A short instructional YouTube video by Brian Tracy that teaches public-speaking techniques centered on using deliberate silences. Tracy explains why pausing makes speakers more authoritative and attentive (slower pace, lower pitch), describes the "dramatic pause" and the "sentence please" pause with examples, and closes with a viewer call-to-action.
Hello, I'm Brian Tracy and I'd like to share with you one of the little known secrets of the top professional speakers. And it is called the power of the pause. Now, in speaking, the drama and power of the speech is contained in the silences that you create as you move from point to point. And this is an art that you can learn with practice. Many speakers are nervous when they stand up in front of an audience. As a result, they speak faster with a higher pitch to their voice and without pausing. When you are more relaxed, you speak slower, you pause regularly, and you have a deeper and more authoritative tone of voice as either a man or a woman. Now, there's nothing as attention grabbing as a pause. When you pause, you bring people up short. They mentally trip and fall into the silence that you have created. They immediately give you back their full attention. Each time you pause, go silent, smile, you get them to recenter themselves on you and what you are saying. For instance, the dramatic pause is used to make a particular point stick in the minds of your audience. You can use a dramatic pause immediately before delivering an important point and you can use a dramatic pause immediately afterwards to allow people to absorb the importance of what you just said. For example, I would say there are three keys to your doubling your income in the next six months. If you practice these keys, nothing can stop you from earning more money than you've ever earned before. Key number one is this and you start and at the end you stop. Key number two is this, and then you start and describe it and then you stop and at the end you just stop and allow people to absorb. Another pause you can use is called the sentence please and pause. This should be illegal because it's so powerful. And this is where you make a statement or quote a line that everyone has heard before and knows the words. When you give the first half of the line, or even 9/10 of the line, the audience mentally leans forward to complete the sentence with you. This causes them to engage more closely with you and to listen with greater intentness to what you're saying. Now, whenever you use this technique, you must discipline yourself to stop and wait until the audience speaks up and completes the sentence. You then repeat the words to finish the thought. You'll have the total attention of the audience. Here's an example of what I do. I'm talking about selling and running a business in competitive times. And I say, but you're not afraid of that. Because when the going gets tough, the tough get going, going. Everybody in the audience completes the sentence. They lean forward, they go, go away. They're always saying it. They don't necessarily speak aloud, but they finish the sentence in your mind. Their mind. So it's a very powerful technique you can use. Thanks for watching. How have you used pauses effectively in your speeches? Please comment below. If you'd like to see more videos like this, please subscribe to my YouTube channel.
