'Holding' the audience - the art of communication

I am not a very confident public speaker. I often feel trembling when asked to give a presentation or speech to large group of people. In the past few weeks I evaluated and improved this area in my work place and caregroup. I attend my company's weekly meeting with seniors and managers. I participate in the meeting to report the KPI of my function, review other function's KPI and discuss ideas to solve problem. In the church, I led discussion and chaired caregroup program. Though the group size is smaller, I consider it as good training ground before I speak to a larger group of people.

I learned something about 'holding' the audiences when we speak to them. Holding them means we are fully engaged with them during the delivery. Here are some tips I discoverd:

• We have to be very clear of what we want to deliver and what we want the audience to receive. Planning is required most of the time.
• We have to connect with the audience by being relax, friendly, be ourselves, humorous and personal if possible.
• Observe and pay attention to the audience at all times!
• Be self-confident!
• Finally, it is not about ourselves; it is about others. No matter what happened, take it easy and see the bright side of life!

The Beauty and Power of our Five Senses

One of the greatest gifts God has given human is their five senses: ears that can hear, eyes that can see, mouth that can taste, nose that can smell, and skins that can feel. All these senses receive information constantly and send it to our brain. Our brain is like the CPU (Central Processing Unit) of computer. Once our brain receives the information, it interpretes it and responds to it.

The senses we use frequently are hearing and seeing. But do we maximize the usage of these two senses all the time? I think no. Our mind may be idle or asleep even when we are physicall awake. As a result, we are not very alert and sensitive to the surrounding, happening and people. This will eventually affect our effectiveness to achieve something great in life. We need to constantly be alert, watch and observe by hearing and seeing in order to help ourselves and others. Do not waste this precious gift given by God!

Love vs. Fear

By nature all of us have fears. We fear for different reasons such as below:

• Health deterioration
• Money not enough/Losing our job and income
• Loneliness
• How people perceive us
• Losing our ability, power and influence
• Failure and defeat
• Weakness
• Uncertain future
• Many many......

Fear is harmful. Fear controls and cripples our lives slowly even without our notice. Fear limits us to live life to the fullest. Fear makes us lose our patience easily. Fear causes us to take matters on our own hand. Fear induces us to make rash and unwise decision. Fear is a trap set up by the devil. Once we fall into it, we are in its vicious circle and it has no end to it.

I thank Jesus for saving me from the chain of fears. His unconditional love always satisfy my deepest needs. When I fall in love with Him, I feel as if I have overcome all things in life, even death. When I feel fearful, I don't allow fear to control my mind. I call upon Jesus who will never leave me or abandon me, who loves me and knows what I am going through - my struggle, my pain, my feeling, my thought, my burden, my everything. He really cares for me.

1 John 4:18b - But perfect love drives out all fear. This verse summarizes everything I said above.

Something about my hobbies

Swimming is a very good sport. It helps to reduce stress and refresh the mind. MM LKY at one period of his life swimmed very morning. No wonder his mind is always so sharp despite living in his old age. I am determined to swim twice a week to exercise my body and refresh my mind.

I really love the DSLR camera I bought two weeks ago. It can shoot photo incredibly fast - in less than 20ms. I love to capture the funny shots and eye-catching moments of event. Picture really speaks thousand words so I posted many pictures in Jedi's blog. I bring it whenever possible so I can utilitize the equipment for maximum "investment return". As I am a beginner, I still have tons of knowledge to learm about photography. My room-mate, shepherd CN, many colleagues and friends also know photography better than me. I can tap on their experience and knowledge in my learning journey.

Footprints

Below is a Christian poem that I like a lot. I shared it with the people when I led praise and worship last CG.

Footprints

One night I had a dream--I dreamed I was walking along the beach with the Lord and across the sky flashed scenes from my life. For each scene I noticed two sets of footprints, one belonged to me and the other to the Lord. When the last scene of my life flashed before me,I looked back at the footprints in the sand.I noticed that many times along the path of my life,there was only one set of footprints.I also noticed that it happened at the very lowestand saddest times in my life. This really bothered me and I questioned the Lord about it. "Lord, you said that once I decided to follow you,you would walk with me all the way,but I have noticed that during the most troublesome times in my lifethere is only one set of footprints. "I don't understand why in times when I needed you most,you should leave me." The Lord replied, "My precious, precious child,I love you and I would never, never leave youduring your times of trial and suffering. "When you saw only one set of footprints,it was then that I carried you."

...Mary Stevenson

Making Our Relationships 'Fireproof'

The 'Fireproof' movie screening presented by our district lastnight taught me a lot of things about relationship.

1. Love is not a feeling. Love is a decision. When Caleb decided to do anything to salvage his marriage, he followed the suggestion given by the lovedare book to love his wife eventhough he didn't feel like doing it.

2. "Do not leave your partner when there is a fire" the famous quote of the movie. He learned this from his profession - fireman. A broken relationship can be amended. So do not give up.

3. Persevere on when things get tough and when we don't see the expected result. I feel sad for Caleb when Catherine does not respond to his love acts after 20 days or so. The relationship seems to get worse after all that he had tried. The breakthrough came finally when he surrendered all his life to God.

4. Coach people to handle relationship problem and be with them throughout the journey. I admired the way Caleb's father guided him to go through the tough times. His father is so loving and patient toward his son. He prayed for him regularly. He visited his son from a long distance when his son feels very discouraged. What a wonderful father!

5. We can't love more than we are loved. We can't forgive more than we are forgiven. When we know Jesus' love, forgiveness, we know how to love and forgive others.

The Art of Relating with People

Relating with people is one of the most important aspects of our lives, if not the most important aspect. I have come to learn the following principles in somewhat a hard way:

1. Be natural - God created each one of us uniquely. Everyone is so special in the eyes of God and so loved by Him. We don't have to compare ourselves with others and pursue some standards that God do not set for us.

2. Accept others - Before we can build any relationship, we will have to learn to accept people as they are. Do not judge people too early based on their outward appearance, social status, wealth, etc...We will not appreciate them when we start to perceive people negatively. When we know how God accepts us when we do not deserve it, we will know how to accept others.

3. Interested about others - God loves us and he know every detail of each individual. He even know the numbers of our hair! When we know how much God interested about our lives, we will be interested about others as well.

These are very basic principles. But they will bring us a long way.

Jackie Chan Incident

I unexpectedly met Jackie Chan when I went to Vivocity this Monday evening.

He showed up on stage to promote his latest movie Shinjuku Incident. The place was so crowded. He gave some short speeches to the crowd and then left the stage. When I headed to the basement foodcourt, I happened to have close proximity with him as he also walked down to the basement car park. Then I and a few others stood along the barricade to wait for him to pass by. We waved at him at a distance when he passed by. He came over to give a pad on our hands and ran up to his van! I think I was lucky to meet him in real person for the first time and had a chance to get 'close' to him. Sometimes life is full of surprises.