How To Project Your Way To Success

How To Project Your Way To Success

Who says learning tools are limited to books, articles, reports, and other school materials?

Did you know that a mirror could be an effective learning tool?

Keeping desk or wall mirrors in your study room makes it conducive to effective learning. Very few know the value of mirrors as study and training aids. We are used to the usual books, pad papers, pens, calculators and other school materials, but mirrors?

Teachers and students then and now are almost the same. They all have the capacity for greatness, but the real problem with most of them is mastering effective communication.

Sure, they can recite in class and in school programs. Sure, they learn speech and public speaking. But these things do not necessarily always equate to effective communication. Effective communication is both verbal and nonverbal. This is where the mirror technique can be used as an effective tool in communication.

When practicing your communication skills in front of a mirror, you can immediately get feedback. With a mirror, you can see how you project and how your bearing and stance look. Mirrors also help you in evaluating the way you smile and other nuances like eye and hand movements, gestures, and the like.

While in front of a mirror, you can also practice communication skills. Remember that a great part of effective communication is good self-projection. The key to good self-projection is to see yourself doing what you are doing.

With a mirror, you will immediately see how awkward you look when performing and instantly correct yourself. A person with a good modulated voice, perfect pronunciation, timely gestures, and a superb understanding of his subject matter can still appear dull to his audience and bore them to indifference. Thus, we see good students and teachers who are reduced to nothing as they literally talk to the blackboard while explaining mathematical solutions to the class.

Having the good points of public speaking like posture, gestures, confidence, and voice modulation are not enough. These are often done without harmony and natural grace. The best and inexpensive way of practicing harmony and natural grace is to make it a habit to perform or talk in front of a mirror. The bigger your mirror, the better.

Whether it is for a speech, recitation, class report, lecture, job interview, dance, sports move, or even an ordinary conversation, practice in front of a mirror. Observe your gestures, eye movements, smile, laughter, and facial expressions.

Are they appropriate with what you are saying? What is the message that you want to project? What do you wish to accomplish? As you practice, are you directing attention to your message or to your awkwardness?

In every performance, your target audience may get either of two things: the main message or the clumsiness of the message giver. In some cases, people get both — but it is the clumsiness that lasts in their mind.

Students vaguely remember the algebraic formula but they will surely remember the professor who “talks to the blackboard” in class. Interviewers will most likely forget your good credentials but they won’t forget your clumsiness. No matter how knowledgeable you are, that dull look or expression may cost you your new job.

Remember first impressions last. Projections are polished with the use of a mirror. After all, that mirror on the wall helps show the smartest of them all.