Hay River toastmasters will make better speakers
Terry Halifax
Northern News Services
Hay River (Jan 29/01) - Here you go again; living your worst nightmare.
You're about to be called up to give a presentation on the thermodynamic properties of that thingamajig and you've had no time to prepare.
Public speaking. It's a fear worse than death for some.
The first Toastmasters club was established on October 22, 1924, in Santa Ana, California, by Dr. Ralph C. Smedley, who had the idea of helping others to speak more effectively.
Toastmasters International now has more than 8,642 clubs worldwide, boasting more than 174,900 members, in more than 60 countries around the world. New clubs are formed at the rate of about 2 per day.
True North Toastmasters #494, Hay River was chartered on Jan. 20, becoming the second club in the North, but boasting a larger membership than the Yellowknife charter.
Vice President Heather Love was a Toastmaster for eight years before moving to Hay River and she missed the weekly meetings, so she set out to start the Hay River chapter.
She was coaxed to her first meeting by her uncle in Edmonton.
Her first speech lasted a only few seconds she admitted.
"I'd been to university, I've had to give oral presentations, but I never had to give anything off the cuff like that before -- I couldn't even remember the question," she laughed.
Love said the reasons she joined Toastmasters are much different than why she goes now. The stay at home mom of two said she hopes to use her skills to become a better storyteller for her children.
"I admired some of the people in my family who were storytellers," Love said.
"My goal is get involved in storytelling, but to have some local content or at least some Northern content."
Minister of Education and MLA for Yellowknife Centre, and Toastmaster Jake Ootes was on hand to wish the new charter well.
Ootes gave a speech on people's fears and spoke of his fear of neck ties when he recalled a story how he once got caught in an airline washroom.
"I bent over to push the lever, and as you know there is a great suction when you flush that toilet in an airplane," Ootes recalled. "When I did, it went whoosh and grabbed my tie in the trap door."
With his trousers at his ankles, Ootes said pushing the emergency button was not an option.
"I struggled and I finally flushed again and got my tie out," he said laughing.
He said he joined Toastmasters in 1992, as most do, out of his fear of public speaking. He said his designation of CTM (Competent Toastmaster) gave him the confidence to run for MLA in 1995.
As with each meeting, dinner guests and members were selected to step to the podium and deliver a two-minute speech on a randomly selected subject.
Even some of the seasoned southern speakers began their speeches strong, but as the clock ticks on their eyes dart about the room, searching for the next words, waiting for that last light to come on.
But as Ootes told the crowd, "With each speech you become a better speaker."
The True North Toastmasters meet at the Northland Utilities boardroom on the first and third Tuesday of each month.
