Filler Words Quotes

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I don’t know’ is just a filler word when you don’t want to say what you’re really thinking.
Magan Vernon (My Paper Heart (My Paper Heart, #1))
Well, that's what everyone wants, isn't it? Even these people who go out and have their noses shaved down to pencil erasers, and who get implants, and fillers, and who Botox their faces into immobility, they're all in search of the miracle that's going to make them feel like..." She searched for the word. "Like themselves.
Beth Harbison (Hope in a Jar)
In 90% of cases, you can start with one of the two most effective ways to open a speech: ask a question or start with a story. Our brain doesn’t remember what we hear. It remembers only what we “see” or imagine while we listen. You can remember stories. Everything else is quickly forgotten. Smell is the most powerful sense out of 4 to immerse audience members into a scene. Every sentence either helps to drive your point home, or it detracts from clarity. There is no middle point. If you don’t have a foundational phrase in your speech, it means that your message is not clear enough to you, and if it’s not clear to you, there is no way it will be clear to your audience. Share your failures first. Show your audience members that you are not any better, smarter or more talented than they are. You are not an actor, you are a speaker. The main skill of an actor is to play a role; to be someone else. Your main skill as a speaker is to be yourself. People will forgive you for anything except for being boring. Speaking without passion is boring. If you are not excited about what you are talking about, how can you expect your audience to be excited? Never hide behind a lectern or a table. Your audience needs to see 100% of your body. Speak slowly and people will consider you to be a thoughtful and clever person. Leaders don’t talk much, but each word holds a lot of meaning and value. You always speak to only one person. Have a conversation directly with one person, look him or her in the eye. After you have logically completed one idea, which usually is 10-20 seconds, scan the audience and then stop your eyes on another person. Repeat this process again. Cover the entire room with eye contact. When you scan the audience and pick people for eye contact, pick positive people more often. When you pause, your audience thinks about your message and reflects. Pausing builds an audiences’ confidence. If you don’t pause, your audience doesn’t have time to digest what you've told them and hence, they will not remember a word of what you've said. Pause before and after you make an important point and stand still. During this pause, people think about your words and your message sinks in. After you make an important point and stand still. During this pause, people think about your words and your message sinks in. Speakers use filler words when they don’t know what to say, but they feel uncomfortable with silence. Have you ever seen a speaker who went on stage with a piece of paper and notes? Have you ever been one of these speakers? When people see you with paper in your hands, they instantly think, “This speaker is not sincere. He has a script and will talk according to the script.” The best speeches are not written, they are rewritten. Bad speakers create a 10 minutes speech and deliver it in 7 minutes. Great speakers create a 5 minute speech and deliver it in 7 minutes. Explain your ideas in a simple manner, so that the average 12-year-old child can understand the concept. Good speakers and experts can always explain the most complex ideas with very simple words. Stories evoke emotions. Factual information conveys logic. Emotions are far more important in a speech than logic. If you're considering whether to use statistics or a story, use a story. PowerPoint is for pictures not for words. Use as few words on the slide as possible. Never learn your speech word for word. Just rehearse it enough times to internalize the flow. If you watch a video of your speech, you can triple the pace of your development as a speaker. Make videos a habit. Meaningless words and clichés neither convey value nor information. Avoid them. Never apologize on stage. If people need to put in a lot of effort to understand you they simply won’t listen. On the other hand if you use very simple language you will connect with the audience and your speech will be remembered.
Andrii Sedniev (Magic of Public Speaking: A Complete System to Become a World Class Speaker)
It’s hard to find words to explain why you love someone, they don’t make words with that much passion. And even if they did, there isn’t a perfect combination of syllables and sounds to create a word strong enough to explain love. Love is just a filler word, a useless word that tries to do a job that no word can.
Kandi Steiner (Song Chaser (Chasers, #2))
If you are furious, and you’ve exhausted your reasoned argument but still want to get a powerful emotion across, then you might say, Fuck you. What I object to is the use of these impactful words as fillers, such as when people say, What the fuck are you doing? That’s lazy. How is fuck helping that particular sentence
Ann Napolitano (Dear Edward)
The different countries of India can be identified by the way each pronounces this word—from the Punjabi “bhaanchod” to the thin Bambaiyya “pinchud” to the Gujarati “bhenchow” to the Bhopali elaboration “bhen-ka-lowda.” Parsis use it all the time, grandmothers, five-year-olds, casually and without any discernible purpose except as filler: “Here, bhenchod, get me a glass of water.” “Arre, bhenchod, I went to the bhenchod bank today.” As a boy, I would try consciously not to swear all day on the day of my birthday. I would take vows with the Jain kids: We will not use the B-word or the M-word.
Suketu Mehta (Maximum City: Bombay Lost and Found)
Ditch the hedges. When the goal is to convey confidence, avoid words and phrases like “may,” “could,” and “in my opinion,” which suggest that things, and the people saying them, are uncertain Use definites. Rather than hedging, use definites instead. Words like “definitely,” “clearly,” and “obviously,” which suggest whatever was said isn’t just an opinion, it’s an irrefutable truth. Don’t hesitate. Ums and uhs are natural parts of speech, but too many of them can undermine people’s confidence in us and our message. So cut the fillers. To decrease hesitations, plan what to say in advance or pause to collect your thoughts when needed. Turn pasts into presents. Using the present tense can communicate confidence and increase persuasion. So to signal certainty, rather than using past tense (e.g., “I loved that book”), use present tense (e.g., “I love that book”) instead.
Jonah Berger (Magic Words)
Elderly people are not always craggy, wrinkled, stooped over, forgetful, or wise. Teenagers are not necessarily rebellious, querulous, or pimple-faced. Babies aren’t always angelic, or even cute. Drunks don’t always slur their words. Characters aren’t types. When creating a character, it’s essential to avoid the predictable. Just as in language we must beware of clichés. When it comes to character, we are looking for what is true, what is not always so, what makes a character unique, nuanced, indelible. This specificity applies, obviously, to our main characters, but it is equally important when creating our minor characters: the man at the end of the bar, the receptionist in the doctor’s office, the woman with the shopping bag on the street. They don’t exist simply to advance our protagonist from point A to point B. They are not filler—you know, simply there to supply some local color. There is no such thing as filler or local color in life, nor can there be on the page. Ask of yourself: How does this character walk? How does she smell? What is she wearing? What underwear is she wearing? What are the traces of her accent? Is she hungry? Thirsty? Horny? What’s the last book she read? What did she have for dinner last night? Is she a good dancer? Does she do the crossword puzzle in pen? Did she have a childhood pet? Is she a dog person or a cat person?
Dani Shapiro (Still Writing: The Pleasures and Perils of a Creative Life)
He promised to keep in touch and always love her when she had to move away. Now she felt they were empty words that people did not intend to keep. They bandied them about as conversation fillers and nothing more.
Ellen M. Totten (A Scent of Gardenias)
fact, good communication is a lot like pasta sauce. The more you boil down and reduce a sauce, the more dynamic the flavor. Speaking redundantly and using filler words in your communication is like adding water to the sauce. The result is something bland and forgettable.
Bill McGowan (Pitch Perfect: How to Say It Right the First Time, Every Time (How to Say It Right the First Time, Every Time Hardcover))
I hate the word fine.  It is descriptive of nothing.  Socially acceptable filler with no true meaning.  It’s what you say when you are checking your feelings, unwilling or unable to let yourself be too happy or too sad.  Fine.  It’s an emotional bookmark.  A pause until you can continue the story.
Emme Burton (Fix It for Us (Better Than, #2))
The person is simply using a filler while they try to think of the right word,
James Rand (Body Language: Secrets They Don’t Want You to Know! Read Anyone, Learn How to Analyze People, and Attract, Connect, and Influence Everyone on a Deeper Level with Non-Verbal Communication)
Dialogue can be tough because it has so many requirements to be truly wonderful. It must sound authentic but not overly realistic (think of all of our hiccups and pauses and repetitions and filler words). It must move the story forward while revealing character. It must entertain and provide information. It must have “Voice” with a capital V, and not sound derivative of other writers who went before you. And if you’re working in first-person, then you have to do all of this within the narrative too.
Tom Leveen (How To Write Awesome Dialogue! For Fiction, Film and Theatre: Techniques from a published author and theatre guy)
It is not enough that you see things from that person’s perspective or understand what they are feeling. You also have to visibly confirm to the speaker that you are listening. There are multiple ways to do this. The easiest one is to vocalize your reactions with phrases like “Wow, that’s wonderful!” or “I’m sad to hear about that,” or “That sucks. I can see why you’re frustrated!” But what if the person’s message or feelings are unclear or you don’t know how to react out of fear of being misunderstood as indifferent? You can easily confirm that you are paying attention by nodding or using filler words like “mm-hmm” or “uh-huh.” The goal here is to assure the speaker that they have your undivided attention and that you are following their narrative. This is important in situations where the person is not only telling a story but giving you instructions for performing certain things.
James W. Williams (Communication Skills Training: How to Talk to Anyone, Connect Effortlessly, Develop Charisma, and Become a People Person)
Television operates at a distinct disadvantage to print—adults can read about twice as many words per minute as news anchors typically speak, and this does not account for the various commercials, empty banter, and other substance-free filler that consume a third or more of the average broadcast.
Bruce Cannon Gibney (A Generation of Sociopaths: How the Baby Boomers Betrayed America)
This is your body’s unsung hero. For a long time, the fascia was believed to just be a filler in the body, but fortunately, in recent years, science has brought it more to the foreground. High-tech examination equipment such as ultrasound and micro-cameras yield more and more astounding knowledge about its important functions in your body. Fascia is now classified as its own organ. This means, if you separated out all other tissue of the body, the fascial tissue remains as a connected part. In other words, the fascia forms a suspense network that pervades the entire human and animal body. That’s what the name implies: fascia means “bind” or “band” and “binding together” is exactly what this important
Helle Katrine Kleven (Physical Therapy for Horses: A Visual Course in Massage, Stretching, Rehabilitation, Anatomy, and Biomechanics)
Commit to mastering three to four new words every day. People with a rich vocabulary seldom have trouble articulating their views and display greater confidence while talking to people. The difference between a functional vocabulary and extensive vocabulary can be the difference between a black and white and vivid, colorful picture. Paint a picture with your words to make the conversation more interesting and compelling. Stay away from redundant words and phrases. Avoid using conversation fillers. Keep your sentences short, crisp and to the point. Do not use the most highfalutin words to flaunt your vocabulary. Instead be an effective communicator by using words that convey your ideas and feelings most appropriately. Less is always more in a conversation. Try to say more by using less yet effective words and phrases. Think of better and more articulate ways to convey your emotions and ideas, For example, you can say “famished” in place of “very hungry” or “livid” instead of “very angry or upset.” Try to convey your ideas using more effective words. Replace redundant words and phrases in your daily conversations. For example, instead of saying, “They said xyz about my looks” say “they commented on my looks.” The idea is to make your speech crisper, more articulate and tighter by replacing ineffectual words/phrases with more meaningful expressions. Everyday words and phrases such as “big” can become “gigantic,” “massive” or “colossal.” Similarly, scared can become “petrified” and “spooked,” hungry become “famished” and so on. Consciously think of more effective ways to convey the same meaning. This practice will make you come across as a more engaging, interesting and vibrant conversationalist. A richer and more power-packed vocabulary lends more character, feelings and sensory experiences to the conversation. The way to go about it is – Use a diary or notebook for listing new words and phrases you come across each day. You can also randomly pick three new words to learn from the dictionary every day, and try to use it in your speech or conversation. Install ‘word a day’ applications on your phones to keep enriching your vocabulary. It’s a work in progress. You’ll never know everything. Even if you believe you have a limited vocabulary or aren’t able to hold a conversation because you don’t know how best to express yourself, breathe easy. There are plenty of ways to build a powerful vocabulary if you have the initiative.
Keith Coleman (Effective Communication Skills: How to Enjoy Conversations, Build Assertiveness, & Have Great Interactions for Meaningful Relationships (Speak Fearlessly Book 2))
First, articulate the kernel segments for which you don’t have a thoughtful point of view. Just knowing what you don’t know gives you permission for that confidence about the things that you do know, and in the process allows you be honest about what you don’t know. Heck, just whip out the list when a client asks a question about anything on it. They are fine with advice-givers who are human, and merely saying “no” from time to time can give real meaning to your “yes” statements. “Honestly, I’ve been asking that same question and I don’t think I have it figured out yet. [Reaching down] Here are my notes so far, and this will provide that opportunity to finally figure it out. Any thoughts along the way would be welcome. Thanks.” Second, determine all the methods that would motivate you, as a unique individual, to develop a given position. This might include a public speaking engagement, a repeatable section to include in proposals, an article you can place for publication, an interview with a journalist seeking expertise, a seminar you will teach, some internal training to prepare for, or a handout to be used at predictable conversation intersections when talking to clients in person. Third, group the topics by platform, order the topics in each group by descending level of importance, and assign a date to each item. About that: You cannot fully explore one of these topics and then craft the language to present it in less than two weeks; typically it requires a month or two. Fourth, ignite the research (less than you’ll guess) and insight generation (more than you’ll guess) by articulating a compressed 2,400–3,600 words for each topic. Fifth, begin what academia calls the peer review process. Release it to the brutal public for feedback, disagreement, and “this strikes me as right” commentary. If nobody reads your blog, that’s like winning a race with no opponents; you can just skip that and cast it far and wide instead. Email it to everyone not already tired of you and wait. Or just let that one cynical employee eagerly make you wince as they’ve always dreamed of doing. Sixth, over the following years, strip out what later seems like filler and replace it with more substance. Work on it long enough each time to make it shorter and shorter.
David C. Baker (The Business of Expertise: How Entrepreneurial Experts Convert Insight to Impact + Wealth)
And what are they? They are Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time-related. How bureaucrats love their acronyms. Now, that’s fine except that ‘achievable’ and ‘realistic’ amount to the same thing. So couldn’t the criteria be reduced to four? But then it would be SMAT aims or SMRT aims, neither of which has quite the same ring. So SMART aims it has to be, which means that form-fillers everywhere struggle to find something to write in the ‘Realistic’ box that hasn’t already been included in ‘Achievable’.
John Humphrys (Beyond Words: How Language Reveals the Way We Live Now)
This was meant to trick me because the person thought it would give none of himself away. The same as using lorem ipsum as filler text. But every time we engage with words, we make choices. It was a choice to try to give nothing away.
Brianna Labuskes (The Lies You Wrote (Raisa Susanto #1))