Ask HN: I often confuse words with another when I'm speaking, am I the only one?

Re:Ask HN: I often confuse words with another when I'm speak... by quickthrower2 on Monday February 25, 2019 @04:13PM (#19249503)

I think everyone does this from time to time to some extent. I definitely do it with more technical jargon, and I often see other people do it. For example I will forget the official jargon and say something similar, but that will confuse someone who has the jargon embedded in their minds. Often I will resort to showing them the bit of the program or code I am talking about.

As for a solution. I don't know really. You could try toastmasters for public speaking, and practice speaking more slowly than you would normally speak in speeches. The funniest speeches I heard there were from someone who had a stammer and had to pause between each sentence to do a breathing exercise, but he used those pauses for building suspense in the story.

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Re:Ask HN: I often confuse words with another when I'm speak... by le-mark on Monday February 25, 2019 @10:46PM (#19251827)

I've also been guilty of this for a long time. I annoy myself, and fear I undermine my credibility when talking to peers and managers.

> I think that when I'm speaking, I want to say words faster than my brain can build a sentence.

This is the explanation I've thought of for myself many times. What I find helps is to practice mindfulness and try to listen to what I'm saying.

I recall at one job, the companies core systems database tables had really absurdly long names. I made a point of learning these names precisely. People would look at me in amazement when I would precisely rattled off the names during meetings and technical discussions. Oddly, this really helped.

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