Smart ways of expressing opinions

Speak English confidently

We all express opinions umpteen times a day. Yet, one thing that stares at one in the face is how people cannot express their opinion without feeling nervous, or even sounding bombastic – the two extremes. Over my 16 plus years of teaching English, I have found that most people don’t know, what I call, the proper “opinion chunks”—the signposts that help the listener make out that we are expressing an opinion and not a final cast-in-stone statement. Without these opinion chunks they sound like matter-of-fact statements by an “expert”, eliciting comments like,

“Who does he think he is?” 

Let’s look at some opinion chunks that we could use in formal and informal situations.

We’ve heard the most common “baby” chunks – I think / I feel / I guess / I would say.

But these are really BORING! Let’s see if we can bring in some variety, add some colour to our expressions. I’ve tried to relate the expressions to the attitude involved.

I’m giving here fifteen chunks. I’m sure these cover all the situations we face in our lives – work, social, home – you name it. Of course there are a zillion others.

Let me know what chunks you use in your everyday spoken word.

1. Confident, fully convinced, polite, not aggressive, very assertive

1. 1. Plainly, …
   2. Quite frankly, …
   3. Without a doubt, …
   4. What I always say is …
   5. Without a shred/shadow of doubt, …
   6. My position on this is quite clear…

 

2. Confident but Aggressive expressions

1. 1. You’d have to be crazy not to agree that
   2. Any idiot can see that …
   3. Know what I think?

 

3. Polite expressions: I don’t want to hurt anybody

1. 1. It could/might well be that …
   2. To my mind…
   3. I’m entirely/quite convinced that …
   4. I think it’s fair/reasonable to say …
   5. After giving this matter some (serious) thought, I feel…
   6. To my mind…
   7. What I always say is…

 

4. I don’t care either way

1. 1. I’ll tell you what I think, …
   2. As far as I’m concerned, …
   3. I tend towards the opinion that …
   4. If I must, I’ll say this…
   5. It might well be that…

 

I wish I could just tell you that you could just pick up a few of the above chunks and you could waltz your way to glory. But the reality is you won’t.

 

This is just one single element in the total communication package. A noverall development of communication skills calls for an all-round development of communication skills. And language skills is, again, “just one element”!

 

And, “language chunks” isn’t just a fancy talk or technical stuff. The science of communication affirms the need for the speaker / writer to let the listener / reader know what is exactly in his or her mind. Otherwise, a confused receiver (listener / reader) will switch off. And the result could at best be a futile effort, and at worst a world war!

What would you rather have?