Golden Ears!

This my 8th speech in Crystal Talk Toastmaster Club. This is about using visual aids in the speech along with the general rules. The visual aid should be used in accordance with the speech, and just not for the heck of using. So, I choose a topic which had a lot to do with pictures.

This speech inspired by the people surrounding me who are hooked to their headphones or cell phone speakers all time to their ears. :)

Here goes my 8th speech. I used presentation slides as my visual aid. Speech material is a collectiom from various sources.

Only the speech text is here but for the visual effect, it is better to watch the video :)

Golden Ears

Good Afternoon Everybody!

This dates back to the initial dates in my career when I used to go by the BMTC bus changing the bus in corporation. It would be the regular bus and the regular people almost everyday.

And one such group of people where some high school students, nicely laded in their uniform, very beautiful smiling faces and heavily conversing with each other. One tends to go back to their school going days when we see such students.

All the bus passengers had become mute on-lookers of their conversation, trying to figure out what are they conversing about. Their conversations were aloud, everybody could hear it.

But strangely, nobody could understand it. Why? Simply because we were normal people with good hearing skills and they were special people with good conversation skills using only their hands and sounds.

Dear friends, they were the students of a deaf and dumb school.

Does this give us a jitter?

Well, this made me think about all the normal people like us who have golden ears. How cherished should we be about our hearing capability.

Well, do we really give importance to our ears? Are we cherishing about it? Are we taking enough care about it?

Friends, today my topic is all about ears.

This is for all normal people like us to know and to be aware of our own ears. Also, see how much we take care of it.

So, do we actually take care? Yeah, obviously, whenever we get pains in our ear we go to ENT specialist, right.

I have two parts today.

First part is a very short introduction about the golden and magical ears and their working.

[Slides]

The ear is made up of three basic structures: the outer ear, the middle ear, and the inner ear.

The purpose of the  Outer Ear is to:

1) It delivers sound to the middle ear

2) Within the outer ear canal are wax-producing glands and hairs that protect the middle ear.

The purpose of the Middle Ear is to:

1) Transmit and amplify sounds from the eardrum to the oval window

2) Act as a dampener on loud sounds that may damage the inner ear (cochlea)

Here, we are seeing the working of the middle ear.

The purpose of the Inner Ear is to:

The inner ear contains the most important parts of the hearing mechanism - two chambers called the vestibular labyrinth and the cochlea.

Vestiblar labyrinth:

1)      Maintain a sense of balance by responding to gravity and changes in acceleration of the head (up/down, forward/back, and side to side)

2)      Communicating balance to the brain

The Cochlea:

The cochlea is the second part of the inner ear and is the actual organ of hearing. It is embedded in the skull in what is called the mastoid area, a spongy part of the skull just behind where the jaw hinges. The mastoid bone acts as an amplifier for some sounds, especially those in the lower frequency ranges.

Functions:

1) Sound wave interpreter and converter

2) Messaging to the Brain: In the brain the electrical impulses are translated into sounds which we recognize and understand.

Opposite the base of each "root" of a hair cell are the nerve endings of nerve bundles that carry the hair-cell generated impulses to the brain. This bundle of nerves is called the "8th nerve".

This means that in a healthy young person there are about 30,000 - 35,000 associated nerve fiber endings across each synapse. The 8th nerve carries the electrical/ chemical messages to the brain for processing and is the conduit for the messages from the brain back to the cochlea.

Well, Friends, are you seeing stars? Got a jitter now… Ecstatic and amazed how our ears toils for us… or bored of some stuff?

Now, moving on to the second part,

Now, that we know what ears do for us to hear properly, let’s see, what do we do with our ears?

[Headphones and latest gadgets figures]

We use so many gadgets, headphone, bluetooth headphones, mobile hands-free, any new gadgets that are in.

Has it happened to you that you didn’t realize a person who has come to your cube, had actually had to tap on your desk for you to notice.

Has it happened to you that while crossing the road, you forgot about the honking of the car?

Have you witnessed in a bus, conductor screamed for no reason at all.

Does the car behind you, has to honk and inform you that the signal is Green.

If this sounds familiar, then you are in the listening to the right speech.

Now, let’s see, what are the different noise levels that we normally hear?

These are specified limit in which you can hear this noise levels specified by OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration).
Most people are unaware how dangerous is to exposure of noise levels on a daily basis, but usually for far less time that it would take for hearing damage to occur.
The harmful effects can be cumulative, so long-term exposure to short periods of loud noise can produce hearing loss years later.

Hearing damage from headphones is probably more common, because many people exploit the acoustic isolation by listening at higher volumes.

Moreover, even at comparable volumes, due to the close coupling of the transducers to the ears, they are under high-risk.

SYMPTOMS OF HEARING DAMAGE
After exposure to loud music, the listener may experience "threshold shifting," when low-level sounds are no longer as audible as they were.
What happens in long term?
Two types of hearing damage:

•         Sensineural hearing loss:

–        When high energy sound waves, rippling through ear fluid, over stimulate and kill hair cells

–        Result: When hair cells for a band of frequencies are destroyed, those frequencies are no longer heard

•         Tinnitus hearing loss:

–        The damaged cells fire continuously even though there is no real sound

–        Described as a persistent, loud buzz in the head at the frequency of the hearing damage.

–         For some tinnitus sufferers, the buzz is very loud - 90dB or more and can compromise the quality of life, not to mention completely ruin all ability to enjoy music.

How to Safegurad?

Should we stop using Headphones and its variant?
If you can do this, that’s the best.
But what else can we do:

1.      Setting Safe Headphone Volume Levels

a.       Always adjust the volume level such that you are able to hear the outside noise as well. Not only ears, it will prevent you from accident’s as well.

b.      For those who wear headphones (eg walkmans), the volume is also too loud if a person standing near a listener can hear the music coming through the headphones.

c.       Stereos and other types of amplification devices should be kept to a moderate level. People should be able to talk and be heard over the music. If people need to shout to be heard above the music, then the volume is too loud.

2.      Wearing Ear protectors and ear plugs, if we have to listen long time

3.      Anyone who listens to loud music or is exposed to loud noise on a regular basis should test hearing periodically, because hearing loss can be cumulative, very gradual and virtually symptomless.

4.      Wearing headphones during exercise is also dangerous to hearing. Aerobic exercise diverts blood from the ears to the limbs, and leaves the inner ear more vulnerable to damage from loud sound. So, better avoid.

So, friends, with this, I want to conclude my speech saying that, let’s all be normal people, let’s not try to become special people.  Let’s cherish this golden gift given by God by being aware and giving importance to it.
Let’s protect ourselves, because nobody else can.
Only you should be caring about yourself. Take care.
Thank You.

The Drive

Two months back, I had participated in the Toast Master Area Level Humorous speech contest which was held on 2nd October 2010 in my office campus.

What I learnt, it is really tough to make people laugh :)

Though I did not win any prize :-( but at least I have the satisfaction I gave tough competition ;-) At least I hope so :)

Well, so you read my speech and let me know, if it really made you smile/laugh(?). Please give in your comments. If reading is boring and you are a fan of YouTube, you can as well watch my video :)

Caution: It is entirely my wild imagination and original thoughts. But please don't come to any conclusion about my driving skills :)

The drive

Spirituality, Personality and communication classes are the latest trend. Anybody you ask, they are in something or the other. When you join these, you are welcomed, as though you have decided something big. ‘Congratulations to you for choosing the path of transformation’. Suddenly you feel, is something wrong here.

‘Have I come to the wrong place?’

Friends, why do you have to get into so many things, when you can learn every day from you own experiences.

Here I am, today, I am going to demonstrate to you, and how your personality development takes place by just driving a car. By the end of it, I am sure you will realize how it improves your communication skills, negotiating skills and of course some time the driving skill too.

Driving to my office in the car is a joyful ride.

The drive......

Some times the drive is bumpy, with so many pot holes on the road that you struggle to see that the car is not hit by the road. Obviously, coz we have paid so much, and how much more we have to shell out for the repairs. You learn being careful, careful about our things.

There are these days, when I am getting late to office, and I have to attend a meeting. Just in time, I cross the signal when it is about to go red. Wow.. what a sense of joy, and just turn back give an agony look to all vehicles who couldn’t cross it. Wow.. I did it again, a speedy drive. Here, you learn the timing and time management skills.

Then again, there are some days are relaxing, when the drive is like a tortoise due to traffic jam due to rain or felling of a tree. Do you get upset,  you are totally wrong, it is a boon in disguise,  this is the right time to show your multi talent. Just switch off your engines, switch on the FM channels and relax. You can enjoy the time with various FM Channels available who greet you with ‘Hello Bengaluru’, you can SMS and win some gift vouchers too. And you can even show your loved ones how much you care, by dedicating a song to them.

So what do you learn by this, You improve your confidence and learn to care.

But some days, are learning daysss… the days when we actually break the signals, and get caught by the cops. Then we horne our negotiating skills.

Some times, the drive is good times pass/ stress buster. How, just imagine you had a fight at your house/office, when you are driving the car, usually, we can get atleast one person who was about to hit us. Just stop your car and take out your entire bad mood onto that person, and you will be relieved. But don’t ask, what happened to the guy in the receiving end. :)

Now, you learn how to pass on the buck.

Sometimes the drive is a fear/helplessness, when a bus which is in the left most side of the road standing in the bus stop, suddenly starts and moves over right most side. So, what do we learn here, we learn  to be Thankful to God. which, in turn it improves our spirituality.

Then are these days, when we to go behind a tractor, and you cant overtake it. Oh no... it had to come now, I did a mistake taking this road, and we start comparing India with all the other developed countries, and finally say, it happens only in India. And decide that next time, I will not vote. So, we what do we learn here, we are enlightened about us being a citizen of India, hw important we are.

Sometimes the drive is little risky, when in front of us there is a truck without the back light. We suddenly, start thinking what will be the next move of the truck. Now, we learn planning and actually game planning.

Every drive you can always exhibit respect and love for animals. When you meet a cow or bull or herd of goats on the road, and carefully drive without disturbing them.

There are these lucky days, when it is little drizzling and your having a smooth drive, when suddenly the vehicle in front of you, breaks or halts. Then when you put a break and realize that the car is not stopping and the car stops just in nick of the time, when you thought the car has already hit it. Now, you remember your husband who said, you had to give it to the service last month. Thus, you realize the family value.

So, see friends, there are so many things that we learn from driving a car and improve personality. Mind you, these are just few of them, there are many more.

The important thing is that, we don’t even have shed any money. So what do you get as a bonus… learning to save money, of course. :)

Friends, Henceforth, instead of going to any personality/spirituality/communication development classes, just be chill, wear your seat belt and drive your car to your favorite or not so favorite destination depending on your mood. :)

Thank you.