Are you afraid that pausing when you speak English and applying higher tones in your voice make you sound strange? Well, you’re not alone. But, as an advanced speaker of English, it’s essential that you take greater risks in these two areas. The good news is that pausing and intonation are much easier to adjust than the pronunciation of individual sounds, so keep reading if you want to get past any fears you have about being a dynamic speaker of English.

Excel At Speaking English By Exaggerating Your Pronunciation

“But, isn’t it too much?”

That’s the question I get so often when people come to me to learn The Diamond Method™️.

They want to speak:

✔︎ clearer,

✔︎ more confidently,

✔︎ more effectively,

✔︎ and more dynamically,

but they don’t want to change how they sound.

Well, how does that work? Magic?

Nope.

The only way that you’re going to get past the inhibitions that so many feel when they start to master a foreign language is for you to exaggerate the sounds, rhythms, and melody until it feels natural.

Plus, you never fully take the exaggerated version of your practice into the real world, but you have to go faaaarther than you think in order to reach native-like speech.

That’s why this month’s blog post is going to be about the risks you need to take to make the advancements you wish to make.

Plan?

Let’s do it.

You know that nothing comes without hard work, right? But, did you know that it’s not just hard work that gets you to reach your goals?

If you want to:

1. sound more American
2. speak with more ease
3. and, exude influence

you need to focus your hard work on going outside of your comfort zone.

It would be one thing if you were still a beginner. But, you’re not. You’re fluent in English, and you’re looking for that next-level you when it comes to speaking English with confidence and sounding native-like.

So, we’ll begin by looking at two areas that tend to be the most challenging for my clients when it comes to taking risks, and then, we’ll talk about how you can take that leap of faith you need to reach the next level of your English fluency.

Here are the two most challenging frameworks in The Diamond Method™️ that hold people back:

1. Thought Chunking
2. Melody

Quick reminder: Thought Chunking is that thing we do when we group our words together into meaningful thoughts and we follow each thought with a pause. That ‘pause’, something that you would think would come easily since it’s not about articulating sounds and stressing syllables, haunts my advanced speakers of English as a foreign language.

Why?

Well, because silence is not something that everyone is comfortable with—even in their native tongue.

The silence required for effective speech is often only milliseconds, but people still avoid it out of fear.

➔ Fear they’ll draw too much attention to themselves (exactly what you should be doing when you are speaking, by the way)

➔ Fear they’re being dramatic

➔ And, fear they’ll sound inauthentic

If you are one of those people who have tried adding pauses to your spoken English, but haven’t done so successfully yet, this might help you:

Think about pauses like written punctuation marks.

You wouldnt write a sentence without commas periods and paragraphs so why would you want to speak that way

Did you see how I left out the punctuation marks there? It was harder to read, wasn’t it?

So if we use punctuation marks in writing to help guide our readers, we need to also do that when we speak. And if you are about to say something like, “But, pausing is for formal speech and public speaking! It sounds exaggerated when used in everyday speech.”

I’d say, “Wrong.”

No one says that you need to make each pause long and dramatic (although there are appropriate times for those too), but your speech needs to be intentional, plus, including the pauses makes you sound more like

✔︎ an authority on the topic

✔︎ you know where you are in your communication

✔︎ you want to let people into your thought process.

All of those things are essential to great speaking skills, and it’s easier than you think. So, jump on the bandwagon and start singing out your speech with clarity and focus.

And now for other ways to sing your speech...

Melody

People come to me from all over the world and from every industry you can think of so that they can enhance their spoken English. Many know that they speak in a monotone voice, and they immediately tell me that they want to change that.

But, guess what?

For starters, they feel super uncomfortable with the sound of their voices.

Then, when I suggest that they record and listen back to themselves (something I’ll touch on more in a moment), they get even more uncomfortable.

“I don’t like the way I sound,” they’ll say.

Do you know why most people are uncomfortable with the sound of their voices when they listen to their recordings?

This is interesting…

When we speak and the sound is coming out of our mouths, we hear our voices with the addition of vibrations from our skulls and heads. You could say that the sound is distorted.

We are the only ones who interpret the sound of our voices in this way.

Now, when you listen back to a recording of your voice, you’re hearing it as others hear you—in an unobstructed way.

So, we believe we sound one way, when in fact, we sound quite differently to others.

This is just a background note on coming to like the sound of your voice.

I really want to talk about melody since it’s the second point of contention for my clients when it comes to getting American English right.

Melody, also referred to as intonation and pitch in The Diamond Method™️, involves two main components: stepping and gliding.

In the case of stressing a syllable or word, we generally skip over (step up) some notes to reach a higher note and then glide back down through the notes until we land back at our baseline tone.

Putting this kind of attention on your speech can feel very risky for some. People say they feel like it’s too much; they feel they are exaggerating their speech in a way that Americans don’t normally speak.

That’s only partly true.

It is true that your practice will include the exaggeration so that you take some of it with you in the real world, but the best speakers in the world (think Oprah Winfrey, Tom Hanks, Simon Sinek) use melodic variety to create dynamics when they speak.

Using higher tones when you speak means you’ll grab the attention of your audience. You point their attention to where you want it to be. It puts you and your listeners in sync with one another.

And here’s something you may not realize. American English is monotone for most of each thought chunk. We only use those higher tones when we get to the emphasized words in a thought. That means that we don’t go up and down frequently; rather, we speak flat until the end of a phrase where the focus word normally sits.

Then, we have to step up, grab the stressed syllable of the most important word in the thought chunk, and emphasize it with a higher pitch, followed by a glide back to that more monotone place.

Does that make sense?

So, what would it mean for your career and life path if you took more risks with the sound of your voice and your speech?

I mean, pausing and melody aren’t about pronunciation. They’re about public speaking skills. And once you have them, people think less about your accent and more about your message.

That’s the point of speaking any language, isn’t it?

The Importance of Recording Yourself

Before we conclude, let me give you a suggestion for improving pausing and melody. It’s right in the palm of your hand, at least 50% of your waking days—your phone.

Download a voice recorder app right now and start reading passages and speaking impromptu into it.

Listen back to yourself at least once a week to get familiar with the sound of your voice. If I’m honest, you can even do this in your native language. The point is to get comfortable with how you sound to others.

Take risks in your first language when it comes to pausing and melody, if it makes you more comfortable. Then, bring it to English.

And always remember to find native English speakers you admire. I mentioned some of my favorites already, but you find yours. Listen to them; imitate them; exaggerate with them, and let your voice be free.

Conclusion

You can check out last month’s blog post for more about Thought Chunking and Melody, but just remember this: When you are passionate and connected to your communication, you’ll never sound exaggerated. You’ll just sound like a person with a purpose as you excel at your speech.

Plus, you’ll never know how good it feels until you try it. So, take some time to go further than you think you need to before you decide that pausing and melody aren’t for you.

You’ll be glad you did.