Chester’s Tips for Success

This is the speech I wrote a few weeks back for my weekly Toastmasters meeting.  Something about the transience of life got to me and I felt compelled to write about it.  Enjoy!

The average life span of an American male is around 74 years and for a female, it’s 79. According to a German survey [...]

Here’s my second speech from the Competent Communicator manual. It seems my difficulty is in keeping things within the time limit. If I aim for a sub 900 word speech, (this speech is about 1350) I think that might get things in under 7 minutes.
Title of the Speech: Better Than You [...]

In an earlier post entitled Knowing and Trusting Thyself, I described “knowing thyself” as a three step process involving: 1. Ignoring the general consensus, 2. Developing your own ideas and 3. Sticking with your own ideas. In this post I will share my thoughts on step 1. I’ve been studying Japanese language, culture, politics and [...]

Yesterday I gave my first Toastmasters speech.  I think it went well, though I definitely spoke faster than I intended.  I find it funny how no matter what I do I still get a little nervous when getting up to speak.  But I still love it! Here’s the speech, please enjoy!
 
Hello everyone my name is [...]

There is a universal catch phrase that resounds deeply in almost every culture around the world—“Follow your dreams.” I’ve seen or heard it during my time in Germany, China, America and Japan. What I find ironic is that this phrase is so often attached to some advertisement or promotion of a product, company or [...]