Dig Deeper

We are deep in the Toastmasters International Speech Contest season here in Japan. Fortunately, I’m still alive and kicking, so Toastmasters style speeches have been on my mind a lot recently.

We Toastmasters are prone to the emotional, inspirational and motivational type of contest speeches. I’ve written and given so many variations on “Don’t give up”, “You can do it” and “Follow your dreams”, that I think I could write and deliver one in my sleep. In fact, I think I have a few times.

But while the subject matter may have gotten a bit stale for me, it’s been a very valuable process, because it has taught me a lot about the craft of structuring, writing and delivering a speech. I’ve become quite proficient at producing a certain type of clever, entertaining riff on a motivational topic.

It’s just not enough for me anymore. The skills I have developed are valuable, but I want to use them to move beyond being clever and funny, and start talking honestly about things that matter, not just to me, but to everyone.

In that state of mind, I happened to stumble across this clip of the comedian, Louis C. K., speaking at a memorial tribute to George Carlin, the 60’s, counter-culture comedian who managed the trick of staying interesting, relevant and popular long after the 60’s had faded away.

If you’re easily offended by strong language, you might want to give the video a pass, but Louis says something here that strikes me as highly relevant to my own journey.

At about the 5:28 mark, he was talking about his amazement that Carlin came up with a new hour of brilliant comedy every year, while he, Louis, kept recycling the same hour of jokes he had spent fifteen years building up.

When, in desperation over his stalled career, Louis threw out his entire act, he realized that, “When you’re done telling jokes about airplanes and dogs, when you throw those away, what do you have left? You can only dig deeper. Start talking about your feelings and who you are. And then you do those jokes and they’re gone, and you dig deeper. So then you start thinking about your fears and your nightmares.”

Louis took it a bit farther, for a laugh, but as I listened to him, it occurred to me that I had been doing the Toastmasters equivalent of speeches about airplanes and dogs; speeches about clever ideas. And the solution for me, as well, is to throw that all away and dig deeper.

So this year, my goal is to stop being clever and start being honest, start talking about who I am, what I feel, what scares or hurts me, what I want and where I’m going.  And it’s turning out to be a very scary proposition.

Talking about clever ideas has always given me a certain protective distance. The audience might not agree with what I say, but that’s OK. It’s not about me.  But when I honestly expose myself, and the audience doesn’t like it, it’s me they don’t like.

It’s terrifying to expose myself that way, not knowing how people are going to react. I feel emotionally naked on stage, but when I open myself up and the audience embraces me, it’s a communication that goes so far beyond a meeting of the minds. For the first time, I feel like I am really connecting with my audience, instead of just talking at them.

As uncomfortable as it can be, if I want to improve as a speaker, I’ve simply got to dig deeper.