Finding Your Story

Like myself, Larry King, former CNN anchor, is really a comedian at heart. He had to play it straight all those years in radio and TV because you would too if you were being paid millions of dollars a year for straight man interviews with those making news worldwide. So when people get a chance to hear Larry speak to a group, they are taken aback. What did they expect from his performance. A talk show to break out? Let's take Larry to Casey's Storyboard I teach all my students online. How to build a story and have your audience eating out of the palm of your hand. This is how Larry does it. And nobody does it better! Are you taking notes? Larry enjoys going back to his Brooklyn New York days. It's easy speaking. He has done it forever and it requires no memorization or notes. Is my speaker student listening? NO MEMORIZATION OR NOTES! Extemporaneous speaking is the key to being brilliant in front of an audience. If my students don't learn anything else, they learn that. Rote memory and teleprompter speech reading or reading from notes scattered in front of you is a recipe for a boring presentation. I may be a lot of things. Boring isn't one of them! Trust me on that one. Like an over matched minor leaguer, you will soon be sent back to the Minor Leagues or out if the speaking business entirely. Larry introduces his best friends in the story and Moppo. Moppo will soon become the star of this tale. Audiences have been known to holler at Larry if he doesn't share this story. "Tell the Moppo story!" Shouted someone from the stand. How cool is that? It seems that Moppo had a serious allergy illness and several doctors advised the family that Moppo live in a dry climate to improve the quality of his life. Larry and his two friends used that bit of knowledge to make their own decision, Moppo and his family took off out of the blue. One day they were in their apartment. The next day they were gone! The family neglected to tell the school anything at all. It was ass if they simply vanished without a trace. Larry's friend saw an entrepreneurial opening. They went to the principal the next day. With a heavy heart, they did what they had to do. They made the announcement to the principal which spread like wildfire through the school. Moppo never made it alive to Arizona['s haven. In Fact on the journey, Moppo had died. There was no turning back for Larry and his henchmen. Moppo was dead! Now it made sense why the family had tore out of town. They were trying to save his life, This is where Larry and the boys came up with step #2 The boys went back to the principal and asked to use school resources to raise money in Moppo's name. The principal almost cried but of course the answer was yes! Larry and his friends ate at Nathan's every night, Carvel for dessert and saw every movie that came to town. No one was the wiser. Moppo was dead! Every great story has its conflict. And this one seemed harmless. The city newspaper wanted to honor the boys for their civic duty. Brooklyn was proud of their boys. A gala was planned. Money was still pouring in. Life was good. Moppo was dead! Now that special day of honor turned bright and sunny. Photographers jockeyed to get the best shot of the boys who had been dubbed in the news as BROOKLYN'S FINEST! Someone forgot to tell Moppo. On this day of all days, his family returned to Brooklyn and Moppo showed up at school during the festivities. As the entire caper began to dissolve around them, Larry did the only thing a high school senior could think of, he shouted at Moppo at the top of his lungs. Moppo, go Home!!!!!! You're dead! And the audience went out of their mind with wild applause. Do you think Larry loves telling this story? Do you think it's hard to remember. Do you think meeting planners hear about a corporation's reaction to Larry's speaking nd wants him NO! You just were delivered your first lesson in the power of storytelling. From my own Casey at the Bat to Larry's Moppo, you now have a blueprint. But we have only just begun. How Casey at the Bat teaches the world to Speak One Speaker at a Time Moppo/The Power of Story steve-tarde.blogspot.com