August 2008 South Main Monthly

South Main Monthly Vol. 4 No. 2

South Main Speakers, District 56, Club 8609

August 2008

The mission of the Toastmasters club is to provide a mutually supportive and positive learning environment in which every member has the opportunity to develop communication and leadership skills, which in turn foster self self-confidence confidence and personal growth.

In This Issue

President’s Corner

• President's Corner • Anniversaries & Milestones Lu Yao, Brian Zhang, Gary Chen, Erika Parrish, Alvin Chenier

• Calendar of Events Farewell Party eremony New members and new officers induction ceremony Humorous Speech eech and Table Topics Contests

Looking forward to another great year! By Jian Wang, ACB, CL Welcome to the first edition of South Main Speakers Toastmaster club lub newsletter in the calendar year 2008-2009. 2008 At the beginning of the new calendar year, please join me in refreshing our memory about our club’s past achievements: •

• Features “The Spirit of Adventure” by Francis Athappilly “Getting Organized” by Erika Parrish “Why compete in speech contests?” by Vivek Rajan “Lessons from the Geese” by the Master

The South Main Monthly is a monthly publication of the South Main Speakers Toastmasters club. We meet every Sunday at 1:30 p.m. in 10305 South Main Street (Houston Chinese Church), Room 411. For more information, please visit our website at: http://groups.msn.com/southmainspeakers If you have any comments, contributions, or suggestions concerning this or future issues, please send them to [email protected]. Thank you for reading! -Vivek Rajan, Editor

• • •

President's Distinguished Club (achieving 10 of the 10 goals) – the highest level of recognition reco available for any Toastmaster’s club – five years in a row (2003-2008) (2003 Smedley Award – for membership building in August and September – two years in a row (2006, 2007) Talk up Toastmasters Award -- for membership building in February and March – 2005 005 Beat the Clock Award -- for membership building in May and June – 2006

These great achievements could not have been made without each club member’s contribution. I am both proud and thrilled of being part of this award-winning group. Besides these awards, ards, South Main Speakers have been featured in various local newspapers, including Houston Chronicle (2003), News 24 (2003), and Sothern Daily News (2008). What’s more, our club has been known throughout the district for its camaraderie, diversity and depth th of talents. South Main Speakers club is not only a great place to learn public speaking and leadership skills, but where you can have some fun and make friends. Our club has been holding twice-a-year year picnic fulfilled with food and fun, tennis party, and Survivor Membership Contest.

I am glad to see that South Main Speakers are making steady progress in extending the track record of success. During the past three months, we have retained four new members. The past month also saw an array of exciting toastmaster meetings, themed with “Day “Da of magic”, “Board Games”, and “Eco-friendly endly living”, which were not only fun but exhibited the deep insights into global issues by our club members. The common goal of practicing public speaking and leadership skills has brought all South Main Speakers together as a big family. fam Sadly enough, several of our members, Jeanne & Renay Jacob and Vivian Li, are leaving us due to moving out of Houston. Please join me in wishing them the best and also success in their future endeavors. In August, our club will hold contests for Humorous speech and Table Topics. opics. The contests will be a fantastic opportunity to showcase your humor and table topics skills plus potential opportunity to compete in the upper levels of the toastmaster organization. Please be encouraged to participate in the contests. With the great success that South Main Speakers have achieved and the numerous talents of all members, we should have no doubt that our club will march on to more success. We are looking forward to another great year!

Anniversaries & Milestones

Lu Yao and Brian Zhang celebrates their 2nd anniversary with South Main Speakers this month! And congratulations to Brian Zhang on earning his Competent Communicator award! Gary Chen celebrates his 2nd anniversary with South Main Speakers this month!

Erika Parrish celebrates her 1st anniversary with South Main Speakers this month! And congratulations to her on earning her Competent Communicator award!

Alvin Chenier celebrates her 1st anniversary with South Main Speakers this month!

August 3: Farewell Party to Renay Jacob, Jeanne Jacob, and Vivian Li Three of our dearest members – Renay, Jeanne, and Vivian are moving out of Houston
Renay (our inspiring mentor), Jeanne (our our outstanding evaluator), and Vivian (our ingenious newsletter ewsletter creator) creator … we are all going to miss you! Your contributions to us will always be remembered! Come and celebrate the farewell party for all three of them at Bob and Grace’s residence. Let’s make this a party that they will never forget! August 3: New member induction and new officer induction ceremony August 24: Humorous Speech Contest and Table Topics Contest Sharpen your humor skills and bring out your impromptu speaking skills by participating in the humorous speech contest and the table topics contest! Both these contests are open to any member who is in good standing. The table topics speech has to be 1-2 1 minutes, and the humorous speech contest has to be 5-7 5 minutes. Participate and see yourself grow! Winners from South Main Speakers will represent our club at the area level. Brenda Throne one will be the chair for this event. South Main Monthly 2

The Spirit of Adventure By Francis K. Athappilly Have you failed in a significant undertaking during the last year? Have you have failed in something significant in the last 5, 10 or 20 years? If you have, I congratulate you for trying something that was not so easy. It is true that most of us hate to fail. At times we fear failure. But, we should not let that fear intimidate us to limit us within our own comfort zones. I write this to appreciate, praise and encourage that spirit of adventure that motivates you to try something beyond your easy grasp. We all owe much to that spirit that prompts us to push sh our boundaries in our quest to improve our lives and those of or our fellow brothers and sisters. Much of human progress was made possible because someone had the vision and courage to dream and do something to improve their lives and those of others. You become old when you stop growing. In order to stay young, keep growing up. On May 25th, 2008, Min Bahadur Sherchan, a 76-year-old old Nepali man became the oldest person to climb to the top of Mount Everest. Life is like climbing a mountain. Each one of us is climbing his or her own Mount Everest. We are on a journey. We started this journey, when we were babies. We have made big strides. That is how we have reached where we are today. But, this course was not a straight line. We had our setbacks. Much like the mountain climbers, sometimes we had to change our planned course. As babies, we learned to walk by falling. We learned to talk by making mistakes. Babies are not afraid of failures. Falls or mistakes did not make us give up on trying to walk or talk. We were encouraged by our role models, the adults, who could

walk and talk. We enjoyed pushing the boundaries that limited us. That is how we grew up. In the process, we created images of ourselves in our minds. Successes in life and the encouragement of others made us confident to deal with the daily challenges. That was very good. Then, something happened. As adults, our lives took us to our own unique experiences. We did not have role models who could guide our paths. As we entered the unun chartered territories ritories of life, our own images of ourselves began to dictate our lives. We were "expected" to conform to that image. We loved our images and wanted to protect them. In order to protect our image, we began to avoid the possibility of failure. Thus, our interest terest to conform to our own images began to limit ourselves. We often limited our experiences to those areas where we felt comfortable. In our interest to protect our images and to conform to our expectations of ourselves, we lost our enthusiasm to exploree our potential. At times, we choose to stay still and not to grow up. Stunting growth is contrary to the very nature of life. Stones and mountains can stay still. But, life is a journey, where we have to keep moving. Like it or not, we find ourselves facing ing challenges, even to keep the status-quo. quo. In our mountaineering experience, we encounter strong winds, avalanches and slippery slopes. Sometimes, after a slip, we find ourselves hanging by some ropes. Sometimes, these falls wake us up to the potential that hat lies ahead. We do not have to wait for a fall from a cliff in order to try a different path. So, I invite you to consider your attitude toward dropping out of something and trying something different. About 12 years ago as a scientist at Columbia University niversity in New

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York City, when the grant which paid my salary was not renewed, I felt that all my dreams and plans about life crumbling down. At first, I felt ashamed to even consider another option. In retrospect, I am glad that I made a career change. That change helped me to develop a more wholesome perspective on life.

organized. ized. If you maintain a messy environment, it just means you lack the skills of organizing, which anyone can learn. Today I will share with you how to clear the clutter, give everything a home, and maintaining your organization.

I strongly recommend changing our attitude to life and our rigid images of ourselves. We should be more willing to explore and test our limits and not be confined by our own expectations ons or by our interest to conform to our own images. We should not let fear of failure to dictate our lives. As someone else said, do not take counsel of your fears. Life can be an exciting and exhilarating experience, if we keep an open mind. As little children ildren we were interested in exploring life. We should rekindle that spirit of exploration and adventure to get out of our comfort zones and try something new. Remember Bill Gates is just one of the many successful drop-outs. outs. Taking alternative routes to the zenith of one's experience, to the personal Mount Everest is a smart and rewarding option.

The first step to tackling a room is to make three piles, the keep pile, the donate, recycle, or sell pile and the trash pile. The criteria for the “keep pile” includes:

Getting Organized By Erika Parrish, CC Have you ever been late because you were busy looking for something? Have you ever bought something only to find outt you didn’t need to buy it because you already had it? Being unorganized can cost you not only time, but money. If you're one of those people who is surrounded by clutter and just can't seem to get organized, then you simply never learned how to get

Sort the Clutter

#1 Is the item functioning or in working order? If you are holding on to something that is broken, roken, chances are it really isn’t that important if it is still broken. Get rid of it! #2 Does it have sentimental value? It’s ok to be a collector, but don’t let it take over your life. I had such an extensive I Love Lucy collection that it took over our o old living room. We even had a giant picture of Lucille Ball over the fire place! I trimmed my collection down to only the most beloved items and now have them in one cabinet. #3 Quality over quantity. Clutter and chaos go hand in hand. The more things thing you have, the easier it is for clutter to form and grow. Always remember to place your emphasis on quality over quantity. In other words, it's not important to have a lot of things, many of which you never use. It's more beneficial to have fewer things, all of which you use and/or enjoy. Ever heard the saying, one person’s trash is another’s treasure? That is so true. Unwanted items can be given away to such organizations such as Disabled Veterans (which will pick up your items) Good Will or Purple Heart.. You could also sell your items at a garage sale or consignment shops. Proceeds can go towards organizational bins

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or containers. Lastly, don’t forget about recycling. Besides the obvious paper, plastic, and cans, most recycling centers will accept the following items on certain days. Flammables such as oil based paint, paint products and refinishers, oxidizers such as pool chemicals, corrosives such as acids and certain cleansers, batteries, motor oil, filters and cooking oil, latex paint, antifreeze, computers, monitors, printers, printer cartridges, & cell phones. An item to go in the trash pile are of no longer use or is broken. Give Every Object a Home Now that you've sorted the clutter, grab one of the boxes from the keep pile and take a look at the contents. Ask yourself why these items ended up as clutter. It's most likely because you didn't have a good system for dealing with these items. Maybe these items don't have an assigned home, or maybe the storage location you've assigned them is too inconvenient, so it's easier just to leave them out. Maybe you have items that need to be filed, but you don't yet have a file for them, and your blank file folders are inconveniently stowed away deep in your closet. Ask yourself under what conditions each item might not have ended up as clutter. This will give you a clue as to how to prevent the clutter from returning. As you go through the boxes one by one, assign a home to each item. Where will you put those old bank statements? Where should all those design notes go? If you assign a convenient home to every item, you will be much more inclined to put them away. I always put things away because the storage for items is right next to where they're used. Assign appropriate containers for items. Take a trip to the local office supply store to

get an idea of all the different types of containers that are available. Don't be afraid to buy new storage such as drawers and shelves once you identify a need for them. Where clutter has accumulated, most likely items either have no home, or the storage isn't convenient. Acknowledge your true needs -- don't fight them. If you have a short bookcase, would a taller one serve you better? Any office store will also carry a variety of plastic drawer cabinets, ranging from small desktop units to larger floor cabinets on wheels. The drawers are usually made of clear plastic, so you can always see the contents inside. Small drawers are great for storing things like postage, rubber stamps, and other odds and ends that may clutter up your work area. If your space is tight, go vertical. There are many storage units that can be mounted on walls or stacked vertically. Also note the space beneath tables. Many containers can fit in those spaces to store infrequently accessed supplies. Maintaining Your Organized Environment Don’t put it down, put it away! When you remove something from its home, the best thing to do when you're done using it, is to put it away. Yes, sometimes it seems easier to just place it on the kitchen table until later, or to put it on your desk until tomorrow. Unfortunately, this often results in many items being out of place, which can leave your home or office in disarray. Never mind the fact that it presents a bad example for other family members, or staff members. Don't give clutter a chance to form. Put it away now. You'll find it when you need it, and your environment will remain clutterfree. File it, don’t pile it! It is very easy to get

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overwhelmed with paper. Our paper volume increases on a daily basis. Betwe Between lists, mail, bills, school papers, documentation, warranties, etc., it's often seen as a pain to take the time to handle those papers immediately. However, if those papers begin to transform themselves into piles piles--and they usually do--it's going to be even ven more of a pain to get them under control. Piles tend to get taller and taller, until even the idea of dismantling them seems colossal. This result in lots of piles, and even more stress. If you DON'T need a piece of paper, get rid of it immediately. Either ther recycle it, or give it to the appropriate party. If you DO need a piece of paper, file it right now. Don't put it down, even for a minute. Either place it in your filing cabinet, your bill paying system, etc. If you take the time to file it now, it won't n't stand a chance of growing into a huge pile. In conclusion, the steps to getting organized include, clearing the clutter, give every object a home, and putting things away when done using it and file, don’t pile to maintain your organized environment. Being organized actually entails finding everything you need when you need it. To me, the greatest benefit of getting organized has been a greater ability to concentrate when working and a greater ability to relax when not working. Working in a self-maintai maintaining, uncluttered environment can increase productivity by making the process of work flow more smoothly.

Why compete in speech contests? By Vivek Rajan, CC, CL Are you competing in the Humorous and Table Topics

Speech contest this fall? There is a reason r why Toastmasters conducts speech contest, and unlike American Idol it is not a talent search for the best speaker. If you look at the Toastmasters speech contest rules, you will notice that the speech contest has two purposes. First, it is to provide an opportunity for speakers to improve their speaking abilities. And second, it is to provide an opportunity to learn by observing the more proficient speakers. The purpose does not tell anything about winning, it’s all about improving your speaking skills skill and learning by observing other speakers. So compete in the contest to learn and improve your speaking skills. I joined Toastmasters to improve my speaking skills but it took some effort for me to come out of my comfort zone and join Toastmasters. And I am sure that is the case with some of you as well. After attending several meetings and giving my first few speeches I started becoming comfortable and this club became my comfort zone. But that wasn’t the case when I started. Can you guess how long I took ok to prepare my iceice breaker speech? I think I spent about 3 weeks just to come with something to speak! And it took me another week to put the speech together with Renay’s help. My iceice breaker speech was probably my most prepared speech and that was because beca it was my first speech and I was stepping out of my comfort zone. But now, I usually prepare my speeches the night before the meeting. I prepared this speech last night! We need to step out of our comfort zone again to take our speaking skills to the next ext level. And Toastmasters speech contest gives us this opportunity to do so. Moreover, you tend to work more harder on your speeches for a contest than your speeches for the club. And I can guarantee that if you participate in contests your speaking skills ls will improve at

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a faster rate than giving speeches in the club. In the humorous speech contest two years back, when Renay and Annie asked me to participate, I said, "I might participate if I put something together". Now, what do you think is wrong with that attitude? The problem with that attitude is that you are not going to give your best shot if you don’t commit! I had a problem of finding good topics to speak so I didn't commit to the contest. About a week before the contest, Renay noticed that I still ill hadn't come up with a topic to speak on, so he said, "You can reuse content from either your 1st or 2nd speech because they were funny". He also said that I had a good chance of winning if I tweaked my second speech since he thought my second speech wass more original. Now, this was a big motivation for me because I now had a topic to speak on and I mentally committed myself to participate in the contest. Once I made that commitment I started working on my speech and I eventually stumbled on another topi topic which I felt was humorous. The point of this story is that if you don't commit, I mean at least mentally commit, you are not going to work hard enough to win since you have the option of backing out. So commit yourself and compete in the speech contest aand you will see yourself grow. I couldn’t make it to the area contest last fall, but I made it a point to go and watch the speakers in the Division and District contests. There is a lot to learn by just watching the other speakers speak. Now I think most people listen passively and don’t really study the speakers. I know I used to be like that. But last time, I got the sample judges ballot which contains the criteria the judges use to judge the speeches. It contains criteria like Speech Development, Speech Value, Audience Response, etc., and each criteria has points associated with them. I

used this sample ballot to evaluate the speakers myself and by doing this I started listening more actively to see what the speakers were doing well and what they were not. t. This exercise made me an active listener and helped me to learn from the more proficient speakers. So I encourage every one of you to step out of your comfort zone and compete in the speech contest. Commit yourself and give the speech contest your best st shot, and by actively listening you will learn immensely from the other speakers.

Lessons From the Geese By the Master Channeled through Erika Parrish, CC

This Fall, when you see geese heading south for the winter flying along in "V" formation, you might consider what science has discovered as to why they fly that way.

FACT: As each bird flaps its wings, it creates an "uplift" for the bird immediately following. By flying in a South Main Monthly 7

"V" formation, the whole flock has at least 71% greater flying range than if each bird flew on its own. LESSON: People who share a common direction and sense of community can get where they are going more quickly and easily because they are traveling on the thrust of one another.

FACT: When a goose flies out of formation, it suddenly feels the drag and resistance of trying to go it alone. It quickly gets back into formation to take advantage of the lifting power of the bird in front of it. LESSON: If we have as much common sense as a goose, we stay in formation ation with those headed where we want to go. We are willing to accept their help and give our help to others. It is harder to do something alone than together.

formation, and another goose go flies to the point position. LESSON: It is sensible to take turns doing the hard and demanding tasks and sharing leadership. As with geese, people are interdependent of each other’s skills, capabilities, and unique arrangements of gifts, talents, or o resources.

FACT: The geese flying in formation honk from behind to encourage those up front to keep up their speed. LESSON: We need to make sure our honking is encouraging. In groups where there is encouragement, the production is much greater. The power of encouragement (to stand by one's heart or core values and encourage the heart and core of others) is the quality of honking we seek. We need to make sure our honking is encouraging and not discouraging.

FACT: When the lead goose gets tired, it rotates back into the

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