A physical approach in dealing with emotion, breath, space, and voice in professional speaking, by Alex Boon, speech therapist and voice teacher.

Dealing with emotions is dealing with breath- and voice control. Speakers speak in many circumstances and will experience different spaces to work in, different public to respond to and different moods to work from. Speaking, for most speakers, is often accompanied by a certain amount of stress.

All these components make speakers react on a vocal level during speaking: pitch, loudness and strain are severely influenced. Also the degree of perception and listening differ from a more normal situation. Physical functions of the voice - tensing and moving, positioning the larynx, muscular support and breath - are affected.

Most speakers tend to interfere in these processes in their own different way, in order to keep their production on a ‘normal' level. In doing this, we hardly see any adaptation to the environment and the situation the speaker finds him or herself in. This can result in a rather immobile en hardly emotional speech.

Working with movement, tension, breath and voice asks the most of a speaker: next tot content there is a form and a production that needs care and attention. In doing this, the speaker involves himself personally as a physical person (some-body) into the lecture. By doing this, the speaker risks loss of control. This loss of control we  recognize as a result of temporary stress, anxiety or emotional instability.

By recognizing the elements that are needed to built speech, one also runs risks,  but, at the same time, one creates opportunities to gain control over an essential part of the voice: oneself