My whole life I've been told I have an awful tone of voice. People criticize me for sounding critical, sarcastic, or condescending, even when this is farthest from my intent. SO...what exactly am I supposed to do about this? I cannot cease speaking and I cannot pinpoint the particular sound I make that makes people react negatively to my voice, so I cannot 'work' on or fix it.
I suspect the real reason is two-fold:
1. I live in Central Texas, where practically everyone has a soft, almost lazy articulation, and
2. I use full grammar and use a larger variety of words than most.
Oh, and maybe
3. I respond to things very quickly, seemingly without thinking or considering my words. This is often misconstrued as being 'snippy'.
Usually when someone calls me out on my tone of voice, it really does make me angry. Primarily because I find it very rude to criticize someone else for their tone of voice. I would not do it to someone else and I would be open to constructive criticism but I'm not really interested in someone pettily carping that I don't phrase or say something exactly the way they would. I also get really irritated when my 'tone' of voice is merited and people say I'm being too harsh.
There are more important things in life folks, and I would say "mind your own business, please," but I wouldn't want to offend anyone.
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1 comment:
I get that tone of voice crap,too. I always want to say, "get a backbone", and sometimes I do.
With me, its because I get into what I'm talking about. I'm enthusiastic about some things and my voice does something that a lot of people find scary. I, too, have a large vocabulary. And, I lived in Central Texas for years.
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