The Power of Verbal Intelligence: 10 ways to tap into your verbal genius
Tony Buzan
From the international bestselling author Tony Buzan, simple techniques to help improve your recall and be brilliant with words.How to be brilliant with words – reading, speaking, remembering and understanding them!Includes the best of Buzan's world-famous techniques for improving recall and understanding.Increase your vocabulary.Learn to speed read.
The Power of
Verbal Intelligence
Tony Buzan
Copyright (#ulink_5280bc39-4158-5279-8a20-a8f667050472)
Thorsons
An Imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers
1 London Bridge Street
London, SE1 9GF
The website address is: www.harpercollins.co.uk (http://www.harpercollins.co.uk)
and Thorsons are registered trademarks of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd
First published 2002
© Tony Buzan 2002
Tony Buzan asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
Mind Maps
is a registered trade mark of The Buzan Group
Original Mind Map concept © Tony Buzan
Plate section illustrations by Alan Burton
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
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Source ISBN 9780722540497
Ebook Edition © SEPTEMBER 2018 ISBN: 9780007386055
Version: 2018-11-05
Dedication (#ulink_6a5a06fe-0295-5dc1-8f8f-e37c75823c17)
The Power of Verbal Intelligence is dedicated to my dear Mum, Jean Buzan, who guided me to a love of words and to a deep understanding of their beauty and power; to ‘Master Mind Mapper’, and phenomenal friend, Vanda North, for her dedication to communicating the message of Mind Mapping; and to Dr Wilfred Funk, whose books on developing word power and his regular column in the Reader’s Digest inspired me to develop my own Verbal Intelligence.
Contents
Cover (#ua524469f-f5a3-5edf-a52a-50411ad88539)
Title Page (#u55a8b750-a5db-567d-afb5-3d6b1debd37d)
Copyright (#ulink_b04519aa-2c06-5eb2-86db-731e2ee3740d)
Dedication (#ulink_1831072e-03bd-534c-aeb1-e8ca68d68718)
List of Mind Maps
(#ulink_40af9368-2260-5cf7-8d9c-4239a6915a78)
Summary Mind Maps
(#litres_trial_promo)
The Last, Last Word (#litres_trial_promo)
Recommended Reading – Tony Buzan’s ‘Top 10’ (#litres_trial_promo)
Answers (#litres_trial_promo)
Acknowledgements (#litres_trial_promo)
Other Books By (#litres_trial_promo)
Keep Reading (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
List of Mind Maps
(#ulink_576046fe-9f9e-52e2-9977-2efb7e685bfe)
Summary Mind Map
of Chapter 2 (#litres_trial_promo) – Learning a Language – children’s verbal learning tricks – mimicking; play; making mistakes; persistence and curiosity.
Summary Mind Map
of Chapter 3 (#litres_trial_promo) – Word Power (Roots, Prefixes, Suffixes) power of words; opportunities R,P,S give to expand Verbal IQ; using dictionaries and thesaurus.
Summary Mind Map
of Chapter 4 (#litres_trial_promo) – Writing an Essay – more prefixes, suffixes; expanding vocabulary.
Summary Mind Map
of Chapter 5 (#litres_trial_promo) – Improving Your Vocabulary – memory and recall; left and right brains and multi-ordinate nature of words.
Summary Mind Map
of Chapter 6 (#litres_trial_promo) – Body Language – posture and demeanour; gesturing and memory; voice tone and strength.
Summary Mind Map
of Chapters 7 (#litres_trial_promo) and 9 (#litres_trial_promo) – Preparing for a Job Interview – speaking in public; speaking so people remember; giving directions and animal communications.
Summary Mind Map
of Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo) – Reading – best approaches to texts; reading faster and knowledge files.
Summary Mind Map
of Chapter 10 (#litres_trial_promo) – Verbal and other intelligences
– how they interact – creative, spatial; social and physical.
Fore-word! Your Journey to Verbal Power Begins (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter One (#litres_trial_promo)
‘“The pen is mightier than the sword” only if the brain behind it knows how to wield the word!’
Tony Buzan
what is ‘verbal intelligence’?
Verbal Intelligence is the ability to ‘juggle’ with the alphabet of letters: to combine them into words and sentences. Your Verbal IQ tends to be measured by the size and range of your vocabulary, and by your ability to see relationships between words.
why does verbal intelligence matter?
At the beginning of the 20th century, psychologists observed that there was a direct correlation between vocabulary size and strength, and life-success. In other words, the bigger and better your vocabulary and your Verbal Intelligence, the more successful and confident you will be in your life in general – in your work, in your social and personal life, and in your studies.
Words have tremendous power. Those people who harness the strength of words give themselves the power to persuade, to inspire, to mesmerize, and to influence in all manner of ways the human brain. It is not surprising, then, that words and their power have become one of the most important currencies in the ‘Knowledge Revolution’ of the 21st century.
how will the power of verbal intelligence help me?
The really good news is that it is easy to improve and expand your verbal skills, and to increase immeasurably your Verbal IQ, and this book will show you how. Barry McGuigan, whom you can read about in Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo), deliberately set about raising his Verbal IQ when he turned to TV commentating after his retirement from the boxing ring, and has since become as adept mentally as he was physically as a fighter.
The Power of Verbal Intelligence is about to take you on one of the most exciting journeys of your life. It is a journey on which you will:
discover and explore new worlds
feast your imagination on new concepts and ideas
learn more about your amazing brain and how to use it
learn the basic building blocks of word power, enabling you, at a stroke, to expand your current vocabulary by thousands of words
learn how to use your body to communicate effectively
rediscover the joy of playing around with words and their meanings
learn the basic secrets of reading faster and comprehending more
learn how to mesmerize and entrance others with the power and beauty of your conversation and most importantly, The Power of Verbal Intelligence has been designed to make sure that you have fun while you increase your Word Power.
Most importantly, The Power of Verbal Intelligence has been designed to make sure that you have fun while you increase your Word Power.
an overview of the power of verbal intelligence
The Power of Verbal Intelligence is divided into 10 chapters, each one of which guides you into new areas for improving and expanding your verbal powers.
In this opening chapter I introduce you to the overall structure of the book, so that you can get a clear ‘picture’ and ‘map’ of the exciting territory you are about to explore.
You will learn about the history of the development of IQ, and will discover why it is that so many people think they are far less intelligent than they really are. The rest of this chapter will be devoted to your first Verbal Workout, in which you will discover new words, play games, be given the first boosts to your Verbal Intelligence and, hopefully, have fun!
Chapter 2: Child’s Wordplay – Proof that You are a Natural Verbal Genius
In Chapter 2 (#uceafbcad-d84e-5c8b-875b-5f5c8f13b232) I will introduce you to a master of Verbal Intelligence – a total genius in this field who, by example, will show you the secret formulas for improving on all levels your verbal powers.
Who is this paragon of Verbal Intelligence?
The human baby! I will introduce you to the special tools a baby uses to master any language and all verbal situations. A baby learns thousands of new words and hundreds of new verbal skills every year. Using the same approach, you can do the same.
And, if you think about it, you used to be a baby.
You have already done it once!
With the right help, you can do it again!
Chapter 3: Word Power I – Roots: How to Improve Your Vocabulary, Creativity, Memory and IQ!
Words, like all other structures, are made up of their basic parts. When you know the parts, it is easier to construct the whole. For example, realizing that there are only 26 letters that make up all the words in the English language, makes spelling and word recognition considerably easier than if you had thousands of different letters to learn!
It is exactly the same with word parts – their ‘Roots’, ‘Prefixes’ and ‘Suffixes’.
In this chapter I will introduce you to 25 key Roots.
As there are only 25 to learn and remember, the task will be a very easy one. It will also be immensely rewarding, for each Root is like a magic key, which will open up meaning to many tens and often hundreds of new words.
With these keys in your possession, you will be well on your way to the mastery of the English language.
Chapter 4: Word Power II – Prefixes and Suffixes
Chapter 4 (#litres_trial_promo) is very similar to Chapter 3 (#u468c0d39-35c6-5a37-a396-230f90906e0f), concentrating on those common basic building blocks to words, the beginnings and ends: Prefixes and Suffixes.
Using the same approach as you used for Roots, you will once again massively multiply the number of words at your command.
Chapter 5: Brain Word – Using Your Brain Power to Develop Your Word Power
How do the following vitally important aspects of your own brain and its functioning relate to the development of your Verbal Intelligence:
Your memory while it is taking in information?
Your memory after it has taken in information?
The right and left brain?
Study techniques?
Mind Maps?
The multi-ordinate meaning of words?
Read this chapter and find out!
Chapter 6: Body Talk – Body Language and How to Improve It
Your Verbal Intelligence has a giant servant – a ‘silent helper’ – who has phenomenal powers to increase the already phenomenal power of your words.
Your body!
In this chapter I will introduce you to the huge part your body can play in your Verbal Intelligence. You will discover how the way in which you think affects both your body and the way your language is used with your body.
I will also introduce you to that magical musical instrument – your voice – showing you how to ‘play’ it in ways that will increase your Verbal Intelligence as well as your confidence and popularity.
Chapter 7: Present Yourself – How to Become a Successful Speaker
One of the greatest fears we humans have is that of being seen as a boring conversationalist and a dull speaker. One of our greatest dreams is the opposite: to be a fascinating, witty and enthralling conversationalist, and a mesmerizing presenter.
Happily the fear is unfounded and the dream attainable. In this chapter I will show you how to speak and express yourself with confidence and in a manner that will make you more respected and popular.
Chapter 8: Read On! How to Improve Your Speed, Comprehension and Recall
One of the best indicators of a high Verbal IQ is the ability to read a wide range of materials at a faster speed than average and with greater comprehension.
There are simple ways of achieving these skill levels.
In this chapter I will introduce you to them, showing you how to get a quick grasp of the overall meaning of what you are reading, giving you easy-to-learn-techniques for accelerating your speed, and setting you on the path to lifelong learning and development of your Verbal Intelligence.
In this chapter you will also discover the secrets of the ‘Magic Eye’.
Chapter 9: Communication Power – Using Your Verbal Intelligence to Gain Control of Your Life
The ability to communicate clearly and powerfully with words is one of the greatest signs of Verbal Intelligence, and one of the greatest guarantees of lifelong success.
In Chapter 9 (#litres_trial_promo) you will learn how to become a master of communication. You will learn how to link with and understand others, how to use a Mind Map
as a tool for communicating by telephone, letter, etc., and how to give directions that people both understand and are successful in using. You will also discover some of the secrets of animal communication.
In this chapter I will also introduce you to the Self-audit, in which you will learn how to be your own ‘Verbal Doctor’, guaranteeing you a long and glowingly healthy verbal life!
Chapter 10: Last Words – Using Your Verbal Intelligence to Increase Your Other Multiple Intelligences
By the time you reach this final chapter, you will already possess a Verbal Intelligence that is considerably more powerful than when you started the book, and will have the tools to ensure it continues to grow.
In ‘Last Words’ I will introduce you to ways in which the power of your newly empowered Verbal Intelligence can strengthen your overall intelligence.
As I will show, you actually have 10, multiple intelligences, of which Verbal Intelligence is just one. Each of these intelligences strengthens and supports the others, and this Multiplier Effect means that your overall effectiveness and intelligence, not to mention success, can multiply by hundreds of times!
* * *
Features
To assist you in all this, each chapter contains a Verbal Workout, to exercise and strengthen your verbal muscles. These workouts will take the form of exercises and games designed to stretch and stimulate your Word Power. In each Workout there will be specific mental muscle-building verbal games:
Word Puzzles – half of these games consist of four scrambled words, which you have to unscramble into meaningful words. Selected letters from the answer-words, will, when they themselves are unscrambled, form another one- or two-word answer to a clue that you will have been given. The rest of the puzzles are of a type typically given in standard IQ tests. Give yourself a maximum of five minutes for each one. The answers are on here (#litres_trial_promo). If you score more than five out of ten, you will be doing well!
Verbal Intelligence Tips – after each of the Word Puzzles, I will give you an insight on how to help your brain solve these verbal games more easily and efficiently. These special insights will build up into a complete Verbal Intelligence Brain Kit, which will help you in future with any similar puzzles, as well as in the wider context of taking any thinking or IQ-type tests.
Word Power Boosters – at the end of each Verbal Workout, you will be introduced to 10 new words, which will add depth and richness to your existing vocabulary. By the time you have finished The Power of Verbal Intelligence you will have accumulated 100 such Power Words!
Although these games are fun and enjoyable entertainment, they are also extremely important tools in developing your Verbal Intelligence. It is ‘games’ like these that form a significant part of standard IQ tests. Improve your ability with these ‘practice’ games, and you will raise your IQ.
Throughout the book there are also apposite quotes, case studies to give you insights into how your brain works, and examples of the wonderful thought-enhancing tool I invented especially for the purpose of increasing my own memory and intelligence – the Mind Map
.
a brief history of IQ tests
As has already been mentioned, at the beginning of the 20th century, psychologists observed that there was a correlation between someone’s vocabulary size and strength and their success in life. This naturally gave rise to a desire to define a person’s mental strength, and so the first basic intelligence tests were devised.
These tests measured people’s powers of vocabulary, their ability to see relationships between words and between numbers, and logical abilities. Average scores were calculated for different age groups. If your score was average for your age, you scored 100; if your score was slightly below average, your score was determined to be between 90 and 100; and if slightly above average, between 100 and 110. Someone whose scores were measured between 120 and 130 was deemed to be of high intelligence, and a score of 140 or more conferred the status of genius.
These tests became properly known as Intelligence Quotient Tests, or IQ Tests. However, there were two problems with them. First, it was assumed that your IQ score could not and would not change. This, we now know, is completely untrue – you can significantly change and improve your standard IQ score.
The second problem lay in the assumption that what the tests were measuring was intelligence, and was all there was to intelligence.
Because of these beliefs, education systems around the world became predominantly verbal and mathematical, and being intelligent or smart meant, generally, ‘having a way with words’!
However, we are now beginning to realize that Verbal Intelligence is but one of 10 different intelligences – along with Creative, Social, Spatial, Numerical, Spiritual, Personal, Sensory, Sexual and Physical – and that each of the intelligences benefits by the development of the nine others. Thus, as you continue to develop your Verbal Intelligence, you will be simultaneously working on the other nine too!
It is time for your first Verbal Workout!
verbal workout
Word Puzzle Number 1
See the answers here (#litres_trial_promo)
Welcome to your first Verbal Intelligence Word Puzzle. You will be given four scrambled words. Your first Verbal Intelligence task is to rearrange the letters so that they form a meaningful word. When you have discovered what the word is, place it in the space provided. When you have done this, you will notice that between one and four of the letters in each word are highlighted. These letters take you on to the next stage of the puzzle. Underneath the four words you have unscrambled you will find a clue and a number of blank spaces. The clue will guide you to a one- or two-word answer, found by arranging the ‘selected’ letters from the first phase of the game into a word or words that satisfy the clue.
This is the first of many such games. In each chapter you will find a similar game, played in the same way. Answers to all the games are in the Answer section, here (#litres_trial_promo).
Clue: Having a ball – or more! __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __
Verbal Intelligence Tip
Whenever you have such Verbal Intelligence questions, always scan the entire question first.
Why?
First, because scanning gives your brain the ‘whole picture’, which means that it can grasp the whole territory and therefore feel in control. Second, if you have scanned all the puzzles/questions, they are ‘in’ your brain. This means that as your conscious brain works on one of the puzzles/questions, your para-conscious brain (that 99 per cent-plus powerhouse of your brain that works without you consciously having to control it), will be working on the remaining questions. This makes it much easier to find the correct answer when your conscious attention focuses on the next puzzle/question. In the psychological idiom, you are allowing your brain to incubate (sit on, as a bird, for the purpose of hatching) your ideas.
You will know in your daily life that often when you ‘can’t get’ a word, if you allow your brain to ‘sleep on it’ the word will often pop up into your consciousness. Here, you are simply using this natural process to help raise your Verbal Intelligence.
Word Puzzle Number 2
See the answers here (#litres_trial_promo)
There is a three-letter word in brackets. When you add, successively, the seven-word beginnings to the three-letter word, each one makes a different meaningful word. What is the word in the brackets?
L
M
P
GL (__ __ __)
GR
BR
B
How Verbally Intelligent Are You?
Now that you are becoming familiar with your Verbal IQ, how Verbally Intelligent do you think you are, and more importantly, how Verbally Intelligent do you want to be?
On a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being tongue-tied and not at all Verbally Intelligent, and 10 being eloquent, witty and very Verbally Intelligent, how would you rank your Verbal Intelligence at the present time?
Now do the same exercise, but this time indicating on your 1 to 10 scale, how Verbally Intelligent you would like to be when you finish this book.
When you have completed these two tasks, start working on converting the real into the ideal.
Get Into Crosswords
Crosswords, Scrabble
and other word games such as word searches and code crackers, are all fantastic ways of stimulating and increasing your Verbal Intelligence. More and more magazines of crosswords and word puzzles are published each month, and they are a great way to try your hand at a variety of different word games.
Check Your Work-word Level
Each different profession has its own specialized vocabulary and expressions. Remember that your Verbal Intelligence has a direct correlation with your success at work. The most successful people in their chosen fields have a vocabulary that ranks in the top 10 per cent for that field.
Begin to keep a list of words that is special to your own profession, and make sure that you aim for that top 10 per cent!
One way to get your mind set for this new vocabularian accomplishment is to pretend that you already are in that top 10 per cent. Act out the role, especially using the kind of vocabulary that is used by people who are successful in your field. If you keep persisting, you soon won’t have to act the role – you will be living it!
Set Vocabulary Targets for Other Areas of Your Life
Choose two or three other areas of your life, such as hobbies, social activities, your children’s interests/studies, etc., and set yourself goals similar to those you set above for your profession. By doing this you will be following the example of a body-builder who trains a wide range of muscles, rather than simply one. You will therefore develop a well-balanced body of vocabulary skills.
Listen for New Words
Listen out for new and unusual words as you go about your daily life – on the TV or radio, at the local shops or a meeting at work. Adding this new focus of attention will not only make you a better vocabularian; it will make you a better listener, and therefore more popular and successful with others. Keep a notepad or some form of recorder always with you so that you can jot down new words of special interest, meaning or beauty. At regular intervals, either at the end of the day or week, transfer your new words to a master list. When you come across such words, try to use them in sentences at least five times in a day – this will help you remember them.
Look for New Words
Do exactly the same with your eyes as you did with your ears, checking newspapers, magazines, books and screens for new and exciting words. Transfer them to your lists. When you are doing both these listening and looking exercises, be on the look-out for words that reflect or relate to your senses of sight, sound, smell, taste, touch and movement. This will both improve your vocabulary and widen its range, making you a better, more confident communicator.
Make a Mind Map
Build a mini Mind Map
on all the advantages an improved vocabulary and increased Verbal Intelligence will give you. In the centre of here (#ulink_821deee4-a09a-5cda-a599-97182e3b5875) is a little image which summarizes Verbal Intelligence. Branching from it are 10 main branches, and from each of these, three sub-branches. Copy the Mind Map
onto a large sheet of paper. On the main branches print, clearly, the first 10 key ideas that come to your mind when you think of the ways in which an increased Verbal Intelligence would improve your life and your chances of success. When you have completed the first 10 ideas, think of three more ideas that branch from each of those main 10 and, in the same way, print them neatly on the lines provided. When you have completed the exercise, place your Mind Map
somewhere where you will constantly be reminded of just how valuable an increased Verbal Intelligence is to your entire life.
Invest in a Good Dictionary!
Make sure you get a good dictionary. A good dictionary is the ultimate guide and support for anyone wishing to improve their Verbal Intelligence.
Word Power Booster Number 1
As this is your first Word Power Booster, it is introductory! Below each word are four different definitions. Choose the one you think is closest to the correct meaning. See the answers here (#litres_trial_promo).
1 INTRODUCE (in-tro-jóos) (a) To stick a needle into (b) To become a Duke (c) To bring in or present (d) To do first
2 INTROFLEX (ín-tro-flex) (a) To bend outward (b) To bend inward (c) To build muscle (d) To look strong
3 INTROCEPTIVE (in-tro-sép-tif) (a) Capable of receiving into itself (b) The beginning of a reception (c) A method of preparing food (d) Able to perceive the inside of things
4 INTROGRESSION (in-tro-gré-shon) (a) The act of going in; entering (b) Falling behind (c) Thinking about things (d) Becoming aggressive
5 INTROJECT (in-tro-jékt) (a) To inject (b) To ask (c) To discard (d) To throw into
6 INTROMIT (in-tro-mít) (a) To lay on hands (b) To stop (c) To allow to enter; insert (d) To jump across
7 INTROSPECT (in-tro-spékt) (a) To look for glasses (b) To inspect (c) To look outward (d) To look within
8 INTROMISSION (in-tro-mí-shon) (a) To start a break (b) To insert (c) The beginning of a project (d) To start religious conversion
9 INTROVERT (in-tro-vért) (noun) (a) One who turns inward (b) Something upside down (c) Dressed in green (d) One who stands vertically; good poise
10 INTROPRESSION (in-tro-pré-shon) (a) To introduce the media (b) Pressure within (c) To make heavy (d) To press upon
Child’s Wordplay – Proof that You are a Natural Verbal Genius (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Two (#litres_trial_promo)
‘Language is the immediate gift of God.’
Noah Webster
In this chapter I will introduce you to the best language learner the world has ever known – that master of Verbal Intelligence, the human baby!
I will show you the ‘secret’ formulas that babies use to achieve their astounding results. As a consequence, you will discover new approaches to: ‘cheating’/copying; play as a learning tool; the making of mistakes and ‘failure’; creating success from ‘disaster’; general attitudes to learning; and the incredible ‘genius power’ of Persistence.
You will come to realize that, as a baby, you used all the right tools to develop your Verbal Intelligence. As your life progressed, you discarded them, and as a result the development of your Verbal Intelligence came to a grinding halt.
However, all you have to do now is pick these tools up again and continue with your verbal growth. This time around, you’ll not only have the tools you once used to learn and remember thousands of new words – you will have the additional tools from The Power of Verbal Intelligence, which will enable you to use the ‘baby skills’ as a launching pad for your own accelerated development!
You will end up as an even better vocabulary and language learner than the baby.
Let’s start with the fascinating story of a Japanese musician, Suzuki, who made some amazing discoveries about your incredible Verbal Intelligence potential.
Suzuki’s Story
Suzuki was a Japanese teacher, musician and instrument maker. He had two special paradigm-shifts in his awareness that changed his life forever, and which are at this very moment changing the lives of millions and the way the world thinks about all babies and their Verbal and Creative Intelligences.
Suzuki’s first revelation came when he was visiting a giant incubarium for Japanese larks.
The Japanese breeders of these songbirds take literally thousands of eggs and incubate them in giant, warm, silent halls that act as a gigantic nest. Silent, that is, with the exception of one sound – that of a lark Master Singer, a veritable song-bird Beethoven!
Suzuki noticed to his amazement that every little chick that hatched, automatically began to copy the master singer. After a few days he observed that each chick, having started out by purely copying songs, began to develop its own variations on the original Master Song. The breeders waited until the chick musicians had developed their own styles, and then selected from them the next Master Singer, and so the process developed.
‘Astounding!’ thought Suzuki. ‘If a bird’s tiny, tiny brain can learn so perfectly, then surely the human brain, with its vastly superior abilities, should be able to do the same and better!’
This line of reasoning led Suzuki to his next revelation, which, when he announced it, made many of his friends think that he had lost a large number of his own brain cells.
Suzuki, in a delirium of enthusiasm for what he had realized, rushed around telling everyone he knew of his remarkable discovery: that every Japanese child learns to speak Japanese!
His friends and colleagues patted him on the shoulder, informing him rather firmly they were actually already aware of that. ‘But No! No!’ declared Suzuki, ‘they really do, and it’s amazing!’
Suzuki was correct. Like Newton before him, he had discovered something that was so obvious no one could see it – that any baby, born in any country, automatically learns, within two years, the language of that country.
This means that every normal baby’s brain is capable of learning millions of potential languages.
If you, dear reader, had been born in and lived for the first few years of your life in a totally different country from that you are familiar with now, your own baby brain would have absorbed that language as rapidly and fluently as you now speak your own main tongue.
If you, for example, were a Caucasian baby and had been born in Beijing, you would not have looked up with your little baby eyes and thought ‘Oh, Chinese. Far too complex for me! Think I’ll stay silent for the rest of my life!’
Not only would you have learned the language of that country, you would have learned the specific language sounds of the special area of that country in which you had been born – your accent.
What Suzuki had discovered was that the voice/ear/brain system was a virtually perfect copying machine, with an almost infinite capacity to learn the music (words and rhythms) of an infinite number of languages.
What’s more, it didn’t matter whether the language was Chinese, Portuguese, Music-ese, Maths-ese, Art-ese, Burmese, or Japanese. So long as a baby was given the right learning environment and proper encouragement, it could learn anything!
mimicking
What Suzuki had discovered was the Brain Principle of Mimicking. This principle states that your brain is designed to learn by copying the best of what it sees around it. If it is allowed to do this, it will be capable of ongoing learning at an accelerated rate.
For the bulk of the 20th century we incorrectly thought of mimicking as copying, copying as cheating, and cheating as bad. With this incorrect way of thinking, we created habits of learning that increasingly diminished our abilities to develop our intelligences, especially Verbal Intelligence.
We even came up with ridiculous assumptions to back-up this incorrect thinking, such as that once you are past the age of 10, the development of Verbal Intelligence becomes much more difficult, and that once you are past the age of 25 it becomes virtually impossible.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
By applying the principle of mimicking, as the songbird chicks do, and the additional knowledge you will gain from The Power of Verbal Intelligence, you will be able to increase your rate of vocabulary acquisition and word power at a pace that makes a baby’s seem embarrassingly slow by comparison!
play
When the baby is ‘at work’ dealing with the massive tasks of survival and learning, its main tool is Play.
Play is the method the universe has designed for allowing the brain to learn most easily.
How is this so?
Because play involves activity that is enjoyable, often amusing, and always imaginative. It usually involves physical activity, often vigorous and long, and demands that the brain makes new associations between things.
You will know that all babies love to play, especially with words. They roll them around in their mouths, often purposely mispronounce them to make them more interesting or funny, play with different variations and combinations of words and parts of words, change the pitch, speed, tone and volume of their voices, and are always curious about new words and their meanings and associations.
Unfortunately during the last two centuries learning has been made much more serious, and the element of play removed except in the classrooms of superb teachers. Even at the beginning of the 21st century this is still happening. In America some educators are leading a movement to eliminate play from schools altogether, including playtime. Their argument? That if you eliminate play and playtime, you will save time and get far better results from the young brains because they will be 100 per cent dedicated to ‘serious’ work. Such a policy is like saying that if we remove children’s legs their bodies would be lighter and therefore more mobile!
It is by applying the Brain Principle of Play that babies and children rapidly develop their Verbal Intelligence.
You can begin to see the implications for yourself …
love of learning
Another of the baby’s secret weapons in the development of its Verbal Intelligence is its boundless love of learning. This love is both led and fed by an insatiable curiosity.
The instant the baby’s brain asks the next question or wants to know the ‘next step’, all its senses open, and all its energies are immediately directed to the achievement of that answer; that goal.
This openness and focus are exactly what the brain needs to take in, understand and remember new verbal information.
‘The use of increasingly complex and sophisticated language structures, and the units (vocabulary) which make up those structures, is one of the defining characteristics of evolutionary advance and development. The training and nurturing of your skill in this area is your natural right, your own responsibility, and a rare opportunity. If you grasp it, it will provide you with exceptional benefits. Claim it. Accept it. Develop it!’
Tony Buzan
Ironically the baby’s love of learning is accompanied by something that most adults think is not acceptable or permissible, but which forms the foundation-stone in the development of Verbal Intelligence. It is the next ‘Baby Secret’.
making mistakes / ‘failing’
Does the baby make mistakes?
Yes!
More than the average adult learner?
Many more!
How can it be that a super-learner like the baby makes more mistakes than the average adult, who does not learn so fast?
Because the baby knows the secret: making mistakes and experiencing ‘failures’ is one of the fastest ways to accelerate your learning.
If you don’t make mistakes it means that you have not tried. If you do not try you will never learn.
The baby has hit upon the secret that if you combine your love of learning with creativity and taking risks, you will not only make more mistakes than most other people, you will have many more successes.
All research shows that the world’s great geniuses simply carried on using this Baby Success Formula. They wrote millions of words, painted millions of brush strokes, composed millions of notes, and formulated millions of ideas. They then discarded much of it, and kept the best!
‘Language is the dress of thought.’
Samuel Johnson
There is one other secret principle at which the baby is a world champion:
persistence
Combined with the love of learning and the making of mistakes, the baby realizes that without persistence, no progress is ever made.
Just think of how many times a baby sometimes tries to pronounce a complex word before getting it finally right; it is sometimes hundreds of ‘failures’.
Does the baby go into a sulk and think something like ‘What’s the point?! I’ve tried thousands of times and still can’t get this bloody word! This language-learning lark is too hard; it’s not for me – I give up!’
Of course not.
The baby uses each mistake as a platform for the next attempt. While doing this it makes a game of the whole thing, relishing the process, and always keeping its eye on the inevitable success of the goal.
‘Language is the armoury of the human mind.’
Coleridge
You are now ready to enter the playground!
verbal workout
Word Puzzle Number 3
See the answers here (#litres_trial_promo)
Clue: Makes you happy and fit __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __
Verbal Intelligence Tip
Always answer the easiest questions first, no matter where they are in the list or linear order you have in front of you.
Why?
Because answering the easiest questions first will allow you to ‘get one under your belt’, your para-conscious brain will realize that there is already less to do than when you started, and this will significantly reduce stress, while simultaneously boosting your confidence.
Secondly, answering these questions first will establish a habit in your brain – the habit of success. And success breeds success!
Word Puzzle Number 4
See the answers here (#litres_trial_promo)
Insert the word that completes the first word and begins the second.
(Clue: finish)
T R (__ __ __) I V E
Mimic the Best
In exactly the same way that a baby copies those people it considers to be the most powerful and successful (its parents!), copy those experts, public figures, actors, sports personalities or people from your own profession whom you consider to be ‘Top of the Pops’ in the imaginative use of words, as well as in range and clarity.
Make a point of observing and studying them, noting especially interesting words that they use, as well as their methods of delivery.
Play with Words
Remember that one of the baby’s most powerful learning tools is ‘play’. Apply this to the development of your own vocabulary. Mix sections of different words to come up with startling new words and meanings, and enjoy the freedom this gives you. Make up doggerel verse, rhymes and palindromes (phrases that read the same both forwards and backwards – ‘Madam, I’m Adam’ for example!).
Shakespeare, one of the highest Verbal Intelligences the planet has ever known, loved to play with words, and as a result added over 200 new words and expressions that are now common to the global language. Try to catch up with him!
It was this freedom of mind and ability to create that gave rise to the study of Holanthropy, the discipline that arose from my own frustration at not being able to find any discipline in which I could study the whole (Greek ‘holos’) human-being (Greek ‘anthropos’).
Another new word you might enjoy comes from a friend of mine and a teacher of Holanthropy, Lex McKee. A lover of words as well as a musician and artist, Lex had been very happy with the word onomatopoeic (a word whose sound imitates that of the noise or action it describes, such as ‘buzz’).
However, he suddenly realized that this word applied only to sound, and as he was also an artist, he wanted a word that appealed also to the sense of vision. He simply took ‘onomatopoeic’, and pasted on to it a preliminary ‘v’, thus creating ‘vonomatopoeic’ – a word meaning ‘sounding and looking like the thing described!
Alphabet fridge magnets are the perfect fun way to explore and make up new words and meanings. What’s more, the entire family can join in, creating more and more words on that wonderful public notice and message board that is many people’s fridge door!
Look Out for Unknown Words!
Keep a constant look out for words of which you don’t know the meaning, and also for words that are completely new.
For many adults, facing the fact that they ‘don’t know’ is disturbing. As a result they tend to try to avoid such situations. If you look at this ‘formula for behaviour’ for a moment, you will realize that it is a formula for disaster! If you only stay safely in areas that are completely known to you, and always avoid those that are not, what will you ever learn?
Nothing!
The baby is exactly the opposite. Why? Because a baby loves not knowing! Not knowing opens up the infinite opportunity for learning fresh, new and exciting things. The baby is purely ignorant, and ignorant (which comes from the Latin ‘ignorare’) simply means ‘to not know’. Realize that the more you know you know, the more you will know that there is still more to know!
Approach your pursuit of new and fresh knowledge like a baby does – with enthusiasm and gusto!
Give Your Brain a Healthy Diet
Your brain survives on the four foods of Information, Nutrition, Oxygen and Love. One of your brain’s main sources of information is Vocabulary and Language. Therefore feed your brain a healthy diet of words, making sure that you ‘eat’ regularly, that your ‘diet’ is varied, that you constantly supply yourself with ‘fresh food’ and that you never ‘fast’ for too long. Sometimes it’s good to binge!
Learn From Your Mistakes
As with ignorance, many adults also are discomforted by and afraid of making mistakes, especially with words. They, mistakenly, think that this shows them to be slow, unintelligent and somehow not worthy.
Nothing could be further from the truth!
If you want to learn how to speak any vocabulary brilliantly, learn from the greatest language learners there are – babies and children. They seldom hide in the safety of words they know; their preference is to leap for the stars, and to make as many mistakes as are necessary to get there.
That is why they often prefer hard or ‘more difficult’ words: these give them a better game to play in acquiring them, and often lead to mistakes that are much more humorous and which provide many more belly laughs than the ‘correct’ ones!
We now know that mistakes are not an impediment to learning; mistakes are the golden pathway to learning.
Enjoy all of yours from now on …
Become Friends with Words
You bring your feelings and emotions more into play when you increase your Verbal Intelligence. Many people mistakenly think of words as ‘intelligent’, ‘analytical’, ‘hard’ and ‘cold’. And who would really want to have a relationship with anything (or anyone) that only had those qualities?
But words are in fact ‘wondrous’, ‘imaginative’, ‘sensual’, ‘sexy’, ‘warm’, ‘delicious’ and many other things which would make you lust after a relationship with anything or anyone possessing these qualities.
As soon as you start making friends with words, as babies do, they make friends with you, and allow you to meet, learn from and play with them much more rapidly and with thousands of times greater enjoyment and fun than before.
Persist in Your Pursuit of Verbal Power
Remember that one of the prime qualities used to describe the incredible intelligence and accomplishments both of babies and the great geniuses is that single word: persistence. The Oxford English Dictionary defines ‘persistence’ as meaning: ‘To continue firmly in an opinion or course of action in spite of difficulty or opposition; to continue to persist.’ It comes from the Latin ‘per’ and ‘sistere’ – ‘to stand firm’.
If you steadfastly pursue your goal of Verbal Intelligence, you will become much more Verbally Intelligent, and will approach the incredible skills of the baby and the genius in this area. Persist and you will overcome all obstacles to learning. Persist and your mistakes will turn into successes. Persist and you will acquire thousands of new word-friends.
Persist!
Word Power Booster Number 2
In this vocabulary booster section I introduce you to some fascinating adjectives. They will spice up your conversation, adding richness and depth to it. Choose the definition that you think is closest to the correct meaning from the four options given for each. See the answers here (#litres_trial_promo).
1 DIDACTIC (dy-dák-tik) (a) Teacher-like; instructive (b) Aggressive (c) Explosive (d) Like an extinct bird
2 SURREPTITIOUS (surep-tísh-us) (a) Grey in colour (b) Serrated (c) Stealthy or secret (d) Completely silent
3 HERETICAL (heh-rét-ikal) (a) Deserving of punishment (b) At the present time (c) Greek behaviour (d) Revolutionary; contrary to the official/established viewpoint
4 COPIOUS (kópe-eus) (a) Able (b) Abundant; plentiful (c) Religious (d) Relating to the police
5 IMPERATIVE (im-pé-rra-tif) (a) Royal (b) Relating to the empire (c) Vital (d) Strong
6 INEFFACEABLE (in-e-fáce-abul) (a) To confront (b) Incapable of being erased; indelible (c) Female face (d) Building
7 INESTIMABLE (in-ést-im-abul) (a) Not enough time (b) Priceless; immeasurable (c) Unfriendly (d) Timetable
8 UNPRECEDENTED (un-préss-e-den-ted) (a) Never known or done before (b) Description of dental procedures (c) Damaged (d) Before production
9 UNEQUIVOCAL (un-e-kwívo-cal) (a) Different voices (b) Unambiguous; leaving no doubt (c) Unequal (d) Discordant choir
10 CATEGORICAL (kata-górr-ical) (a) Bluntly and unconditionally expressed (b) Dividing into categories (c) About cats (d) Vaguely defined
Word Power I – Roots: How to Improve Your Vocabulary, Creativity, Memory and IQ! (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Three (#litres_trial_promo)
‘Words are the instruments that make thought possible.’
Judd
‘Words are the body of thought.’
Carlyle
In this chapter and the next you are going to learn more about the incredible power of words.
I will guide you through recent history, showing you how words developed as a ‘secret power’, and will introduce you to research that show why this was so.
The bulk of this chapter and the next are then devoted to a veritable feast of building blocks of vocabulary and Verbal Intelligence: Roots, Prefixes and Suffixes.
With the mastery of these your Verbal Intelligence will inevitably improve, and your life will change irrevocably!
Case Study – A Word About Business
In America, Dr Johnson O’Connor, who worked at the Human Engineering Laboratory in Boston, was fascinated by the relationship of vocabulary and professional success. He gave a vocabulary test to 100 young men who were studying to be industrial executives. Five years after the original experiment, Dr O’Connor checked how successful the young businessmen had been in their careers.
The correlation was astonishing. Of those who had scores in the top 25 per cent of the original vocabulary test, all were in executive positions.
Of those who had scores in the lowest 25 per cent of the original test, not a single one had become an executive!
words and power
Since the dawn of civilization, words have had an aura of mystery, magic and power to them. The earliest form of writing (Cuneiform) developed in the Near East, in Mesopotamia, to allow rulers to keep accurate records of what taxes were due and who had paid them, and for other bureaucratic records, such as details of amounts of grain stored and distributed.
In ancient Egypt the priests were the ‘keepers of the word’. They tried to keep the art of writing and reading secret, because doing so gave them tremendous power to manipulate both knowledge and people. For the next four thousand years leaders in all societies kept this special power to themselves, communicating in the secret codes of higher vocabulary and writing, while the ignorant masses around reacted with awe, superstition and fear at the power that words held over them.
‘We rule men with words.’
(Napoleon)
This power was the power over knowledge; the power of persuasion; the power to inspire; the power to mesmerize; and the power to control and lead. In other words, it was the power to affect the human brain.
Two of our modern words, which you would never have thought would have derived from this history, do – ‘spell’ and ‘glamour’!
As recently as the great European Renaissance, the time of Queen Elizabeth I and the master-works of Shakespeare, still surprisingly few people could read or write. The record books show that most of the young people who had to sign for a marriage licence did so not with their name, but with a cross.
The ability to read and write was looked upon by the ordinary people with awe, and those who were able to do so were often considered to be dabbling in some form of magic. Those who could write could, in general, spell.
So the logic in the ignorant and fearful mind was that those who could spell possessed a magic that could mysteriously and ominously control others. As a word could be considered a ‘spell’ the owner of such esoteric knowledge, by using words, was ‘casting spells’: QED!
The word ‘glamour’ has a similarly interesting etymology, or derivation.
In the 17th century the language of the intellectuals was predominantly Latin. In this they used to write, converse and increase their grip on social, economic and political power.
To ‘tie their words together’ they used the mystical concept of ‘grammar’. Grammar became an idea that linked with those who had authority and power. As time passed the first ‘R’ in grammar slowly mutated, as ‘R’s often do over time, to the letter ‘L’. Thus ‘grammar’ eventually became ‘glamour’, a word that is still applied to those who emanate an aura of power, elegance and control.
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