James Burden: Foreign.
Joanne Lockwood: Welcome to Inclusion Bites, your sanctuary
Joanne Lockwood: for bold conversations that spark change. I'm Joanne Lockwood,
Joanne Lockwood: your guide on this journey of exploration into the heart of
Joanne Lockwood: inclusion, belonging and societal transformation.
Joanne Lockwood: Ever wondered what it truly takes to create a world? Remember, everyone
Joanne Lockwood: not only belongs, but thrives. You're not alone.
Joanne Lockwood: Join me as we uncover the unseen, challenge
Joanne Lockwood: the status quo and share stories that resonate
Joanne Lockwood: deep within. Ready to dive in? Whether you're
Joanne Lockwood: sipping your morning coffee or winding down after a long day, let's
Joanne Lockwood: connect, reflect and inspire action together.
Joanne Lockwood: Don't forget, you can be part of the conversation too. Reach out
Joanne Lockwood: to jo.lockwood@seechangehappen.co.uk
Joanne Lockwood: to share your insights or to join me on the show.
Joanne Lockwood: So adjust your earbuds and settle in. It's time to
Joanne Lockwood: ignite the spark of inclusion with Inclusion Bites.
Joanne Lockwood: And today is episode 179
Joanne Lockwood: with the title Stuttering Without Apology. And I have the
Joanne Lockwood: absolute honour and privilege to welcome James Burden.
Joanne Lockwood: James is a speech language pathologist and the founder of
Joanne Lockwood: Stuttering Blueprint, empowering professionals who stutter
Joanne Lockwood: to lead with confidence and connect without
Joanne Lockwood: compromise. And when I asked James to describe his superpower,
Joanne Lockwood: he said it is creating safe spaces where stuttering
Joanne Lockwood: becomes strength, not silence. Hello, James, welcome to
Joanne Lockwood: the show. Hi, Joanne, thank you so much for having me.
Joanne Lockwood: I understand from where we were chatting just now it's early o' clock for you
Joanne Lockwood: because you're based Pacific time on the US
Joanne Lockwood: continent, aren't you? Yes, that's right. So
James Burden: I'm from Vancouver BC originally and I still live there. That's
James Burden: my home base. But right now I am living in Mexico for the last
James Burden: couple months, on my way to Peru soon. So I love
James Burden: doing what I do and I also love doing it while travelling and seeing the
James Burden: world because it really brings some depth to
James Burden: my, my service and I like to go to places that have
James Burden: a lot of sort of spiritual, interesting things to do. So I.
James Burden: I got to go and do different ceremonies with different indigenous
James Burden: peoples all over the world, which is not something to do with my stuttering
James Burden: programme, but is very much to do with what I
James Burden: find valuable. Wow, that sounds fascinating. I can't wait to get to
Joanne Lockwood: that. One of my claim to fames is I've been to Mexico by mistake
Joanne Lockwood: and you might wonder how one could go to Mexico by mistake. Well,
Joanne Lockwood: it's quite easy when you're driving down the aisle in California and you're not paying
Joanne Lockwood: attention and then suddenly there's a sign that says last US Exit and it
Joanne Lockwood: disappears behind you. The next Sign you see is welcome to Mexico. It's
Joanne Lockwood: like that wasn't the plan. So it took like 30 seconds to get into Mexico
Joanne Lockwood: and it took about three hours to get back out again through border control. So
Joanne Lockwood: that's my claim to fame Mexico by mistake. Luckily we happened to have the
Joanne Lockwood: passports in the car. So you were there for all
James Burden: three hours? Yeah, you just end up queuing up out of
Joanne Lockwood: Tijuana to try and come back in. It's like, yeah, I guess it
Joanne Lockwood: was the spring breakers or the college students were all out in force trying to
Joanne Lockwood: queue back because it was a whole roll of us plated
Joanne Lockwood: cars trying to get back in. So, yeah, we were, yeah, we were kind of
Joanne Lockwood: okay. But yeah, we're a bit worried for a bit because we were lucky to
Joanne Lockwood: have our passports. Just happened to have them in the glove compartment, the car. So
Joanne Lockwood: we were lucky. But yeah, could have been fun. Yeah. So that's my claim
Joanne Lockwood: to fame Mexico by mistake. James, we were chatting again in the
Joanne Lockwood: green room before we went live. Around stuttering and
Joanne Lockwood: your masterclass in your programme, what triggered
Joanne Lockwood: you to focus on stuttering and speech in the way you
Joanne Lockwood: have? Well, my focus on
James Burden: stuttering speech came just from an interest in
James Burden: speech and language, from learning Spanish years ago and
James Burden: finding it fascinating the similarities between Spanish and
James Burden: English, the words that are similar. So I got interested in linguistics. I
James Burden: already had a psychology degree and then the, the idea of speech
James Burden: pathology came up and I'm like, wow, that's a great combination of both. So
James Burden: I put all the effort into getting into grad school, which wasn't easy, still isn't
James Burden: easy to become a speech language pathologist. It's very competitive, but I
James Burden: managed to get in. And then during grad school at one of my
James Burden: practicums, I started, I went and did a practicum at Columbia Speech
James Burden: and Language Services in Vancouver and they were doing a 10
James Burden: day intensive stuttering workshop. And this is the first
James Burden: time I had come across people who stuttered in a professional
James Burden: setting. And when I met everybody, they all came in,
James Burden: they had quite intense stutters and I, I very quickly got used to
James Burden: hearing that, so it wasn't quite so scary or
James Burden: different. I, I didn't feel as uncomfortable as I think a lot of people feel
James Burden: when they hear it. And then over those 10 days, these 10 people
James Burden: went from stuttering intensely to
James Burden: almost completely fluent. And some were completely fluent. It was, it was
James Burden: an incredible transformation and
James Burden: I was, I was impressed by this. I decided this, this is
James Burden: something I wanted to do in so much in speech Pathology is,
James Burden: you know, making little ripples and, and hoping those turn into big
James Burden: waves later. But this was a massive change in a short
James Burden: period of time and I, I found it very satisfying. However,
James Burden: there's a little bit more to this story when it comes to working just
James Burden: on fluency. But I'll, I'll circle back
James Burden: around to that in a minute because it's important for inclusion.
James Burden: But for this story, I see these people have this
James Burden: massive transformation. I changed my graduate paper,
James Burden: graduating paper topic so that I could follow this up. And I was very
James Burden: lucky in that one of my professors was a
James Burden: clinical professor and a speech language pathologist who specialised in
James Burden: stuttering. And so she took me under her wing after
James Burden: graduation. She started giving me clients for stuttering from
James Burden: her overflow. She mentored me. I picked up a couple other
James Burden: mentors along the way in those first few years. So I got to
James Burden: do in a one on one setting what I'd seen done in this intensive
James Burden: setting. I also discovered this programme called Camperdown,
James Burden: which is from Australia and it's using the same method, the
James Burden: prolonged speech method as well we used in the intensive
James Burden: programme. But now it could be done in a once a week
James Burden: setting and send clients home with practise. And then it also
James Burden: transferred very well when the time came to doing it
James Burden: via zoom. So very powerful method, making big
James Burden: changes. As I started to see those changes, I started to feel
James Burden: very comfortable, very good at this. I'm like good at helping
James Burden: people become fluent. I'm very comfortable around
James Burden: people who are stuttering. And one of the most interesting parts
James Burden: was almost like a therapist effect
James Burden: or a placebo effect that would be like when people
James Burden: came in and even when they had just started to begin to work with
James Burden: me, they started to relax right away. And I
James Burden: think that came from being in a place
James Burden: where stuttering is okay. Being in a place where stuttering is
James Burden: accepted, we're accepting it. At the same time, we're trying to
James Burden: make it easier to speak. Speak. And that's always been kind of. My
James Burden: attitude is let's make it easier to speak
James Burden: rather than let's fix you, let's make sure
James Burden: you don't stutter so that you'll be okay. Because I don't believe
James Burden: that stuttering makes someone not okay. So removing the shame and
Joanne Lockwood: the stigma and the awkwardness, taking away the pressure
Joanne Lockwood: to be perfect. Exactly. And what is perfect
James Burden: anyway is a little bit of
James Burden: stuttering here and there. I mean, we all do it sometimes. The difference
James Burden: between someone who stutters every once in a while
James Burden: and someone who Stutters a little bit more is
James Burden: that if that stuttering starts to
James Burden: affect their mindset, like, oh my God, there's something wrong with me,
James Burden: I, I don't speak right. And they're getting messages
James Burden: from well meaning family, maybe even well meaning teachers
James Burden: or not so well meaning peers, you know, in school getting teased
James Burden: or bullied. They're getting the message over and over that stuttering
James Burden: is not an acceptable way to speak. And once that takes
James Burden: root, it can really blossom into a not so pleasant
James Burden: plant that just affects the way they
James Burden: interact with the world. And so we're trying not to,
James Burden: trying not to stutter. And in avoiding it, in avoiding the
James Burden: stutter we start, people start to avoid important
James Burden: speaking situations, making, not putting themselves out there. Maybe on a
James Burden: professional level, it might be job interviews or it might be even
James Burden: applying for certain types of jobs because if I can't speak, I
James Burden: can't do that job. I could never be a lawyer because they have to speak.
James Burden: I could never be a, a politician or
James Burden: whatever it is. And yet we know that's not true because in the US
James Burden: Joe Biden, who was the most powerful men in on the planet for
James Burden: a number of years, was a person who stuttered or is
James Burden: a person who stutters. So there's a lot of myths that
James Burden: get in the way. That is a big part of
James Burden: my masterclass that I will share the link with you later.
James Burden: How to break those myths. But also in the
James Burden: masterclasses, how to speak more fluently from a place of I'm
James Burden: already enough. I'm just trying to work on my
James Burden: speech, not I need to work on my speech in order to be enough. There's
James Burden: an important fine distinction there. Is there a root
Joanne Lockwood: cause? Is it childhood trauma? Is it just a
Joanne Lockwood: developmental difference? Is there something that
Joanne Lockwood: triggers your language development, if you like, or your speech development that
Joanne Lockwood: can make you more susceptible to developing a stutter or
Joanne Lockwood: stammer or speech impairment. That
James Burden: is the billion dollar question, because so much,
James Burden: and I say that literally, I don't know exactly how much money has gone into
James Burden: researching that exact question, what causes stuttering. But
James Burden: we still don't have a definitive answer.
James Burden: And when we don't have a definitive answer, it usually
James Burden: leads to the conclusion that it's just a normal part of being
James Burden: human. And that is what came out in
James Burden: 2023. There was a forum of some of the
James Burden: biggest names in stuttering treatment. Mark
James Burden: Onslow, Barry Guitar, Rosalie Shenker,
James Burden: others. Now these are people who literally wrote textbooks.
James Burden: Barry Guitar wrote my textbook in grad school for
James Burden: stuttering and in this forum it's a discussion over
James Burden: stuttering as a neurodivergence. It's
James Burden: not it. And it follows a neurodivergent pattern. It
James Burden: affects all different cultures at the same rate. It is a little bit
James Burden: more common in men than in women, but
James Burden: that could easily be a reporting issue because
James Burden: of the pressure on women to conform a little bit more in
James Burden: society or maybe a lot more. The masking abilities might be there.
James Burden: Now I can't necessarily prove that one, but what we see
James Burden: reported is a 4 to 1 ratio of men to women. Stutter
James Burden: more, men stutter more. That's people who are identified at birth
James Burden: as men or women or male or female. But,
James Burden: and, and, and so this neurodivergent neurodiverse
James Burden: angle is I think incredibly powerful because as a
James Burden: society we are learning to accept that we
James Burden: have people with different kinds of minds, ADHD
James Burden: minds, people with autism, people who are
James Burden: left handed, and also
James Burden: in this case stuttering. That's very interesting. You say that happens across languages and I,
Joanne Lockwood: I suppose that never, never occurred to me. I just always in my head
Joanne Lockwood: imagined a stutter in English. But I guess,
Joanne Lockwood: yeah, it happens in Chinese, it happens in
Joanne Lockwood: Indian, Punjabi, whatever. It just, I guess the words
Joanne Lockwood: manifest themselves differently because often in English it's certain
Joanne Lockwood: letters that trigger, isn't it? Is it the same sounds
Joanne Lockwood: that trigger or is it, what's the commonality between.
Joanne Lockwood: Because often people get stuck on the T's or the S's or something or
Joanne Lockwood: certain words. Are there certain words in different languages that also trigger.
James Burden: You know what, that's another great question because what it
James Burden: turns out to be, it's usually a bit of a self fulfilling
James Burden: prophecy. The sound that an individual is going to stutter
James Burden: on. Now the way it usually works is something like this.
James Burden: Some big stutter happens on a certain letter that
James Burden: results in an embarrassed feeling. So the
James Burden: next time that letter comes up for that person in a high
James Burden: stakes situation, they're expecting to stutter. And lo
James Burden: and behold they do. Because they, their body gets
James Burden: more tense. They, they're expecting this to happen.
James Burden: They, they, they sort of tense up and then it does. And then
James Burden: that is proof that it's that letter that is the problem
James Burden: and it just compounds from there. And
James Burden: usually it's not always this way. But a very common
James Burden: letter for someone to stutter on is the first
James Burden: letter of their name. Because they have had an
James Burden: experience where they've tried to introduce themselves, they've stuttered and then
James Burden: some smart person has said, what did you forget your name? Because
James Burden: that's such a classic thing to say when someone stutters on their own name
James Burden: and people don't realise how harmful that can be and how
James Burden: hurtful. Even though it seems like an innocuous joke, it
James Burden: is not an innocuous joke if you're very sensitive and
James Burden: understandably so, considering how people treat stutterers
James Burden: about stuttering and not wanting to stutter where people can hear you. So
Joanne Lockwood: as a listener or the other part of a conversation and
Joanne Lockwood: somebody is struggling, however we would describe that,
Joanne Lockwood: what should I do to be a better listener and to help that
Joanne Lockwood: person over the situation? Should I. Obviously I shouldn't
Joanne Lockwood: be speaking for them. I shouldn't be interrupting them, I shouldn't be completing their sentence.
Joanne Lockwood: How should I react? You're absolutely right with the not
James Burden: interrupting and not completing sentences. That's. If there. If there were
James Burden: gonna be rules, that would be rule number one. The best thing
James Burden: to do is simply wait and listen and just be
James Burden: patient and keep looking at the person. And
James Burden: I think more importantly is what we're doing here
James Burden: is advocating that stuttering is not a disorder,
James Burden: it's not a disease, it's not a neurological
James Burden: problem, it's not a tick. It's simply
James Burden: the way that this portion of the population,
James Burden: 1%, which is much, much bigger than most people would
James Burden: realise, how many people that stutter, that's simply the way that they talk
James Burden: and that it's okay. And if you understand that deep
James Burden: inside as the listener, makes it a lot easier not
James Burden: to have to, like, remember all the rules about how to talk to a
James Burden: person who stutters. You just know that it's okay and you don't have to worry
James Burden: about them and they're fine. They're just doing their thing. It's just going to take
James Burden: a couple extra seconds. Sometimes it's going to take even longer. But if
James Burden: you wait, the message will come out. And you don't have to
James Burden: say anything like, it's okay, I'm waiting. You don't have to,
James Burden: like, draw attention to it in any real way. You're just. You're just paying
James Burden: attention like you would to anyone who is taking a little bit longer to say
James Burden: something. Yeah. As you're talking now, I'm just thinking, how would I react in the
Joanne Lockwood: situation? And I'm thinking all these emotions and things are flying
Joanne Lockwood: around my head going, oh, do I feel. So am I feeling sorry for that
Joanne Lockwood: person? Maybe I am. Maybe I'm feeling a bit of empathy. Maybe I'm feeling a
Joanne Lockwood: bit of compassion, benevolence. I want to say they're there. It's okay. Don't
Joanne Lockwood: worry. I want to help them and reassure them, but I also,
Joanne Lockwood: in my head is, don't draw attention to it. Be patient. Don't look like I'm
Joanne Lockwood: bothered. But it's trying to find that middle ground, isn't it?
Joanne Lockwood: Just a blank stare and kind of a vacant
Joanne Lockwood: smile, tilting your head to one side and going, I'm waiting on the inside. I'm
Joanne Lockwood: waiting on the inside. Keep going. And I'm just trying to think of how
Joanne Lockwood: I can learn myself to create the right
Joanne Lockwood: listening face, the right listening mode to not
Joanne Lockwood: add to the pressure. I think that when we know that there's
James Burden: nothing wrong, it's not a sign of anything. It's not a
James Burden: sign of lower intelligence, it's not a sign of a
James Burden: neurological problem, it's not a sign of a disease or
James Burden: anything, then it takes the pressure off us to, to look
James Burden: normal, look normal, everything's okay. Also,
James Burden: when I said don't draw attention to it, I think that's
James Burden: absolutely fair. When talking to adults, we. We don't need to tell them
James Burden: they're okay or, or. Or give them a pat or, or feel sorry for
James Burden: anyone. What we. But
James Burden: I. That. That doesn't necessarily mean. Let's
James Burden: say you've got a young child who stutters. I'm not
James Burden: saying don't talk about it because that just makes it into the
James Burden: elephant in the room. When we, when we don't talk to a child
James Burden: about their stutter at all, then we're sending
James Burden: the message, this is so bad that we can't
James Burden: even talk about it. I remember experiences when I was
James Burden: young. Nothing to do with stuttering, but, like, the things that we don't talk about
James Burden: are the worst possible things. We don't talk about
James Burden: Uncle John because, you know, in his drinking
James Burden: problem. Just don't talk about it. Never mention it, you know, like it. Those
James Burden: are the things in families that are a sign
James Burden: that it's really, really bad. So I don't suggest that
James Burden: parents don't talk to their children about stuttering if that starts to
James Burden: happen. There's also a lot of, like,
James Burden: typical developmental stuttering that may come
James Burden: and then go just on its own. And
James Burden: if it goes fine, if it stays also fine, there are
James Burden: other ways to deal with it. And I don't mean deal with it as in
James Burden: fix it. I just mean ways to interact with your child. I
James Burden: mean Palin pci. So Palin parent child interaction
James Burden: is actually based out of the UK where you're located. And it's From Michael
James Burden: Palin. And I love Michael Palin's story. You remember him
James Burden: from Monty Python. Monty Python, yeah. Great fan of Michael Payne. So
James Burden: he did a movie called the Fish Called Wanda many
James Burden: years ago where he played a stutterer. Yes, he did. And
James Burden: he was the comic relief. And after the movie aired, a stuttering
James Burden: organisation came to him and said, hey, you've actually done us
James Burden: a disservice. You know, you're putting up stutterers
James Burden: as people to be laughed at and mocked. And he was so
James Burden: struck by this that he
James Burden: founded the Palin Institute for Stuttering.
James Burden: He has done more for stuttering than any
James Burden: single other person I can think of off the top of my head. You
James Burden: know, he founded this institute, he's put money into research and more important,
James Burden: he's put money into therapy. And so I did one of
James Burden: my trainings. I did, I flew to Boston and
James Burden: people from the Palin Centre flew into Boston as well. And I spent a week
James Burden: learning about Palin Parent Child Interaction Therapy, which
James Burden: is very different from the Lidcombe method. So Palin
James Burden: pci, or Parent Child Interaction, teaches how
James Burden: you interact with your child on a. You get down to their level,
James Burden: you learn how to play with them by commenting instead of asking a bunch of
James Burden: questions. Now, it's interesting. I'm talking a lot now
James Burden: about how to help a young child. My
James Burden: current focus and the focus of my
James Burden: masterclass is on adults. It's like
James Burden: how especially professionals, entrepreneurs,
James Burden: people who are. Have a lot of skin in the game and need
James Burden: their speech to advance their careers or advance
James Burden: their business or whatever they're working on, go after their
James Burden: goals. So that's what I'm focusing on now. But I've worked
James Burden: with all ages. I've worked with adults, I've worked with teenagers,
James Burden: I've worked with school age kids and I've worked with preschool kids,
James Burden: pretty much everybody. So I'm giving you guys some information about what
James Burden: to do if you're a parent and you're worrying about your child starting to stutter.
James Burden: But, but most of what I'm. My, my masterclass is
James Burden: focused on the adult. So if you're a person who stutters as an
James Burden: adult, definitely check it out. It'll give you more about
James Burden: how society and
James Burden: how the stigma has made things
James Burden: harder for you on a level that I'm sure you understand
James Burden: if you're a person who stutters, but how it's actually affecting
James Burden: your speech and by going underneath the iceberg.
James Burden: So Joseph Sheehan, a longtime stuttering
James Burden: advocate, person who stutters and a therapist
James Burden: Talked about the stuttering iceberg. And so the top of the iceberg is the
James Burden: stutters that you hear and maybe avoidance behaviours that
James Burden: you see like I'm not going to talk in this situation, I'm, I'm going to
James Burden: avoid this word. I'm going to do everything I can to avoid
James Burden: speaking or avoid stuttering. But
James Burden: underneath the iceberg is the
James Burden: thoughts, the feelings, the self judgement,
James Burden: the myths about stuttering. All of the parts that affect
James Burden: your mind and your soul and create
James Burden: those surface behaviours. So if we are
James Burden: tensing up, we're more likely to stutter.
James Burden: If we are afraid that we're going to stutter, we're more likely to
James Burden: avoid. So the way to really
James Burden: help in the long run and not only help but
James Burden: provide lasting support is to melt that
James Burden: iceberg. So take that to warmer water. And by warmer water
James Burden: I mean an environment like a therapy room like with me,
James Burden: where you start to feel accepted for your stutter. And
James Burden: I also like to get people together who stutter so that
James Burden: they can see other people who stutter, see how completely normal it
James Burden: is. Completely, um, okay. And because
James Burden: people judge themselves insanely, hardly insanely
James Burden: hard, but then they see somebody else and they're not anywhere near as
James Burden: judgmental. So we can learn not to judge someone else. Then we can learn to
James Burden: turn that around on ourselves. And this is where it kind of gets into almost
James Burden: a, like a spiritual aspect. Like when, when.
James Burden: Because I used acceptance commitment therapy as part of my
James Burden: programme and that's about like turning that light of
James Burden: consciousness back on yourself and looking at yourself with kindness and a
James Burden: lack and non judgement. And that's what act is about. It's
James Burden: about deciding what your values are.
James Burden: What is more important to me, not stuttering or going for what I
James Burden: know I can do and deserve. And at first it's going to be not
James Burden: stuttering is more important. But then as we begin to
James Burden: not judge we can move that down and begin to see that maybe going
James Burden: for the job interview is more important, maybe building a
James Burden: business is more important. Maybe talking to the man or woman that
James Burden: you're interested in is more important than not stuttering and
James Burden: slowly working towards those goals. You're putting your
James Burden: values in a new order. Yeah, I can certainly relate to the
Joanne Lockwood: internalisation and manifesting your,
Joanne Lockwood: manifesting all of the stereotypes, all of that self loathing
Joanne Lockwood: all at once in your head and putting yourself in situations where
Joanne Lockwood: you can't stop by being wholly consumed that cognitive
Joanne Lockwood: load of worry that you're gonna, the first thing that's gonna come
Joanne Lockwood: out of your mouth is gonna be a stutter. So I can certainly understand
Joanne Lockwood: how that limits people's ability to interact in society.
Joanne Lockwood: Because you say, as you said earlier, what we have is this
Joanne Lockwood: stigma and is there an opposite of normalisation,
Joanne Lockwood: denormalization, where you're in society and society treats
Joanne Lockwood: you less fairly because of that speech impairment
Joanne Lockwood: difference and you're hyper aware
Joanne Lockwood: that you don't want to feel foolish, come across foolish. If you're in a
Joanne Lockwood: job interview, think, well, you, you're almost walking into the room go, they
Joanne Lockwood: won't like me if I started with this. Pressure's on you to get it right,
Joanne Lockwood: isn't it? You know, when we dig down deep
James Burden: underneath the. I don't want to look foolish underneath,
James Burden: the pressure is. And people may not necessarily feel
James Burden: this consciously, but if you dig down deep, there's a
James Burden: sense of not being right, being broken
James Burden: in some way. And are you familiar with Brene Brown's work? It's. Yes.
James Burden: So she talks about shame, and shame is
James Burden: a big, heavy word. And when she talks to be like a shame researcher, who
James Burden: wants to talk about that? Nobody. Right. And so
James Burden: I'm going to go there when it comes to stuttering, because I believe
James Burden: at the deepest root of it all, there's a shame for being broken.
James Burden: And stuttering is something that has all of the
James Burden: things Brene Brown talks about that make shame
James Burden: thrive, which is silence,
James Burden: secrecy and judgement. So when you have those
James Burden: three things, shame thrives. So people are trying to
James Burden: keep silent, people are trying to keep their
James Burden: stutter secret and they're judging themselves and people
James Burden: are judging them or they are perceiving that people are judging them.
James Burden: Now, I'm sure there is absolutely, undoubtedly
James Burden: prejudice in the world, but I would say the. The harshest critics of people
James Burden: who stutter are the people who stutter themselves and not to
James Burden: other people who stutter to themself. Themself.
James Burden: They. They judge themself. And so then shame
James Burden: is thriving. And I've talked about shame as
James Burden: being like poop in the pool. So it doesn't
James Burden: matter how much poop is in the pool, no one's going
James Burden: swimming. It could be like the tiniest fleck. And
James Burden: I'm not saying stuttering is poop. I'm saying that the shame
James Burden: around it is like that it contaminates people's
James Burden: entire world with this idea
James Burden: that they're not good enough,
James Burden: that no one will want to swim in this pool because I'm
James Burden: broken. So I really need to. What I do
James Burden: is I try to help people with that piece while
James Burden: simultaneously working on the speech. But when we work on
James Burden: the speech, we have to work on it in a way that is
James Burden: not about fixing you. It's not about if you
James Burden: speak fluently, then you're okay.
James Burden: No, it's you're okay and I can help and by feeling
James Burden: okay, it will help you speak more fluently. So what are they kind of the
Joanne Lockwood: basic techniques to help you speak more fluently because you want
Joanne Lockwood: to, not cause there's any shame or stigma, but because you want to. What the.
Joanne Lockwood: What the kind of technique? So there are many.
James Burden: There are many different approaches. The one that I
James Burden: recommend using, it's a little bit more involved,
James Burden: but it has most lasting results and it has the most science behind
James Burden: it. And that's the prolonged speech family of methods.
James Burden: And now you could do an intensive programme, but it's like. That's like the
James Burden: one that I did when I was in grad school, which is the 10 days
James Burden: and you're really hammer at it. Or you can do Camper down,
James Burden: which. And what. What you do in these programmes is
James Burden: Camper down works like this. There's a video, I have
James Burden: one on YouTube and there's plenty of others out there where you
James Burden: watch me or whoever the speaker is, speak at it in an
James Burden: incredibly slow, connected, flowy kind
James Burden: of a way. Much in the same way like you would learn to
James Burden: swing a golf club or swing a baseball bat,
James Burden: slowly at first, very slow, just to get the
James Burden: muscle memory and then speed it up over time.
James Burden: And it ends in a kind of a flowy way of speaking that
James Burden: sounds like this. Now I'm overdoing it a little bit so
James Burden: that you can hear. But then when you speed it up, it sounds pretty
James Burden: much typical. Like it sounds like a typical speaker. But what we're
James Burden: doing is we're keeping our voice activated. So that's
James Burden: the here, so that stays activated. And we're making sure each
James Burden: word flows into the next so that it has this sort of flowiness to it.
James Burden: And once we. You practise with the video and
James Burden: you work with me to speed that up over time and still
James Burden: maintain like a natural cadence. So
James Burden: what can be challenging is as people are learning this, they might end up
James Burden: sounding like this for a minute. And then you have to learn how to,
James Burden: okay, let's re. Add in inflection and re. Add in tone and
James Burden: pitch. And until it sounds natural
James Burden: from there, it needs to actually be used.
James Burden: Well, what, what I'm noticing right now with my. One of my current
James Burden: clients is that she's started
James Burden: to learn this method. And she's also been
James Burden: tracking her daily stuttering and we're
James Burden: watching it going down and I have a. I won't get into, like, how we
James Burden: track it exactly, except that it's like it's her feelings about her stutter
James Burden: as opposed to exactly what it sounds like. Because what's more important
James Burden: is how people feel about their speech than it is what
James Burden: other people actually hear. So for her,
James Burden: she's. We. She's only been with me about three, four
James Burden: weeks now. I think we just hit week four and she's doing
James Burden: amazing. She's. Her stuttering is reduced a great deal.
James Burden: She's putting herself out there more than she ever did before
James Burden: and she's feeling really good about it. And that's before we've even finished the
James Burden: programme. What we're going to be doing now is
James Burden: taking what she's learned and going and trying it
James Burden: out with different people. So we start
James Burden: with the easy ones, you know, friends and family. Using this technique for
James Burden: speaking with friends and family and then trying it
James Burden: out with people that she doesn't know quite so well, eventually
James Burden: getting it towards where she'll be doing a
James Burden: little bit of public speaking. Not huge public speaking, but just like in front of,
James Burden: like, a group of people. Not like on stage, just
James Burden: like at a party, say. And then each time we're.
James Burden: We're kind of combining this acceptance, commitment, therapy approach,
James Burden: putting what is most valuable to you with
James Burden: what is. So what are your goals for your speech and then
James Burden: moving up this hierarchy. So she's doing
James Burden: amazing. She's only having to work on this for 15 minutes a day
James Burden: and she's already in a month in. She is. Her mindset has
James Burden: changed a huge amount. She's learning. Not that she doesn't have
James Burden: to be perfect in every single situation because, like, we've been
James Burden: talking about stuttering doesn't mean there's anything wrong, so. And
James Burden: also speech. What. What people don't
James Burden: realise. We are all naturally good at speaking as
James Burden: humans, right? So if a cat is agile and
James Burden: good on its feet, we have a natural ability to talk.
James Burden: But the fine motor coordination
James Burden: that is required to speak is
James Burden: enormous. We have to. We have to coordinate our lips,
James Burden: tongue, lungs, jaw, vocal folds, all
James Burden: in real time, while simultaneously processing language. And
James Burden: then when there's a little interruption in that, we think we might think
James Burden: to ourselves we're not a good speaker. But this is like a tiny blip in
James Burden: an incredibly complex machine that
James Burden: people don't realise. And then people are tracking for
James Burden: danger. They're worried that they're Gonna stutter. So that just
James Burden: interrupts the machine even more. And the pressure
James Burden: is what my current client is, one of my
James Burden: current clients is learning to release. So releasing
James Burden: that pressure, learning to speak in a new way, trying it out
James Burden: in new situations. And again the
James Burden: masterclass kind of breaks it down in more detail than I.
James Burden: Then we have time for here. But that being said, it's, it's only a
James Burden: 19 minute masterclass. It just very quickly will run
James Burden: you through all of the ways that your mindset is
James Burden: affected and how that actually affects the speech directly.
James Burden: So it's not just us sitting around holding hands, singing Kumbaya, saying
James Burden: you're okay because you stutter. It's by doing that
James Burden: it gen genuinely affects the way we speak.
James Burden: It's, it's much more than just feeling good about ourselves.
James Burden: It's about how to speak more fluently because you
James Burden: feel good about yourself. You mentioned at the beginning that about 1% of the population
Joanne Lockwood: will have a stutter some of some shape or form globally
Joanne Lockwood: across ages and disproportionately men over women. I would say.
Joanne Lockwood: Well, I'm guessing it's far more prevalent for people to have different
Joanne Lockwood: speak speech artefacts for want of a better way of describing them in terms
Joanne Lockwood: of filler words. The ums, the ahs, the
Joanne Lockwood: I know I speak and I often repeat a word
Joanne Lockwood: as thinking time. So I would go I, I, I or and, and, and, and
Joanne Lockwood: I would have those kind of artefacts in the way I speak.
Joanne Lockwood: And I often when I'm reviewing the transcript I see the
Joanne Lockwood: words stacked up and I think well that was me revving up for the next
Joanne Lockwood: sentence if you like. Can the techniques you're using here help
Joanne Lockwood: that those artefacts as well as a stutter or
Joanne Lockwood: are they different attributes of the mind here? Well, what you're talking about is completely
James Burden: natural for all of us. I do it, you do it. Those
James Burden: little like I just did right there, like the, I'm like giving
James Burden: myself time to process language and this is what
James Burden: gets mixed up into something that would
James Burden: be what we call stuttering versus
James Burden: normal disfluency. Those things get mixed up in together.
James Burden: And yes, a lot of the techniques, the slowing way down
James Burden: technique and then speeding up, that's more for
James Burden: fluency, that is more for stuttering. But a lot of the other kinds
James Burden: of things that we learn in my programme are pausing,
James Burden: slowing down on your main point. All of the natural
James Burden: good public speaking techniques also help you stutter less.
James Burden: And you, you talked about like
James Burden: these things happening when you're
James Burden: under stress or when you're trying to speak in a
James Burden: public situation, maybe on a podcast. Right now, like as I'm processing
James Burden: what I want to say, I'm having to slow down. And if I
James Burden: don't slow down then I'm going to do the ums and the ahs.
James Burden: Another factor for the ums and the odds for people who stutter is sometimes
James Burden: they're using them to cover a stutter.
James Burden: I know I can say this certain phrase fluently
James Burden: every time. So it might be a, you know, it
James Burden: might be a, you know what I mean or it might
James Burden: be any kind of little filler phrase that keeps things
James Burden: flowing for them while they think of the next thing.
James Burden: So it's a combination of language
James Burden: processing and motor planning for the mouth. Does that
James Burden: answer your question? Yeah, I know there
Joanne Lockwood: are certain words that I'm going to trip over. I just can't get my.
Joanne Lockwood: I just can't form them correctly or in my mind I can't. One of them
Joanne Lockwood: is championing. I just, I really struggle with that word and I
Joanne Lockwood: sometimes I find myself heading down this one way street and that
Joanne Lockwood: word's definitely on the horizon. I'm thinking, blimey, I'm going to crash into that in
Joanne Lockwood: a minute. And I can't stop myself using that word. And what I found sometimes
Joanne Lockwood: is maybe it's because I have the confidence to be able to make light
Joanne Lockwood: of it and go champing one of those words I just can't say and then
Joanne Lockwood: just make light of it and just pause and everyone in the audience knows the
Joanne Lockwood: word I'm trying to say. I've made light of the fact it's got stuck
Joanne Lockwood: in my mouth somehow and I just move on from it
Joanne Lockwood: having used the word as a lighthearted segue to something
Joanne Lockwood: else. And I guess some of that is confidence and also. But I know
Joanne Lockwood: when I'm on stage speaking, training, whatever I'm doing,
Joanne Lockwood: I'll know that I'll get end up in this linguistic roadblock. It's gonna
Joanne Lockwood: hit me. And sometimes I won't even finish the sentence.
Joanne Lockwood: I'll somehow pause, segue to something else and carry on talking.
Joanne Lockwood: And I've learned over the years that nobody notices,
Joanne Lockwood: nobody really listens that intensively to every single word you
Joanne Lockwood: say. And I think once I stopped being
Joanne Lockwood: hung up about being word perfect on every
Joanne Lockwood: sentence, I realised that nobody cares or nobody notices.
Joanne Lockwood: That pressure comes off, doesn't it? You've hit the nail
James Burden: on the head there. So there's a couple of wonderful points in there.
James Burden: First off, that this is a very human thing, you don't have to
James Burden: self identify as a person who stutters to have gone
James Burden: through that experience of, oh, no, here's a word I don't know how
James Burden: to say. It always comes out wrong. And then because of that
James Burden: knowledge or that expectation, then it go. Then it
James Burden: does come out that way. And then it's more proof for you that you can't
James Burden: say that word. The other thing you mentioned is
James Burden: other people don't really notice that much. Now, if you're a
James Burden: person who stutters, who has been teased since you were a little
James Burden: kid, corrected, told that you don't speak normal,
James Burden: then those little micro
James Burden: traumas add up to a bigger trauma around your speech.
James Burden: And it's a lot harder to let that go or laugh
James Burden: it off the way a person who doesn't have that lived experience
James Burden: would. So for you and me, if I
James Burden: stutter, I'll just like, oh, wow, that was funny. And then I move on. If
James Burden: you've had a lot of these micro traumas, it's a lot harder and you kind
James Burden: of clench up even tighter or you just won't put yourself in a situation
James Burden: where that could possibly happen because the fear of
James Burden: that happening is, is too great.
James Burden: The experience, you can't, you don't want to
James Burden: relive that over and over. You remember times as it's happened already and it's,
James Burden: it's just too much. There's so many more people out there who
James Burden: stutter than, than you'd expect. But most of them, you would never
James Burden: hear them do it or know that they stutter because they're avoiding,
James Burden: because they're making sure you don't hear it. And that is one of the things
James Burden: that is top of mind for them. And maybe if
James Burden: we work on that mindset. Well, I know that if we work on that mindset,
James Burden: that can start to relieve the pressure and put them in
James Burden: the same position that you and I would be of just like, oh, laughing it
James Burden: off and moving on. Are there speecho files?
Joanne Lockwood: Like, you have audiophiles, you know, people who want the
Joanne Lockwood: perfect sound recording, you know, the purists who find
Joanne Lockwood: CD music abhorrent and it has to be the full harmonics of
Joanne Lockwood: analogue music from a vinyl. Are there people who have the speech thing? Because
Joanne Lockwood: I've been on various podcast forums and there are people say, oh, no, you must
Joanne Lockwood: clean out all the ums and the ahs. And I get so distracted if
Joanne Lockwood: the voice isn't fluent and the right level of recording and the right
Joanne Lockwood: depth of tone. And are there people out there that want to Police you
Joanne Lockwood: into their definition of perfect.
James Burden: Well, I've done a number of podcasts so far and I've never met any of
James Burden: them. It seems to me more likely that those kind
James Burden: of people are self conscious than they
James Burden: are other consciousness. So if they are
James Burden: disfluent, whether they're a person who stutters or not,
James Burden: if they are disfluent, then that bugs them.
James Burden: If their sound isn't just so it bugs them. And maybe it
James Burden: bugs them when other people's sounds are. But I think it's less
James Burden: common than the self judgement. Maybe that's just my personal opinion.
Joanne Lockwood: Just fluent a lot as a. I never heard of that word before, but yeah,
Joanne Lockwood: it's. We talked about
Joanne Lockwood: stuttering. There's another word, stammer. Is. Is a stutter and a stammer the
Joanne Lockwood: same thing? Oh yes, yeah, sorry, of course.
James Burden: It's just a. It's a cultural difference. In the UK it's stammer and
James Burden: in North America it's stutter. They mean exactly the same thing. Yeah, I've heard
Joanne Lockwood: both terms. I wouldn't, I wouldn't necessarily say that stutter is not a UK word,
Joanne Lockwood: but I've heard they describe it as stammering. So they are the same
Joanne Lockwood: thing. Yeah, I don't really. There is another
James Burden: thing as well called cluttering. I don't want to get too into that.
James Burden: That is a very much more rare. It's like
James Burden: so stuttering is one in a hundred. I don't know the stats on cluttering,
James Burden: but it's related. But it's more like squishing words together.
James Burden: I don't know how to even imitate it the way I could. I'm used to
James Burden: being able to produce a stutter so that I can work with clients
James Burden: on it. So. And it's important for me. Sometimes I will
James Burden: stutter publicly. Sometimes I. I go out and stutter and just to
James Burden: remind myself of the lived experience of people who stutter. It's not the same as
James Burden: having it all the time, but just to. Okay, what is it like when
James Burden: people give you that funny look or do they even give it to you or
James Burden: is it just you're expecting to see it? It's interesting.
James Burden: It's worth. It's worth a little experiment. If you're not a person who stutters, just
James Burden: to go try it once in a while. I don't really expect a lot to
James Burden: take me up on that challenge, but
James Burden: it is eye opening and to see how people
James Burden: react to you if you stutter. Yeah. I developed
Joanne Lockwood: a self consciousness if you like. Probably when I was hitting
Joanne Lockwood: puberty, 11, 10, 12 years old. That kind of age
Joanne Lockwood: we first become self aware of judgement and how people see us and things like
Joanne Lockwood: that. And I remember in school classes in English, we had
Joanne Lockwood: to read out, I think it was probably Shakespeare or Romeo and Juliet or something.
Joanne Lockwood: We all had to. The teacher would go around the room and say, right, you
Joanne Lockwood: read out the next paragraph. And I remember having to stand up in
Joanne Lockwood: class holding this book. And I find it
Joanne Lockwood: extremely difficult to read and talk, to read out
Joanne Lockwood: loud from a written page. My eyes don't track properly. I'm
Joanne Lockwood: really bad at following a book and reading each line.
Joanne Lockwood: I can read paragraphs and I can read and get the gist of things, but
Joanne Lockwood: I can't read word for word. So I used to be really paranoid about standing
Joanne Lockwood: up, reading out loud, knowing I would lose track of where I was in
Joanne Lockwood: the sentence or not be able to come up the next word properly. And of
Joanne Lockwood: course that, that led me to feel like I was going bright red. You know,
Joanne Lockwood: that embarrassment, all the blood flowing to my cheeks, all that fight flight, fear kicking
Joanne Lockwood: in, that adrenaline and that, that led me to
Joanne Lockwood: avoiding standing up and speaking out loud for many, many years.
Joanne Lockwood: Yeah, right up and probably through my 20s, into my 30s.
Joanne Lockwood: And it only became, when I guess I became more self
Joanne Lockwood: confident in other things, in my ability, that I
Joanne Lockwood: lost the fear just by being a more confident person.
Joanne Lockwood: But it did dog me for many years, that stigma and shame
Joanne Lockwood: of not being able to speak without my face going bright red and the fear
Joanne Lockwood: of messing up in public all through that, reading out loud in school.
James Burden: And so here you are as a podcaster, you're speaking in
James Burden: front of, you know, thousands, tens of thousands of people,
James Burden: even if it's recorded first, you're, you're putting yourself out there.
James Burden: So for you, I'm curious, do you think the confidence came
James Burden: first or did putting yourself out there come first? Or was it
James Burden: like kind of like meshed in together? I think it was. I'm gonna,
Joanne Lockwood: I'm gonna say. Experience.
Joanne Lockwood: Of nobody really noticed, you know, I was standing up, I was doing
Joanne Lockwood: something, I wasn't practising, I was doing live.
Joanne Lockwood: All the anxieties in my head, all these things are firing off in my brain
Joanne Lockwood: saying, you can't, this is going to go wrong, you're going to go bright red,
Joanne Lockwood: you're going to fluff it up, people are not going to like you, they're going
Joanne Lockwood: to hate you. All this stigma's kicking in. And then I realised
Joanne Lockwood: that it was Just false statements going on in my head. I
Joanne Lockwood: learned that all these, all this negative down talk was
Joanne Lockwood: made up and I think it just became. I
Joanne Lockwood: overcame that self fulfilling prophecy with a new story and became a
Joanne Lockwood: new self fulfilling prophecy that it was okay. And I went to a stage where
Joanne Lockwood: I was just starting to become a stage professional speaker going out on
Joanne Lockwood: stage all the time in front of 6, 700 people audiences, huge audiences.
Joanne Lockwood: And I'd always have this fight flight, fear kicking in
Joanne Lockwood: in like 30 seconds before I was. As the person started to introduce me,
Joanne Lockwood: I'd always sit in the wings going, if there's suddenly a power cut, I
Joanne Lockwood: won't be disappointed. If suddenly I'm cancelled. And the person introducing me says,
Joanne Lockwood: we've changed the programme, sorry Joanne, you're not on anymore. I was going.
Joanne Lockwood: So I had this major anxiety because I was always scared
Joanne Lockwood: of those first words, that first sentence. Because in
Joanne Lockwood: my mind I wasn't sure what I was going to say first. Because I'm one
Joanne Lockwood: of these speakers that doesn't have a script. I don't over rehearse things. The first
Joanne Lockwood: thing that comes out of my mouth often is a surprise to me.
Joanne Lockwood: It's been playing around in my head and something gets, a package of words
Joanne Lockwood: gets delivered to my mouth and it comes out at the right moment. So I
Joanne Lockwood: had to learn to trust myself. I had to learn that when I'm
Joanne Lockwood: on that stage and I pause, I smile, I look around the
Joanne Lockwood: room to create that dramatic effect, that lean in feeling
Joanne Lockwood: in the audience. I knew that whatever came out my mouth first was
Joanne Lockwood: gonna make sense, the audience were gonna be drawn in
Joanne Lockwood: and it would work. So once I started realising that I could trust
Joanne Lockwood: myself, I then believed in myself and now I
Joanne Lockwood: don't get that anxiety. Someone said, oh, can you go up there and talk about
Joanne Lockwood: this? I go, give me 10 seconds, I'll just plug the module in. Go. Okay,
Joanne Lockwood: okay, okay. All right, I've got an opening line. Once the opening line's out,
Joanne Lockwood: I know the rest will just follow. And it is a kind of a
Joanne Lockwood: trust in me and not let that fear
Joanne Lockwood: dominate my life. So yeah, I guess it's, I've developed that technique.
Joanne Lockwood: And also people have described me as having a late night radio voice,
Joanne Lockwood: very slow, very methodical, very rhythmic. When
Joanne Lockwood: someone said they found it very warming and easy to listen to, I thought, okay,
Joanne Lockwood: let's max that. Let's really focus on that's the way I speak. And
Joanne Lockwood: very rhythmic and very calm. It means I don't have to rush
Joanne Lockwood: my sentences out. And I Can put a bit of pace in if I want
Joanne Lockwood: to. I can tone up, tone down and I can bring
Joanne Lockwood: some different sorts of pace and rhythm to my speaking. So, yeah,
Joanne Lockwood: it is a learned behaviour through observation and practise.
James Burden: What you're describing is so human. I mean, one of
James Burden: the biggest fears many people have sometimes. I've heard this
James Burden: said. I don't know if it's true that sometimes people fear
James Burden: embarrassment more than death or they fear public speaking
James Burden: more than death. And, like, I can't speak to that, but because
James Burden: I am, I don't have that fear. Dying? No, no, I haven't tried dying
James Burden: either. But I mean, I've been in some scary situations,
James Burden: skiing and some scary situations doing sports.
James Burden: Yeah, no, fear of death is worse than. Worse than fear
James Burden: of public speaking for me. But, you know, that might be
James Burden: true for some people. What you said, though,
James Burden: made me think of this funny quip I heard.
James Burden: When you are young, you care what other people think.
James Burden: And in middle age you don't care what other people think. And
James Burden: when you get older, you realise no one was thinking about you
James Burden: in the first place, they were just thinking about themselves. And
James Burden: that is very powerful for getting up on stage or
James Burden: very powerful for doing a podcast. People want to
James Burden: hear what's in it for them. If you make a little mistake here and
James Burden: there, the people who are judging
James Burden: you are more likely, if they are judging you at all,
James Burden: they're judging you to feel better about themselves, that really, everyone's wandering
James Burden: around thinking about themselves 99% of the time.
James Burden: So if that helps you take some of the fear
James Burden: out of public speaking, out of trying to speak, and
James Burden: the fact that you might start to remember that most people are just thinking about
James Burden: themselves most of the time. Yeah. There's another analogy that I use on this one,
Joanne Lockwood: where if you take a group photo, whether that's
Joanne Lockwood: your school, class, the conference you're at, your family grouping,
Joanne Lockwood: whatever it may be, and the first thing you do when you grab that
Joanne Lockwood: photograph is you find yourself in it to make sure
Joanne Lockwood: your expression, whether you were looking the right way, whether you were smiling at the
Joanne Lockwood: camera, whether your hair was in place yet your clothing was right,
Joanne Lockwood: I guarantee that's what most people will do with a photograph, where they're in it
Joanne Lockwood: somewhere they'll find themselves. And if you pass that photo to the next person,
Joanne Lockwood: they're going to do exactly the same about them and
Joanne Lockwood: not give a hoot about you. It's only maybe after
Joanne Lockwood: time passes, they'll scan the line and go, oh, look, you've got A silly grin
Joanne Lockwood: on, haven't you? But the first reaction everyone's going to do with that photograph is
Joanne Lockwood: find themselves and worry about them. So exactly what you're saying,
Joanne Lockwood: so what's in it for me? What do I care about? I care about me,
Joanne Lockwood: how I'm getting out of this. Actually, you know, I've got my daughter,
Joanne Lockwood: you take a photograph, you say, oh, don't ever post that, don't. What did you
Joanne Lockwood: post that one for? I look awful. I go, it's just a family photo, we
Joanne Lockwood: all look awful, don't worry about it. Because people lock on to
Joanne Lockwood: themselves and they exactly what you're saying. So audibly or even visually.
James Burden: And so if, if I could take that point and run with it, if, if
James Burden: there's people listening right now who want to know, what
James Burden: can I get out of this? And I'm
James Burden: speaking to, mainly to the people who stutter.
James Burden: What you can get out of listening to this and
James Burden: watching my masterclass is how to use these
James Burden: techniques practically, how to use this information
James Burden: about people not really thinking about you, about
James Burden: how stuttering affects your mindset and your mindset affects your
James Burden: speech. How to use that practically
James Burden: to stutter less. Because that is what most people who
James Burden: stutter are interested in. They want to stutter less. They don't want to hear
James Burden: about mindset or feeling good about themselves, they just want to stutter
James Burden: less. And I'm here to say that learning about mindset,
James Burden: learning about techniques will help you stutter
James Burden: less. So that is what you can get out of
James Burden: my very short 19 minute masterclass. It's not, it's not there to
James Burden: just make you feel good right away, but to actually help you
James Burden: stutter less by feeling good about yourself. James, that is fascinating. I
Joanne Lockwood: mean, our conversation is, it's, it's really resonated with me.
Joanne Lockwood: Just as I say my own speech artefacts. Never. I don't think I've ever stuttered,
Joanne Lockwood: but I've, I've certainly had speech artefacts I've been very paranoid about, so it's helped
Joanne Lockwood: me contextualise those. So how can people get ahold of you and find out more
Joanne Lockwood: about your masterclass and your programme? Well, I'll give you the link to the
James Burden: masterclass and that will send you
James Burden: straight to a. When you watch the first minute or so, three
James Burden: minutes, then you'll get a link to book a call with me. I am
James Burden: just interested in having conversations with people, so it's,
James Burden: there's no charge to have a conversation with me.
James Burden: Just get on the phone, tell me what your struggles are. I'll
James Burden: see if I can help you. And if you invite me to help
James Burden: you, I will. This is not. I have never, ever
James Burden: successfully convinced someone that they need help with
James Burden: their stutter, that it has to come from them. So
James Burden: because otherwise none of the
James Burden: therapy, none of the coaching can be
James Burden: effective from a. From a place of. I don't really want to be here.
James Burden: So there's absolutely no point whatsoever in pressuring you. So
James Burden: please reach out, make a call. Even if it's
James Burden: about a teen or a loved one, maybe I can offer
James Burden: them some support as well. Excellent. I found you on LinkedIn and
Joanne Lockwood: just search for James Burden. B U R D E N. Yeah, you're there. Yeah.
James Burden: Also, I'm on a stuttering blueprint on Facebook
James Burden: and Instagram. But yeah, the really best way is to
James Burden: just watch that masterclass and then make a call
James Burden: with me. Great. I'll put all the links in the show notes at the bottom
Joanne Lockwood: of this so people can track you down. But it's been a fascinating conversation. James,
Joanne Lockwood: I've really got something out this. It's a subject I've probably never explored
Joanne Lockwood: before. So thank you so much for your time. You're welcome. Thank you for having
James Burden: me. Can I just send one
James Burden: last little. Say one last little thing to your audience? Go for it. Go for
Joanne Lockwood: it. To our listener that they're leaning in. Go for it.
James Burden: Okay, so for those listening, especially if you're someone
James Burden: who stutters, here's what I want you to take away. People are out there
James Burden: who need to hear your
James Burden: voice. Not a polished version, not a perfect version.
James Burden: The real you. So
James Burden: every week, challenge yourself to share your story with at least one person,
James Burden: one group or one platform. And not because it's easy,
James Burden: but because your voice matters.
James Burden: So Joanne, thank you so much for having me and this conversation has
James Burden: been a guest. Thanks, James.
Joanne Lockwood: As we bring this conversation to a close, I want to express
Joanne Lockwood: my deepest gratitude to you, our listener, for lending
Joanne Lockwood: your ear and heart to the cause of inclusion.
Joanne Lockwood: Today's discussion struck a chord. Consider subscribing to
Joanne Lockwood: Inclusion Bites and become part of our ever growing community
Joanne Lockwood: driving real change. Share this journey with friends, family and
Joanne Lockwood: colleagues. Lets amplify the voices that matter.
Joanne Lockwood: Got thoughts, stories or a vision to share? I'm all
Joanne Lockwood: ears. Reach out to
Joanne Lockwood: jo.lockwood@seechangehappen.co.uk
Joanne Lockwood: and let's make your voice heard. Until next time, this
Joanne Lockwood: is Joanne Lockwood signing off with a promise to return with
Joanne Lockwood: more enriching narratives that challenge, inspire
Joanne Lockwood: and unite us all. Here's to fostering a more inclusive world.
Joanne Lockwood: One episode at a time. Catch you on the next bite.