I recently had the honour of attending the 50th Anniversary Dinner of the Blacktown CIty Toastmasters Association. It was a lovely night of celebration, acknowledgement and joy commemorating leadership, confidence and speechmaking.
During the night, they incorporated the much loved Toastmasters activity of Table Topics. This is where a speaker is given a topic at random and must present a two minute improv speech in response.
Now it has been a good eight years since I had improv drama class and debate team so I was a bit lost for words when I was asked to provide an answer to: 'What does it mean to be Human?'
Yes a very philosophical question and very difficult to answer in two short minutes.
I however answered it in about twenty seconds. I spoke too quickly, I used ums and uhs, I looked down, didn't use hand gestures and kept my hand on my hip the whole time.
But what I did say was important: Being Human is about failing. It is about learning from your mistakes and becoming a better person in the process.
However as soon as I sat down after speaking, I became so critical of myself and negated my own advice; that it is ok to fail, it is ok to make mistakes and that's what being human is all about.
Once I realised this I thought it would be best to ask for advice about how to re-approach the activity. I was given advice about a technique called PREP,something I instantly linked back to debate team.
But hey: being human is about making mistakes and learning from them. So here is the learning part.
During the night, they incorporated the much loved Toastmasters activity of Table Topics. This is where a speaker is given a topic at random and must present a two minute improv speech in response.
Now it has been a good eight years since I had improv drama class and debate team so I was a bit lost for words when I was asked to provide an answer to: 'What does it mean to be Human?'
Yes a very philosophical question and very difficult to answer in two short minutes.
I however answered it in about twenty seconds. I spoke too quickly, I used ums and uhs, I looked down, didn't use hand gestures and kept my hand on my hip the whole time.
But what I did say was important: Being Human is about failing. It is about learning from your mistakes and becoming a better person in the process.
However as soon as I sat down after speaking, I became so critical of myself and negated my own advice; that it is ok to fail, it is ok to make mistakes and that's what being human is all about.
Once I realised this I thought it would be best to ask for advice about how to re-approach the activity. I was given advice about a technique called PREP,something I instantly linked back to debate team.
But hey: being human is about making mistakes and learning from them. So here is the learning part.
PREP stands for:
Point - Introduce the speeach with a main point - focus on one point
Reason - why is the point important - research/statistics or personal experience (speak from the heart)
Example - give an example that supports the main point and reasons
Point - re-iterate your main point
If I was to answer this questions again, I would answer like this:
"Although a philosophical question, I believe the meaning of being human is imperfection, it's about making mistakes and learning from them. My belief is that perfection is boring, there is no growth and no learning when we don't make mistakes. And if we continue learning, it creates excitement in our lives to better ourselves. I remember every morning in high school when my dad would drop me off to school, he would tell me one last thing: Be Human. It took me a while to understand what he meant, but I slowly realised what he meant. He was telling me in two simple words, not to put pressure on myself to be perfect, to make mistakes. He was telling me that it was ok for me to fail and not be the best as long I learnt from my mistakes and become a better person, a better human. So you ask me, what does it mean to be human? To me it is about making mistakes, learning from them and becoming a better person everday."
Point - Introduce the speeach with a main point - focus on one point
Reason - why is the point important - research/statistics or personal experience (speak from the heart)
Example - give an example that supports the main point and reasons
Point - re-iterate your main point
If I was to answer this questions again, I would answer like this:
"Although a philosophical question, I believe the meaning of being human is imperfection, it's about making mistakes and learning from them. My belief is that perfection is boring, there is no growth and no learning when we don't make mistakes. And if we continue learning, it creates excitement in our lives to better ourselves. I remember every morning in high school when my dad would drop me off to school, he would tell me one last thing: Be Human. It took me a while to understand what he meant, but I slowly realised what he meant. He was telling me in two simple words, not to put pressure on myself to be perfect, to make mistakes. He was telling me that it was ok for me to fail and not be the best as long I learnt from my mistakes and become a better person, a better human. So you ask me, what does it mean to be human? To me it is about making mistakes, learning from them and becoming a better person everday."
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