As we move into the darker months, it’s exciting to live in a country that has now chosen to acknowledge and celebrate indigenous tradition. Having grown up in the Northern Hemisphere, it has never made sense to me that in Aotearoa New Zealand we celebrate Christmas, a time of reflection and hopes for the future, (and mid-winter time in the north) in mid-summer. And we celebrate Easter, the time of new life and new beginnings, (springtime in the north) at the start of our autumn. I think it makes much more sense that we take time in the shorter darker months, when Matariki is visible in our skies to rest, reflect and look to the future.
So for me as Toastmaster of the week, choosing Matariki as our meeting theme was an obvious choice. In my pre-meeting despatch and in the opening, I encouraged members to incorporate some te reo Māori during the course of the meeting, (leaving the prompt sheet of relevant phrases we were given in our recent workshop on the lectern for those, myself included, who need a bit of a reminder) and it was heartening that pretty much everyone chose to use at least one phrase. Major props to Jacqui Anderson who chose to incorporate a specific whakataukī that is not in our notes, into her evaluation. Koia kei a koe Jacqui!
It was also fitting – and to my knowledge totally unplanned, at least in terms of my chosen theme – that our two speakers, Roydon and Dee, were completing their Pathways, both delivering reflections on what they had learned along the way; another cause for celebration.
Our Grammarian, Shaun, gave us ‘sublime’ as our word of the day. Meaning ‘of very great beauty or excellence’, it was a stellar word, which related beautifully to the theme and which people peppered into their speeches and roles throughout the meeting.
Introducing our first speaker of the day, Max took to the stage clearly having taken time to think about how he would introduce one of our highly regarded and experienced members, Roydon. He shared the project details, gave the speech time for the Timer and set the expectations high for what was to come, putting the focus squarely on the speaker; an exemplary introduction.
Finishing up his Visionary Communication Pathway, Roydon took us through his journey, experiences and reflections on completing 15 speeches (including “The Seduction of Finding Your Passion” and “Why Work?”) and being evaluated by 13 evaluators over the past five years. Peppered with anecdotes and analogies, his speech, ‘Where to From Here?’ was a masterful blend of wisdom and humour as he shared insights and stories both from his Toastmaster experiences and life in general. Engaging as always, Roydon shared that while he has typically been a planner with ambitions of achieving much in regard to his work life, the exercise of looking back at the speeches he’s made on his Visionary Communication path brought him to the realisation that his perspective of what’s important has changed over the past five years. These days, he’s thoroughly at ease being ‘Pops’, showing the grandchildren how things grow in the garden, and with the idea that you can plan for the future, but you can’t predict it. Essentially, he’s happy just chilling out and planting seeds here and there, and seeing what pops up. And finally, Roydon shared that he’s unsure which Pathway he’ll choose to take next, but he’s looking forward to it. And I’m looking to hearing more from Roydon, so Where to From Here? Somewhere interesting, informative and inspiring is my guess!
Kori, our second introducer showed that he is fast becoming a gun at setting the scene for the upcoming speaker. Not only was he well prepared with some interesting background information on Dee, but he also shared the necessary purpose and objectives with the audience, and built up a little bit of excitement as he welcomed Dee to the stage.
Dee’s Persuasive Influence Pathway reflection speech “Are We There Yet Papa Smurf?” focused on the challenges she has faced at Toastmasters including dealing with the various different personalities as well as her public speaking fears. Although she nearly called it quits early on, she told her personal story of how encouragement from her Toastmasters mentor and other members gave her the encouragement to continue, put on her “Miss Piggy’s Pants” and find her voice. Dee has enjoyed success at contest level in her relatively short time at Toastmasters and consistently demonstrates how showing vulnerability at the front of the room can be a powerful storytelling/speech technique (the fact that her speech moved her Evaluator to tears is testament to that). And her delivery of a 12 minute speech was a textbook demonstration of how telling the same story in multiple different ways, applying the various lessons/techniques/styles outlined in different Pathways projects, is an effective way to get familiar enough with your content and story that you can confidently present for a decent chunk of time with no notes. Well done Dee on sticking with it and completing your Pathway.
Deb presented our newest members John Beach and Thomas Bernard with their club name badges as we formally welcomed them to the club. It’s always a treat to see new faces up the front of the room, so welcome to you both. It’s great to have you in the crew. She also thanked outgoing members Rachel Walton and Gerald Hartley for their contributions to Boaters over the past few years. Go well team. Enjoy your new adventures!
Table Topics Master David came up with some entertaining, thought-provoking and relevant Matariki-related topics which Alannah, John and Ruban all spoke to well. Alannah encouraged us to let our children wonder at the mystery of the stars (and be sure to point them out rather than assume that they’ll even look up), John related the stars to ‘tiny eyes’ and Ruban had us relaxing on the beach, with no phone, just looking up at the stars. Thanks for taking us all on a wonderful starry table topics wander team.
When it came to evaluations, Helen admitted it had been a challenge to find any, but she did a sterling job finding a few good ones for Roydon (he did give a very engaging speech). More vocal variety – such as dropping the tone or cranking up the volume – to disrupt and add interest to the flow, along with a bit more volume would add some interest. And she suggested that he think of an alternative ending rather than ‘thank you’. As she said, it should really be us, the audience, thanking Roydon for such a terrific speech.
As mentioned earlier, Jacqui was moved to tears by Dee’s speech, but despite that, she still managed to give a solid evaluation and demonstrate to us what she particularly enjoyed (including a demo of Dee side-stepping through time, which saw me get totally distracted by her fabulous red boots and I missed what she was actually saying, but overall, she found the speech very moving and not just in the sideways sense!).
Rachel – as always – gave some exemplary Table Topics evaluations for each speaker, and I will miss her keen insights in terms of giving perceptive and constructive feedback. Rachel also shared some more information on Matariki in relation to it being the time of year to reflect on departed whanau as well as what lies ahead, and it was interesting to add another piece of knowledge to our Matariki kete.
Sabine mixed things up for us with the General Evaluator’s role and instead of giving us her insights and observations on the meeting, asked us to evaluate ourselves, asking us each two questions “What’s one thing you did well?” and “Why did it work well?”. Surprisingly (well, at least, I thought so) everyone was able to quickly come up with a positive comment about their contribution AND tell us why it worked. It was fast-paced, interesting and a fun way to end the session. Thanks Sabine.
So overall, an interesting, reflective yet engaging session. A great end to the Toastmasters’ year and well worth getting out of bed for on a dark, but starry winter’s morning!
Member blog by Louise Landess.