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Peak Toastmasters in
Colorado Springs, Colorado, and a professional baseball pitcher for 12
seasons. He was a finalist in the 2009 World Championship of Public
Speaking.
「當我一度相信這是我的缺陷，這個組織卻教我相信，這是上帝所給予的能力，而不是限制。」安柏瑞這麼說，一個在科羅拉多州，科羅拉多溫泉市的派克峰Pikes
Peak演講會的成員，同時也是一個投了12個賽季的職棒投手。他曾經參加2009年國際演講會的公開演講世界冠軍賽。
As a black child of a
single mother in Richmond, Kentucky, Embry grew up in poverty. “There
were poor folks and then there was po’ folk. We were po’,”
he says. “Poor is when you’ve got nothing; po’ is when you’ve not
only got nothing, but you owe everybody else money.”
作為一個生在肯塔基州里奇蒙市單親母親的黑人孩子，安柏瑞在貧困中長大。「有窮鄉親，並且『落魄』。我們是『落魄』。」他說。「『窮』是你什麼也得不到；『落魄』則是你不僅什麼也沒得到，而且你還欠別人錢。」
This painful reality was
coupled with the physical challenge that brought him much ridicule: His
stuttering. Putting a sentence together and then uttering it aloud was
not only excruciating but humiliating, as people quickly lost patience
with his slow and often incomprehensible speech.
他的口吃，這種痛苦的現實，再加上表達障礙的挑戰，給他帶來了許多嘲笑。把一個句子放在一起，然後大聲說出它，不僅是痛苦的，而且令人感到羞辱。人們很快地對於他緩慢，而常常難以理解的講話失去了耐心。
Embry saw his childhood
dream of being a television weatherman swiftly shot down by a schoolmate
who told him, “By the time you spit out the words ‘A storm is coming,’
people’s house would have already been blown down!” To avoid further
public embarrassment, the young man turned inward, keeping to a small
group of friends. He couldn’t ask a girl to the high school prom without
stuttering, so he didn’t go. 安柏瑞的童年夢想，是成為電視台天氣預報員，這個夢想很快就被同學摧毀。他的同學告訴他：「到時候當你說出『風暴來了』，人家的房子早就已經被吹倒！」為了避免被進一步的公開羞辱，小伙子轉而內向，只跟一小群朋友連絡。他無法不口吃地開口，邀請一個女孩參加高中畢業舞會，所以他選擇缺席。
Finding Solace in Sports
在球場上尋求慰籍
Consulting one professional after another, his mother despaired that
nothing seemed to help. To protect her son from the rough and rugged,
she encouraged art, literature and music. Instead, Byron gravitated
toward sports. “Baseball was the one place I felt secure,” he says. He
embraced the game and soon found he was quite good at pitching.
經過一次又一次專業的諮詢，他的母親感到絕望，似乎沒有什麼能幫上忙。為了保護她的兒子遠離崎嶇坎坷，她熱心從事藝術、文學和音樂活動。相反，拜倫被體育所吸引。「棒球是一個讓我感到安全的地方。」他說。他積極參加球賽，很快就發現他很擅長投球。
Embry perfected his
fastball while attending Indian Hills Community College in Centerville,
Iowa. He enrolled in Professor Enfus McMurray’s freshman speech course,
but stopped attending after he failed his first two speeches
安柏瑞完美的快速球，在就讀愛荷華州森特維爾市印度山社區學院(Indian
Hills Community College)
中展現。他曾報名安佛思•麥克默里教授的新生演講課程，但在前兩個演講失敗後，他不再參加課程。
“One day at baseball
practice I looked up to see Professor McMurray walking toward me,” Embry
recalls. “She’d come to tell me I was failing.” The professor listened
intently as her student complained that speech class was pointless for
someone with his impediment. Her reply stopped him in his tracks. “You
don’t have a speech impediment; you have an excuse.” In that pivotal
moment, she expressed belief in a young man who had a challenge that
could be overcome with hard work. To his surprise, she told Byron he
would have to attend Toastmasters to pass her class.
「有一天，當我正在練棒球時，抬頭看到麥克默里教授向我走。」安柏瑞回憶說。「她來告訴我，我在退步。」這位教授專注地聽著，當她的學生抱怨說演講課對他是毫無意義的，與他遇到的障礙。她的回答阻止了他的抱怨。「你不會有語言障礙，你只是有一個藉口。」在這關鍵時刻，她表現出相信這一個年輕人有一個挑戰，並且他能努力克服這難關。令他驚訝的是，她告訴拜倫，他必須參加演講會以便能通過她的課程考核。
“Speaking for Table Topics was sheer torture...for everybody in the
room,” says Embry, “but it gave me the confidence I needed to finish the
course, and eventually I graduated.”
「對房間裡每個人來說，即席問答是簡直是一種折磨...」安柏瑞說：「但它給了我信心，我需要跑完全程，最後我畢業了。」
After commencement services, Professor McMurray approached Embry with a
hug and encouragement. “You will be a star one
day off the field,” she told him. The words
were quickly forgotten, landing somewhere in the back of his mind.
America’s favorite pastime had become his
obsession.
在畢業典禮之後，麥克默里教授給了安柏瑞一個擁抱和鼓勵。「你會成為一個明星，即使將來不在球場上。」她告訴他。這些話很快就被遺忘，被他遺忘在心裡的某個角落。但美國最受歡迎的娛樂已因他而瘋狂。
In 1997, the Atlanta Braves recognized Embry’s
pitching talent and signed him right out of college. His career with the
Braves was interrupted by elbow surgery and he later wound up with the
Kansas City Royals organization. There his fastball topped out at 100
mph – an elite speed for a pitcher –
and he had the opportunity to go toe to toe with Roger Clemens, his
childhood baseball hero.
1997年，亞特蘭大勇士隊賞識安柏瑞的投手才華，和他在畢業後簽了約。他在勇士隊的職業生涯，因肘部手術中斷，之後投效堪薩斯城皇家隊。期間他的快速球超過了100英里-對一個投手來說，這是一個優秀的球速-他有機會與克萊門斯近距離對戰，那是他的童年的棒球英雄。
Ten years into his pitching career, Embry faced a third elbow surgery
and began to wonder what life after baseball would look like. By this
time he had married, and he and his wife, Kelly, had two young daughters
to support. One afternoon, while working out at the gym, he saw a poster
promoting Toastmasters. Despite the painful memories of Table Topics, he
decided to give it a try. “I gave my Ice
Breaker on January 16, 2008,” he says. As he
spoke to the club about his life experiences –
the poverty, the stuttering, the professional baseball career –
several of the audience members sat with their mouths wide open the
entire six minutes, Embry recalls.
十年的投球生涯中，三分之一的時間安柏瑞面臨肘部手術，讓他開始思考生活中沒有棒球的樣子。這時，他已經結婚了，他與他的妻子凱利，有兩個年幼的女兒來支持。一天下午，當他努力在健身房運動時，他看到了一張演講會宣傳海報。儘管有著即席演講的痛苦回憶，他仍決定試一試。「我的初試啼聲(Ice
Breaker)演講在2008年1月16日。」他說。當他在演講會演講提及他的人生經歷-貧窮、口吃、職業棒球生涯-有好幾次觀眾坐在底下不自覺的嘴巴張開，整整六分鐘，安柏瑞回憶說。
Throwing a Career Curveball 投出職業性的曲球
Several months later, he joined the Pikes Peak club. He was assigned a
mentor, and as he gained experience, speaking became second nature.
Byron began to seriously contemplate leaving baseball to become a
motivational speaker, despite objections from friends and family
members. Even so, Embry stepped off the baseball field and into the
world of motivational speaking. His Toastmasters mentor, Tom Lachocki,
says it was a natural transition from successful athlete to successful
speaker.
幾個月後，他加入了派克峰演講會。他被分配擔任一位指導會友，他所積累的經驗，形成了第二天性。儘管朋友和家人不斷出現反對的聲音，拜倫開始認真考慮離開棒球，成為一個能激勵人心的演講家。即便如此，安柏瑞還是決定離開棒球場，並走進激勵人心演說的世界。他的演講指導會友，湯姆．拉克奇說，這是一個自然的轉換，從成功的運動員，變成傑出的演講家。
“Having been a pro athlete, Byron understands
the serious dedication and effort it takes to achieve excellence,”
says Lachocki. “There’s
no better qualification to achieve something than to have already
experienced it.”
「曾經是一個職業運動員，拜倫了解認真的奉獻和努力，才能做到精益求精。」拉克奇說。「比起已經經歷過，沒有比得得成就，更能證明自己的實力。」
He adds that Embry isn’t afraid to be honest
when dealing with emotional subject matter. “He
shows a great deal of courage,” says Lachocki.
“Byron can speak on very personal topics and
still has the strength to display deep emotions without diminishing the
delivery. The effect is that his audience feels every word much more
intensely.”
他補充說，安柏瑞在處理情感題材上不怕說實話。「他展現了很大的勇氣。」拉克奇說：「拜倫能夠訴說一些非常私人的主題，但仍然有深厚地感情力道，在表現上沒有隱瞞。得到的效果是，他的每一句話讓觀眾感覺更加強烈。」
Says Embry: “Baseball gave me the confidence
to stand in front of huge crowds. Toastmasters afforded me the
confidence to speak to those crowds.”
安柏瑞說：「棒球讓我有信心站在人群的面前。演講會使我有信心對觀眾說話。」
He developed a presentation for schools based on the
true story of Emmett Till, a black teenage boy hung in 1955 for
whistling at a white woman in the heat of America’s
racial unrest. The speech, “The Whistle that
Changed America: The Murder of Emmett Till,”
launched his speaking career.
他以埃米特•提爾的真實故事基礎，在學校做一個演說。1955年一個十幾歲的黑人男孩，因對一個白人女子吹口哨，在美國引發了種族動亂。「口哨改變美國-埃米特•提爾的謀殺案」這個演講標題，開啟了他的演講生涯。
In 2009 Byron started his company, Closing Remarks.
The name originated from his experiences as a “closer,”
which is a particular type of relief pitcher.
2009年拜倫創立了自己的公司，並命名為『總結Closing
Remarks』。這個名字源於他的棒球經歷，曾經為「終結者」角色，這是一個特定類型的救援投手。
“As a closer, you come in when the game is on
the line,” explains Embry. “A
closer makes certain that his team comes out ahead. Closing Remarks
reflects my mentality in speaking to organizations that are in a pinch.
The heat is on and they need someone to pull them out of a close
situation. Instead of throwing baseballs, I throw words of inspiration
and encouragement.”
「作為一個終結者，你進場時候，比賽已經成定局。」安柏瑞這樣解釋：「一個終結者的工作，是要確保領先的比數。『總結』反映了我對組織團體演說心態，總是在緊要關頭戰戰競競。火正在爐子上燒著，他們需要有人來拉他們一把，走出一個緊繃的情況。不是投擲棒球，我丟出字來啟發和鼓勵。」
Aiming for a World Championship
目標在世界冠軍
In the spring of 2009 Embry attended a Toastmasters club as a guest
speaker. A member was practicing her speech for the International Speech
Contest and Byron instantly realized this was something he wanted to
participate in. Entering the contest himself, he subsequently won
competitions at the club, area, division and district levels. In August
2009, he found himself standing on the stage in Mashantucket,
Connecticut, with nine other finalists in the World Championship of
Public Speaking. It was the culmination of a dream born from much
encouragement from others.
在2009年春天，安柏瑞出席演講會，並為主講嘉賓。一名會員正在為了參加備稿演講比賽，練習她的演講，而拜倫立即意識到，這是他想要參與的東西。於是他自己也參加了比賽，隨後他在分會贏得比賽，接著是分區、分部和地區不同的比賽。2009年8月，他發現自己站在康涅狄格州瑪漢塔克特的舞台，與其他九名選手，在世界冠軍賽舞台上競技。這一個夢想的高潮，來自於許多人的鼓勵。
Embry is a passionate advocate
of Toastmasters, noting how the program helped him overcome powerful
doubts and opened up a whole new world.
安柏瑞是一個充滿熱情的演講會員，他指出整個演講會課程，如何幫助他克服了強大的質疑，並打開了一個全新的世界。
“Toastmasters took my handicap and made it my
greatest asset,” he says. “Speaking
professionally is not merely the source of my income but the source of
my joy, the source of my life’s
purpose.”
「演講會將我的口語障礙，轉變成我最大的財富。」他說：「專業演講，不僅是我的收入來源，而也是我的快樂泉源，以及我的生活目的。」
“Anyone dreaming of pursuing a
career in speaking, or of just becoming a better communicator, should
not allow anyone to tell you that you can’t do
it,” he adds. “You
have an entire story to tell and no one can tell it quite like you.
Toastmasters can give you the tools to tell it effectively and
powerfully.”
「任何人追求著夢想，將演講做為志業，或者僅僅成為一個更好的溝通者，當然不應讓任何人告訴你，你不能這樣做。」他補充道：「你有一個完整的故事要說，沒有人能像你一樣敘述它。演講會可以給你的工具來讓你更有效、更有力地敘述它。」
DiAnna Steele is a freelance writer and professional speaker in Colorado
Springs, Colorado. Reach her at
dianna@DiAnnaSteele.com or
www.DiAnnaSteele.com.
作者：迪厄納．斯蒂爾，科羅拉多州科羅拉多溫泉市專欄作家及專業演講家，她的網址為
dianna@DiAnnaSteele.com或www.DiAnnaSteele.com
譯者：陳建能 Jonathan, ALE Max
Toastmasters Club
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