Transcription
Do you struggle with storytelling? I want to share with you seven storytelling secrets that's going to unlock the storyteller in you. I've been teaching communication skills and storytelling now for over a decade. I've spoken on thousands of stages and I work with some of the biggest companies in the world. This stuff has been tried and tested. It works. Let's get into it.
So, my question is, I've been trying to tell my personal stories to my clients, and they're coming to consult me to help them with their issues. I'm imagining myself sharing a personal story, okay? And I'm just imagining the client just kind of like gazing at me and wondering, "Why am I telling this irrelevant story to them?"
So, pretend I'm one of your patients. Pretend I'm one of your patients and share a personal story and try to link it to me. And let's just use this as a testing ground, and we will workshop it as we go. And I think this is going to be very beneficial for everyone here because now you get to see how the sausage is made.
What kind of clients normally come to you? What are they coming to you for? What's the issue? I'm a physical therapist, so they come to me to solve our pains. So say I've got, uh, I've got back pain. Tell your story, link it best you can, and then I'll, uh, then I'll start to put the sausage together with you. I'll count you down. So, three, two, go for it.
All right, so the story is, in 2017, I went on a trip to New Zealand. And, um, we were doing a road trip with another couple friends. And on the third day, I was starting to be really tired and cranky. And it was actually a very special trip for me and my fiancé at the time, but I was so hangry and tired at the time that there's one night. So I would have to specify that on that trip, on the beginning of the trip, my, uh, my fiancé proposed to me. And on the third day, I was so tired and cranky that I started having an argument with him to the point of me throwing a flip-flop at his face. So that's my story.
I'd say, um, okay, I have no idea how to link that to back pain. Okay, okay, got it, got it, got it. I love it, love it. Okay, so I just, I was typing a couple of quick thoughts. Okay, so the thing is, first of all, before we find the link, this story is amazing. I love it. There's so much drama, so much intensity here. Uh, one thing I want you to just take note of in the story is that, uh, when you were hungry, give me a little bit of dialogue on what you were both saying before you threw the flip-flop at his face.
So he said, "I was angry." "I was tired." Right? And all of a sudden, you know, he said this, and then say what he said, and then, and then I said this, and then say what you said. And I was so, I did, you threw the flip-flop and hit him in the face. So I just want to say that that's a, that's a main point because that takes the story to another level of, uh, engagement. And then the link, I, I really think the link here is really clear in that when you're not feeling your best, you're not the best version of you that you can be. Whether it's hungry, whether you had sore feet, you can add that, you know, we're doing a lot of walking. I had sore feet, I was hungry, I was tired, I was in pain. And you, at the end of the story, you can say, you can say, "The reason I'm telling you this story is because if we don't address some of the things that cause us pain, whether it's hunger pains or whether it's pain that we feel in our feet, it causes us to be going through life irritated, sometimes treating the people we love most with a slap in the face with a thong." So I want to help you improve upon the pains that you feel in your life because I know what that's going to do is, is going to help you lead a happier and more fulfilling life so that you can be the best version of you, show up as the best version of you, and that you don't throw thongs in people's faces.
Well, in that's so good. You're hired. Right? Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much indeed. It would be, it would be weird if I was, be weird if I was at this. But I think, I think the most important thing is I want you to do that again and then just give it a try, okay? And just give it a try. And you can add in there, if you're in New Zealand, were you doing hiking in New Zealand? Did you do some hiking? Yeah. Great. So your feet are sore. My feet were sore. I had hunger pains. And one of the most beautiful moments of my life. But you know what? We had an argument. And then play the scene. What did you say? What did your husband say? What did you say? What did your husband say? I need you to do your husband's voice. He was like, "What's wrong, baby?" I need you to do that, okay? Because your husband doesn't sound like you, Louise. You'd be like, "What's wrong?" You know, do that dopey guy's voice that guys do. But we always sound like that. "What's wrong? Why don't you just sit on your hands in?" Because that sounds even really annoying, right? And you'd be like, "Oh, I'm, I'm hungry." And I need you to play up the emotions. "I'm hungry. I'm cold. And you haven't stopped when I wanted to have lunch." And so build up that intensity a little more for me. Playful, playfulness. Don't be afraid of it. Safe environment. All right, let's go round two. In three, don't think about it. Two, give it the best you got. Bring the characters to life. Go for it.
On my trip to New Zealand, on the first day, my husband proposed to me. We spent two great days hiking, looking at the great scenery in New Zealand. But on the third day, I was starting to be really tired. We walked a lot. I didn't sleep well. And I was getting hungry. We weren't eating on time either. So on that evening, on the third day, my husband asked me, "So Louise, how are you feeling? Are you okay?" I said, "No, I'm really tired." He asked me, "Well, if you're tired, just go to sleep then." I said, "No, actually, I'm just, it's not that I'm just tired. I'm hungry. I'm really hungry. And I'm cold." He said, "Well, if you're cold, just put your hands under your lap then." Then I went, "I don't like this." So I, I kicked my flip-flop. One flew over his head. I kicked the other one. That one landed on his face.
So the reason why I'm telling you this story is that don't ignore your hunger. Pay attention to your needs and take care of your body because when you don't, then you don't show up the best version of yourself.
Oh, love it! Can we give her a big round of applause in chat? Big round of applause for Louise. That was amazing, Louise. My only thought here to share with you is, you, you, you crushed it almost immediately. You, you, you did so well. So coachable. Love that you applied the lessons we've learned. I would only say in parting here, don't be afraid to play more. Don't be afraid to play more, right? You took the playing from like a two to a four. I'd love to see you take it up to an eight. And I mean it, right? You, because the most beautiful thing about storytelling is when we're playing with the dialogue like that, we want people to feel like they're actually there with us. And while you're playing the characters there, give yourself the freedom to be even overly animated because it's okay. It's not you. You're just saying, "And that's what my husband said." And I would tease him a little more, you know? And I play, I'll play that part because that's so powerful. And then now you see the link. You can't unsee it. So I would go through the linking process because the way I was able to do that was when I was listening to you tell the story, I was like, "Hmm, what else does this story symbolize?" This story symbolizes feeling hunger pains, pain in my feet. And I was like, "That's it. That's the link into the pain in my back." You did great. How good's that? Imagine you're sitting down with with an expert and you're feeling back pain, and they start with a story like that that deeply engages you, that builds deep connection with you, and then they link it to what you're going through and how you're going to help them lead a more healthy life, as opposed to just coming in and then starting the process. One creates connection, creates rapport, creates depth. Then you go into helping them. Beautiful. That was amazing. Well done. Did you see what we just did there? Louise didn't just learn a new storytelling skill. She immediately learned and then right after that, took action and applied the lessons that she learned, and she was immediately able to get results. The problem with the world today is that we're so addicted to knowledge acquisition. We just keep learning, learning, learning, learning, and we never apply anything. That's why the majority of people in the world feel hopeless and they feel like, "Oh, I'm uninspired. I can't get anywhere." It's because inspiration comes from taking action. And if you feel inspired from this video and you want to take things to the next level, I'm running a free two-hour masterclass titled "Unlock Your Voice, Unlock Your Potential." Come join me. We won't only just learn in this session, we'll also apply the lessons we learn. Just click the pin comment below. Save your spot. Back to the video.
How can I make storytelling more engaging and memorable? All right, Greg, I think one of the most fun things we could do right now is, do you have a story you can share? I do. Software development and design, and I also teach martial arts. Do you have a story around martial arts you can tell me? I lived in China and studied Shaolin and Tai Chi. Wow. Okay. Was there a moment there that stands out to you? Probably, I don't know. Okay, well, let's try. Because your question is about how do we bring the story to life and make it more engaging. Why don't you tell me about a moment that stands out, and we'll keep it as short as you possibly can? Share a moment that stood out while you were learning Shaolin. We're in the middle of a forest, and we got to teach Qigong, which is breathing exercises, where we got to study, um, how to better breathe and flow of energy in our bodies. One of the best experiences I ever had was sort of after practicing for a while, was when I actually really got to feel that that energy and that connection with nature when I was, um, practicing my breathing exercises in the morning in the middle of this peaceful, quiet forest in the middle of China. Beautiful. Okay. Okay.
Right, so now, now your question is, then Greg, you asked, "How do I make the stories pop more? How do I make it more vivid and engaging?" Right? Okay, so a couple of questions for you. First one, what's the name of your teacher? What was your teacher's name? Master Ting. Master Ting. Okay. So Master Ting. Now, you see, one thing to make the story more engaging is specificity. When you add more detail, the story comes to life more. So specificity is important. So instead of just saying "my teacher," right, Master Ting, and describe Master Ting a little bit, right? So how, if you had to describe him a little bit to give us an idea of what his stature was like and how he dressed, what would you say? He, he was a, uh, not a very large, large man, but, uh, he was very old. So short in stature. He'd, uh, kind of let himself go. The picture of your quintessential martial arts master after they, you know, 30 or 40 years where they've kind of semi-retired. You feel like it, uh, he's smoked and drank a lot. He also, um, was quite, uh, opinionated and sometimes if you asked too many questions, would kind of shoo you away. And what, what, what would he say while he's shooing you away? Uh, he would mutter sometimes under his breath. And what would he mutter in Chinese? He would normally mutter, sort of, uh, you know, "Just do what I, what I showed you." Okay. Do you know any Chinese, Greg? Um, it was very long time ago. My wind is very poor. Okay. No, no, that's great. That's good. Okay. So you can, so make the story come to life not only by describing Master Ting slightly because when you did, all of a sudden, you painted a picture for us, right? And then I could see people smile when you said, you know, he was, you know, he's a little bit, he was let himself go a little bit, he smokes, he drinks. And all of a sudden, you're painting this picture. Now this person comes to life for us more, whereas before it was just your master. And when you said that, I, I was imagining Bruce Lee, but now I'm kind of imagining like a different character forming, which is kind of interesting. And like you said, you know, he muttered under his breath like, "Oh, just shut up." And you can give him some dialogue because the second thing you can do is now bring him to life by giving him a little dialogue, right? So what would he say under his breath? Even if he said it in English, what would he say? Like, like he said, normally he'd just say, "Just do the technique." I love that. So you can feel free to play with the, give him a little dialogue for fun and say, you know, and he would just say us to say to us, "Just do the technique and shut up. Do it." You know? And you can kind of, you can kind of play with it a bit because then it brings his personality to life because that's the kind of attitude that I feel that that he's coming across with, right? So again, specificity brings a story to life. Dialogue adds color to the story, okay? And just like in Louise's story, when you've got that dialogue back and forth, when a story has a little bit of dialogue back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, that brings the story to life even more.
Now, here are some tips that are very important for storytelling. You want to tell the story around a peak emotional moment or a peak action moment. Steven Spielberg, I think was the person who said this. He said, "A movie is just life without the boring bits." And I think that gives us a really good indicator of what great stories are. Stories are, you tell a story around a peak emotional moment or a peak action moment. So during that story, I didn't really notice a peak emotional or peak action moment. So I would think back to, during that story, was there a peak emotional moment that you had or a peak action moment where he showed you some form of martial art that all of a sudden inspired you, or he said something to that story? The, the peak part was the connection and feeling one with nature while practicing the breathing. Um, the other part was the part that I didn't tell about Master Ting, um, I guess, uh, believing himself like in about five meters away from me in the middle of the forest while I'm trying to practice my breathing exercises. He where he peed while you were? That's a great moment. That's a great moment, right? So that part links to, links to the peak emotional moment of, um, being one with nature. Imagine telling that story. You said, like, again, you can, you can, you can bring it by bringing drama. So you can use your delivery mechanisms, being your voice, to be able to increase the storytelling ability. But imagine you did something like this, and I'm going to get you to try it in a sec. You can say, use the word "imagine." The word "imagine" is very great, really good for storytelling. So you go, "Imagine you're in the forest in, in the East of China. Leaves are blowing just effortlessly through the wind. And while I'm sitting there taking deep breaths, oh, I felt this sense of calm. And and I've never heard the sounds of birds. And and all of a sudden, I could hear this beautiful stream that I didn't know was close to me. And I was like, 'Wow, the stream is, what a strange stream. It starts and it stops, and it starts and it stops.' That's, that's, it's quite an interesting stream." And then as I open my eyes to investigate, Master Ting was peeing next to me. It wasn't a stream. He was taking, he was taking a good old piss. And you know, and all of a sudden, that story now just came to life because I was focusing on the peak moment. And all of a sudden, we're able to tease out these parts of a story, right? And then you could relate the story. You, you can almost end the story and you can say, "And you know what? The, the reason why I tell you about this moment in my life is that when you meet your heroes and you realize they're human, some people find it disappointing, but for me, I find it inspiring because it shows me that even the greatest people in this life, the most amazing people, they're human, just like you and I." All of a sudden, now that story has this depth and this meaning. So can I, can I, can I challenge you to give that a go? Sure. All right, so just give that a go. So just, you know, I want you to take a breath, right? And even you can say, "Master Ting was close to me, and he said, you know, I want you to take a deep breath and then let it out." And then do his voice a little bit. Have a bit of play. Do a little bit of, be a little playful, okay? So we just try it again and then link it to meeting your heroes, being human, etc. Just give it a go. In three, two, go for it.
Imagine, uh, you're in this beautiful forest, uh, with the wind blowing. Uh, you can hear the nature sounds of birds chirping and, uh, little insects around buzzing around. Um, you're relaxed. You're trying to practice your Qigong, your breathing methods. You're breathing in, you're breathing out. Um, you've started to feel that sense of, you know, tingles running up the spine as you feel one with nature. And, uh, all of a sudden, you start to hear this flow of water. And, and you kind of wonder, "I'm, I'm not quite so close to the lake." Uh, so what is that? What is that sound? And as, as you open your eyes and turn over to my shoulder to the right, I realize that Master Ting's there, relieving himself in the middle of the forest next to me while I'm trying to practice my Chi, my Qigong. So the reason why I was quite shocked, but the reason I'm telling you this is, um, you know, sometimes when you meet, you know, the people that you look up to or that are inspirational, um, it, it makes you understand and realize that, uh, these, these people are human, just, just like us. Um, and they have the exact same needs. They need to relieve themselves. Sometimes they just do it next to you.
Oh, I love it! You did amazing. And I love the way you said it. Someone said it in the chat. I'm going to call it out. It's like, "As I was feeling the tingling in my hands, someone was taking a tingle behind me." Master Ting was having a tingle by Catherine. Well done. How did, how did that feel, Greg, as you did that? It, good. It kind of, um, it actually kind of took, took me back to the moment a little bit as I was kind of looking over my shoulder to see. Okay. So you just unlocked something there on your own, and I'm so proud of you because when you act out part of the story, it allows you to relive the story. Whereas a lot of people just report stories. And that's the first iteration of you doing that. You're reporting the story, right? Meaning you're just giving us the list of historical things that happened. Whereas all of a sudden now, what I'm encouraging you to do there is to relive the story, right? Right. And, and then by you reliving the story for them, you also feel it. And I heard you laugh that time you tell it too. You chuckled. And when you feel it, the audience will feel it. So I got you to do that as well. Great because I wanted to show everybody else. Storytelling is one of those things where you have to give yourself permission to just start the process and start creating. And while we're creating, we create masterpieces. But you have to start. And most people don't start. They'll go, "All right, I'm going to go do storytelling." And they go, "I don't know where to start." You, it doesn't matter where, just begin. And then always start to focus, where's the peak emotion? Where's the peak, uh, peak emotion or peak action moment? And another one you can look for is you can also look for where lessons were learned. Usually there's like a peak moment where the lesson was learned. You can tell the story just around where the lesson was learned, just around the peak action moment, or just around the peak emotional moment. And those are great ways to tap into this massive pool of creativity. And look, if you want to learn more about communication skills, then click this video up here. And if you want to join me for a class and actually interact with me, then click this link here to save your spot.