Transfer-Wk 14,Fri.-Daily practice

Although, I’ve ventured into the drive through a few times since my last post, control has been virtually non-existent, so I left it out of my blog.

Speaking of which, pulling my targets out of thin air, for controlled speech, is becoming increasingly difficult. If I don’t do my shaping every day, it’s almost impossible to pull it off.

Wednesday, at toastmasters, I volunteered for the responsibility of “Invocation / Toast”. Basically, I give a toast at the beginning of the meeting. I came up with a good toast, even though I left it to the last minute. My delivery was almost controlled, but I was so nervous, my hand was shaking uncontrollably. When I took a drink, I spilt water on my shirt. That’s not a sign that I felt in control by any means.

I’m still doing my shaping everyday … well pretty much … well once every other month anyway. ;-)

Seriously, I do my shaping almost every day. However there have been occasions where I don’t. As mentioned in a previous posting, my stopwatch was broken for a bit, and I was unable to do it for over a week. Then there are also times where I’m so caught up with what needs to be done, I’ll put it off for an hour, then forget, then another hour, then another, then the day is over without me doing it. And sometimes I will try to do it right before somebody is around to speak to … this almost always fails with me not doing it until the evening, if at all.

Yesterday and this morning I noticed however, that I did not want to do my shaping. When I grabbed my stopwatch to do it, I kept thinking about the pains in my chest and throat caused by the stress speaking without air.

I don’t know why this kept coming to mind. Perhaps I had better pay closer attention to my full breath target when speaking and doing my practice. I have noticed that I am starting to miss the full breath target consistently in spontaneous speaking situations.

About 2 weeks ago, Tom Weidig, of The Stuttering Brain, asked about the acceptable cost-benefit limits of practice. He said his cost benefit limit was 30 minutes of exercise per day or 1 hour if skipping days was an option, if he was guaranteed not to stutter for the rest of the day. Based on the comments to that posting, I believe others are in agreement.

When I first read that, I disagreed and felt it’s worth a lot more than 30 minutes per day. My recommended practice is 90 minutes extra per day, not 30. And that’s also not including the practice I should be doing in my regular life which does not take extra time.

I mean the benefits I’ve felt since doing my therapy have been astounding! Major life changing benefits! I feel it’s well worth the cost … and I don’t have a guarantee!

But saying and doing are two different things. My daily decisions reveal my true values.

So based on my daily decisions, what is my daily practice cut off time? Apparently it’s 30 minutes, since that is how much, on average, I spend on daily practice.

Logically, I still disagree. But, I guess I need to convince my subconscious. ;-)

---

Not meant as advice, please find a qualified therapist if you are interested in similar therapy.