Five minutes of deep breathing and five minutes to practise the other movements advised will be sufficient, if one performs these tasks every day with regularity and conscientiousness.
The speaking exercises, to which we shall now refer can be carried out while we are dressing.
Choose a phrase, a short one to start with, and longer as you progress, and repeat it in front of the glass while observing yourself carefully, to be sure that your face shows no sign of embarrassment and that you do not stammer or hesitate in any way.
If the words do not come out clearly, you must make an immediate stop and go doggedly back to the beginning of your phrase, until you are able to enunciate it with mechanical accuracy and without a single sign of hesitation.
You must study to avoid all the jerky and abrupt movements which disfigure the address of the timid and deprive them of all the assurance that they should possess, for the reason that they can not help paying attention to their own lack of composure.
Finally, from the moment of rising, as well as when brushing his hair, tying his necktie, or putting on his clothes, the man who desires to acquire poise will watch himself narrowly, with a view to making his movements more supple and to invest them with grace.
Once in the street, he will not forget to carry his head erect, without exaggerating the pose, and will always walk with a firm step without looking directly ahead of him.
If this attitude is a difficult one for him when commencing, he can, at the start, assign a certain time for observing this position, and gradually increase its length, until he feels no further inconvenience.
The feeling of obvious awkwardness is a large factor in the lack of poise.
It is then a matter of great importance to modify one's outward carriage, while at the same time applying oneself to the conquest of one's soul, so as to achieve the object not only of actually becoming a man who must be reckoned with, but of impressing every one with what one is, and what one is worth.