Sometimes I come across as arrogant when speaking to someone, because of the tempo of my speech. When I thought about it, I realized that I fly through my speech because I think that other people are thinking of me that I’m completely boring and, especially, if they’ve heard anything like what I’m saying before, they could practically complete the sentence for me.
Add to that the fact that undergrads (and grad students, perhaps even more so these latter) are altogether prone to interrupting you in order to insert their own highly important and college-educated opinions on the matter, and I end up speaking quickly so as to not be interrupted. If I find myself stringing together more than a few sentences at the time, I get exasperated with myself: I will begin to rush and be almost apologetic about the fact that I’m taking so long to talk about something that the other person is probably already more adept at anyway.
But wait—could it be that I’m just projecting? Could it be that I’m just assuming that people are so impatient with me because I am with them? Ooh, sweet humility! Of course, I can’t help the fact that people interrupt other people, though I make it a point not to do so, but I wonder if sometimes I become exasperated with people when they tell me something I already know, or somehow I think that I could complete their sentences for them. Interesting. Humbling, but interesting….
