Latest / Radiant Voices / Public Speaking Tips from a World Champion | Verity Price
Transcript
- speaker-0: think you have to start at a place of soul. A lot of people when they communicate, they communicate from the head. And I've got this belief that if you're wanting to change someone's mind, you first have to change their heart. So you have to speak from a heart place. And it was finding that story that I knew I had something that if I applied the craft to it, could win. speaker-1: Hello and welcome everybody. Today I have the wonderful Verity Price, who is an international keynote speaker, a speaking and presenting coach, and she won the 2021, hear this, Toastmasters World Champion of Public Speaking, the best speaker in the world in 2021. We are going to investigate all things public speaking and her journey of finding her voice, developing confidence, and then learning how to transfer and share that skill with human beings in the world. And we're definitely gonna spend some juicy time going into the minuti, the nerdy details of how you prepare for and deliver a world champion speech. Okay, welcome Verity. speaker-0: I'm so happy to be here and it sounds like we're going deep. So I'm ready. speaker-1: We are going deep indeed. Let's begin in the beginning where you and I both got to know each other, which was in the music industry. How did you become a singer? And what was the journey of finding your voice and becoming confident in front of people? speaker-0: ⁓ It's a long story because it's the last thing I ever thought I was going to do with my life. As a little girl, I wanted to act. So I did want to be on stage and I used to practice the acceptance speech, the Oscar acceptance speech with my hairbrush. But after being bullied in high school, after getting the lead in the school play, I very quickly discovered or decided that if you stand out, people are going to stand on you. So just stay at the back, keep safe, don't take up space. But life has a funny way of having other plans and on my 20th birthday at quarter past four in the afternoon, I remember because that's the exact time I was born, out of nowhere, I was sitting contemplating what I was gonna do with my life and I felt inspired to start writing. And when I finished, it was lyrics. There was verse and a chorus and a verse and a chorus and I was like, where did this come from? And it just kept coming. These songs kept coming. And it was like some part of me was saying, you need to put this in the world. And that was a problem because I suffered from debilitating stage fright by that point. And so I kind of say, I didn't choose music, it chose me. But from writing my first song to starting my music career took me seven years. speaker-1: Wow. Yeah, so many people who watch this podcast and follow my work are very anxious speakers and they will absolutely identify with having been bullied as a child. Sometimes the bullying starts in the family or it happens at school and then this fear of being seen and heard develops. How did you deal with that anxiety that must have arisen the moment you stood up in front of people? Let's just say that your first performance, like what did that feel like? What happened in your body? speaker-0: So I do remember my first performance because I actually did manage to get on stage twice in my early 20s and the first time was at a singing like a contest at a folk music club here in South Africa, the Barleycorn Music Club. And not only did I decide to sing one of my songs, it was a song called Everything with Silence and it was about, you know, do we need words to be really be heard? You know, can we say things in silence? So I thought maybe I should also learn sign language to do this. So I was learning sign language from a friend, practicing to sing that song in this competition. And I honestly felt nauseous for three days leading up to it. My body was a mess. The shaking, the anxiety, I'd added an extra layer of pressure because now I was singing in two languages. And I can't say that I got on stage and was like, wow, that was amazing. I was just so relieved it was over. A part of me went, ⁓ you can actually do that. So it wasn't easy, it didn't solve the problem, but that was my first time. My second time on stage, I opened for Just Ginger with the same song. And that was a meaningful one for me. I was 24 years old and both my parents were in the audience and I had no idea that just a few months later my father would pass. And so he got to see me vaguely face that fear, but it took another three years to actually start singing professionally, so it wasn't a quick fix. speaker-1: Why did it take those extra few years? speaker-0: Procrastination, I think often it is easier to stay in your room dreaming than to step out your door and try and potentially fail. But losing my dad was the wake up call of life is short and why am I setting all these big dreams for myself but just thinking about it? And funnily enough, the thing that started the journey, and this is not what everyone should be doing because not everyone has the time, but I decided to walk the Camino. to Santiago de Compostela in memory of my dad. It was 800 kilometers, 500 miles on my own and when I got to Santiago after walking for five weeks I thought you know what if you can walk across the country you can walk onto a stage. speaker-1: It's beautiful story and there's so much in that. I think so many folk who are interested in this work have got a story inside them. They've got this feeling of, on the one hand, a deep anxiety about being seen and heard, but usually there's this secret desire, like a real kind of internal fire to put out some form of message, some kind of contribution. And it's incredibly painful to carry these ⁓ these stories stuck inside. But of course, ⁓ you know, a debilitating fear is incredibly frightening on the one hand, and then will result in, for example, procrastination, like you said. And so one lives with these endless dreams potentially, not actualizing them, and usually a lot of frustration. So I mean I I love your description of going on the Camino and I suppose really processing your fear and you obviously did a lot of contemplation on that walk. So what happened next? You started as a as a singing artist, but public speaking then arrived on the radar how? And and what was it like? Yeah, what was it like? speaker-0: Sure. It was, that was an unexpected journey. think, can I take one step back? Please. Because there was a really big part of that helped me to build confidence with speaking and it started recording my first demo, just finding that one person that I felt safe with, my producer, Bruce Music, you might know Bruce. And working with him on that demo, I had that one person saying, you can do this, try that, push your voice a little bit. And I felt unjudged. You know, people say we're afraid of public speaking. We're afraid of public judgment. And so that relationship with Bruce started building my confidence. And then I took that demo to the States, you know, because I was like, ⁓ let me crack open the South, you know, the, American music industry, which I didn't do because we know that. But while I was there, I got a vocal coach named Joe and Joe, Joe was the game changer for me because I would go for lessons. apartment and he looked like James Brown, Younger's brother. was this tiny little African-American guy. was a complete character. And the first time I tried to sing for him, he kind of switched off the music and he said, Verity, I'm not going to teach you how to sing. I'm going to teach you how to be confident. So I thought, okay, well, how do you do that? And it was very weird. He would turn up the music, would turn down the music, he would knock over the microphone. He'd invite his neighbors in for tea while I was trying to have my lessons. And every time I got thrown and I'd lose my place and I doubt myself, he would come up to me and he would say, Verity, when things go wrong, just keep on. And at the time, I was like, this guy is weird. I'm spending a lot of money on these lessons and I wasn't sure it was working. But when I came back to South Africa and I started singing professionally, firstly, I was starting to see the audience as a friend, as an audience of one, not hundreds of eyes, was one person, one heart that I needed to connect with. Secondly, things went wrong, as you know, on stage all the time, and I would just keep going. And I once fell face first in front of 700 people walking onto stage. And that was the day I learned what Joe had been teaching me about confidence. Because I think that's why most people don't want to speak. You just heard this shock from the audience and lying on the floor I turned around and I looked at them and I said, well, I can only go up from here. And there was this incredible moment of connection with the audience and that was where I discovered that confidence is being okay with it not being okay. speaker-1: Mm-hmm. I hope you all heard that. Confidence is be is say it again. Okay. Confidence is okay with it not being okay. I think that's so beautiful. That's such a great story, thank you. And it is that, it's this willingness to be imperfect, the w willingness to stutter like I just did, willingness to be imperfect on the internet, on a stage. And in that process, like you said, the audience becomes a friend. speaker-0: is being okay with it not being okay. speaker-1: It begins as this incredibly threatening ⁓ feeling of walking onto a stage and as you mentioned, those eyes on you and it feels like one is going to be judged and rejected and never be enough. And there's this potential to move through into a state of friendship and communion even with audiences and call it even love and appreciation and connection. And that's really what our voices are meant for, or the potential in our voices is to connect and truly create a sense of bonding and to be able to share our message and put it out into the world with courage, a little bit of panache and the willingness to fail and fail again and still get up, like Veriti said. Thanks for that story. So you began public speaking, how and why? speaker-0: So the public speaking was also unexpected. It's funny, my life has been a series of I didn't choose this, where did it come from? Because I was singing, I was trying to be a pop star. I was now practicing the Grammy, except in speech with the hairbrush, know, it was all happening. But in my music industry journey, I needed funds for my first album. I brainstormed with my sister. We came up with an idea of asking people to buy it before we recorded it. So this was 2005. We didn't realize that what I was doing would one day be called crowdfunding. And we sold 2000 copies of nothing in 25 countries. And what happened was no one was interested in my music. They were like, come talk to us about innovation. Come talk to us about pioneering crowdfunding. And that was tough. I'm not going to lie. I loved it. I realized I love being with an audience. I love sharing a message. But my ego was in conflict because I was trying to be a pop star. Why would they ask me to speak? They were like, no, you don't need to bring your band. Just come talk to us. And I honestly got stuck in a ⁓ very interesting tug of war between my ego and my soul. And it took a lot of grace and a lot of introspection to realize, yes, my ego thought I was meant to be a singer, but my soul was telling me, speaking, teaching, facilitating, coaching, that's actually your path. And when I started listening to that, my whole life changed. speaker-1: Wow. Wow, that's beautiful. Yeah, I I think I've got a bit of a similar experience. Spent so much time in the music industry and it's been so c it was so core to my identity. But really what I I same thing, what I what I find myself contributing on planet Earth is about helping people liberate their voices and finding the courage to express themselves in the spotlight or with their families or wherever they need to. So here we are. So ⁓ let's segue straight across to this meaty thing. We're gonna skip out a bit of history, which we might get to later, but I'd love to just get to you find yourself lining up, attempting to become the world champion speaker. And how do you prepare what does it look like to prepare a world champion speech? speaker-0: It's a lot of work. The one thing I can say, you know, if anyone's in Toastmasters and trying to compete for this, you've got to look at it like the Olympics of public speaking. You would prepare like an athlete would trying to get gold in the Olympics. So for me, the backstory without history is it was 10 years in Toastmasters, 10 years of watching other people speak, watching other people win, losing, learning that I didn't always have the right approach. And so when I entered in 2021, I entered with what I call a champion mindset, which is a growth mindset. I'd watched all the winning speeches. What were they doing? How could I take what worked for them and apply it in my style? I'd looked at why I'd lost. Okay, what am I going to do differently this time? I had to be prepared to put in a lot of effort because it was locked down. So I was literally on a virtual screen with no audience. So there was a lot of mindset that went into it. But the actual mechanics is understanding that if you've got seven minutes to speak to the world, it needs to be a message that moves you to your core. You need to be speaking from a place of passion, of conviction, of authenticity. And that comes from story. And for me, the easy part was when I knew what I wanted to talk about, which was my dad and the last letter he wrote to me three months before he died. when I was still too afraid to actually sing. And it was this message of your life is a book and if you are not enjoying the read, pick up your pen and write a different story. speaker-1: Yeah. Let me ask you, were you feeling some emotion as you were expressing this now? Yeah, I could feel it too. And and I mean I feel it right now as as we're speaking. I mean I it's in my voice and and I suppose that's what the opportunity is, is are you are you willing to put one put yourself out and express something so deeply meaningful and heartfelt into the world? And you obviously develop the courage over time. And I think we're gonna spend some more time about this level of storytelling, like the willingness to go into yourself and just tell something that is deeply personal and real for you. The moment Verity started speaking about that, I can still feel it. Like my the skin on my arms is is kind of ⁓ the hair on my arms is raised. It's an incredibly powerful place to start. Let me go back to you. So okay, so this is really powerful about your father and about authoring your own story. Please tell us more. That was amazing. Ha ha. speaker-0: So this is where it gets even deeper is that you have to be prepared. It's that being okay with not being okay. I spoke about a time of falling flat on my face. I chose to work on a speech about being 40, single, no children, no house, living in my sister's spare room. So really was a lot. Music career had failed. And I chose to go into that story and share how finding my dad's letter in a very messy room one day gave me the wake-up call I needed to start changing my thinking, to change my attitude. And in all good stories, what happens is you share the hero at their lowest point, you introduce a guru or a mentor that helps them to change, and that was my father and that was his letter, and then you show them the transformation and You know, I was competing at 46. I had met my husband at 41. I'd got married at 43. I'd had a child, a miracle child at 44. And here I was at 46, back in a spare room, turning it into a world stage. And so that was the story that I knew the world needed in lockdown. And I'm getting emotional again because... If you ever follow the World Championships, there are two speeches. So you have one speech you compete with for seven months to get you to the finals, to get you to give that best speech. And that one had been about my mum. So this was like my year of really paying tribute to them. And when I won the Southern African level with my mum's speech, which was her lesson she taught me growing up, leave the world better than you find it. It's simple. She was normally talking about my cupboards in my bedroom. speaker-1: Yeah. speaker-0: Which I thought he was a mess still. there's a lesson there. But that was why I knew I needed to speak about my dad. And while I'm not going into the speech craft right now, I think you have to start at a place of soul. A lot of people when they communicate, they communicate from the head. And ⁓ I've got this belief that if you're wanting to change someone's mind, you first have to change their heart. So you have to speak from a heart place. It was finding that story that I knew I had something that if I applied the craft to it could win. speaker-1: It's so powerful. And of course, it's this willingness to vulnerably look at one's personal history and be willing to talk about the hardest things and to share your the hardest things with with an audience. But in that act of vulnerability, hearts crack open and incredible potential emerges, right? It's powerful. Amazing. Okay, so so Y this personal story is at the heart of it. You obviously had to craft that then into seven minutes of really, really accurate storytelling. did you write it out in full? Was it bullet points? Take take us through the detail. speaker-0: For a world champion's speech, this is like Borum dancing. Every word is chosen with precision. Seven minutes, you're looking at about 750 words. I wrote, for both speeches, I wrote more than 30 versions of each. I rehearsed in 42 clubs in 16 countries on five continents. I was sometimes visiting a club in Australia, then I was one in India, then I was one in New York. I was getting such diverse feedback. but I was using that to craft a speech because this is what I learnt at the end of it. A speech is not for you, it's for your audience. And we always call it presenting. And it suddenly hit me, it's got the word present in it. And I was like, it's a gift for them. And the more I ask people what's working in my story, what do you need less of, what do you need more of, that helped me to really hone a speech down. It's like, if you look at these flowers and if we were trying to make perfume, You'd have to distill it down just to the essence, but you start with thousands of petals. And that was my experience. It was so much. I mean, I was talking my life up to 44. I can't give the audience all of that in seven minutes. So it's using analogies. I built the idea around I wanted the fairy tale. And let me tell you, if you turn 40 single with our children, you haven't had the fairy tale. Two sentences, the audience knows where you act. I put them in the fact that I was stuck in a spare room eating ice cream, watching Netflix. So it's a universal image that like, even if you haven't gone through that, you go, it's kind of like, I know what losing at life looks like and that sounds like it. So I really had to find the key moments so that I could put them inside the struggle that I was having so that when I found my dad's letter and it said, here's a way forward, pick up your pen, write a different story. I could also draw people into the fact that I didn't... Here's the big lesson with storytelling. A lot of speakers do this and a lot of people telling a story is they forget some of the struggle. So I someone said you should run a marathon. And guess what? I did the comrades and they leave out the whole journey of the training and what, how you changed. And I did that in early versions, but I had to really distill. I didn't accept my dad's message straight out. I was like, really? Have you seen my life? How would you like me to get positive about this? I was on Facebook. Everyone's lives looked amazing. And then I kept thinking of him and how he'd done that, how he'd been such an example to me. And then I could show the audience how I started changing my attitude. So it takes time to sometimes get into the gold of a lived experience because what we tend to do is gloss over it and forget to take people into it. given you a lot. speaker-1: No, I love that. That's it's I mean it's beautiful. There's so much to so much that you've shared about storytelling and just the richness of that story of the ice cream and Netflix. It's just a a little indicator of what it's like to take people into the small moments in one's life. And I think people often feel like, ⁓ I don't have a story, nothing spectacular. I didn't grow up Everest, you know, and it's that's not really what's interesting. What's interesting is that moment of crisis. where one sat alone in one's lounge and ⁓ really had no idea how to move forward. And it's the minutiae in the room, like what was the moon or the sun doing? What song was playing? ⁓ what did you eat? Were you nibbling on some some chips and tomato sauce? And ⁓ you'd run out of protein and you hadn't eaten veggies for a week. You know, what is ⁓ So storytelling. speaker-0: was that? speaker-1: I'd love to just also stay within the minutia of preparing for that speech. That's incredible. As you said, you you really you actually practiced practice that speech all around the world. Let's just say for a a for a classic Toastmasters seven minute, if you were advising a client for for per for preparing for one of them, how much preparation would they do if they wanted to excel? speaker-0: On average, for every minute that she's speaking is 10 hours of prep. If you want to do great, great communication. It's almost like TV commercials. They do more work on a TV commercial sometimes than you do on a feature film for those 30 seconds or that one minute. So it is huge preparation. It's intentionality. But the formula that I came up with, this idea that it's a gift, gives you four steps. Step one, get clear on the message. When you finish speaking, what's that one sentence that people are going to repeat? I still get emails Five years later saying, very tea, I lost my job, but I'm picking up my pen, I'm writing a different story. And I go, okay, that message has been communicated. So you want something that's memorable, that's personal to you, that you're excited about. And once you've got that, that's what they take home. You wrap it, you intentionally wrap it, so that's the eye of gift, is with the story and how you tell the story. So we can talk about how to tell a great story later. The F is the fill in the gaps. That's what I did by going and visiting clubs. What's working? What's making sense? Because I can't assume how people are hearing my story. And I was competing internationally. So in early versions of my story, I was saying, you know, our family had to leave Zimbabwe after the civil war. We moved to Cape Town and people are like, where is Zimbabwe? When was there a war in Zimbabwe? I was like, my dad lost his job. We had to live in a caravan. What's a caravan? I mean a camper van. Like I had to keep changing for them. And then the T, the final step is to tie it all together. Powerful communication takes the audience. When you get to the end, it's taking them right back to where you started. So it's every golden moment, every incredible punchy phrase that you've said, you start bringing it into your closing so that the last sentence you leave with them. They go, wow, thank you, you've given me something. Formula, gift formula. speaker-1: Amaz Yeah. Okay, the formula that is No, it's it's ⁓ wonderful to be led through it. Okay, let's go back into the anatomy of preparing for this world class speech. Or if you're just gonna prepare your seven minute pitch to the boardroom next Thursday, how do you prepare? How much rehearsal would you on average do? You mentioned I think ⁓ ten hours per minute. speaker-0: Of writing and preparing, yeah. So because it was a competition speech, it was extraordinary circumstances. The last three months of the contest, I was rehearsing two to four hours a day. Between writing and rehearsing, I would film myself. So I would do a full delivery, then I would watch back what's working, how's my timing, because it's very technical. So if you go and watch a Toastmaster speech, please know you do not have to speak like that in life. It is competition speaking. It is a different world, but it really teaches you the craft. So I was watching myself. I was sending it to people, getting their feedback. So there was a lot of that rehearsal. But then I also would go for a walk in the mountains and I would speak through it just like I was chatting to a friend. So not delivering it, but internalizing it. And I think this is the most important thing for preparation. Please don't memorize what you're saying. internalize, know the journey you're taking an audience on. There's a technique called the memory palace. If you struggle with remembering things, I don't know if you know this, but you place your speech around your house. I'm to be at my front door when I say this in the introduction. Then when I'm in my lounge, I'm going to say this point, then I'm going to go to the kitchen. It helps people amazingly. So I would walk and I would just create my memory palace of the story and where I was taking the audience. And then the fun one, so that you don't take yourself too seriously, is practice it like you're telling a four-year-old. And you can be talking to the board, I'm here to tell you the numbers, how, you know, and you're not gonna do that. But what that does is it tells your brain and your body, this is not going to kill you. You're going to be fine. So those are the things I did to keep it fresh. And sometimes in those silly rehearsals, I uncovered a new humor moment or a different way of pausing. So mix it up. Please don't ever practice nervous. So a lot of people do, I've got to do my speech and I'm practicing like this. Your whole body is getting the instruction that this is hard. speaker-1: And you're training that nervousness and the anxiety right into the speech. What do you what what do you do about anxiety in your coaching and how do you support people with that? speaker-0: So physiologically, specifically just before speaking, the two things I always give people as a technique is coming to the breath. So my one that works really well for me is four in through the nose, hold for four and out for eight. While I'm doing that, there's a lot of positive talk. I heard a really interesting thing about ⁓ anxiety and terror and excitement the other day because You know, they're processed in the same part of the brain, but I've never heard it this way. Fear is anticipation of the future with a negative outcome. Excitement is anticipation of the future with a positive outcome. So to tell yourself, I'm ready, I've done the work. So the breathing really works. And then I'm a big fan of a power pose. I was walking around before the world championship like this, thanking my parents. speaker-1: Ha ha ha. speaker-0: You know, I can do this. I mean, my heart was racing. There was one part of me going, are you crazy? I think it's a fluke you got here. And another part was going, you just keep quiet. She's all over this. that insecurity doesn't go away. But I found that checking in with your physiology, being grounded, actually went for foot massages the day of each contest. I went to where my parents' ashes were scattered to connect with actually why I was speaking. And I think all of that really, really helped. it's finding a ritual that works for you, something that builds you up, a song that makes you feel positive, telling yourself, I'm ready rather than I'm nervous. Those are the techniques that I try to really help my clients with. speaker-1: Sounds good, sounds good. What about imposter syndrome? What do you do with that and and how is that featured in your life? speaker-0: ⁓ there's nothing like getting a really big title and going, me? You know, because I'd been looking up to world champions for 10 years and suddenly I am one. So the one thing I know about imposter syndrome is probably the biggest problem that we have as human beings is we put happiness and fulfillment on the other side of success. Like if I get the trophy, then I'll feel fine. And I got the trophy and I was like, ⁓ wow, the issues I had before the trophy are still here with the trophy. So imposter syndrome is very, very real for me. I will sometimes doubt, you know, who am I to be here? And then I have, I don't know how to explain it. I mean, I sound like I've got split personalities. have this idea of me, myself and I, and me is the very like, look at me, I'm amazing part of me. And myself is like, where's the ice cream? My life is hard. And I is that scented self that kind of has to balance those two. And when I let the eye of me be in a room when the imposter syndrome that myself is going, ⁓ that helps me to balance it. But I often will name it on the stage. I'm not afraid to tell an audience that I sometimes go, I can't believe I won this. You know, I sometimes think, was it because it was in lockdown and I just got lucky and they look at you, they can't believe you're thinking that. And I want them to know that anyone with an accolade is very few people unless you're on a spectrum that do not suffer from imposter syndrome. It means you care. It means you want to do a good job. Like, that's why you're like, am I good enough? And you're always like raising the bar. So it's very real for me. speaker-1: Look for me too. I I think I think sometimes if you're standing on the outside s with a stuck voice, you imagine that all the people who are putting it out into the world are just feeling amazing every second of it and it's just like I'm killing it everywhere I go. And they don't recognize that, you know, we all watch each ⁓ watch ourselves being filmed and look at the film afterwards and have kind of yik ek and aucs awkward moments and I'll watch this and w watch myself stumbling over my words and The process of putting one's voice out into the world is, as Verdi said, is a process of becoming comfortable with falling on your knees, getting up again, being imperfect, and the willingness to actually, here's the crazy thing, is to to lower your standards. You know, to actually be really good at anything in in life, and especially around speaking, you have to really humble yourself and be willing to stand up and fail and be ordinary and get off stage and think. ⁓ there are a thousand ways I could have done that better. And to then keep showing up. And ideally, along the way, to release the self-criticism, to work through the imposter syndrome, or to work through that perfectionism, because we all have some cruel voices inside, right? I don't know if you ever have, after speaking or perhaps after singing, just those voices that would arrive afterwards and dissect. How would that be for you? speaker-0: Yeah, it still happened. It happened recently with a big keynote and I was so hard on myself because what I had planned and it was a new keynote I'd written and it was an hour which is, you know, it's a lot of pressure. But I knew it, but I sat in the conference the whole day taking in what was happening because I like to draw on that in the moment. So what I did on stage, like I was throwing stuff in and examples and there's a part of me going, this is not what you planned. what's going on? But I did the talk and people said they loved it, but I was like... wasn't what I planned, that wasn't right. I really, got back on the plane flying home being really hard on myself and then two days later I watched it and I was like this was valuable. This was what needed to be in the room. Who are you to think that what you planned was what everyone needed? Like that's what needed to flow through and it was quite humbling. So that's a big one and the other thing I really want to touch on because a lot of people don't think about this is We often are basing our self-worth and whether we're good enough on how the audience is reacting. And I get a lot of very favorable reactions as a speaker and as a trainer, people always nodding and smiling. So my ego goes, this is great. I'm doing such a good job. And about two years ago, I was training young graduates. So very different audience to my more kind of senior executives. I mean, I couldn't get them to put their phones down. They looked bored stiff for two days. I was... And the voice was going. I was like, you're not relevant. You're a middle-aged housewife. They're thinking white. I mean, it was wild. And I did my course because I had to. And part of my training, I get people to write each other, they call them woohoo notes. So when people stand up and practice, they get a note of affirmation. It's beautiful for confidence. And I mean, these kids were loving it. It was happening. But I'm going, they don't need me here. I am so last century for them. At the end of the course, I was saying thank you and this girl puts up her hand and she goes, sorry ma'am, which was slightly depressing, but I was like, okay, I'm now a ma'am. She says, sorry ma'am, I've got something for you. And she walked out. She had a pile of woohoo notes. I'm getting really emotional. From like 37 of these, like 20-somethings, the affirmation of what they'd been receiving, but it did not look like it for two days. It looked like nothing was going in. And I thought, who am I to judge how my value that I'm bringing is landing? Who am I to think that it's only valuable if it's being smiled at and applauded? And sometimes people are really like, this is terrible. That does happen. But that was a beautiful moment. Just because someone's sitting quietly, you might be impacting them profoundly. just allow for that possibility. Just allow for that. speaker-1: Yeah that's Yeah, that's so powerful. And actually the neuroscience tells us that when we are anxious, we will tend to misread facial signals. So someone might have just a very neutral expression and we'll read that as boredom. And really what we'll do is project our fear and anxieties and insecurities onto our audience and presume ⁓ that they're having a negative experience. So ideally develop some positive self-talk around that. I love that story though about how you misread them so terrible. speaker-0: It like going home at night going, what am I going to do tomorrow? It was a beautiful. speaker-1: Yeah, that's incredible. Yeah, and so and so really that just speaks to this thing of of also of coming into oneself and learning to trust one's voice. And ⁓ rather than the kind of hyper vigilance. We start with this hypervigilance where we're we're scared, we're looking every second as we speak, are we are we failing? Do they hate us? Are they gonna reject us? Are they gonna you know? Call us off stage and all of the other frightening scenarios that we could possibly imagine. And there's a process of slowing down and moving, I think you, as you said, into one's eye, into one's core, and learning to sit within oneself when speaking. How do you support your clients then to move out of those, those perhaps those two other at parts of self into more of the core of themselves and what effect does that have on their speaking? speaker-0: think the way that I help my clients with that is interestingly in the process of how I help them write their speech. Because a lot of why the me and the myself show up, the me is like, I'm amazing, let me tell you about all my accolades. And the audience does not like that. They like speakers that are similar to them, not separate. So if I've got someone like that, I've got to try and make them more human and more accessible. And then if I've got someone who's stuck in myself, I'm like... good enough, you know, why me? My job is to take whatever story they've brought to me and find the gold in it. And it is the privilege of a lifetime because sometimes someone gives me a story and they've told me it all and I'm listening and then I just go, that moment with your grandmother, what did she say there that changed the way you think? Because it's not in their speech and they suddenly, ⁓ I don't, and I'm like, I've got a feeling like, we'll dig and we'll suddenly hit something. That is them. It's their truth. And when someone finds that, the whole speech changes. Because this is not a performance anymore. This is a conversation. This is a sharing of me, of that I, that absolute truth of who I am, how life has shaped who I am. And so that's the place that I play. Because at the end of a session when someone's going, I can't wait to share this. They don't know we're there. And I mean, this is not just speakers. I'm doing this with financial analysts where we're taking a huge financial plan, but we're finding an analogy that they can explain complex numbers with. They go, ⁓ I can't wait to tell my colleagues. And I go, no, that's the eye that's going to show up. So that's the way I'm doing it. Definitely not a therapist, but we do cry a lot in our sessions sometimes because we suddenly realize, like, people stumble onto deep gratitude for lessons they didn't realize. had shaped them just because they'd never put words to them. speaker-1: That's beautiful. And and I think it's so powerful 'cause really also what you're describing is this move From the head, from analytic analytical facts, or a dry a dry narrative that's really just kind of logical into meaningful stories, into sharing the heart of what's real for them, or finding, as you said with the financial analyst, just finding beautiful metaphors that turn a dry ⁓ actuarial speech into something that can light up an audience. And instead of being ⁓ watching paint dry for this speech, suddenly the speaker discovers that they can be entertaining. And I think most of us, and certainly it was true for me approaching public speaking before I I began to do that, is I never really thought I had stories. I didn't think I had stuff to tell. And ⁓ this process that you're describing leading folks into is helping them find the deep stories, the stories where when one begins to talk about it, your voice catches in your heart and in your throat because there's emotion. And the moment that's happening, it brings us into ourselves. And it's hard not to tell the story from a place of authenticity. And so I think that's that's also where the speech writing craft is is so powerfully. It's one of the things I like to say is is is is a well-written speech is your get out of jail free card because it it will l it automatically guarantees that no matter what you do on that stage, something beautiful will happen. Of course you want to add on stagecraft and the ability to deliver it fluently. Perhaps we if you've just got a w a moment for me, can we talk about stagecraft and just what are the essential components of things you bring together when you're getting up on a stage to persuade, connect and be authentic? speaker-0: I love that. it actually, again, it comes back to the gift, you know, how do you like to receive a gift? If something gets given to you in a crumpled brown bag, you're going to be like, I don't feel special. But if it's beautifully wrapped and presented, you go, ⁓ I want to open this. So that's from the moment you walk into a conversation, onto a stage. Do you look presentable? your shoulders back? Are you smiling? Are you making eye contact with warmth and authenticity? Because then people are like, this looks like there's something valuable here. Because if you walk in like this and your voice is kind of croaking, they're already speculating, is this going to be worth my time? So it's very much how we stand. You want to face the audience. It's finding, I call them safe eyes, find the people that are smiling. Don't look at the blank faces because it's going to kick the voice in. So the people that are smiling, that are nodding, so that you feel connected because that already grounds you. and your body needs to show up. So a lot of people always say to me, I don't know what to do with my hands. And that's normally because they've forgotten to tell a story. If I'm talking about facts and trying to get through all the data, I don't know what to do with my hands. But if I'm saying to you, you know, this is like a train journey and we're going to have stations along the way, your body's going to naturally speak. So that's helping people to show up with their full body, with a strong voice, with pace, with energy. My big trick is to understand the difference between weak words. I call it weak words or wow words. Okay, so a weak word and I had this with a client once for a Ted talk. She was telling a story of as a teenager she would climb out her window when her parents were sleeping and she said, I went up the street to go party with my friends, but went doesn't carry energy. So we changed one word. We changed it to snuck. You try to say the word snuck without like suddenly and then the audience also goes like, ⁓ you snuck and they're all with you. So it's like rushed, terrified, know, extraordinary. You want to use words that bring energy because that's when you start to share who you are. And those are small choices. But when people make them, they suddenly go, ⁓ I'm excited to have my voice in the room. speaker-1: That's so powerful and I love how that tricks the whole body into expressing it. So as opposed to one having to kind of deliberately and a bit dramatically put one's arms out, you're really just narrating a story like you would with friends because there's enough meat and juice in the story that you can't help yourself but act it out or demonstrate the moves. I would love us to talk about moving beyond rehearsal. Mm. This thing about right with this the fully scripted speech, all the detail, we rehearse it endlessly, versus moving on to bullet points and the move to trusting your voice, to trust your voice to just flow out and that the words will come out just right. How does that happen? What's the benefit? Would you recommend it? speaker-0: It's definitely how I speak now, but it's taken years of many prepared speeches, learning how to write a good speech, how to speak in short sentences, vivid or wow words. All of those tricks that I learned through preparing then help to show up when I'm unprepared. And I can draw on them because they're in my memory banks. So my... Biggest tool that I try to teach people is build a memory bank and I call them sticky statements. They're your like little catchphrases of what you stand for and what you believe in because you'll find that you can kind of pull on them in the moment. So if I'm speaking about thinking and innovation in the moment, I'll say, you know what, if you can change your thinking, you can change your results, it works, but it's there for me. I don't have to have rehearsed it anymore. So those are things like what are the mottos that you enjoy, catchphrases that would help you organize your thoughts in the moment. With bullet points, it's great if you know what you're wanting to say with clarity. What happens with bullet points is people start to talk around the point and they start to waffle and then they start to panic because they can hear, ⁓ no, I'm not getting my point across. So with any communication opportunity, it's going, what is the message I want them to walk away with? What's that one thing I want them to know? And then share content around that fluidly. So I don't know if that helps. Very much does. speaker-1: It v yeah, and and tell me, what does it feel like for you to then speak like that? Do you prefer it to the prepared speech? speaker-0: I like the combination. So if I'm honest, today a lot of what I'm sharing with you are stories I've told before. So are they prepared? I'm drawing on them in the moment but I've told them so many times before I know how to tell them in a way that I enjoy telling them. And that's what I think if you have a repository of those stories, those moments that you can draw on because Your lived experience, your stories, that's where your value lies. And why unprepared speaking is so scary is there's nothing behind you to like, you know, the pantry's empty. But if you've got like, ⁓ I can draw that story, that happened at varsity. ⁓ that thing happened once on the way to work. I learned to boil an egg once and I learned this lesson about whatever, not dropping it on the floor. They could be really small moments, but suddenly they'll go. can't believe the story that person told me about the egg. That was unforgettable. And now your value's been in the room. So it's going back through your life and going, what are the stories I enjoy telling? What are the moments that have mattered? The situations that have shaped me? The challenges that have changed me? That's where your value lies. And then impromptu and to do with work, it's the same thing. what's an analogy of how I explain this concept that I could draw on in the middle of the board meeting? It's not prepared, but it's in my pantry and it's just there. And I think that's what people don't give themselves the gift of. They feel like it's, I've got to go find it. But you can get in the habit of going, I've actually got so much inside me. And if you start speaking in pictures and stories, it's very easy to remember. speaker-1: Yeah, this thing about pictures and stories. I know we've we've said it already in this conversation, but I think most people feel like they have no stories inside them and it it's it's it once you begin to play with stories you realize how absurd it is. It often is helpful to have someone like Verity ⁓ or myself or anyone who coaches to help you find your stories. But it becomes more normal to look back on your life and look at these key points, moments of struggle, moments of achievement, and then the incredibly ordinary moments. You know, I think that's you know, that's often when speaker-0: They're my favorite. speaker-1: ⁓ It literally is, you know, it's down to the fine detail of the fact that I love oil grey, I I love oil grey tea, I I I like oil grey with Roybor, so I have decaf oil grey, I like loose leaf caffeinated oil grey tea, I have it with oat milk or macadamia milk, but I have a lot of oil grey tea. I'm a lover of bergamo. Anyway, it's the kind of arbitrary detail that allows people to connect. And We imagine speaking is this athletic, it is very athletic, but that it's a a lot of facts, you need to come up with incredible ideas. But often it's this drilling down into the small details of life and into the emotional and meaningful and vulnerable moments of life. And we all have that. All we have to do is just be willing to go into our our into our human story. I love what you what you said about actually then assembling those as a kind of a collection of stories. I'm not sure that I've done that enough. I love the sound of that process. So people find that useful then to be able to draw spontaneously. speaker-0: What you start to get into is the habits of noticing potential stories in your day. Again, we call it presenting. It's to be present. When you're present, you're noticing lessons in everyday moments. I had a bizarre one with my two-year-old making orange juice. We were squeezing and he was very sweet and he was helping me and I said, okay, we finished with that. He's like, no, and he kept going and he got more juice out of an orange that I was ready to throw away. And I looked at that little small arbitrary moment and I thought, this is the same as thinking. People brainstorm and they go, I've juiced that idea. Keep squeezing. I could make a quick little social media post. People loved it. But it was there because I noticed the value of a tiny interaction with my child. So start looking at what did I learn from this traffic jam? What happened with that rude person? What happened, you know, standing in the whatever, the checkout queue. I mean, I've got a TED talk that came out of something that happened in a checkout queue where I turned my scarf into a plastic bag because I was trying to say no to plastic. It made it into a TED stage. It was a tiny moment at a supermarket. So you've got to see the value in your lived experience and know that that is where your value lies. speaker-1: Yeah, I li reading your website, I think one of the things that you expressed a lot is this thing about as a human being with a shutdown voice that you're not bringing your value into the room. Can you express that a as as you do on the website? speaker-0: So my thing is if your voice isn't in the room neither is your value. And we're going into a world where so much is going to be done for us, so much is going to be automated. But the one thing that cannot be taken away from us is what makes us human. And so when you can really dig into what makes you human, what you believe in, what you'd fight for, what frustrates you, what excites you, and when you speak about that, that's when you become valuable. speaker-1: That's it. You know, in an AI world where a lot of communications will be semi-perfect, the one thing we can do that people really, really, really want is to dig into our own personal story and share it and make meaning. And so the incredible thing is is that all as all this text spreads across the planet, our simple humanity and the ability to express it in the moment, vulnerably, openly, authentically. is our probably our biggest asset and our biggest gift. speaker-0: Yeah, I call it the connection advantage. They don't want polished, they want personal. And that's the problem with AI, don't let it write your entire speech. I actually had a client come to me who'd had AI write a keynote for and AI said, I can't help you anymore, you need your own stories to make this work. I thought the AI knows this is not going to work without you. You are the important part, but you need to know that you're valuable. speaker-1: Beautiful, I love that. Thank you. Okay. speaker-0: and then trust slowly putting that in the rooms where your voice and your value needs to be experienced. speaker-1: That is perfect. I think we've kind of hit the end. Thank you so much, Ver Verity. This was absolutely incredible. Yeah. A thousand million nuggets of of gold here to share with everyone. So please follow Verity at VerityPrice.com. She's also on Instagram on Verity Price Speaks. Any other channels? speaker-0: LinkedIn, Facebook, all very two price speaks. speaker-1: price speaks. Yeah. And thank you so much for spending time. Yeah, it was a real joy. speaker-0: ⁓ let's keep spreading the joy. Thank you. speaker-1: Thank you.