Toastmaster, more than speaking in public

I have discovered during these past few months that being a toastmaster is a whole lot more than speaking in public, and one example of this was this session.

Our President Pilar started the meeting by explaining the unusual circumstances leading up to the session, and how with the toastmaster of the day, Celine, and the VPI, Robert, they managed to organize the meeting after cancellations and changes at the last minute. Despite this, the session was great and very inspirational, where we could all participate and, I think I can speak from all my fellows, we finished with our batteries full of energy.

Celine conducted the session with her habitual charming nature, being honest and explaining the Word of the day SERENITY, the quality or state of being serene, clear and calm. A word that Celine wanted to transmit in this session after a hard and difficult week because of different kind of matters she explained to us.

The first speaker was Robert Ferrer with a speech from the Advanced manual Speeches by Managements. With the title “Sometimes, 1hour is enough” Robert explained the benefits of preparing speeches with less time and he tray to persuade us about the benefits of spontaneity. Also try to overcome our natural behaviour which is to prepare everything very thoroughly. He was direct, honest and empathetic with the audience and brought us smartly a very clever subject for the evening.

After this, Robert himself generously gave us an Educational Session from the Manual Leadeship Excellence with the title “Organizing your speech”, Robert conducted through the Organization method of Introduction, Body and Conclusion, how to create a midmap and control our fear among other tips and tricks that help us to advance in being a better speakers. Personally I am always very grateful when a member does an educational speech so a big thank to Robert for taking the challenge to do two speeches.

Then it was the turn to the Table Topic and Gabriella mastered the role by introducing us in a world of the senses. The four persons who did the table topic, Stuart, a guess from London, Albert, Ethel and Guillem, from TEDx Youth Barcelona had to talk without the sense of the sight and only using the rest of the senses to discover and experiment with the object Gabriella gave them. It was very funny and very creative!

Follow this, all the team did very well in their evaluation as Timekeeper by Pilar, Grammarian and Ah Counter by Oscar and Gianluca as a General evaluator.

But the evening also gave us another surprise and that was having for the second time Guillem Trius with a talk about his passion for travelling to Africa and how as I photojournalism, photography is the best method of telling a story. It was a very good speech, inspirational and touching. I am sure he is going to be fantastic in the next TEDx Youth Barcelona that is held in February.

The evening was a wonderful session with very interesting speeches and warm ambient. It was a very good opportunity to take on different roles as the nine of us took the opportunity to do at list one role and also to learn that toastmaster is not only about talking in public, but management and leadership skills that you can use in organizing the agenda, if you are toastmaster, motivating other people, etc.

By this time I am sure some of you have asked what the hell is the photograph for, that is my personal view of serenity, the word of the day. ☺