Maiden Speech

I just made my maiden toastmasters speech today!
yipee!
it's a beginner's workshop and they made everyone do the first speech with a preparation time of just 10 min.

It went pretty well. Here's the speech:


"Good evening toastmaster of the evening, and fellow toastmasters.

How many of you here feel like you're juggling life all the time? you're multi-tasking with so many things, family, work, friends. Show of hands pls.

Then all of you can empathise with me then, because i'm a juggler. For real. Juggling balls, clubs, rings. I've been juggling for abt 10 years now, and i'm at the stage where i do performances and some freelance work here and there.

I've so many interesting stories to tell about juggling, but let me share one of my most memorable one. Back then when i was at NUS, there was a campus wide talent competition. I was there once to support a friend who was taking part, and i saw that the competitors there were of the fun sort. There were magicians, pple singing with loudhailers...so you know, i thought it would be fun and so i joined the following year.

I didn't want my juggling to be boring, so i prepared an item where i was wearing cheongsam and i had a Hokkein soundtrack. Imagine my horror when i sat through the rehearsal and i saw people doing classical guitars, classical pianos, serious drama...dances. And there i was with my little hokkein act. it was really embarassing.

On the actual day itself it was even more terrible, as those pple were now dressed in long elegant gowns and there i was in my cheongsam. But the great thing is, i actually won the competition! i beat the classical pianist!

In my life generally now, i'm also juggling many things. i work as an engineer, and i'm starting with Toastmasters and i'm also just attending church. Yea, i found God! So a lot of things are going on.

You know, in juggling, we usually only focus on one ball at a time, but from a distance, you can see a pattern. In the same way, i'm doing all the little things i like, and one day, all these things will come together and form a pattern. One day, all the dots will connect.

Toastmaster of the evening pls."

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the speech was pretty well received and the last paragraph made all the difference.
even i liked how it ended.

and it wasn't even prepared.

all i prepared prior to the speech was 3 lines:

1. multitask intro
2. juggling competition
3. wrap up

Everything came out by itself. including the ending.

You know it's coming, yes,
i thank God for it.

It's His way of encouraging me for two days of feeling pretty down.
and it's His way of reinforcing his messages to me.
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Inspiring story from the bible this week.
the talent parable from Matthew 25:14.

Now i have very weird ways of interpreting the bible,
somehow i get messages that don't really seem quite "right" at face value.

so quite paisei to share my thoughts sometimes.
can see my fellow sisters' blank look like "oookay...how do i break this gently to her that this is not what it's saying"

but anyway,
i think the "talents" in the parable may actually refer to money.
but when i read it, it struck me as talent, like a gift.

And to me the story was saying,
when God gives you a talent, or a gift, don't hide it and return it to Him.
He wants you to use it, and to multiply it.

~~
And he who had received the five talents came forward,
bringing five talents more, saying,
‘Master, you delivered to me five talents; here I have made five talents more.’

His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant.
You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much.
Enter into the joy of your master.’
-Matthew 25:20-21
~~

Chances are, the more you use the talent given to you, the more talents you'll get along the way.
that's what God wants.
He doesn't want you to hide the talent He gave you.
He doesn't want you to return with what He gave you.
you basically wasted the talent.

So use the talent that God gave you.
There is a purpose for it.
Find it.
Use it.

"And behold, I am with you always, to the end of age."
Matthew 28:20