Do you have ideas you’re trying to convey to others, and you just can’t seem to express yourself?
Do you ever feel like you can’t even tell a story? You could be in the middle of telling a story, and you keep overexplaining and using way too many words. Or you never can get to the end, and you already forgot the moral?
Sometimes you’re in the middle of expressing yourself, it’s going awry, and then someone cuts you off to express their views? “What the heck?! I’ve just been interrupted while telling my rambling story. Oh, well, I guess I got saved.”
Do you know people who seem able to express themselves well in any situation?
Then there are those folks who can express themselves quite well.
You know people who can express themselves to a fare-thee-well. They speak clearly and confidently. It takes them almost no time to get to the point. And they can change your views quickly.
These folks have executive presence and an incredible verbal brand. They’re assertive, yet warm. They can tell stories, answer difficult questions, and know how to say “no” without hurting anyone’s feelings. They can express themselves during tense meetings, interviews, and on stage.
Don’t worry; they don’t have an extra gene that you don’t. People who express themselves well have the essential techniques necessary to get their point across well.
We’ll start with the basic techniques and then delve deeper.
How to Express Yourself Better
People who can express themselves well don’t have a different gene; they have the techniques.
- Formulate your ideas in advance until you don’t need to anymore.
- Don’t overexplain & avoid redundancies.
- Speak in bullets.
- Don’t be afraid of the pause while speaking.
- Start with the bottom line & don’t use too many details.
- Be relaxed.
- Use a voice that’s warm & authoritative (not aggressive.)
These are the steps you’ll want to practice to get people loving your ideas and following your suggestions. Read on to learn how to implement these steps when you’re expressing yourself.
Many people have trouble expressing themselves.
How to implement these techniques:
Formulate your ideas in advance until you don’t have to anymore. My suggestion is to record yourself or at least talk to yourself in the mirror.
The advantage of recording yourself is you can hear when you make mistakes. Don’t be afraid to become aware of your mistakes. It’s the only way you can get better.
You wouldn’t tell your tennis pro not to video record you because you don’t want to see your swing. You want to see your swing! You know that doing so will improve your game! And unless you have sponsors for your tennis games, improving your tennis won’t make you any money. But learning to express yourself better will. So let’s get back to it, shall we? Don’t make me come over there!
Learning to express yourself better is well worth the effort.
Right now, you’re cringing listening to yourself talk (Best to not be subjective but like a scientist.) But in a couple of weeks, people will be loving your ideas and following your suggestions.
You’ll love listening to yourself on a recording!
9 Secret Steps to Influencing Others
Want to be more influential? We all want to communicate our most important messages in a way that encourages others to take action. Whether that action is voting for our candidate or picking up milk from the store, the words we use and how we speak play a huge role in getting the job done.
Expressing yourself well is about getting your message across easily.
I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad news; nobody wants to listen to a long rambling story. (Don’t hate! You’re in this to express yourself well and have people love your stories and concepts and follow your call to action. So let’s break some eggs. Is that the expression?)
People who express themselves well use pauses & speak in bullets.
Be not afraid of the pause. Some people really hate the pause because they know it allows others to interrupt them. It gives them that space they’re looking for. Remember, if people are interrupting you frequently, it means you’re not speaking very clearly & concisely.
Use your pauses like parenthesis around your bullets. Formulate your ideas into a few bullets. Take out the non-essential words. Eliminate redundancy and then surround those bullets with pauses.
Expressing yourself in high-stakes situations.
Master the ability to express yourself in low-stakes situations first. Talking to yourself is the easiest; telling stories to your pets comes next. (Unless they’re very judgemental.) You’ll probably need to focus in these areas for a week or two.
Once you’ve mastered the low-stakes situations, move on to the medium-stakes ones. Maybe talking to a colleague or friend and speaking in friendly meetings.
All the while, you are recording yourself and seeing significant strides. And now you’re feeling proud! Good for you!
Express yourself using a warm & authoritative voice.
Your voice plays an enormous role in how people perceive you. It impacts your credibility. Once you learn to express yourself using a warm yet authoritative voice, you’ll have people eating out of the palm of your hand.
If you don’t want to influence others and express yourself well, definitely don’t take The Voice Spa.
All these influential, authoritative people you know have worked on their ability to express themselves well. They didn’t think it would magically happen, and they certainly didn’t put up with telling ineffective stories and not having people follow their call to action.
Go from rambling, filler word user to fluent speaker.
You can do this by measuring your success. If yesterday you used 15 filler words and non-essential words and today you only used 10 pat yourself on the back.
If last week you couldn’t get to the point but this week your stories are short & succinct, be proud!
Assess each skill minutely and expect incremental progress. I can’t say enough how you should be an objective scientist recording data.
How to express your opinions.
Now that we’ve gone and made every single topic political, expressing yourself becomes more challenging. Perhaps you mention how much you like cheese, and someone wants to blame you for climate change.
Or perhaps you did want to discuss something that may be inflammatory. You may want to start by addressing the things that you and your conversational partner have in common.
You can say, “You and I are very similar. We both feel really strongly about ___. We both want to make the world a better place. If we take politics out of the discussion, I think we can make some progress toward our goal. We don’t have to agree on everything we just have to keep our eyes on the end goal.”
Grab attention & inspire action!
Imagine possessing incredible communication skills—the kind that not only grab attention but also inspire action. When you speak, people listen and follow your lead. That’s the power of exceptional communication.
Now, you can either bootstrap your way there or fast-track your success by hiring a coach. Whichever path you choose, just make sure you get there!
Don’t shy away from investing in a speaker coach. Think about it: You’ve likely spent tens, if not hundreds, of thousands on college and grad school. You’re probably shelling out hundreds every month for music lessons, gym memberships, personal training, or nights out with friends. Yet, you’re hesitant to invest in the one skill that can multiply your earnings? The skill that could land you that dream job, secure a promotion, or close that big deal?
If you’re already successfully bootstrapping your communication skills, that’s fantastic! But if you’re struggling to improve on your own, know that you’re not alone. The majority of people find it tough to master this skill solo. Don’t be part of that majority—take action and invest in the one thing that can truly transform your future.
Want extra help? Take The Voice Spa
Hi Ita –
I made it through my Bloomberg interview yesterday, and I did well.
The perfect teacher shows up in life when I’m ready for it, and that teacher sure was you.
I was in total freak-out mode when I signed up for the Voice Spa. Not only is the Bloomberg Radio show live (yikes!), but it has 25.5 million listeners (double yikes!)
I’ve tried a number of public speaking courses over the years and even hypnosis. Your Voice Spa has been by far the most helpful thing I’ve come across.
I found it so helpful that the Voice Spa starts with relaxing and belly breathing. Those first few days, I did a lot of belly breathing. I was so nervous I was practically bouncing off the walls. Most relaxation programs have you doing meditation or counting breaths. There is no way I could have done those things – I was too agitated. But I could belly breathe -and it always calmed me down. Talking in phrases was also hugely helpful – it’s a great way to slow down without sounding mechanical.
Thank you for what you do. The Voice Spa is so well thought out. You saved my sanity.
-Betsy Clark, Ph.D
The Voice Spa online video course will change your life!
Easily express your feelings.
Do you keep your feelings bottled up inside? Do they cause you stress and pain? That’s no good. You know it & I know it.
First, you want to decide if it’s worth it or let it go.
If it is worth it to tell someone your feelings, be sure to do so in private and when there isn’t too much going on. You don’t want to express your undying love for someone and they reply with a cheer for their favorite football team who’s currently on the telly.
If you want to tell someone they did something wrong, phrase it from your perspective. You can say, “It hurt my feelings when you…”
Make sure you’re relaxed. It doesn’t hurt to practice with a recorder first! 🙂
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Thanks
This really helped me
Thanks
This really helped me.
i dont know how to use phrases or word properly. how can i express myself without using the wrong phrases or words?
https://conveyclearly.com/2021/03/10/how-to-articulate-your-thoughts-into-words/
Very practical. Love the content!
Wow! Kudos from the famous news anchor! I do appreciate it, Dong! Hope you’re doing well!
What I learned from this is you must know your content very well. From there you can then learn to speak to it adding magnetic bells and whistles, reduced redundancies and be concise with it.
Yes! Very well said. And that’s the thing, most people do know their content very well. When they’re at work, they know their stuff. Talking about their own background, well who would know more than you when you’re talking about yourself? But the problem is we aren’t taught to communicate well in school. And we should be. So parents out there, make sure you teach your kids the content in this website. 🙂
Yes! I’ve been searching for this! Everything I’ve ever find on improving speaking skills and expressing myself better has just been off! But your information seems spot-on! I love how you say, “People who can express themselves well don’t have a different gene; they have the techniques.” haha! That’s so true! I always feel like the people who express themselves well were born with it! But no, they worked on it!
Thank you for your insightful and helpful tips & strategies.
I do all the things you say not to do. I overexplain and almost never pause. It’s a wonder I don’t pass out while talking cuz I don’t think I breathe either! I’ve really been struggling with expressing myself. I feel like people don’t get to see the real me. When I’m trying to say something smart or funny, it just doesn’t come out the way I intended.
I figured that my inability to express myself well was just who I was, that I could never get better. But you make perfect sense. And you make it sound easy. I can see that I use too much tension in my throat and my ideas aren’t focused when I speak. They seem focused in my head. 😀
I’m going to try your techniques! I’d like to work with you, is that possible?
Sometimes when I’m trying to express my ideas it comes out nothing like I can think it in my head. It’s frustrating. I thought I could figure out how to speak better by myself. But I’ve been trying for years! So thankful I finally found this blog post. I think I needs some sessions with you.
I need to learn to express myself better! The ideas are crystal clear in my mind but when they come out of my mouth they’re confusing. When I say something in a meeting everyone looks at me blankly then someone else says the same thing and everyone loves the idea. Help!