Week 95: The Art of the Pause – #AlphaFemaleFriday

Week 95: The Art of the Pause – #AlphaFemaleFriday

“ WEEK 95 / 133 – 133 WEEKS TO SUCCESS “

Last week, I talked about the aggravation of an unnecessarily long and trailing VM. This week, I’ve been thinking about the art of the pause. When I was in the first grade, our class was taking turns reading out loud, learning the nuances of the English language which were so new to us then. I remember asking my teacher what the semicolon symbol meant—what was the difference between the semicolon and the period? She told me that the period was a hard stop whereas the semicolon was just a pause. When it was my turn to read out loud, there was a semicolon and I took a pause between the next word. I took too long of a pause and my teacher had to usher me to go onto the next part of the sentence.

A pause can effectively and sparingly be used to draw attention and add emphasis as needed. I’ve found that remembering the importance of the pause is crucial to our listening skills. When someone is speaking to you and they take a short pause between their thoughts, it’s better to let them gather their thoughts than to barge in and complete it for them.

The rule of thumb for the pause is three seconds, and those three seconds do make a significant difference. When we don’t take a pause and we just blitz though what we’re saying, all the words tend to blend together. We are afraid that we will take up too much of someone else’s time or that what we are saying isn’t all that interesting. I say take the pause, because if they can’t wait three seconds, then they’re not worth your time, either.

Cheers,

Kelly

@AlphaFemSociety tweets by @KellyRGonzales

About:

Each week, I take a tip from Lois P. Frankel’s book, Nice Girls Still Don’t Get the Corner Office, and explore how each of these tips affect myself and other women in similar positions on the road to becoming the women we want to be. There are far and few between who are a few steps behind me, and many more who are far advanced. I found that Lois P. Frankel’s advice applied to novice, intermediates, and experts alike. It helped me see that I was already doing right, served as a reminder to keep on doing what I was doing and how to keep that momentum going. The book also showed me areas where I could improve, and gave realistic tips to jump on board. There are a total of 133 tips, and explore one tip per week in a program I call: 133 Weeks to Success.

Join the movement using the hashtag #133WeeksToSuccess with posts which are posted every #AlphaFemaleFriday.