Speaking Up For DisabilityIt goes without saying that if you happen to be a person living with, or being affected by circumstances of disability, or have some interest in disability issues, you must be prepared to speak up for disability needs, interests, and abilities in virtually all of your day to day life endeavours. Speaking up publically about the inequalities that are rampant in the realm of disability is critical to addressing those inequalities. It is also an excellent way to achieve greater wellness in living with the circumstances of disability through the natural therapy of public speaking for as Orison Swett Marden once said:
Nothing else will call out what is in a [person] so quickly and so effectively as the constant effort to do [their] best in speaking before an audience. When one undertakes to think on [their] feet extemporaneously before the public, the power and the skill of the entire [person] are put to a severe test.
The practice of public speaking, the effort to marshal all one’s forces in a logical and forceful manner, to bring to a focus all the power one possesses, is a great awakener of all the faculties. The sense of power that comes from holding the attention, stirring the emotions, or convincing the reason of an audience, gives self-confidence, assurance, self-reliance, arouses ambition and tends to make one more effective in every way.
One’s judgment, education, [personhood], character, all the things that go to make a [person] what [he/she] is, are being unrolled like a panorama in [their] effort to express [themselves]. Every mental faculty is quickened, every power of thought and expression stirred and spurred.
Imagine then the potential and power of developing public speaking and more effective communication skills in helping persons with circumstances of disability to restore wellness and dignity in their lives, and find new opportunities for self-improvement, self-determination self-actualization and participation in society.
Secondly, one cannot underestimate the importance of good communication skills when it comes to advocating for disability interests. Often, ineffective advocacy results are only reflections of ineffective communications because of misunderstandings that occur between persons when the dynamics of disability are present.
