She Too Cries

She watches me with an innocent doe-eyed expression,
I look into her face, the pockmarks and pulsating wrinkles have their sad say,
Her voluminous hair appear to be balding all along,
Eyes that yearn to sleep,lips that long to gel,
For she cries inside looking at the life I live
She watches me walk towards the sink,
I take my comb and brush my hair,
Take the mini make up kit and start setting myself,
Look a hundredth time in the mirror,
I find the lady still gaping at me with wondering eyes,
Crying inside looking at the life I live
She watches me laughing out loud with my friends,
Talking about outings and parties,
She watches me with curiosity,
Maybe the thought of "Will I ever?" crosses her mind,
She walks towards me just to trash the used tissue I had left near the sink,
Crying inside looking at the life I live
She still watches me while I cry out my problems with friends,
Grumbling about petty issues and concerns,
She walks towards me with bleaming eyes,
Just to convey the message in a very timid tone,
"God is grateful to all, be grateful to him"
She then walks inside to resume with her toilet cleaning,
This time I realise I was mistaken,
Because she cries inside looking at the thankless life I live

Dibya Maheswari 

CC, CL

ToastMaster 

Madhapur Toastmasters

A Friend Indeed

Soulful sufi music – has always been an integral part of me. It helps me relax when I am in turmoil. Of late, I have been drawn a lot towards Persian sufi kalaam of legends like Rumi and Amir Khusro.

In addition to Sufi music, Public speaking has also been an integral part of me for the past 6 years. Like every veteran toastmaster would agree, I start drawing similarities to Public speaking with anything I experience.

Recently I was listening to this kalaam:

Na shawad nasib-e-dushman ke shawad halaak-e-teghad
Sar-e-dostaan salamat, ke tu khanjar azmayii

With the limited knowledge of Farsi that I have, it translates to: “It is not the destiny of your enemy to be killed by your sword; Your friends’ heads are still safe, so you may continue testing your skills”.

The moment I heard this, I thought about my favorite topic in  – Speech Evaluation.

A speech evaluator is supposed to be the best friend of the speaker (at least during the evaluation session). And all speech evaluators are constantly reminded – “your evaluation should be encouraging and positive”. And sometimes, we get so carried away with making the evaluation so called “positive”, that it becomes a flowery narration of what the speaker did, and kills his/her skills rather than adding value to his speaking skills.

I asked couple of my toastmaster friends about their opinion on positive and encouraging evaluations.

Arun Goyal said – “It’s good as long as you are helping the speaker to improve. It’s not about impressing the audience.”

According to Jagrut Vaishnav, “Encouraging feedback is one that makes a speaker to feel to take the stage again with more enthusiasm.”

What’s my take on a “positive” evaluation? I believe, as an evaluator, I can’t make a speaker a world champion overnight. But I can do something to put him in that direction. One step at a time. One tip at a time. One area of improvement at a time. As an evaluator, if I am able to analyze the speech, and come up with just one practical feasible doable suggestion that the speaker can incorporate in his/her immediate next speech with ease, I have done my job of pushing the speaker up that one step.

How do I achieve that? Which area do I focus on? Delivery? Content? Body Language? Voice?

Where do I make one hit that will make the biggest impact?

For that, I need to analyze the speaker before Ianalyze the speech.

For example, free-flowing body language may be a big challenge for one speaker. He is so conscious about it that it is difficult to change right away. Now if my whole evaluation revolves around body language, the speaker will start looking for excuses to avoid his next speech.

Instead, if I see that his content is good, but missing in organization. I can make the biggest impact if I help him with tips on properly organizing his speech in general; and just one part of organization in particular – say transitions. Give him tips on transitions. Something that he can immediately implement in his next speech.

This is just an example ad there are no hard and fast rules. The job of a speech evaluator is more than reading project objectives before the speech and doing everything in his/her ability to win that best evaluator ribbon at the end of the session.

Be a friend indeed. Use the sword of evaluation, not to behead your speaker’s skill, but to sharpen it, one stroke at a time.

Toastmaster  Mubeen N

CC, ALB