Volume 2, Number 2 | February 2008
I gave a speech at my Toastmasters club last week--my longest ever (a whopping 20
minutes!)
It was also my first speech in a long, long time. As such, it was a great reminder to me of many things:
how terrifying it can be to
get up in front of people; how long (and how short) 20 minutes truly is; and above all, the role that preparation plays in great communication, no
matter what the medium.
While I don't write out and memorize my speeches, I do rehearse the hell out of them, just like I
used to rehearse the hell out of my film, TV and theater roles.
It's not that practice makes perfect; rather, practice frees me up to be imperfect--to let the real me
shine through, quirks and all. When I work the material until it's in my bones, I can plug into the truth of the moment. If I'm looking for a line
(hint: it's not up there in the rafters) or I don't know my stuff backwards and forwards, it's impossible
to be "in the moment"--and that's where all the interesting communication happens.
And what goes for performance goes for other kinds of communication, too. The more you know your stuff,
the more you'll have the freedom to (say it with me, now) improvise.
So here are my favorite hacks for getting my butt prepared, whatever medium I find myself using, so my
spirit can (hopefully) take flight:
Break your speech into "pods," and get comfortable enough with each pod that you can pad it, trim
it or cut it entirely on the fly. Once you plot out the main points of a speech, find bits to hang on each one--stories, examples, songs,
what have you. Rehearse those bits individually until you know them well; try changing them up here and there each time you run them. Then practice
your series of bits or "pods" in different orders. That way, if you find you're getting great response from one pod, you can riff on it; conversely,
if things aren't going as well, you can trim them way back or excise them completely.
If you find yourself trying to write beautifully, stop and force yourself to write badly.
When thoughts go off the rails, quite often it's because the thinker tried to skip the step of organizing her thoughts clearly. Yes, brilliant
writers--and speakers, and improvisers--have built up fancy-talkin' muscles over years of practice. Mere mortals (or even geniuses who are momentarily flummoxed) should write out the idea in the most elementary,
no-room-for-doubt way possible. Once it's so clear a fourth-grader could grok it, feel free to stick frilly underpants on it. Or not. Ernest
Hemingway got pretty far keeping it real.
If you are designing anything, sketch first--and think before that. I don't care whether
you're designing a ginormous PowerPoint show, a "simple" logo or the company's newsletter in Word, before you do anything, get out paper and pen and
doodle. Also, doodle with ideas: write out all the stuff you want to accomplish with your piece, get super-clear on intent, content and order, and
then commence to using your digital toolbox. Desktop publishing is great, but its ability to make things look awesome is a double-edged sword. Bad
information beautifully expressed is still bad information. Plus, as with all kinds of communication, it's much easier to let your mind wander when
it has a safe, fenced-in area in which to do so.
Finally...
If you have to memorize material (for a play, film, etc.), rehearse it in a range of
accents or, if you stink at dialects, silly
voices.
Part of why we go "up" on lines is because we learn patterns of words
by rote, rather than the meanings and emotions behind them.
Doing the material over and over with different voicings breaks that
rote drilling, and forces your monkey brain to wrap itself around the
words
differently. Try it; it works!
Got any other tricks for helping yourself create masterpieces? I'd love to hear
them!
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