Pubic Speaking

That's right, I said pubic.

As in mons pubis, from late 19th century Latin, meaning ‘mount of the pubes.’ Today let's talk about the oft overlooked importance of this particular bodily habitat and its relation to our speaking.

I was working with a wonderfully exuberant woman named Patti who wanted to appear at her most confident in front of groups. She was already a powerful speaker, and came across confident - she just was honing her edges, so to speak. Because of her experience working as a teacher, school administrator, and education speaker for years, our coaching session was not going to be about working on her fundamentals. What we started talking about was her style.

Specifically, Patti's natural exuberance came across in a 'rock and roll' manner. This was fine. Her fiery and bigger-than-life presence was just striving to successfully and fully translate when she addressed groups. So we started talking about some of the mechanics lead singers of rock bands use. This seemed to connect well for her.

One thing many lead singers do is push their hips forward, their (shh) pubic area forward, especially when they are front and center at the edge of a stage. Whether intentional or unintentional, they adopt a primal, sexual posture, and it conveys a strong confidence. Now, knowing that she probably did not want to be so brazen as to sexually shove her she-junk at audiences, we toned it down, distilling the hips-forward stance into a working, confident posture.

This can work for women and men when your style is earthy enough. Place your feet one-and-a-half to two times shoulder-width, while holding a two or three inch push forward of your hips. It is better to have your hips forward (pelvis, belly, etc.) than your shoulders or head. And this is not an 'always on' stance - just something to use for certain big and bold moments where you are really rockin' a point. I have found it a valuable addition to my own posture where my body wants to curve forward, leading with my shoulders. Thinking about "pubic speaking" keeps my shoulders back and helps me feel more confident in my delivery.

Too much?

Words To Describe Body Language

Non-verbal communication. Body language. Etcetera.

If you are like me, you have heard things about how important it is, how non-verbals matter more than verbals in conversations, how the majority of our communication meaning is due to the things we do rather than say, stuff like that.

OK, so what are we to do with that information, exactly?

I remember when I first heard a statistic about how 67 or 72 or 84 percent of our communication comes from body language (it seems to change dramatically with the source). Considering it opened my world.

But after deciding that it could be true I felt paralyzed, because unlike verbal communication, body language is something I was never taught. Yes, I enjoyed language of the wordish variety, but I wanted deeper understanding and mastery of the whole genre. (By the way, did you ever have to do those workbooks called Wordly Wise? Love-hate.)

My life-long trek to learn how to be a better communicator began in elementary school when I wrote myself a part in some horrible school play. By the time I graduated high school, an 'A' in a speech or acting class meant more to me than anything else in school. I was in all the plays I could manage and even gave a shot or two at standup comedy. By the way, if you think you are funny, try standup comedy. It makes you think you are not.

So here are three easy non-verbal tips to try in your next presentation or speech.

1. Don't just do something, stand there. Nothing is more frustrating for an audience than watching a fake, so stop thinking and planning about what to do with your hands and just let them chill out. When you are in the moment and connecting with your messages, your body follows naturally.
2. Stand. Up. The development stage of those who read blogs tends to be past primate. Give yourself a couple little stretches for your shoulders and back before you step up front so you are reminded to stand tall. A slouching speaker is demoralizing.
3. Walkie-talkies are for Rosco P. Coltrane. When you have a key message to deliver, stand still and deliver it. Walking while talking only works when it is purposeful (ex. moving to a new spot to begin a new idea, or moving to demonstrate an action in a story). When you have a powerful point, stand in one place and deliver the line.

I am always interested non-verbal communication observations. If you have any, start talking.

Move Your Body

I remember an observational game we played in an undergrad acting class back when I was at the University of Minnesota. I can still picture that class very clearly.

The teacher, Nancy Houfek (my first real interaction with an incredibly talented and dedicated acting teacher), asked the class one at a time to stand up and walk around the room. The room was a cool, modern theater-in-the-round setup, with darkly lit audience seats fully surrounding the stage, going up about fifteen rows. I remember how well-lit the stage area was, like a little bastion of security /insecurity. Whenever you were out on it by yourself, if you felt any self-consciousness, you just felt totally exposed as classmates looked in and down on you from every angle.

So in this activity - this walking thing - one at a time, we were told to just walk completely normally, don't ham or strut or anything, just do your natural walk. Nancy would let each of us keep walking in silence for maybe a minute while everyone else in the class watched. It felt like a long time to just walk around, across the stage, up and down different stair cases, not really having anything to do except walk. The internal chatter started up immediately. Am I moving my arms normally? What do I look like from the back? Do I have a silly walk?

Then, after a minute of silent walking and everyone watching you, after you started to hopefully walk naturally and not how you wished you walked, she began to ask the class questions. "What are you seeing? Is he Fast or Slow? Is he Light or Heavy? Is he Direct or Indirect?" Those same questions were repeated for each individual. The class would discuss and state opinions about the walker's rate, semblance of (not physical) weight, and directional style, all while the one in the spotlight continued to walk about for a few more minutes. After a total of perhaps four minutes, the walker could sit down and the next person would stand and the process would begin again.

The learning was awesome. I learned not just about my own movement but also about how other's movement impacted me. The questions she asked during the walks were a simplified slice of Laban Movement Analysis, specifically the Action Drives people employ when they move. It remains my most useful movement awareness tool for large group communication. I use it when jumping into a character for a second in a story I am telling, to consider how to best make an impact for a certain bit I want to say in a speech, to assess staff I train on how their movement impacts student engagement, or to consider how I am physically presenting myself when I walk through a room full of Bolivian dignitaries. Slow/Fast, Light/Heavy, Direct/Indirect. The point is that all of the categories occur in how we move all the time, whether it is by choice or reaction: when we walk, when we gesture, and in our posture.

Changing any one aspect of our movement changes the emotion conveyed, the intention conveyed, and even perceptions others have about our personality. For example, we all have our own natural movement tendencies (I typically move slowly, heavily, and indirectly. Laban labels this a "wring" movement style.) We also have choices to purposefully change our movement to create a new combination, changing how we are perceived.

Do you need to make a detailed, important point in a speech? When you speak it, move slowly to let the detail 'breathe', use a heavy weight for credibility, and be direct in gesture to give a purposefulness that correlates with the intention of your communication. Want to appear uninterruptable and busy? Move fast, heavy, and direct. Want to convey upbeat and energetic because you need to loosen up a group? Move fast, light, and indirect to convey casualness. It's all about matching the strategy to the situation, and in this case the strategy is your body.

Laban Movement is like a blueprint for the body-in-action that provides us with more choice in our communication. It is not something to build a fake mask about ourselves, but rather to open up choices when we are looking to be more dynamic or generate a certain result with others. So much is communicated through our body language - we hear these stats - but Laban gives us a reference for making meaningful choices to do something about it. I highly recommend it for anyone invested in public communication.