Mushmouth

November 5, 2009 8:42 AM

How did you learn to express your thoughts in a way that is clear and thorough - but concise?

I tend to ramble when I talk. I start out with a clear idea of what I want to say, but I end up backtracking or going off on tangents that I think help clarify or give context to my larger point. I'm often left feeling like I've only gotten my point across in a very muddy way, and I can only imagine how frustrating it must be for a listener.

If I have plenty of time to edit and reframe and reword what I'm going to say (or if the communication is happening in writing) I have no trouble - speech/presentation situations are no problem. It's more just everyday conversation at work and at home - I get bogged down correcting myself or going off in a direction I think will work better. I'm the master of the half-finished analogy. I constantly correct and fine-tune what I'm saying, as I say it, based on feedback (real or imagined) from my listener and on how it sounds to me as I say it. Basically, I talk like George Michael on Arrested Development.

Can you give me tools to: 1) figure out exactly what I want to say, quickly; 2) say it, without equivocating or qualifying or otherwise confusing things - again, quickly?

Thanks, AskMe!

posted by peachfuzz to human relations (25 comments total)

Toastmasters. Or anything else that will give you formal public speaking experience. I got mine on the college debate team. The point is to force yourself to figure out what you want to say, organize it, and spit it out within a time limit. It's great practice.
posted by decathecting at 8:50 AM on November 5

I used to have this problem too - basically working out what I wanted to say only once I'd opened my mouth and started speaking.

Now I don't feel the pressure to reply immediately. It's perfectly acceptable to say "Let me think about that for a minute", gather your thoughts together, and then say them.
posted by Ziggy500 at 8:52 AM on November 5

Practice.
posted by I EAT TAPAS at 8:53 AM on November 5 [1 favorite has favorites]

I avoid jargon and keep my statements concise. I also find that when I use pauses correctly, it helps make my point clear.
posted by jmmpangaea at 9:02 AM on November 5

I'm often left feeling like I've only gotten my point across in a very muddy way, and I can only imagine how frustrating it must be for a listener.

First question: is this really what you sound like? It's really easy to feel like you've made no sense when you actually have and your listener is following. (Similarly, it's easy to feel like you've made perfect sense when in fact you have not.) Do people normally respond to you with confusion? Has anyone outright told you you were rambling confusedly? Can you ask a trusted friend to tell you if this is how you sound?

The next question is, how old are you? If you're still young, you may just grow out of it. Also, if you're still fairly young, are there still college-going years ahead of you? If you can take classes with an emphasis on scholarly writing, that will probably help you. (Sure, your problem is with speaking, not writing, but just getting better at structuring your thoughts in general can be helpful.) I particularly suggest studying logic, because the more practice you have with logical operations, the easier you'll find it to keep your thoughts in a logical order.

If you don't have schoolwork ahead of you, you can still try to get the same type of practice in other mediums.. You can even use Metafilter to your advantage: if you see a post or question you want to respond to, take a moment first to try saying out loud what you want to post here.
posted by Ms. Saint at 9:06 AM on November 5

On the first point, it's okay to pause and look thoughtful for a few seconds before speaking.

On the second point, one thing I've worked to do is eliminate certain words from my daily vocabulary: 'Just', in the casually dismissive way most of us use it, always makes your sentences sound weak. 'Should' is often used as a qualifier to give yourself wiggle room later if something doesn't happen. There are others, but here's an example:

'I'm just going to apply firmware updates to the entire datacenter and all systems should be back online by midnight'

This makes it sound I'm doing something easy but also suggests I have concerns about my ability to complete it. Plus, at 1am I don't get to remind everyone I 'only' said 'should'. By removing just, and changing the 'should' to a 'will' it becomes a much stronger sentence:

'I'm going to apply firmware updates to the entire datacenter and all systems will be back online by midnight'
posted by IanMorr at 9:12 AM on November 5

Ms. Saint: First question: is this really what you sound like?

Yeah, I think it really is. People in my personal life have expressed, in various ways, their frustration with the way I talk (It's confusing, stay focused, I'm not following you). No one at work has actually called me on it, but I cringe when I hear myself sometimes.

I'm in my mid-twenties, and definitely feel that I should know better by now - if anything, it's gotten worse over time. Part of the problem is that I'm really self-conscious about it at this point, which of course exacerbates it.

Embarrassing admission: I am a content editor by trade, a pretty decent one. I have no problem structuring and organizing other people's thoughts, and doing so with my own in formal writing is okay, too. It's just the spontaneous talking thing that I seem to have a lot of trouble with.

I really like the suggestion to slow down and not reply right away. I don't know why that hadn't occurred to me before.
posted by peachfuzz at 9:34 AM on November 5

Transcribing my own interviews have helped me immensely. Try recording yourself having a conversation, and then later going back and transcribing it. You'll have an immediate understanding of what you should have said instead, or maybe not said at all. You'll also hear all the other person's conversational cues as if for the first time -- you'll hear all the opportunities you missed, and be able to note all the places where you were really listening. It's excruciating, but it works.
posted by hermitosis at 9:39 AM on November 5 [5 favorites has favorites]

First of all, you're probably being hard on yourself. I'm sure it's not as bad from the listener's perspective.

Second, agreed on just taking your time. Concentrate on speaking slower, waiting to respond, pausing between sentences, etc. In a work situation, it's rarely a good idea to open your mouth with a half-formed idea anyway. At least 66% of what I hear in meetings is just parroting what everyone else is saying....and that gets worse the smarter the people in the room are. I work in health care administration, and I'll let you guess who I fear 4:00pm Friday meetings with...

It's perfectly OK (probably even preferable) to say "I don't want to make any commitments/statements that are inaccurate. I'll look into that and get back to in a few minutes." Then, reply via the rambler's best friend: email.

Third, don't worry about this in a non-professional environment. If you're among friends and family, just embrace it. It's how your mind works. If I'm your friend I don't want to be getting heavily filtered content. I want to hear you thinking. It's no fun to argue with fully formed ideas.
posted by paanta at 9:51 AM on November 5

Not the kind of answer you're looking for but, personally, I think this is a great quality. I love listening to people who don't talk in straight lines, especially women. Obviously, talking like WG Sebald wrote could be a problem in business, but I thought I'd put this out there on a personal level.
posted by SebastianKnight at 10:10 AM on November 5 [1 favorite has favorites]

Some think they're boring, but you might find university courses in logic to be useful. At the 200-level, mathematical logic and philosophical logic have a fair bit of overlap and are probably most applicable to everyday life.
posted by randomstriker at 10:13 AM on November 5

I find anxiety is usually the cause of lack of clarity--having to say it quickly while you still have their attention, expecting to be laughed at, trivialized, misunderstood. Needing to get the process over with. The result is premature conversational ejaculation.
posted by Obscure Reference at 10:26 AM on November 5

You could try giving yourself a word limit, or sentence limit. (Just as a trial, if it's too distracting you can always stop.) What if you had to get your point across in two sentences? You'd have to stop and think first.

I suggest it because I assign students the writing task of condensing their papers down to 100 words or 200 words, and I do the same when I'm stuck on a piece of writing of my own. I imagine the same would apply in speech.
posted by LobsterMitten at 10:41 AM on November 5

Seconding IanMorr's statement that pauses aren't a bad thing.
You're about to start talking?
stop. breathe. think. Okay, now talk.
Oh, wait, if you want to make this point best, your listener should really have the background - Wait! Don't start any form of sidetrack before you pause. Just count to two. Two nice full seconds. During those two seconds, you may have enough time to consider - does your listener really need to know that? Does he actually look like he's confused and needs extra explanation? How long do you think this side-track will take?

I tend to plan ahead. I enjoy talking, but I'm also somewhat private about information - it's a need-to-know thing with me, and I enjoy finding ways to summarize only the relevant parts of something complicated. My husband, on the toher hand, can't buy a stereo without telling the salesman what we were watching when the cat knocked the receiver off the shelf, which is one of those 4-foot-high things we bought at IKEA so it's no ownder it broke but maybe this time we should get something with rubber feet. It drives me crazy, and has been part of my inspiration for learning to control myself. Need to know. Your information is your own. Not everyone you talk to wants some of that. You do not need to inform someone against their will.
posted by aimedwander at 10:43 AM on November 5 [1 favorite has favorites]

I'd be curious to hear a sample of what you are talking about. If it's anything like me, I find myself verbally revising introductory subordinate clauses before I've spit out the main topic of what I'm talking about. If this was a new conversation, the listener at this point does not even know the topic that I am interested in.

I sometimes have to remind myself to speak using more simple sentences, not so many clauses, exclusions, and delimiters. Then when the listener is on the same topic as I am, I take a short breath and go crazy with qualifiers.
posted by CathyG at 10:50 AM on November 5

As an editor, you know how important it is to keep the audience of a piece in mind. Do that when you talk and see if it helps. Perhaps focusing on what you want the other person to understand, and how you can help them get that from your conversation, will help you tone down the internal speech editing just a little. Be very attentive to your conversation partner's reactions, and use that as the only basis for any midstream adjustments in what you're saying. The shades of nuance you're worrying over are probably lost on your listener 50% of the time anyway, so only worry if it's going to make a difference to the listener.
posted by slow graffiti at 10:52 AM on November 5

Oh, and as a secondary thought - get your idea out there first, then explain it. In writing, an article has a title and a hook paragraph or abstract, so try structuring your comments that way, maybe with a solid pause before you launch into the explanation. You might even find that a well-informed person can reply to your summary with a specific question, thus clueing you in to which supporting points that you can actually skip.
posted by aimedwander at 11:03 AM on November 5

Get a friend to ask you some open ended questions with you sitting in front of a video camera. Then watch it. You'll cringe and be embarrassed to death, but you'll learn really quickly what you need to work on (ramblings, uhs, ums, whatevers, etc...). A lot of different professional training schools do this on their students in a variety of disciplines (we had to do it as part of law school trial advocacy) and it really works. It's pretty amazing to actually see and hear yourself on video as an individual's perception of him/her-self is vastly different than what others see and hear. The video shows you all of your little mannerisms (both verbal and physical) that you would otherwise probably never notice because, well, it's just you.
posted by webhund at 11:34 AM on November 5

I would add: Don't forget, you're in a conversation. You can say one thing, pause, and then see see what response you get. You don't have to anticipate everything your listener is going to ask you--if you pause, they can ask you, and you can respond.
posted by Wittamer at 11:59 AM on November 5

Pause and think, then talk. Repeat.
posted by KateHasQuestions at 1:59 PM on November 5

These are incredibly helpful tips so far, thanks! I especially like the tips to tape/transcribe/record otherwise examine how I talk.
posted by peachfuzz at 3:13 PM on November 5

To people advocating the "tape yourself / watch the tape / cringe" method -- has anyone actually done this outside the context of professional school? Or in school, for that matter? I can't imagine this doing anything other than making yourself MORE conscious of bad mannerisms (taking the data you already have -- "Christ, I can hear myself fucking this sentence up AS I'M SAYING IT" -- and giving you strong visual evidence to support that yes, you fucked up that sentence, nobody can understand what you're saying, and you do this ALL THE TIME)

Visuals are always good, but this seems prime to exacerbate self-consciousness rather than alleviate it. Maybe I'm wrong, though? (anyone had luck with this?)
posted by puckish at 4:20 PM on November 5

also: I've been told that trying really hard to be clear and get your sentences straight and failing can be an endearing trait. c.f. David Foster Wallace. I'm inclined to believe it's true.
posted by puckish at 4:24 PM on November 5

If you're answering a question, make sure the very first thing you say is the answer to the question! Then, if you feel the need, you may explain how you got there.

Question: What do you recommend for lunch today?

Wrong Answer: Well, today is Tuesday, so that means they got in their fresh catch of fish, and I'm a big fan of their mango salsa, so maybe fish tacos?

Right Answer: *Pause to think*. Fish tacos! Today is Tuesday so that means the fish is super fresh, and I really like the mango salsa that comes with them.

This is a problem I struggle with, and I think it makes me less clear. I don't like to assert an answer, usually, so much as lay all the groundwork and then build to it. But I think people prefer to hear your answer first. Then their query is satisfied, and they can sit back and evaluate whether your reasoning was any good. Otherwise, there's that lingering question of whether or not what you're saying is relevant and whether you'll eventually answer the question.

Also, notice the structure of my answer to your question...
posted by losvedir at 5:03 PM on November 5 [2 favorites has favorites]

Can you teach someone something?

I teach people English abroad, and the success or failure of an activity often depends on how well I "scaffold" my instructions, clarify, and check that my students understand. It's not a simpler form of English - I speak at natural speed - but giving someone instructions for a process, or explaining something theoretical, or even getting students to finish my sentences to complete a "rule" or something has made me really intentional in the way I speak.

If you started tutoring someone, you'd get the benefits of learning to speak a bit more clearly and help someone in your community out as well. Many big-city libraries also offer, after training, the opportunity for community members to volunteer in adult literacy programs for people with weaker reading skills in English, and this too would probably be a place to hone the speech skills you'd like to improve.
posted by mdonley at 11:48 PM on November 5