Ah .. this is … but how uh … me … well, how to get rid of these … like, well … in short, parasite words? Here…
How to get rid of these parasites? The fact that such a question is heard more and more often makes me happy. This means that more and more people are dissatisfied with the littering of their own speech and want to learn how to speak clearly and competently — and therefore more effectively. Perhaps someone continues to believe that there is no particular harm from parasitic words, that it adds immediacy, brightness, a certain color to the speech — well, as they say, your right.
I am sure that these words harm more than the notorious insects. When we sin with rubbish in our own speech, the interlocutor (or the whole audience) has the right to draw the following sad conclusions about us — in a list or individually:
— we have an insufficient cultural level, and we read the last book in school childhood;
— we do not know enough about the topic of our own presentation and, therefore, are not professional enough. As Schopenhauer said: “Who thinks clearly, expresses clearly”;
— we worry, we feel insecure — and this can be used;
— we are confused by unexpected circumstances (for example, a question) and show our true face;
— we subconsciously pronounce through parasitic words what we are trying to hide.
Girls, how do you like the gentle confession of your young man: “well … I kind of love you …”?
The list can be continued, and the result, in any case, is sad — the impression of the performance is spoiled. It is as if an ugly yellow-brown blot of dirt suddenly appears on the impeccably clean, perfectly ironed suit of the speaker …
It’s a shame, right? ..
By parasitic words, we usually call words that do not carry a semantic load at a given time and in a given place — empty, garbage. They often pop up when «the tongue works faster than the head» — the non-professional is subconsciously afraid of pauses in speaking and begins to richly flavor the speech with all sorts of «uh … mmm … well … sort of …». The more the speaker speeds up the pace of speech, the more parasites appear in it. The same situation is observed if «the head works slower than the tongue» — for example, in all kinds of interviews. When answering a difficult or “uncomfortable” question, it often doesn’t even occur to an ordinary person to take a break, use an introductory turn, and other effective speaker techniques. He simultaneously speaks and thinks what to say. As a result, “RAM is overflowing”, and parasitic words are right there.
Another common cause of garbage in speech is old stereotypes of speech behavior, habits. Then the characteristic parasitic words will regularly slip through the speaker even in a leisurely speech.
The insidiousness of parasitic words lies in their invisibility to the speaker. Most often, a person who abundantly inserts the notorious “here … means … as if …” into speech does not notice them at all, does not realize and is sincerely surprised when they tell him about it.
How do you get rid of what you can’t see? Here’s an ambush…
The advice is quite common — to replace the «intrusive» word with some other one. Alas, there is no point in such a trick — in order to replace a word, you must first track it, and it is usually not tracked consciously. In addition, the replacement does not save us from the word-parasite, but adds one more, new one to the “collection”. There is more garbage in the head and on the tongue, less sense.
However, do not despair, friends. There is a way out — and I have repeatedly witnessed a successful «complete cure». I am pleased to share with you a method proven many times in practice —
How to get rid of parasitic words
I don’t promise miracles, as usual — there is no “magic pill” or “magic dichlorvos” for quickly getting rid of parasitic words (SP). The process is laborious: if we recall our four elephants — elephant number two «Practice-practice-practice» is indigenous to the team here. But how nice it will be to show off the result! Pure speech in our time, unfortunately, is an infrequent phenomenon — the interlocutors will definitely distinguish you from many others, and having distinguished you, they will remember you.
So — THE MAIN TASK in the process of getting rid of the joint venture is to LEARN TO NOTICE THEM in your speech.
And without help here, perhaps, one cannot do — at least at the first stage …
If we already know which SPs to get rid of first, great. If not, we ask those with whom we constantly communicate, we record ourselves on a voice recorder or on video. As a rule, there are no difficulties with the definition of the “main enemy” )).
Then we turn for help to those who can hear us often and regularly — and are not averse to helping, of course. Usually family members meet these requirements well.
“Dear friends,” we say. — urgently need your help in the noble cause of getting rid of the word-parasite «as if». I ask you to follow my speech and, if I say “how to”, signal it to me in this way (we show any way that suits us — clap, tap on the shoulder, exclamation, and so on). For each such signal, I will pay you 10 USD (20-30-100 — depending on our financial capabilities and the desired speed of achieving the result). Let’s start right now!
You will not find more attentive and grateful listeners!
Ideal helpers in this work are children. They are guaranteed to:
— to sneak behind you tirelessly and continuously,
— joyfully shouting «Aha-ah!» at the slightest puncture
— and every minute urge you to speak more often and more,
which, in fact, is what you need for a speedy victory over the joint venture)).
In addition, they will get the opportunity to honestly and very usefully earn pocket money)).
However — if money does not motivate, you can use squats, push-ups and other healthy actions that can be performed immediately.
At first, each such reminder will cause you sincere bewilderment. «I said? Twice? Can not be! When?»
Then the reminders will start to get annoying. And sometimes even annoying. Here it is important to remember the elephant number one «A serious, motivating goal», calm down — and continue to work. The main thing at this stage is not to quarrel with the controllers)).
And suddenly, some time later — you suddenly have time to NOTICE that the damned «as if» has almost jumped off your tongue and almost flew out into the world, but you — hooray! — at the very last moment they grabbed him by the slippery tail and — DID NOT SAY, cut him off in mid-sentence. Let at first it will cause stumbling and pauses in speech — it’s okay, you have already achieved the main thing —
Brought the word-parasite to a conscious level!
So, now you can follow him and «catch him by the tail», control his pronunciation on your own. From now on, the earnings of your tireless assistants are guaranteed and will steadily go down — unless, of course, you decide to rest on your laurels …
Well — have we already chosen the word with which we will begin the «weeding» of our speech? Then, let’s get started right away!