Gerald D'Cunha

E ver since I first read Dale Carnegie's’ classic on Public Speaking – some thirty-five years ago - one thing has stayed like a rock in my mind: Unless we are enthusiastic and persuasive enough, we can not leave an impact on our audience. Period. For years, I have been helping small and young children, both, to speak well in public with loads of self-confidence. I am more and more convinced, as seasons pass by, that none on this planet, leave alone a small fry like me, can take away this basic lesson of the old master, Dale Carnegie, from the text of Public Speaking. Today, let me write something more on this. T o speak well, you need to possess incredible amount of conviction. You need to believe in your ideas, your words… Just as you would believe in your God… Just as you would believe that the Mount Everest is the tallest and the toughest mountain to climb, even though you haven’t seen it, touched it and felt it! Yes, you...

In a broad sense, to live well in this world – effectively, successfully and peacefully – we need to ‘sell well’ – sell ourselves, sell our ideas, plans, proposals, dreams… our products and services… Yes, to ‘others’. Just imagine how true it is: Are we all not trying to do exactly that all our lives? The ‘others’ – our ‘prospective customers’ - can be any of these: our parents, children, spouses, siblings or any relatives… They can be our neighbors, strangers, government officials, co-passengers, our teachers or students; they can be our colleagues or bosses, our competitors or clients, our well-wishers or critics… Yes, anybody. If life is about living with all of these… then, we had better be good in human relationship... ‘Others’ don’t buy easily… just as we, too, don’t buy from them easily. They raise ‘objections’ – say ‘No’ – for whatever we try to sell, promote, propose to them… Just as we do every time they try to sell, pr...