Communicating detailed thoughts?

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Often when I try to explain an idea that I have verbally, it sounds nothing like my original thought.
Sometimes I can have a really good idea that could help someone, but when I open my mouth, all the comes out is a lot of "ahhs" and "umms" and a lot of mixed up words. Eventually, I just say "oh, nevermind!" and give up.
Other times I can have a really good idea and seem to have no problem getting words out...but then to find that what I said made no sense or was hard to understand for the person(s) I was speaking to >_<.
At times it seems that my brain and mouth don't co-ordinate properly.

I know that I could write down my ideas, but that takes too long because my throughts are long and detailed most of the time.

Does anyone else have trouble with this and/or know how to stop this issue?

Here's a statistic: The average human's specific attention span is seven to fifteen seconds. If what you're saying is interesting enough you can keep them for about forty-five seconds. After that, they want to interject their own thoughts, or tune out. That's just an average, of course, people will pay attention to lectures, etc, if there's a motivation.

I made my living on the radio for 30 years. The Aah, Er, Uhm stuff you can eliminate simply by being aware of it and making a concentrated effort. Takes time, but it'll go away. Best solution is writing things down before you say them. If writing it down takes too long, you didn't really think it was important enough to say in the first place. Make up your mind, do you want to get your ideas across, or do you just want to whine about not being able to? Write it down, then edit for content and eliminate stuff that's not important.

Here's a practice exercise: Find a song you like with a musical intro (the part right before the singing starts) that's about 20-25 seconds long. Write down what you want to say (use a weather forecast if you can't think of anything), then start the song and try saying your bit and finishing before the singing starts. Too long? reword and shorten, try again. Edit, compact, and practice, practice, practice. It may sound silly, but you'll get better at getting to the point. Eventually you'll realize 25 seconds is a loooott longer than you used to think it was.

one thing that helps me is to have access to an environment which allows for me to develop and practice vocabulary that allows for me to present my thoughts in a presice and concise manner.

working with lawyers can be good for this.

I don't think I can agree more with your sentiments. An idea that's simple in my mind seems to meander verbally. It's not the best when you're making a presentation.

The usual problem with difficulty in characterizing our emotions. I tried to join in a conversation last September, and in trying to speak my feelings on the subject, I kept "chipping away" at the subject, as I couldn't get my feelings into a succinct, brief, clear expression. It's kind of like a sculptor chipping away at a block of marble to reveal the beautiful statue hidden underneath; eventually you see the statue, but it takes a very long time.

People often have had to cut me off from my rambling expression; I was unknowingly often not really in touch with them too, in the way they are accustomed.

When I was younger, I had a hobby of Magic, and hoped it would help me develop the confidence I needed for speaking with the public; I did not apply myself especially well, though. There was a lot of good advice in the "Course in Magic" in regard to effective communication and understanding people, and I think some of it was helpful in the long run.

Even if I'm posting on a forum or in an email, I'm still taking a long time usually to edit and get my feelings expressed clearly, and sometimes I just get stuck and don't know what to say.

i can do maths easily in my head but then im asked how i got that answer and i go totally blank because i never need to show workings because i can do it all mentally

This is a huge problem of mine, it can be very difficult to translate thoughts, especially if they are of a highly technical nature, into words. I have this rich internal, symbolic, and non-linear "mental language" of concepts, jargon, and mental images that doesn't seem to interact with the linearity of verbal language very well.

I cna think very good arguments and discussions in my head but when i try to speak them, I stumble over my words and end up looking like an idiot.

Try writing it down..

This is just another one of life's daily battles. I find that talking slower and thinking about every word while in my head seeing it written out helps for me. It does take longer but I at least get part of what I want to say out. Though most times people don't stick around long enough to hear it through. I personally dislike verbal communication. If people would only learn to talk like bees...

Brittany2907, I know what that is like at times, in that often I can see in my mind from a visual perspective what I'd like to speak upon or about but, when attempting to put it into words the whole process goes horribly wrong. However, I don't give up and try to work around such troubles though.

I have this problem too.

I think it’s related to how my brain works as an indexing system. Often when I feel like I come to grasp some complex set of ideas in my head I only really only work out all the details once. After the thinking is finished what continues to exist in my conscious memory is a bunch pictures or short phrases that come to symbolize the original thought process. They’re like little markers that indicate the thoughts / ideas that I’ve previously worked out even though most of the details are lost. This sometimes gives me the illusion that my ideas are simpler than they really are.

When I try to communicate the ideas I’m forced to quickly revisit all the details that the indices in my head serve as reminders for but don't necessarily describe in their entirety. It can be a slow process trying to reconstruct the thought and put it into words. There's also the problem that this reconstruction process doesn't necessarily occur in the logical order needed for written or spoken language. Often the various parts of the original idea come back into consciousness out of order. For instance I often remember the conclusions of my reasoning before I can recall the premises.