As the longer autumn nights roll in, one of the warmest and brightest and best places to go to begin or to renew a hugely enjoyable, rewarding and fulfilling chapter in life is the Fermoy Toastmasters Club.
Our two hour meetings at the local Youth Centre are such a pure joy and pleasure to be a part of whether as member, participant, visitor or guest. A place where you can relax, listen and be entertained, dazzled by the insights and richness of experience that is set before you, share in great humour and a celebration of all that is best in life. Then for so many of us comes the exciting and wonderful moment when you decide that you would like to give it a go and make your own unique and special contribution, to give something of yourself to enhance and broaden the enjoyment of everyone at our meetings and then to come away with such a warm and cheerful glow inside knowing that together we have once again done something very special and very exciting. That is one of those key moments when as I read in a book recently while we cannot decide the length of our days, we can determine their width and depth.
At our second gathering of the new season, the absence of a number of members at the National Ploughing Championships and on holidays presented a challenge to which the members rose with energy and assurance. Fanahan Colbert chaired proceedings with style and grace while John Kelly presented a diverse range of themes and topics that fostered a ready atmosphere of spontaneity and naturalness that lie at the very heart of the Toastmasters’ ideal. Three very fine speeches made for a memorable and entertaining evening: Seoirse Neilan evoked the long lost days of the grey wolf in Ireland, a magnificent if fierce predator hunted to extinction in the late 18th century with reintroduction a very unlikely possibility today given the importance of livestock farming to our economy. Padraig Murphy told the members of the harmful effects of the confusing nutritional information on food packaging in a well-researched talk that pointed the way to the need for much greater public awareness and education on this issue. This speech was well complimented by a presentation from our President, John Sherlock, who invited all to come with him on a journey of imagination to the woodlands and the wild to sample the many nutritious and healthy food sources that our processed-food society chooses to neglect and ignore.
To every speaker there is an evaluator who offers praise and constructive suggestions for further improvement, a task so we carried through by Johanna Hegarty, Michael Sheehan and Mairead Barry, while Eilish Ui Bhriain as general evaluator praised everyone for their commitment and support that made the evening such a great success. It was a night when the club showed its immense character and its generosity of spirit at its very brightest and best.
Participation is the key to fulfilment. True, there is a certain quiet pleasure in being a passive hurler on the ditch in any form of sport just as in Toastmasters. But there is nothing like the sheer joy and thrill of taking part and getting involved. This was brought vividly home to me recently when a very dear friend brought me to see some of his beautiful model planes in flight. I marvelled at his skill making these streamlined and elegant machines rise from the earth and climb up into the sky. A touch of his remote control had the planes entering a graceful roll or descending into a vertiginous spin or gleefully looping the loop. He is so accomplished in this art that he makes it look easy but of course he has acquired this mastery and finesse through great dedication and sustained enthusiasm. Doing what you love doing is never a burden but a great happiness.
Then he asked me would I like to take control of his glider for a while with the assurance that he was always ready to reassume command whenever necessary. I was a little unsure at first but decided to give it a go. I took the controls and felt a frisson of concern when the craft began descending too quickly, but my good friend intervened every time and with his warm support and encouragement I soon found that I was able to exercise a certain control and thrilling to see the glider wheel and soar and pass gracefully through the air over our heads.
I was no longer a mere passive spectator, but actively taking part. And there was such a great satisfaction in having done so. As my friend said, it is all a matter of practice, echoing those wise words of Aristotle so many centuries ago that we are what we do constantly, so that excellence is not an action, but a habit. For the more you try the more you gain, the richer the rewards, the wider your horizons become so that in no time at all the sky is the limit, whether in flying model aircraft, in tending your garden or participation in Toastmasters. You are never alone, but with friends ever there to help, support and lend their wisdom and encouragement on the path of discovery and achievement.
Our dear friend Mairead Barry is one of our most accomplished and respected members and she has such a very wise saying: ‘Never let weeds grow on your mind’. How right she is: a healthy, active, stimulated and uplifted mind will drive a healthy and active body also. It is literally true: the more we exercise our minds, the wider the neural pathways grow in our brain enhancing our powers of thought and expression ever further. And there are few other activities to compare with Toastmasters when it comes to tapping into all of your talents, to utilising your mind to its fullest and best; to expressing your thoughts, ideas, views and sentiments with that beautiful combination of the well-crafted turn of phrase, the aptly-chosen word, the graceful and appropriate gesture, the ease and smooth assurance that comes from doing something well in the mutually supportive network of friendship and cordial goodwill that is the Toastmasters Club. We come to speak but far more we listen to each other to learn, to enjoy and to have our lives enriched and the horizons of possibility immensely broadened by the stimulation and refreshment that comes through warm and cordial interaction with fellow-members who are the very dearest friends.
The club is a great human resource and more it is utilised instead of growing tired the more invigorating it becomes. Fermoy Toastmasters continues to flourish after forty-three years because of the great dedication and enthusiasm of so many brilliant members both past and present. Today for instance the strength of our cherished club is seen in the commitment of someone like Fanahan Colbert standing next to the new sign he had just helped erect on one of the approach roads to Fermoy advertising our meetings and venue. Fanahan does this because of his great love of our happy club of friends. And whenever and wherever friends gather, there we truly are at home, which indeed is what our club most truly is.
Our next meeting will be held on Tuesday next, October 6th, at 8.15 pm in the Fermoy Youth Centre, for what will be a memorable night of comedy and pleasure in our annual Humorous Speech and Topics Contest to which we warmly look forward to sharing with all our supporters, friends and very welcome guests. For further information, please contact Eilish Ui Bhriain at 087 1235203 or Kevin Walsh at 058 60100 or log on to our mobile-friendly website toastmastersfermoy.com or find us on Twitter @ FermoyT