Your tonality is very important, because you are using your voice to persuade others. If your voice isn't pleasant to listen to, who is going to sit and listen to it long enough for you to get what you want. Also, you need to be able to effectively control your voice in order to use techniques such as embedded commands and voice pacing.

The Speaking Effective English lesson on Tonality is divided into :

• POSTURE
• POSTURE STRECHES
• BREATHING
• EMOTION
• INFLECTION
• EMBEDDED COMMANDS
• AMBIGUITY
• PAUSING
• PUNCTUATION AMBIGUIT

Labels: Chapter 1 - Tonality

Posture is important because if the body is not properly aligned the voice can't come out with the power, the resonance, and the projection that it naturally has.

Exercise 1 - Imagine there is a string that runs through the top of the head and down through the neck, and down through the spine. Then imagine that someone pulls up slightly on the string, straightening the neck and the spine to the point where even if there were no muscles holding them in place the bones would stay sitting one on top of the other, and at the same time you feel your shoulders slide back into place. Now, imagine moving through the world this way ... when you sit at your computer ... drive in your car... watch TV.

Exercise 2 - In order for some people to keep their shoulders back in place they need to stretch out the chest and strengthen the back (especially the rhomboids, between the shoulder blades, and the rear deltoids, which are the backs of the shoulders). This is true especially for people who sit at computers all day long.

Labels: Chapter 1 - Tonality

Number 1
This stretch should be felt just above the collarbone in that little triangle.

1. Stand with your lower back straight. Have your legs shoulder width apart, and your knees slightly bent.
2. Reach behind the back with your right arm and grab the left arm (which is down by the side) at or justabove the elbow.
3. Rotate the left arm back in the socket gently, making sure you're turning the arm at the shoulder joint and not the elbow.
4. Turn your head to the right looking over the shoulder, and then tilt the chin down toward the shoulder.
5. Hold this position for 60 seconds.
6. Repeat on other side.
   

Alternate Step 3 - If you can't reach your arm that way, just gently rotate the shoulder back in the socket without holding the arm. You'll know if you're doing the stretch right by where you feel it.



Number 2

1. Move your shoulders up toward your ear.
2. Roll them back, squeezing your shoulder blades together.
3. Let your shoulders drop, letting them stay back naturally.
   

Number 3
You'll feel this stretch in the chest, just below the collarbone, from the breastbone all the way to the shoulder.

1. Place the palm of your hand again the wall, with your arm straight, and your hand about three inches above the shoulder.
2. Lean into the stretch, so your body is as perpendicular to the wall as possible while remaining comfortable.
3. Hold stretch for 60 seconds.
4. Repeat on other side.
   

You can also do neck and shoulder rolls to loosen up these areas and help them realign after the stretches.

Labels: Chapter 1 - Tonality

It's important to breathe in deeply in order to project your voice and to have power and resonance. You won't be taking in more air, but you will be breathing into the lower portion of the lungs instead of into the upper portion of the chest.

Exercise 1 - Put your hand on your upper chest. Breathe so that this part of the chest moves out when you breathe in. As you breathe out, let out an 'Aaahhh" with the breath. Now put your hand in the middle of your chest and breath into this area, and as you release your breath say "Aaahhh." Now put your hand on your solar plexes and do the same thing. Lastly put your hand on your stomach and as you say "Aaahhh" as you let the breathe out notice how much stronger your voice is when you speak from here, and notice how much more resonant your voice is.

If this isn't easy for you try holding your hands above your head while you do this. As a last resort you can lie on the floor and practice there so you know how it feels, before you practice standing up.

While you do this remember to keep your shoulders slid back and your back straight.

Labels: Chapter 1 - Tonality

When you speak it's important that you can hear your feelings in the words that you say, otherwise you don't sound sincere. In addition to the excitement in your voice when you talk about roller coasters and the wonder in your voice when you talk about peak experiences, you need to make some other words sound like what the mean. For example if you were saying the word ~'short" you would make the word sound just slightly abrupt or if you're saying the word 'humongous" you would drag out the syllables a little and maybe even raise your voice slightly.

Exercise 1 - Here is a list of emotions that you can practice saying with the feeling of the emotion in your voice when you say it. To help you out a little, you might want to imagine a time when you experienced this emotion, and see what you saw, feel what you felt, and hear what you heard. Also make sure when you imagine this event that you're looking through your own eyes and not watching yourself. Lastly think of a sound that might represent that emotion for you.

• Curiosity, Lust, Sincerity
• Love, Amazement, Excitement
• Exhilaration, Happiness, Calm
• Playful
  

Here's a list of words that would sound like what they mean

• Huge, Gorgeous, Beautiful
• Anticipation , Powerful, Tiny
• Bright, Smooth, Rich

Exercise 2 - You also need to practice using these words in sentences, especially since many of them might be in one sentence together.

Have you ever had a peak experience, maybe you saw an amazingly beautiful sunset.

I was snorkelling in Hawaii and I saw the biggest sea turtle ever, and I was so excited that I could hardly breath.

Have you ever met someone and you were really curious, and the more curious you became the more playful you became in your thoughts.

Notice that the words might not actually match the way you say them. For example in the last sentence the word thoughts could be said in a seductive way.


Exercise 3 - Go and eavesdrop on people's conversations, or talk to one of your more boring friends or co-workers. Ignore the words that they are saying and just listen for what state they are in while they are talking. Notice when the states shift and the fine nuances between one state and another. Understand, the other halt using tonality to put forth your own ideas and persuade others Is being aware of other people's so you can know where they're at and what effect you're having on them regardless of the words that come out of their mouths.
When you're up for a challenge, ask someone to talk about one thing while they think about another, and figure out what state they're really in. For example, the last time you were talking about business, while you were thinking about going out water skiing next weekend.

Labels: Chapter 1 - Tonality

Statements just have a flat inflection at the end, questions go up at the end, and commands go down. This is important because if you say something like "Let's go out" as a question instead of a command you give the other person a chance to say no. Also, a question isn't always a question. If you use the grammatical structure of a question but go down with the inflection at the end of the sentence then you actually make it a command.


Exercise 1 Say these sentences using a downward inflection at the end.

• Let's go out.
• Come with me.
• I love you.
• Do you want to go out for coffee with me? (Taking the inflection down on with me)
• Do you understand?

Inflection is also very important for being able to embed commands. You can embed a command using any note, but for the sake of simplicity here we're going to talk about embedding commands by dropping your tone slightly on the command. The difference not only doesn't have to be extreme, but it should be slight so it is only perceptible to the trained ear Imagine a musical scale; the note you use for the embedded command would be a note or even only a half note lower on the scale than the other notes you're using when you speak.

Labels: Chapter 1 - Tonality

Embedded commands are used to say something to the unconscious while you might be saying something completely different to the conscious mind. You can do this by saying all of the words in the embedded commands in one particular note, at a particular volume, etc. The key is to have the note or volume that you embed the commands at distinct from the rest of what you say. For example, if you use the note a sharp to embed the commands, you can't use that pitch elsewhere in your conversation. Personally I find it easiest to drop my pitch slightly on the embedded commands.

Also, when you're embedding a phrase such as, "Buy me presents," the words don't have to be together in the sentence. They don't even have to be in the same sentence. They can be spread out through a paragraph.

I saw a gorgeous Ferrari go buy. To me it seems that some cars have a presents of their own.

Also remember that you should embed commands at last three times each. They don't have to be in the exact words, but they should be similar.

It's easier for the unconscious to take the command at this point than it is to fight it.

Exercise 1- Embed the phrase "Give me a wild ride," into a paragraph about a safari in Africa. No more thantwo words of the phrase can be side by side in the paragraph.

Exercise 2 - Think of phrases that you would like to embed. Then think of a different subject to write about where you can embed the phrase.

Just remember to use a pleasant state that goes with the commands that you're embedding. For example, you wouldn't talk about the most disgusting thing you ever did and embed commands about having a wonderful experience together.

Labels: Chapter 1 - Tonality

You may have noticed when I was talking about embedded commands that I used the word "buy" in place of the word "by." This is called a phonological ambiguity. It can be two words that sound alike, such as bear and hare. It can also be two words that sound like one word, such as in trance and entrance. You see the unconscious has to take the word and reference back to all the meanings it has. In random conversations this means very little, but when you're embedding communards and stack phrases which are on a certain subject the unconscious wile figure out what you really mean.

Remember that the words don't have to sound exactly alike. If you were to substitute the word hue for the word you in the stream of conversation 99.9% of people would never notice the difference.

Exercise 1 - Sit and write down at least 100 phonological ambiguities.

Labels: Chapter 1 - Tonality

The use of pausing when you speak is extremely important. It can make A person anticipate your every word. Or it can make you seem. . . .uh. . . .stupid. There are a few times when you can as a rule use pausing.
One is when you want to keep a person in suspense and anticipate what you are going to say next.
Second is when you want to make a point of a particular word or phrase. Third is when you're using punctuation ambiguity.

For example, when you say "... when you feel that. (pause) With me (pause) I the pause might
only be slight in this case but the unconscious mind will hear it and know the difference.

Exercise 1- Get a tape recorder and read language patterns, poems, articles, etc. into it. Listen to yourself noticing Where you pause and where you can improve.

Labels: Chapter 1 - Tonality

Punctuation ambiguity is when it is unclear where one sentence ends and the other begins. One way of using this is by having a word or phrase that could either be tagged on the last sentence or start out the next sentence. In the conscious conversation this phrase is usually part of the second sentence. By using the tonality in the phrase that you embedded the commands in the first sentence with, the unconscious will associate the phrase with the end of the first sentence. Some examples of commonly used phrases and words are:

• Now
• For me
• To me
• With me

Example: I'm sure that there have been many times when you feel that connection. Now with me , when I feel that dose to this person

Labels: Chapter 1 - Tonality