Geez, I thought, I must sound like an old English peasant from the 14th century.
My wife had laryngitis last week. I found it bizarre; she found it crap.
The effect on her vocal cords was profound. Her voice was reduced to a tiny, raspy, high-pitched whisper, reminiscent of Gollum on helium at 1 per cent volume. But, really, who am I to comment? My speech isn't exactly clear – in fact far from it. My cerebral palsy plays havoc with my tongue and in response to my tongue’s unsolicited movements, my jaw compensates. Or so my speech therapist told me when I was young.
To demonstrate this, she told me to stick my tongue out and move it from side to side whilst keeping my jaw still. I couldn't.
Now and again I still test myself to see if I can do it. I remember absentmindedly doing it in restaurant once while I was waiting for someone. I happened to be looking at a woman and suddenly realised the inappropriateness of it. She didn't look too impressed. I caught up with my speech therapist, Mary-Anne, 40-odd years later.
She gave me insights into the idiosyncrasies of how I talk. She told me that because I talk slower than most, I try to speed up my speech to assimilate with the people I am talking to. Apparently, I miss out syllables and even whole words. My response: denial. “Really?!, no!”
“Ah, yes,” said my wife when I retold this analysis.
She continued to enlighten me. “You say things like, “where's salt?” or “what's time?’.”
Geez I thought, I must sound like an old English peasant from the 14th century. In my head I don’t; in my head they sound like full phrases. In fact, in my head my speech sounds perfectly normal. So when sally had laryngitis, it was kind of a role reversal. I had to listen really carefully, look for alternative communication cues, make phone calls on her behalf and ask her to repeat herself constantly. She soon tired of the latter. “No, come on, one more time,” I found myself whispering, whilst using pidgin sign language.
I realised I was assimilating to her new and temporary medium. I think we all change our communication style when we talk to different people. In an attempt to connect, we echo the communicative mannerisms of our companion, whether it is pitch, pace, volume or accent.
My mother is a classic accent assimilator, specialising in picking up a Highland burr within two minutes of being on the phone with her Scottish best friend. True interpersonal skills, such as my mother’s, are about being able to flex and bend and make others comfortable. There is a lot of talk around being authentic to your true self. I think the skill of modifying your style to interact successfully with others needs to be lauded a lot more than rigidly retaining an unchanging, boorish you.
Och aye, must go now and whisper sweet nothings to the Silent One.
Downloadable pdf here:
| Available Downloads | Type | Size |
|---|---|---|
| Change to suit others and yourself | 182 KB |