How can I learn good conversational skills as a stutterer?

[Count]

I really want to know how being a good collocutor can be learned. I realized that I have developed way too introvert and this is no advantage in life, but causes just problems which I want to get rid of. Saying whatever I like would be awesome, the end of all negative feelings.
So, what can I do? What skills have fluent speakers developed that I haven't?
Mostly my stutter embarrasses me too much, that's why I avoid saying certain sentences or have to find new expressions. I've never been much of a great collocutor though, but I really want to learn it. I need the skills.

Many stutterers on this forum are older and more experienced than me because they already have achieved a career, marriage etc. etc. etc.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Tmd]

really there's not that much to it.

the biggest thing is meet new people, dont be afarid to make a fool of yourself. Remember its not like people have never heard of a stutter before, dont make a big deal about it. Take one step at a time and pretty soon you will be a social butterfly. But start small say hi to people, then move on to asking how there day has been. Talk with cashiers, strangers, friends, people on the phone, go to bar talk to drunks. pretty soon you will start to learn techniques to keep your flow to be fluent that your stutter will really start to drop off alot.

remember take it one word at a time!

[Mullen]

A sense of humor is important. You shouldn't force yourself to joke with others, but if you have an amusing thought and it isn't too crude or socially awkward just share it someone. Girls like to be teased in a subtle, good humored sort of way: and there's nothing more encouraging than when you make a girl laugh or smile.

[Jamus]

This is a very good question as I have always wondered what skills I am lacking or need help on developing.

If I stopped stuttering tomorrow, I would still find it difficult to make good conversation at times, just b/c of a lack of experience in conversational skills. I think it would take me awhile to get into a comfortable place where I feel good about my skills. But in this reality, I know there are skills that are not up to par, and I accept that and just continue to try my best to any given situation.

Such skills would be being able to find the appropriate words to use in describing something. Telling a story in an interesting way, that grabs people's attention and holds it there.

Being able to negotiate effectively. Again, using the right words and being able to use the tone of your voice to persuade.

Just the overall confidence level of opening your mouth to speak in general, I feel is always something that I will struggle against. But the more I talk the more courage I have to step up and talk... over and over again. The key to developing skills is... don't stop talking! :)

There are definitely more out there, I'm just taking the ones off the top of my head.

[Be YOURSELF]

People are quite self centered, and you can use that to you advantage because they love to talk about themselves,

so just be a good listening

Be curious about the subject/person

ask open ended questions/ opinions

Have a thirst for new info & knowledge.

Speaking is not the only aspect of being a good conversationalist

Listening is critically important as well, and we stutterers are blessed in that department

[bignick]

People are quite self centered, and you can use that to you advantage because they love to talk about themselves,

so just be a good listening

Be curious about the subject/person

ask open ended questions/ opinions

Have a thirst for new info & knowledge.

Speaking is not the only aspect of being a good conversationalist

Listening is critically important as well, and we stutterers are blessed in that department


Very good advice, I always listen intently to what people say and when I speak to them again I always bring up something they have told me or ask them about an event they were talking about and they seem impressed that I have remembered something they are doing or a fact about themselves.

Nick.

[emily445455]

A real important thing that most stutterers (and other people, I've notice) forget is to maintain good eye contact. I know sometimes for us it's hard, esp if we have facial ticks/twiches...but this is very important for good converstional skills :)

[peebee]

Remember that barely anyone is perfectly fluent when talking to other people and depending on the nature of the conversation, even excellent public speakers do a lot of 'uhms' 'uhhhhh' etc...

When talking 1 on 1 with someone the #1 most important thing to do is have good eye contact as Emily said. Good eye contact means you're paying attention and care about what the person has to say (in their mind). I find eye contact also makes me stutter less because when someone makes proper eye contact with you, it shows that they're paying attention (even if you stutter or block).

This one goes together with eye contact well... I don't know how to describe it really but "uh huh", "yeah" etc... after someone makes a point is beneficial for the same reasons eye contact is.

The one area that's often overlooked is hand and facial expressions. Sometimes when I'm caught in a 1-3 second block I'll make an appropriate expression that will seamlessly turn a would be uncomfortable and embarrassing situation of being stuck on a word into a smoother transition that may even emphasize my point better. For example, if talking about something rather complicated and you get stuck on a word, you could make the wheel motion with your hands, say something like "the uhh..." and tilt your eyes which looks like your thinking. A better example would be when telling a joke or something funny, if you get stuck on a word, briefly laugh while repeating the previous sentence...

In general I think TMD gave very good advice, just socialize, get out there, meet new people. People have different stutters, you need to find your own fluency techniques

[Paranoid]

Drink Jack Daniels.

[improvingame]

Most of conversational skills comes from being outside of your head.

One of the best explanations that I ever heard on this was that you only have a finite amount of energy and that of that energy, the amount that you use to think about the past (e.g where you stand in relation to the other person, your status) or future (e.g what if they are mean to you), takes away from the energy that you have at the task at hand (e.g interacting withs someone)

Past and future are inside your head, the present moment is outside your head.


I use to at starting conversations too, like probably less than 1 percentile, but now I'd consider myself 99.999% percentile (minus my stuttering...which usually doesn't happen when I'm very spontaneous and ridicously outside my head...i.e "the zone") as far as starting conversations with strangers.

I started going and purposely socializing with people--motivated by a particular pick up/success with women website--and I'd go out to a happy hour or to a bar/club at night on average of 4 times a week, and the days that I didn't, I would get about 30 min-1hr a day of getting my mouth moving with strangers. I went for about 8 months having the goal of doing 10 approaches per day.

At first it really ed, people were really realy really mean. But now I rarely get negative responses.

One suggestion is to avoid thinking about what you are gonna say. It's better to just approach and stand there with your face red and just say 'HI" and get blown off the first hundred times, and then build up, because it forces your internal system to dig as deep as it can to find resourcefulness in you.

It's like if you are in a danger situation and you aren't planning, the answer just comes up, your internal natural intelligence uses the knowledge you've built over the years (in terms of conversation this would be words and lingo) to come up with the best responses. The more you create the situation where you go into "danger" without anything in mind and just do your best, the greater ability you will develop to access your inner resourcefulness.

[stranger]

I've read about a way which helps me to deal with stuttering.
The way is:
You should relax muscles which lift and lower your chin as much as possible and keep this relaxing during process of speaking.
Does it help someone else?

[Asif]

Quote:
"there's nothing more encouraging than when you make a girl laugh or smile."

Oh yes there is :)

[Asif]

Quote:
"What skills have fluent speakers developed that I haven't?"

Fluency perhaps?
And a word of caution: When you achieve fluency, it will NOT be the end of all negative feelings. Although it might mean you will have fewer of them.