Is Control the Problem?

I've always been somewhat of a control freak.

When I had a secretary I'd hardly ever give her anything to do, because I wanted to make sure it was done the way I liked. I never got up the nerve to hire a babysitter for the same reason.

I even try to control things that haven't happened yet. Each night, I plan what I'm going to do the next day and visualize exactly how everything's going to happen.

I'm not a go-with-the-flow-type person by any means. And perhaps this is where the real problem with my stutter resides.

Where speech is concerned, we're supposed to go with the flow. We're not supposed to control how the words come out any more than we're supposed to control how our heart beats. It just happens.

One only has to look at non-stutterers to see that. They don't try to control the smoothness of their speech. They don't even think about it. They simply think about what they want to say, open their mouths, and let the words come out automatically.

I definitely need to stop trying to be in control all the time.

Even if it doesn't smooth out my speech, at least perhaps it'll introduce a bit more surprise and fun into my life.