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Power of Stories

So first couple tips. When you tell the story, start with a scene. What does that mean? Guys? Great picture. You start the middle of the story, the beginning or the end. Very good. So you're gonna start with something like it was late on a Friday night or my boss called manifold. He's so pissed for It was my first day on the new job, but something that immediately pulls you into the scene. No ramp up. If anybody says Okay, I'm gonna tell you a proud moment. Story is that weaker? Is that strong? It's week, cause we already know you're gonna tell a story. That's the exercise. She gonna immediately pull us into the scene and take one of your strongest parts of your story and move it to the front. If you watch TV and movies a lot of time, there's a powerful scene. And then it comes back later that that was from the future. Second, all stories air built on two things. What are they? Characters trying to solve a conflict. Every story in the history of stories is characters trying to solve a ...

conflict. Every movie you've ever seen, Every TV show every novel you've ever read every cartoon you ever watched, his characters solving a conflict. If you don't care characters and conflict, you don't have a story if you have characters, but there's no conflict. Everybody gets along and everybody's fine. There's no story if you have a conflict, but there's no characters. World War two It's not a story until you introduce characters, so when you introduce a character, you have to introduced them visually as well as emotionally. When a novelist introduces a new character in the story, what does the novelist usually do? Very good. Why is the novelist describe the character so you can get to know them? Very good. If you can't picture them, you can't remember them. So when I say go, you're going to turn to your partner next to you and describe somebody in your family. An online. I want to do the same thing. Describe somebody in your family in two sentences and make it so vivid that you can actually remember that character. One sentence should be more physical, something unique about them so I can see them in my mind from the unique about the hair or what they wear or what they looked like in the 2nd 1 is more emotional. Something about their personality. So when I say go type online or turned your partner in only two sentences, describe someone in your family as vividly as you can and you have to start with the name. The name is like a hook. If you don't have a name, the coat doesn't stay up. It falls to the floor. Everybody understand. Ready. Begin online. Go ahead and type in your story. Your character who is in your family, their name. Something physical and emotional that weaken that. Rosser John could paint that picture. Who's the hero of their story, right? So in this particular case is just describe someone in your family a character as vividly as you can so that John and Russ could share it out. Love is gonna take some time, I think, for people that start bringing these in because they got actually, But we will get that coming in in the live room. He likes to five seconds left. 321 Turn back this way. All right, show me with your fingers. How much you remember of what your partner said. 10 means I remember 100% what they said. Zero means I have no idea what they just said. All right, let's hear just a couple. So, what was your What did you hear? Shauna told me about Her brother is two years older than her, and he looks like one of those characters on the pizza boxes. Italian short, stocky. And he tries too hard to get people to laugh at his jokes. I'm sure he's very funny. Let's get one more, Jennifer told me about her brother, who's tall and skinny and loves getting free T shirts from tech company full time job for a lot of us. Great. So we understand character. So when you introduce a character into your story, if it's important for us to remember the character, sometimes it is. Sometimes it isn't. What do you have to do? Just describe them quickly so that we conform a picture in our mind. If we can't form a picture, we generally can't remember that I understand that idea and conflict is something Some people I don't want to have any conflict. While conflict is the key to all drama, reality shows are all based on drama because we're attracted to drama. You need conflict to pull people in. Sometimes people come to se Bill. Hey, would you take a look at our press releases? We keep putting out these press releases, Nobody covers the story. Okay, let me let me take a look. And the press releases is essentially says our company is doing great and everything's fine. There's no story there. You have to have conflict. You have to have something controversial spark. And if you don't give the press something controversial, they'll find something. So you want to have some conflict that pulls the audience in that gets resolved. This one we've already talked about, used to space you have. So let's say I was telling the story where I moved from Boston to Los Angeles. How do I use the stage to tell that story? Okay, pick one. Where's Boston and where's Los Angeles? So if this is Boston here and I moved all the way over to Los Angeles in Los Angeles, I found was a whole different world because of blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Now what point to me, where is Boston? That's how powerful visuals are you using your space. Now, if you're sitting in a meeting will build. I'm not standing up. Same concept to move from Boston all the way to Los Angeles. So I stopped to go to Indiana for a couple years in college, but it was from Boston all the way to Los Angeles. So the use of the space harmonizes your story. Why does that matter? You want to be a three dimensional speaker. The first dimensions your content second mentioned, your voice range and the third dimensions your space. And the more you begin to use it, the more powerful you're becoming. It's a lot more fun and last keep it short. So take comments here. But what I'm gonna ask you to do while we're taking comments is we're gonna do a dry run. I'm gonna be tough on the time. We're gonna goto one minute to tell your story to practice. Since most people it's hard to know. Wait a minute. I'm not sure how much time I've used Everybody's going to stand up on the stage at the same time. And I'm gonna do a one minute countdown, which means when I say go, we're all gonna look like electrons bouncing off of each other. But one minute you say go and you start telling your story, do everything except the volume. Uh huh. And act out the whole story. I'll say 30 seconds. 45 1 minute. Stop. And if you're only halfway done with the story that at least you know that you have more editing to Dio Herb, I understand the idea. Okay. All right. Come on stage and go to the starting place for your story. Think of the whole stage. Is your canvas pick a different spot? Well, folks, moving. I just have to read this because I love it. Yes, And girl did an amazing job. She says Bud Soucy. My dad is a lively love child of Ollie North, Ronald Reagan and Yosemite Sam can deliver a joke like a weapon. Wow. Just like I know that guy. Now, that's world class. I love it. Okay, everybody, a different spot on the stage. Now when you're moving, just disregard are very ready. Get ready. Tell your story and go. All right. I'm timing them to give them a sense. And this is helpful for you at home, so Well, I don't know how long my stories aren't will practice. Just take a little bit of time in practice with the clock. I have found that that's the case where when you're doing something especially stressful or intense or new, like this, you time just expands. You feel like you've been doing it for hours when it's been 10 seconds or the other way around Where I get up, I only have a minute, and I took nine minutes how that happened. So it's okay. You get carried away. 30 seconds. I read a couple more of these descriptions. I think that they are fun noodle on it. Karen has a face like a porcelain doll with eyes so green you don't confuse them for Blue. Easy going would not be a word that shoots the top of the list when describing. We sort of got the opposite there from in the light because he or she is saying Joan has the skin of old weathered Levin. Leathery glove Is this hard headed, this hard core rodeo rider on the heart and soul of Mother Teresa? She sounds like someone I need to meet. One minute Stop! Freeze. So now show me with your fingers. How much did you finish the story? 10 means 100% done. Five means 50%. Done. Go. How much are you done? So a couple of you almost done a little at any sort of, you know, a lot more editing for this exercise. I only want a minute cut out everything that's good. And the only thing that's left is great. So you start strong, build strong, and only a minute I'm gonna be the same hand signal guy in the back. Roberto is doing all the filming, the dials, so I'm gonna be This means 10 seconds left. It doesn't mean shut up. Means finding airport. This means stop. This doesn't mean shut up. It means bringing in for a landing. This means got to go to commercial. So you gotta wrap up that next sentence no more. Everybody understand? Okay, you can have a seat. We'll decide who wants to go first. And what do they do with their dial? When they are dials back to and the dials air 50 for every new speaker. That's the baseline. Now you can never stop moving the dials, ever, ever. No matter what she does says Or do you just keep cranking? It never stopped moving in wild swings is gonna help her a lot more. Everybody understand? Okay, I'm gonna stay off to the side. But you use the whole stage when Roberto gives you a signal. That's when you begin. And I will be your timekeeper. Very well. I almost lost my sight. Picture this drug driving you are, Robert a stop sign and he was mess up. You think maybe a gang members someone just mess it up on? Then when you look in front of you, there's an SUV. When it looks like a sports car right away. I thought I need to see what is going on with my site. Finally, I was diagnosed with detachment that I had my surgery after the fourth rating authorities I saw because she realized my detachment once on board eyes, it wasn't very hard year. I couldn't sit in front of the computer. I have a photo. Four year I couldn't drive. I love my perception of distance. My life changed for the better. I change careers. I started using my voice more. I didn't have to use my eyes And that's how my life change. And I'm thankful for that. Thank you. Great. So one minute, four seconds. Excellent. Who wants to go next? Dial back to 50. Stiles, back to 50 for each new speaker. Richard, wait for Roberto. Signal and map out where you're gonna start in the stage. Ready? So there I am in Minnesota and it's harvest season, and I'm jumping out of a perfectly good airplane. I'm an individual who likes to take challenges. And I've heard some people say that you're born a physician. Now, I was that kid in sex education that saw the uterus and then passed out. I was the kid who was in the classroom. The other kid threw up and I threw up. I was a person who cut my hand, and I saw the blood, and I passed out. And so I'm in medical school and I'm with one of my best friends, big guy deep voice, and we decided we're gonna jump out of an airplane. And so we go during this harvest season and get up in the airplane and we jump. And we hit the ground softly and were walking back to the parking lot and I asked my friend, How was it? Big guy? He says, and was great. And that's how I like to approach life. 59.4 seconds. See, now he's just showing off. I remember I don't care too much about being exactly one minute It's okay to be carried away, but then watch for the signals and bring it back in. About one year ago, we had a design contest at work. There were two teams. It was my team, and it was a team of engineers. And then there was another designer who was a rock star Hizzoner. His name was Jean, and he was one of those. Matter of fact guys, this is just the way it is. Your design sucks and mine's the best. And he was one of those guys and we wanted to beat him so bad. Eso me and my team of engineers, we have less designed to experience with him. He had over 20 years of design experience. We had maybe five and we got together and we said, We're gonna beat this guy, And what we did was we got together and we thought about different ways we can do it unconventionally. Um, we campaign for a design. We made it more personal and we talked to other people and we said, You know, how can we improve this? How can we be George? And when we presented our designs and people got to vote for us, we campaigned and we want by a landslide. And we were so proud of it. And it was one of ah, really great accomplishing part of ours. Great guys, back to 50. And don't stop moving the dial scare you can take Genus. Never stopped moving them. Ready? I was a part of a class at UC Berkeley called Media for Social Change. And at the end of that class, my teacher says you can teach this class as a student, I was given the opportunity opportunity to teach a three unit class for one entire semester have my own students being a student myself. Now, this scared me so bad. How How can I teach other students? When I just finished learning this course so I put together my curriculum. I planned everything out. I tried to learn as much as I can. This class was called art for social change. I interviewed these students. I wanted to make sure they were passionate, excited. They'd be ready to learn with me. So this young student comes in. His name was Sean Freshman, blonde hair, 19. Curious. He comes in and I said, Why do you want to be part of my art for social change class? And he said, because I don't think art can create social change. I was so terrified. How am I going to teach this class? Three months go by and teaching? I'm learning. I'm nervous because of this freshman is trying to learn from me and he doesn't even believe in the topic. At the end of the semester, I did interviews for who would teach the class next, the first person to come interview with Sean. He loved the class and wanted to teach it the next year. And that showed me that if you're passionate and you're inspired, you can help other people, too. Now, some of my hand signals are gonna disorient you, and they're gonna frustrate you. That's normal. But this is part of becoming a professional speakers. There's always have these people doing it, but never nothing fazes you. You're just taking it in and you stay in your moment. Who wants to go next? When I got hard at Creativelive very gave us this task of hiring a completely new production crew for San Francisco. Huge, huge task because our team in Seattle is already amazing and already on par for everything already had our culture laid out. So we had this huge, huge idea, basically of bringing in what's called a batch day, which is candidates that are just lined up one after another. Different roles, different human beings. See who fits you, who doesn't see how to create our team. So I got this idea in my head to bring in somebody that I knew who I thought would be great for Creativelive. And we went through all these interviews, shout out to my team who was amazing and help me do this. And at the end of the day, we had ah conference where we talked about who everybody likes whoever, who everybody didn't like how things went. And there was one resounding thing that waas There was one guy that everybody loved. It was my guy, my guy who's sitting here and my line producer for this course. And every time we wrap, of course, it's just huge whiles about Brian and about how this whole process has gone. And it just makes me super proud that not only was he my higher, he was somebody that everybody loves, and he makes me proud every time we finish the class. So either way, any chance you get to embarrass Brian or anybody on the crew, just get you bonus points. All right, Who wants to go next? Because they're doing good with the dials. If you get tired, I don't care if you get tired. Keep Thailand key movie. That data is gonna be very helpful. The first time I went to a boxing gym, I got all my I got my gloves on, got the hand wraps on, got all ready to do the punches. I couldn't even hit the pads. I had no eye hand coordination at all. So for three classes, I swear head, the owner of the gym came over and he was like, just practice at the speed bag. So I didn't get to practice actual practice, just sat there practicing, punching with speed bag over and over and over a little bit frustrated thinking I was the only person who would not be ableto punch anything. But within three months I was able to step in the ring and participate in sparring, which was a really awesome moment for me to have started here, where I could even hit anything to be actually actively participating with all of the other students. Thank you, 53 seconds. Being being being in the gym. Nice job. Who hasn't gone yet? As I regained consciousness, I realized that I had crashed that crash my plane into the Rockies in the dark in a snowstorm. I looked to my right side to check if my three or son who was my soul co passenger in the plane with me, was he Where was he? And I found the seat empty, and the first thought that ran through my head was My wife's gonna kill me. I heard some cries outside, tried getting out off the aircraft to go get my son. I realized my leg was jammed in the rudder pedal. Ah, later on found out that I had broken my body in three places places, my ankle, my spine and my neck. Somehow managed to crawl outside, locate my son. Um, I asked him how was he if he was hurting anywhere. It turned out the miracle was that he was completely find the same grafted, broken, mean three places. He was completely fry. Fine. But the second danger, I just realize the second danger that I that I that we might have survived across the die off hypothermia. It was sub zero. We were both wearing T shirts and sharks. Um, I managed to put my son into the baggage compartment off the aircraft. Um, I covered wrapped up myself with the tarpaulin which was used to cover the aircraft, and it sparked. And I kept sending distress messages. They found us eight hours after at 6 a.m. When there was light because they couldn't do any search and rescue because of snow storm. In the darkness and the mountains, they brought into helicopters. They reached my son out than myself out. My marriage arrived. I'm completely fine. My son is completely fine. And he still flies with me. Who hasn't gone yet? He went a little long, but I couldn't cut him off. That was like they have to know I have to know if you survive tough active. So two o'clock the morning the phone rings. But this is Ah, back in the day when we didn't have cell phones. No caller, I d. So you sort of had to answer the phone to figure out what was going on. So I go out to the bedroom from the bedroom to where the phone is. Answer the phone and it's Craig. Craig is a tall Australian who is basically set out to be the world's biggest jerk. I think he's just giving me grief because the guy's supposed be on an airplane to France, however, he has discovered a buck. This is a guy who is so dedicated that while he is on vacation flying to France from the Bay Area, he has decided that he's going to read his own code and find a bug. So he calls me on the phone. We sit there and type. Figure out what the bug is, solved the bug and save the company. $10 million Great. 50 seconds. Very good. It's everybody gone. All right, So, folks online, same question. Other than yourself, who do you remember and what would you remember what's The test is three days. What do you think? Three days? If I said, hey, what do you remember this guy? Or she said, What would you remember three days from now? And more importantly, why do you remember it? So who would you remember other than yourself? And why most when shown or talked about Brian? That's something I'm probably remember for several days when you talked about how the student who was initially a skeptic and was the first wall into to read to teach that course again. I remember that I remembered about her struggle with the boxing's anywhere. There's strong human interest. So when there's characters and when there's conflict is what's memorable sometimes when you use names, especially if you formats like this, where other people could hear the story. If you really can't say the name, just say, let's call them blank. That way you can talk about them authentically without necessarily embarrassing somebody. Who else do you remember? And why in an online? A lot of people remember the plane crash because of the life and death nature of it. We have Livia Lee, who remembers Brian, um, Brian Way have before stooped Garden, who remembers passionate art for social change. Let's see the sky bird. Let's talk about the doctor who jumped out of the plane with the big guy who responded in a high pitched voice. Did that very well. Uh, let's see be Worley, retina detachment and stories and Richard's story of a good challenge. Great. So everybody did a fantastic job in the story. So we're going to get round to first while they finalize the DVD and get ready to play back the videos with the data. Now we're gonna do comedy Hour, so going to go in reverse order. So whoever went last now goes first, and the way we're going to the jokes is no, no improvement feedback. It's just how fun now to tell a joke. Well, what do you have to do, right? Think of all the techniques we've learned to tell a joke. Well, what do you think you have to do, right? Pause. Have fun with it. Have fun to tell a joke. Well, what you have to do, right is everything. One of the most advanced forms of any communication, this species is stories and the one the hardest forms of stories is jokes, because it has to be no week language, all strong language. Get over yourself, become the character, excellent pauses and gestures and by languages, everything all together, and you're all going to be fantastic. So after the joke, we're gonna all laugh and applaud, and I'm gonna ask only for two positives. Technically, what did they do? Well, you know, I love this gesture. I love this voice. I love that, But we're not going to any improvements. Every got the rhythm, the cadence in this one. All right, Who was our last speaker? And Brian's gonna tell Joke, too. Is that what we're hearing? Okay, we'll get Brian's tell a joke at the end as well. I think Roberto is just This is a term of public speaking called Throw Somebody under the bus, the technical term for what we just did. So when NASA started spent sending astronauts out to space, they discovered that ballpoint pens don't write in zero gravity. Typical NASA fashion. They can't just come up with the typical solution. They go when they spend a decade $12 billion and come up with a ballpoint pen that writes in zero gravity, but it doesn't just write in zero gravity, it writes, right side up, upside down. It writes underwater, it writes, when the temperature zero degrees and it writes when the temperature is 300 degrees. The Russians, of course, just used a pencil. All right. Jack has a seat and Jack have a seat in the next person. Come on up. Give me two things that Jack did. Well, while he's sitting down, the next person come up positive. He had very good pause rate before the punchline. Good. What else do you do? Well, the movement when he was saying like upside down, right side up, any of the perfect prop? Yes. So props are all around us. You can pull things from your pocket from the room, so it just makes it more effective. It's just one more dimension. Great. All right, Who's next? Actually won't comment about Jack. That's coming up a lot in the chat rooms all throughout the days that we have a very, very expressive face. Very good facial expressions. I think that worked very well in that last exercise. All right, I'm gonna need both of those bills. Props. I love it right here. That's working. The couple is driving down this country road. It's a long drive. Neither of them they, neither of them is saying words very silent. They had a long day fat and are given before, and neither off them has is willing to concede. The drivers driving the boss a farm and they see some pigs and muse the farm. And the guy says, Honey related Off yours, the wife replies. Yes, dear. I married into the family, all right, while our next comedian comes up. What did retest do? Well, a lot of things. Well, it's good. Policies don't rush good. And if you forget, your place is just pause. It's better to be silent and thought a fool Abraham Lincoln's quote than to speak out and remove all doubt. They won't know if it's unintentional. Pause or not, but one little tip for everybody is unless you need the stool. We'll watch the Olympics in London at the end of the vault. What is the gymnast have to do at the end of the vault? Sticks the landing you have. They have to hold that for a couple seconds. What happens if they hit the mat and they jump right off. What happens? Little men toys. They lose a couple points, so you have to stick the pause with the end of every presentation pitch thing, you wait and fade to black. Why? Where you going? They were members. So why do you need that time? You need that time to let the audience finish feeling. Remember that Hold to second cycle of the joke. So when they finished laughing, don't jump off. Hold that two seconds, a doctor says to a patient. I have some really bad news for you patients as Oh my God, what could it possibly be? Doctor says you only have 24 hours left to live in Patients says That's terrible. How could it possibly be worse? The doctor says, I've been trying to reach you for the past 24 hours, saving other jokes for the end after the DVD. But let's give her a quick to What does she do? Well, she's a lot of things. Well, give her to Fosse's good. She embodied each character by using space. Very good. Don't describe the character. She became the character That's a higher level of engagements, much more fun for the audience. When you go to that level,