Actor Kirk Douglas has written his ninth book Let's Face It age 90 years. It is an entertaining book. One thing he wrote struck me as a lesson for trial lawyers. He says when he gives a speech he always starts out telling the audience he has had a stroke. As a result, he tells them, he has to speak slowly to be understood. However, he goes on, he's found that when he does speak slowly people listen because they think he is going to say something important and the audience laughs. But, the fact is that trial lawyers tend to talk too fast and the often ignore the power of the pause as well as silence. When we are nervous we tend to talk  too fast. When we change pace, pause, raise and lower our voice we capture as well as hold attention. We can learn from Kirk Douglas a lesson in communication