Toastmasters

Hello everyone. It’s wonderful to see all of you, both new and familiar faces, and I’m very excited to stand here before you. On a very nostalgic day, I wanted to talk about my life-changing journey with Toastmasters, starting from how I joined to the lessons I’ve learned to the message I want to share.

Allow me to start from the beginning. 

I joined in the fall of eighth grade, in 2021. It was my first year doing in-person classes after COVID-19, and my first year of going to school after moving here the year before. I had a very active and social childhood, which made me feel like talking to people, whomever it may be, seemed like second nature to me. 

Actually, my father was the one who introduced me to Toastmasters. When I first heard that word, sometime beforehand, everyone forgive me, I didn’t think it was an organization aimed at refining public speaking skills into everyday life. Judging by the name, I sincerely thought it was a culinary program. I thought my dad wanted me to join a culinary program because in the previous spring I had taken a culinary class as an elective and really liked it. The thing was, this sounded as if I would be making toast without a toaster. I was going to be a master chef at making toasts. Yet, in the next moment, he told me that a friend of his suggested I join to improve my communication skills, among other things. This sounded a lot more exciting than making burnt toast. 

And so I had my first class at a Zoom meeting (not because it was COVID, we had students from different places in the U.S., including our mentor Jim). It’s a day most of you probably remember. It’s the day you watch people you don’t know speak, think that they’re the best speakers you’ve heard, and silently watch everyone play their roles so perfectly until the end of the class. Then, one by one, everyone leaves. Then you’re alone, with Jim and a mentor you’ve been assigned to. So I had that, and now I was terrified, having to speak my first icebreaker speech. This speech, I’ll admit, was the easiest to write, but the most hardest to talk about, strangely. Have you ever had that moment where you talk about others with ease like you’ve known them your whole life, and then when someone asks you something about yourself, you’re just like, “Me? I don’t know what to say about myself.” 

So I gave my speech, successfully, and I’ve been doing a lot more speeches since, and honestly, it’s been a lot of fun. You get to learn a lot of new things, realize that maybe speaking is your thing, learn how to work on your flaws or verbal habits, among other things. 

With that said, this brings me to what I’ve learned over the past four years, which is insurmountable, yet I just want to highlight a couple of things. Being confident to speak, that’s always going to be at the top. If you feel nervous, that’s okay. You still want to remember that everyone is here in class, patiently and eagerly waiting to see whatever new ideas you’re going to want to tell them. You want to teach them something, so do it, and afterwards, you will feel as though you have done a great job, because you’ve just educated some fifteen to twenty of your peers about a topic that they may have heard about but don't actually know. That’s impressive, knowing something important in today’s world that others are ignorant of, so you are a news channel, bringing the daily newspaper of the world to the table, that’s what we want to hear. 

Another thing to keep in mind is that you always want to make sure that you take the advice into account, and really reflect on it. Lately, I’ve seen a lot of students want to do their speeches again right after they did their speech and received feedback, and this really serves as a great motivation. Regardless of whether you think you did bad or good, everyone will feel that way about their speeches as well, but the best part is to always think that there’s another day. And we’re not just talking about speeches, we’re also including fellow words, grammar, and times. These things are always mentioned in every class for everyone to practice, even me. Everyone is always learning everyday, and that’s okay, because that’s what makes life interesting, always trying new things. 

One last thing I’ll always remember from Toastmasters is that it’s enjoyable when you speak whatever you want to. Don’t feel pressured to choose one of the most wonderful topics and speak about it. Choose something you’re familiar with, something that you’ve known for a long time and something you’re confident talking about. For me, I love books, and I’ve been reading for as long as I can remember. Sometime ago, I researched one of my favorite authors from the eighteenth century and delivered this speech to my class as if I was telling a story. That’s how I discovered that telling stories would become something that I’m best at. You’ll find it exciting to tell us about your passion for painting, or building Legos, or how Newton’s laws of motion work. We get to know each other better, and maybe make new friends with new conversation starters. 

I want to end this with some final words, something I want you to remember when you come back in the fall or wherever you go in the future. Have fun. This is a class where everyone comes together, people of different backgrounds with one thing in common, the desire to speak their minds. The moment you choose to stand before everyone, you are choosing to tell a story. And I dare say, in the past four years, I think I came to the right place to tell my story, and you did, too. It has been a wonderful past year, and I look forward to what comes next in the Toastmasters world. Thank you to Jim and to everyone who’s been with me this whole journey.