NO, I’m not talking about selling the Adani stock and buying something else, but another investment, when I went back to school! I’d been asked to speak at a prestigious institution in the city sometime back, had scribbled a few points of what to say, when a deathly silence descended on my vocal cords; I lost my voice! It was just two days before the event. Let me confess I depend on my voice, and admit I have covered a lot of inadequate content by using baritone and powers of articulation as cover. Suddenly, I was left with a squeak!
I decided to message the organizers and tell them how sorry I was when a strange thought struck me, why not speak nay squeak on ‘losing my voice’? Why not give a talk that addressed the fact that it was not how I spoke, but what I spoke that mattered? Why not tell the young boys and girls it was content that mattered, that it was not their personality that would see them through life, but finally their inner character?
‘Use squeaky voice to emphasize this thought,’ I decided and finally armed with the leftovers of my voice I did just that. ‘Google!’ I squeaked to the young audience, ‘Understands exactly the kind of person you are just by knowing the sites you visit. They know what ads to place for you, after knowing you well enough!’ ‘No more are there locked doors where you can hide! The locks on those doors have been broken and today your character and who you are is revealed, for the world to see!’
I looked at the faces of the earnest students, many, who would soon go into management schools and be told how to stand straight, how to look into someone’s eyes directly, speak confidently, even what amount of muscle to put behind a handshake, and knew I had to tell them that those days of personality development were numbered.
What mattered now was character building. Those days of using only voice were over, and my squeaky tones emphasized the days of solid content had come. ‘Be centred, control your addictions, learn to be compassionate, bring clarity and transparency into your dealings, value education, and learn to stop being resentful,’ were some thoughts I shared.
‘And learn to trust God, so He can live in you and through what you do!’ I crept home, tired, exhausted, all my strength having gone to keep vocal muscles working overtime, but today as I look back, I smile as I look up and whisper, “There was a purpose in my voice disappearing wasn’t there?”
That day it was back to school with nothing but inner content! Yes dear readers, It’s not going to be what you wear, how you look, and how you speak that matters, but what you have within! Start investing in the ‘within’, it’s a good investment..!
—Email: bobsbanter@gmail.com
