Power of the Pause
“The right word may be effective, but no word was ever as effective as a rightly timed Pause.” — Mark Twain
Did you ever consider what a powerful tool Silence is in public speaking?
When I work with clients to help them improve their public speaking skills, I always tell them that one of the most important things that they can learn is when to say nothing at all. And yet, many people have a hard time with pausing, even for one or two seconds.
The reasons are varied but common ones that I hear include:
- Being afraid that the audience will think that they’ve forgotten something
- Feeling their heart pounding in their chest
- Seeing everyone looking at them
While understandable, especially for novice speakers, when we step back and look at these concerns objectively, we see that they do not stand scrutiny:
- Pauses of a few seconds will feel natural to an audience. They won’t think that you’ve forgotten what to say next.
- The audience cannot feel or hear your heart. If they can, someone’s too close!
- Your audience will also look at you when you speak. That’s what audiences do.
Using pauses and silence effectively is an easy way to raise the interest and impact of your presentations. And you needn’t take my word for it. Neuroscience gives us some interesting evidence of this effect.
Four Ways to Use the Power of the Pause
Speeches can be lengthy, and even short talks can be complex. You need to provide audiences with an occasional oasis, i.e., a place of refreshment and recuperation. Without these stopping places, your narrative may begin to feel like a long trek across a featureless desert.
Here are four reasons why using the power of the pause will help your talks:
- To separate the main segments
Listeners can only hold so much information in their minds before experiencing overload. You therefore need a significant pause in these places: between your intro and body, between main points, and between the body and conclusion. Doing that tells the audience: “Here comes something new.” That in turn allows them to press the “Reset” button in their brain.
2. To let something sink in
The self-consciousness and anxiety that comes with public speaking releases adrenaline, which tends to make us speak faster. So we may fly through our talk, allowing important points to whizz by too fast for listeners to grasp them. Here’s a place where a pause is truly your friend, allowing listeners a moment for the important thing you just said to sink in.
3. To ease transitions
Creating natural and helpful transitions between the main segments of your talks is always a challenge. Remember: while we know how the elements of our presentations fit together, the audience doesn’t, and it’s our job to make that clear. In addition to knowing words and phrases to avoid in speeches and presentations, you need to come up with transitions that help keep audiences in the loop. Pauses help immensely here. They help listeners understand that whatever you just said is about to be linked to what’s coming next. Your individual points become easier to follow and retain.
4. To help listeners stay tuned
Speaking of retaining chunks of information, here’s where brain research reinforces the importance of the pause. After asking “Does the language of silence have any neurological value?” researchers found that speakers who don’t pause negatively affect listeners’ comprehension! Our short-term memories can only hold a few pieces of information, and for only around 30 seconds. Pausing is a vitally important way to keep your audience with you — engaged, informed, and enjoying the experience.
Tapping into the Power of Pause
Apart from the practical reasons given above for pausing in public speaking, there’s something more fundamental going on. It has to do with the relationship of sound and silence.
Nature itself teaches us the summoning power of silence. We talk about “The calm before the storm.” And when the everyday sounds of say, a forest go silent, the hairs on the back of our neck make us feel that something out of the ordinary is about to happen.
Public speakers can use the same tool, for the same effect. Why let that powerful point you’re about to make be swallowed by throwing it into the general stream? Or equally bad, filling the moment by not knowing how to stop saying um, uh, like, and so on? Pause! Set what you’re saying apart with silence that combines anticipation and drama. Let the moment gather power. Frame it and focus it with silence.
You’re always most effective with your audience when you have a conversation with them. Adrenaline, as we already know, tends to speed up your speech. By pausing, you stay within the conversational dynamic. And that’s when you sound at your best. Think of it as facilitating a dialogue with your audience.
Finally, listeners need to recognize you as the principal actor in this drama. They must have complete confidence in your ability to lead an audience. So they’re finely attuned to your level of confidence, including how you pace your talk. You mustn’t appear rushed or anxious, but comfortable and always in control.
Be that speaker: the one who delivers a well-paced speech with frequent refreshing pauses. Your audience will linger not on your content, but on your credibility, confidence, and leadership.
Here’s an exercise to help you learn the pausing technique:
Listen to the beginning of Obama’s Presidential Acceptance Speech and notice where he pauses.
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3K8GWCl7P7U)
Here is the edited version of his speech, with the pauses indicated:
“If there / is anyone out there / who still doubts / that America is a place where / all things are possible / who still wonders / if the dream of our founders / is alive in our time, / who still questions / the power of our democracy, / tonight / is your answer.”
To practice this technique yourself, you can take your own presentation and mark the pauses in the same way as in the example above. Then read out loud your presentation, over and over again, paying particular attention to where you need to pause. Remember to slow down and speak as though you have plenty of time. This will leave the audience all the time they need to absorb what you’ve just said before picking up on the next piece of information you’re giving them.
