and see what happens. Or, as you are reading this, try not to think of a pink elephant with blue polka dots and don’t let that image come to mind for the rest of the day. Milton Erickson, the great medical hypnotist, used negative commands frequently, because they worked.

Have you ever read Dale Carnegie’s books? Well worth reading for folk who stammer. One of his points is to attend to other people and what they are saying, particularly before speaking. He says, ‘ it is especially important to keep attention off yourself just before it is your turn to speak’.

Constant monitoring for specific behaviours sensitises the PWS to situations and issues associated with speaking. When one fails again the situation becomes all encompassing.

PM