Presentation pie

Pie: what unexpectedly lands on your face when you’re trying to be cool.

I was the “preacher” stand-in on Sunday, speaking at a Unitarian church about 60 miles from here while their minister was on vacation. It was the second time I’ve presented this particular sermon. The first time, about five years ago, was at my home church and it went over very well.

In the ensuing years I have gotten much more skillful not only at speaking but at crafting a tight speech/sermon. I reworked the old speech, lightened it up with some humorous quips and images, and added a rousing call to action at the end. It was definitely improved, so I felt confident all would be well.

After what happened on Sunday I can tell I need to go back to improv class, because those skills would have been handy.

Before I was to speak, the Sunday School director invited the kids to come forward for story time.  She started telling them a tale that seemed surprisingly similar to what I was about to talk about. At first I thought, “This is good - I can refer back to a couple of her ideas when I speak.”

But she went on and on, pretty much summarizing in kid’s language what I was going to talk about. As she finished she looked back at me and said, “Heheh, I hope I didn’t spoil your story….”

In Toastmasters we are warned in our introductions never to give away the speaker’s main points. For example you might say, “Today Mary will tell us the story of Goldilocks.” But you’d never say, “Today Mary is going to tell about how a little girl happened into a bear’s home while they were out and had to try every chair, bowl, and bed before she found one that was just right. Mary?”

OK, this woman’s version of the story lacked the depth, detail and brilliance of mine, and she missed some of the juicy parts, but still, she left me holding a half-eaten sandwich.

So I got up to speak and noticed that this was a crowd that likes to keep its distance. Most folks sat as far back as possible; the front five rows were empty. I thought I was in Missouri with the “show-me” congregation. Crossed arms, implacable faces.

Still, I wasn’t worried because most audiences respond fairly quickly to the warmth of my manner (not bragging; it’s true).

Ah yes. The congregation soaked up my words like a sponge. That is to say, my words landed on the congregants and disappeared without a trace.  It was like talking to acoustical tile.

I plowed on regardless and I guess it was all right. Next time I’ll bring bagels to toss into the crowd at the end of every page of text. That would get a rise out of them. But if it didn’t I’d add lox.

Afterwards I talked with a friend who had belonged to my church before she moved to this community. She noted that there were a lot of old folks in the group and said that this was their usual “response” to the sermon.

It made me really appreciate the pleasure of speaking to a responsive audience.  My home congregation really hangs in there with the minister or any guest speaker.   At Toastmasters we are totally attentive to and appreciative of the speaker, even if it’s crap. We know that soon enough we’ll be up front and want that kind of support for ourselves.

On behalf of speakers and teachers everywhere, the next time you’re in an audience, do your part by giving the person up front the gift of your full attention. Laugh, frown, cry in response. You’re there anyway; might as well be fully present.

Play! Prescription for the puritan soul

Like many introverts, I take life pretty seriously.  What I do must be purposeful, practical, productive.

Or so my inner critic likes to remind me.

It’s only now that I’m “of a certain age” I realize life’s way too short not to play.  So in recent years I’ve joined Toastmasters, taken up swing dancing, learned to yodel, tried my hand at improv comedy, beefed up my blues guitar chops, and in general decided it’s OK to enjoy making a fool of myself.

This morning, thanks to a comment from Scatterbrain who blogs at Splodge-plog.com, I found a link to an article about the SF Regional Air Guitar contest that took place last week.

Talk about purposeless play! You have to watch the video (the larger image, please) of the winner Alex Koll (stage name: Awesome Shred Begley, Jr.) explaining and demonstrating his extraordinary talents at Air Guitar.

Now this guy puts his heart and soul, body and hair into PLAY!

Piles of possessions: George Carlin on “Stuff”

Inspire yourself to clear clutter with a comedy act from the late great George Carlin. Watch his routine on “Stuff” and see yourself reflected.

I love this line:”A house is just a cover for your piles of stuff !”

Prematurely proud Powerpoint presenter

Last week I was so pleased with myself for my maiden voyage of simultaneously talking and powerpointing  for my feng shui class that perhaps I was overly presumptuous in calling myself a  Powerpoint Potentate: Presentation Priestess.

Well, at least I did not use clip art. I did not use overly wordy slides. I did not use wild wipes and noisy animations. I knew those were non-nos. And I had some very lovely photographs to illustrate some of my points.

But now, having poked around a bit on the web for Powerpoint pointers, and discovering two of Garr Reynolds‘ websites, I see I have miles to go.  I’m not talking about doing fancy photoshopped art, jazzy fonts, fades, etc.  It’s about simplicity, using the least possible material in the most impactful way. (His blog is called Presentation Zen - way cool. He has a book by the same name which I just ordered. I know when I need to eat humble pie.)

In one set of three slides he shows about gender inequality in Japan. First example is typical headline and bullet points. Next example says, “72% of the part-time workforce in Japan are women,”  over a dark background with a woman off to the side.   Final example (same background of woman) in HUGE text : just says 72%.   Pow!  The slide emphasizes the message graphically, but YOU are the messenger.

I’m excited about improving my skill with inspiration like this.

Powerpoint Potentate! Presentation Priestess!

Powerpoint: a Microsoft presentation program that allows public speakers to put their audience to sleep within five minutes

Potentate: one who wields great power or sway

All sorts of Powerpoint horror stories circulate in the public speaking realm. [Here's a funny PPT presentation spoofing bad PPT presentations (is that laughter canned??? it's not THAT funny).] I’ve seen many poor presentations myself.

But certain topics really can’t be done well without illustration - especially when the subject is something visual: art, architecture, design, travel, to name a few. You can use Powerpoint to organize your “slide show”, which is what I did last night to talk about feng shui.

Pictures are worth a thousand words when you’re describing befores and afters, the five elements, yin and yang, color, the bagua map.  The challenge is not bullet-pointitis, but locating the right pictures to project, building a narrative around them. And for me it was figuring out how to talk to the audience instead of the screen while managing the remote control and laser pointer.

Thank god my son was home for the week. I don’t watch TV and have never learned how to manage a remote control (though many women who DO watch TV can’t manage the remote either.

I feel like my skill as a public speaker has just taken a big leap with this new tool. I promise not to overuse it. Which shouldn’t be too hard because it’s still a pain in the butt to haul a laptop, projector and screen.

Precipice postponed: procrastination #3

Precipice: the edge of an extremely dangerous situation; a cliff with a steep dropoff

Postpone: to delay until a future time, put off

I can breathe again. I made my maiden Powerpoint voyage and managed to stay afloat for the duration of the presentation.  Obviously I should have done another run-thru on a wall more than 2 feet wide, because if I had, I’d have noticed that the right-hand 25% of each slide was truncated… for reasons I don’t yet know.

I talked to the screen rather than the audience more than I should have, and I had some issues with the remote control…   Fortunately, I know my feng shui material well enough that I could talk my way through the glitches, and my Toastmasters club is very supportive of anyone trying something challenging.

As I said earlier, I put off preparing this presentation until the last possible moment…  I usually love putting together presentations, but this one filled me with the desire to change my sheets, reorganize my file drawer, clean the toilets…. ANYTHING else.  And all this when I absolutely LUSTED for the projector which would enable me to do illustrated presentations.

According to the study center at Cal Poly there are four reasons we procrastinate:

1. Difficult - the task seems hard to do; we naturally tend to avoid difficult things in favor of those which seem easy to us. [this would explain my desire to clean toilets]

2. Time-consuming - the task will take large blocks of time, and large blocks of time are unavailable until the weekend. [especially if you have no idea how you're going to structure the talk to take advantage of a new medium]

3. Lack of knowledge or skills - no one wants to make mistakes, so wait until you learn how before you start. [I've heard so many horror stories about AV equipment failures that I was scared even to try the projector!]

4. Fears - everyone will know how you screwed up. [This didn't bother me for the Toastmasters talk, but I am preparing for a much lengthier illustrated talk for paying customers next week and screw-ups aren't really cool.]

Cal Poly suggests the following steps to cure yourself:

1. Realize you are delaying something unnecessarily. (Duh… but maybe it’s the “unnecessarily” we need to come to grips with. You have to realize this before days and weeks have passed - like as soon as you feel that twinge of uneasiness.)
2. Discover the real reasons for your delay. List them.
3. Dispute those real reasons and overcome them. Be vigorous.
4. Begin the task.

I do think the secret is just to start anywhere.  Set a timer and commit to working at it for 15 minutes.  Wait awhile and do it again.  This is the swiss cheese approach. Once you’ve eaten a few holes in the project it suddenly seems like no big deal, and you’re halfway there.

What’s your formula?

Procrastination #2: the Powerpoint Presentation

Procrastination: putting off intentionally something that should be done,
from the Latin, pro (forward) and crastinus (of tomorrow)

I am giving a talk tonight at Toastmasters, a dry run if you will, of a much longer presentation on feng shui I’m doing next week.  I can talk on this topic, no problem. I know my stuff.

So why oh why have I put off preparations until just last night (not that I’ve not been thinking about it, obsessing, even)?  It’s because I’ll be working with my new projector and Powerpoint for the first time.

I am actually an accomplished geek so I’ve been surprised at my reluctance to put this presentation together.  I figured out the PPt stuff easily - made a bunch of attractive simple slides last night.

What has held me back is fear of new territory - simultaneous talking and technology.  I’m one of those people who has to turn off the car radio when navigating unfamiliar roads - I may even be someone who can’t walk and chew gum at the same time.  But since I don’t chew gum, I haven’t tested this possibility.

I am writing this post when I should be loading the presentation onto my laptop, hooking up the projector and seeing what happens….  structured procrastination, as Ken Perry would say.

Post #100 - Persistent Practice Pays!

Yay me!  I’ve averaged one post a day for the past three+ months in pursuit of my main goal in blogging: to create a daily writing practice.

I am a writer by profession, but only write under deadline–if you don’t count the occasional dreary whines into my journal.   If one wants to improve in skill or expand one’s ouevre (love that word, ouevre - sounds so Important), one should write every day.

Since self-discipline isn’t my strong suit I had to create a ruse to make me place pen to paper (fingers to keyboard). I needed to feel that I was talking to someone outside my own skull, and that that audience (however tiny) expected me to keep my agreement to produce on deadline.

It’s said that it takes 21 days to make something a habit. For those of us with self-discipline issues, it may take longer.  For me, it took about 60 days to arrive at a point where I WANT to produce a post.  I called the blog 365Pwords, but at this point I suspect I could go on forever, because there thousands of great P-words, and many of them are worth revisiting several times.

Three side benefits of keeping my focus narrow (at least it seemed narrow when I began):

• I see the world through p-colored glasses.  P-words pop up in unexpected places like colorful toadstools after a spring rain.  Oooh. I have to write about THAT.
• Roget’s Thesaurus is my new best friend.  If something noteworthy happens and I’m plagued by a paucity of P-words to describe it, I get out Roget’s and lose myself among a plethora of word associations until I find the perfect one.  (Forget the online thesaurus, folks. Or the alphabetic ones. If you want to boost your creative thinking, you need the original Roget’s on paper.)
• I’ve discovered the dictionary. When I was little and asked the meaning of a word, my mom would say, “Go look it up in the dictionary…” which just pissed me off.   I had resisted it ever since, until the P-word Project.  What riches lie within those pages! Try it yourself sometime. Again, the paper dictionary, not the online one.

Passion and Possibility

I dwell in Possibility -
A fairer House than Prose -
More numerous of Windows -
Superior - for Doors

Of Chambers as the Cedars -
Impregnable of Eye -
And for an Everlasting Roof -
The Gambrels of the Sky -

Of Visitors - the fairest-
For Occupation - This -
The spreading wide my narrow Hands -
To gather Paradise -

Emily Dickinson’s poem opens Benjamin and Rosamund Zander’s book, The Art of Possibility:Transforming Professional and Personal Life. He’s a conductor and she’s a therapist. The book is published by the Harvard Business School Press - indicating this is no ordinary self-help or creativity book.

I read th Art of Possibility when it came out in 2002. LOVED it. Even gave it as gifts to a few people.

Then yesterday the video of Ben Zander’s talk at the TED conference (3/200 was finally uploaded to the TED site so non-attendees could watch it. I was so moved and inspired that I hauled the book off the shelf and have been re-reading it.

First. You. Must. Watch. The Video of his talk. The subject is ostensibly about getting everyone to recognize that they love classical music. And he achieves that goal with his Chopin demo.

But more than that his talk is about possibility - and how the vision of possibility can transform your life. His own transformation came in the 80’s when he realized that the conductor doesn’t make a sound. For his power, he depends on his ability to make other people powerful. It’s like chiseling away the marble to reveal the statue of David within.

My job was to awaken possibility in other people. How do you know you’re doing it? You look at their eyes. If their eyes are shining, you know you’re doing it. If they’re not shining, ask yourself, who am I being that their eyes are not shining?? As a parent you can ask yourself the same question if your children’s eyes arent’ shining.

When you can see possibility and believe in it passionately, you can move mountains:

The mark of a leader is that he not doubt for one moment the capacity of the people he’s leading to realize whatever he’s dreaming. Imagine if Martin Luther King had said, “I have a dream…. but on second thought, I’m not sure if they’re up to it…”

Lucky for me, the Art of Possibility is littered (alitered?) with a plethora of plummy p-words: perfect, perception, perspective, peril, prejudice, pattern, posture, profits, population, pain…. (for starters), so I shall be touching on some of their pointers in the coming couple of weeks.

Second. Read. The. Book. Let’s talk about it.

Playing hooky from plank position

It’s been a week since I pulled a pec doing too many pushups. (In yoga a sun salute involves half of the pushup - from plank to cobra position, so it’s more like a slow drop down…).

The doc had said no pushups or plank for six weeks (!). I had said, no way!

But then I allowed myself to stay home every morning this week, to not rush off to strength training or yoga classes at 7:30am and it has been LOVELY.

I miss the exercise, but not the rushing. Which tells me something I don’t want to hear: that if I don’t want to rush I’d better be getting up a lot earlier (and going to bed a lot earlier too, because I need at least 8 hours of sleep).

This morning I really really was going to go to yoga, and just chill in the back of the room in a restorative pose whenever we were supposed to do a planky sort of position. But here I am at my desk writing, hoisting a cup of coffee instead. Happy.

I’m one of those people who is slothful enough at heart that if I don’t routinize my life with specific commitments to be at a certain place at a certain time to exercise it won’t happen. ANd I’ve discovered that if it doesn’t happen first thing in the morning, it generally doesn’t happen at all, because the day takes over.

On normal weeks I go to a strength training class 2x a week, yoga 2x a week and I walk with a good friend the other 3 days. My pulled muscle did not prevent me from walking except for the first couple of days when I could scarcely breathe, but my friend was out of town, so I didn’t even do that.

Little vacations from routine are a good thing. I hope by Monday I’m eager to get back with the program.