The Art of Articulation

I first felt a call to ministry when I was a senior in high school - leading my peers in student ministry. A huge part of growing into that calling is learning how to deliver sermons. My youth pastor taught me one way to structure sermons, and then I dove into studying people like Judah Smith, Louie Giglio, Craig Groeschel, and more. Eventually, my attention shifted to developing a deeper understanding of public speaking - looking at how to have conversations and the underlying psychology of it all.

Turns out that, beyond just delivering sermons, being a minister is about (shocker) ministering. Having conversations with people. Hearing their hearts and being able to share what the Bible says about their situation. Learning to speak well and articulate what I have learned became a necessity. Now, that’s not to say that I got it immediately. It has been an ever growing process over the last 12 or so years.

Actually, funny story to interject here: When I started my job in Pekin, IL as a Student Ministry Director, I was so bad that one of the volunteers pulled me aside to tell me “Hey, I don’t know if this job it for you.” Praise God that they stuck with me and over the course of 5 years we made an incredible impact in the students there.

Nowadays, I am focused - as the readers of this newsletter know - on constantly learning, improving my knowledge base for the context I am currently in and for the context I aspire to reach. So I am learning business practices, leadership traits, hard skills, soft skills, psychology as it relates to interpersonal relations, how to be a better leader and manager, and how to care for people in the way Jesus cared for us.

As I grow in these areas, I also need to be able to articulate these things. 1. because being able to articulate it means achieving a level of comprehension on my part and 2. because I want to be able to help people through my studies. I can’t help people if I can’t effectively convey what I have learned and what I need them to know.

Watch History

Learning to Speak

I came across this clip of Jordan Peterson and it sparked this week’s issue. This video, in combination with some of the points brought up in Peterson’s book - We Who Wrestle With God - teach the importance of being articulate. Peterson argues that to be articulate is to be the master of your own tongue - to be articulate is to connect with the divine and create order from chaos.

One of the most mind-boggling chapters in section 1 of We Who Wrestle With God has been Peterson outlining this train of thought. Mankind was created by God to have the same role within creation as He had upon creation. God created us, we continue creating within creation, having dominion over it all. As we go about this, as we develop language. The usage of letters, words, sentences, paragraphs, and beyond are examples of the human mind creating an articulate thought from the so-called chaos of abstract thought - as Peterson refers to it.

What’s the alternative? being inarticulate? saying uhm, ahh, and other filler words? stumbling over your thoughts and sentences? In the clip, Peterson says that being inarticulate is “choosing awkwardness over grace.” And he also then poses the question “who would want to do that? and why?”

So, if we want to be more articulate, how do we do that?

Peterson says that we can start just by paying attention to the words we say. Simply the act of watching what we say and how it makes us feel and how accurately our word choice conveys our intention will help begin the process of us becoming more articulate. However, I do have an additional resource that I have found to be incredible in the realm of communication skills. His name is Vinh Giang.

Vinh Giang is a keynote speaker known for his communications skills. He actually started out as a magician teaching others magic but as time went on he shifted his attention to teaching people communication and using his experience as a magician to convey all the things he’s learned.

Speech is a behavior that can be trained.

I’ve met so many people that discredit themselves and furthermore even put down themselves when it comes to new skills. “It’s just how I am” or “I’ve never been able to speak well”, “I always stumble over myself”, “There’s nothing that can be done”.

If that’s what you think, then sure, of course you can’t change. You’re limiting yourself because you think that the way you speak cannot be improved. As I mentioned in the opening of the issue, I first got written off and told “I’m not sure if this is the right job for you.” What I didn’t mention before is the context of that comment. It was my first year - month even - of being a student minister but I had already been giving sermons for 3-4 years before that! I was years into a “speaking career” but still had so much to learn (and honestly, I still have more that I can improve on. I don’t want this to sound like I’ve mastered communication). It’s through a conscious effort of improving this skill that I was able to grow as much as I did.

Giang shares some of his best insights in the video I linked above. And while I didn’t know of Giang back then, I really wish that I did. He outlines several different tactics for improving speech and in different contexts. I’ll share notes on some of the segments from the video.

Your Voice is an Instrument

He sets things up with the framing of your voice being an instrument. A piano has 88 keys, 88 possible notes, but imagine if a musician only played 15 notes. It would sound super boring and monotonous. It’s the same way with your voice. There are so many ways to play it but so many play just a subset of notes. And when people try to expand their vocal range, it often feels like they’re being fake or phony. Giang argues that you’re not being phony, you’re just playing notes that are unfamiliar to you.

There are 5 aspects of the voice that Giang outlines.

1. Rate of Speech

2. Volume

3. Pitch and Melody

4. Tonality

5. Pause

How to Get Past Nerves

• Knowledgable about the material

• How you rehearse is how you present

• Realize that people aren’t really thinking about you or judging you. They have their own lives to worry about

• Reframe speaking as Service. They aren’t here for you, you’re here for them.

3 Tips to become a better speaker

Record and Review

Record a 5 minute improvised video. It cannot be something rehearsed, it needs to be improvised. After you record it, wait a day - you’re too attached immediately following the recording.

Review in 3 ways:

1. Only Listen to the video (play video with screen down). How do you sound?

2. Only Watch the video (no sound). How do you look?

3. Get the video transcribed, word for word (including filler words). Read your transcript and take notes about sentence structure, amount of filler, etc.

Other Lessons

• Why you Hate the Sound of Your Voice and How to Overcome it

• Improving Communication Skills Online (zoom calls)

• How to Witty and Clever

• How to Develop Your Voice

I’ve seen quite a bit of his videos over the last year or so and this video has probably 90% of the best teachings I’ve seen. Highly recommend starting here with Vinh Giang and then branching to his other content if you get value from him.

I’ve linked the videos I mentioned below. The one from Jordan Peterson, and then two from Vinh Giang about communication skills.

I know that you may be thinking, “I don’t want to be a public speaker, why should I spend my time learning to speak? I’ve kind of been doing it my entire life.” Yes, you have been speaking your entire life. However, I know that the use of filler words have become far too common in our speech. And while I know that not everyone wants to become a public speaker - to go back to Jordan Peterson’s comments - who would want to choose awkwardness over grace? The time spent refining your speech will always be helpful because speech is indeed something you use in your entire life, so why not spend some time making sure you articulate it well?

Add to Watch Later:

• This Is How You Become More Articulate

• 13 Years of Communication Skills Knowledge in 53 minutes

• 33 Minutes Of Communication Skills Advice I Wish I Knew In My 20s

Psst. I made a Playlist on YouTube for the videos I’ve mentioned here so that you can always refer back to it!

Reading List

Atomic Habits by James Clear

I’m just about done with this book and I’m so excited to start implementing the habit frameworks it mentions. There was a spurt of a few days where the podcasts I listened to and a chapter in Atomic Habits shared the importance of actually implementing the things you learn. We can spend all the time in the world reading and learning, but if we don’t apply it, it was all pointless.

We Who Wrestle With God by Jordan B Peterson

I finally reached the end of section 1! I’m still unsure if I should call it Chapter 1 or Section 1, but regardless, this has been incredible! So far, Peterson has proven - just with Genesis 1 & 2 - that mankind has value and purpose inherently because we are an echo of our creator within creation. He asserts - as mentioned in the article - that us utilizing language and crafting the words and sentences that we speak is us being the creator’s extension and creating from the chaos of abstract thought. And finally, Peterson argues that anytime we see in other, secular civilizations a spiritual representative of a deity it is in fact a subconscious echo of our innate call to be like our Creator.

I cannot more highly recommend this book!

Shopping List

I’ve compiled a list of the books that I mention in case you want to pick any of it up. Full disclosure, these are affiliate links. Doesn’t cost anything extra on your end, I just get a kickback if you use my link to make a purchase.