7. Well, they are about to devour our words and our
lessons.
8. Train your brain to stop self-sabotaging...
Situation -------> Thought ---------> Feeling
“The Event” “Your reaction” “How it makes you feel”
i.e. He says, “Well, that was interesting.” i.e. “He didn’t like my talk” i.e. “bad”
“worse”
“Nobody liked my talk”
THE SPIRAL
“I should never speak again” “like running away and crying”
stop the spiral of negative thoughts/feelings here by recognizing cognitive disorders
9. 7 Common Cognitive Disorders
Catastrophizing: taking an event you are concerned about and blowing it out
of proportion. (EVERYONE is going to HATE me!)
Arbitrary Inference: making a judgment with no supporting information. (“He
was giving me stinkeye the entire time” when he was trying to read the slides,
so squinting)
Personalization: taking someone else's behavior personally. (Audience
member falls asleep and you take it personally)
Selective Abstraction: focusing in on one bad comment in 10.
Overgeneralization: basing future outcomes on current. (“This talk was a
disaster, therefore EVERY talk in my future will be a disaster”)
Dichotomous Thinking: two extremes. No grey. (They love me/they hate me)
Labeling: making a feeling into a label. (“I answered that wrong, therefore I am
incompetent.”)
10. exercise 2: get up and tell us the story of the
scariest thing that ever happened to you.
12. Ways to practice
• TECHNIQUE ONE: script it: read over that script until you memorize it
enough to be able to ad lib (note: do NOT use a script on stage)
• read it to yourself 10x
• read it out loud 10x
• record yourself in garageband 2x
• listen to it on your ipod 5x
• THEN present it to someone else
13. Ways to practice
• TECHNIQUE TWO: let your deck tell the story
• ‘Lessig Style’ - create 300+ slides that talk as you talk (it’s artsy and,
consequently, shows well on slideshare)
• TECHNIQUE THREE: story time
• Personal stories are easier to remember. Put LOTS of them in.
• TECHNIQUE FOUR: build in tons of audience interaction
• get your audience to participate (warning: some audiences do not
participate)
14. tip: practice silence instead of fillers. (listen for your
“ums” “uhs” “likes” “you knows” and practice
replacing them with dramatic silent pauses)
18. 1. The hero’s journey normal 1. The call to adventure!
7. a new normal 2. dude, no way in hell.
3. something happens
that you canNOT ignore
normal crossing the
the hero’s return threshold
whoah! (gulp)
6. atonement + 4. challenges + temptations
transformation
helpers, mentors,
allies + enemies
come forth
5.
The Abyss
Death + Rebirth
credit: Joseph Campbell (Hero’s Journey)
25. challenges + temptations
=
examples/case studies/stuff that makes the
audience think about how they can apply this new
knowledge to their world
26. the abyss (death + rebirth)
=
this one is tough. can you challenge your audience
to have a ‘eureka’ moment? can you put them in
the ultimate hero’s position? the death of old
beliefs once and for all? this is conversion.
27. atonement & transformation
=
this is the part of your talk where people are getting
excited to get the heck out of your talk and go
preach it to the rest of the world
28. a new normal
=
this is not part of your presentation, but you are
hoping that this is what your audience is
experiencing.
29. exercise 4: put together a 5 minute hero’s journey
in groups of 2.
30. Presentation Tips & Tricks
• stock photography is your friend. take your time to find really great images.
have them take up your entire slide.
• fonts are art, too. stick to one, but have fun with size.
• don’t play long videos. it’s just darned awkward. short videos are amazing,
though.
• ask the audience LOTS of questions, “Who here has heard of??” “What is
your favorite ice cream flavor??”
• cheap tricks are awesome. use them. steal them from really good
motivational speakers (watch lots of talks online + steal stuff). (money trick)
32. Getting gigs 101
• Ignite/BarCamp/Other community events
• SXSW Panels (search through them and email people who are hosting them
to volunteer yourself)
• APPLY/PITCH a talk - Web 2.0, ETech, etc. are all looking for female
speakers. They don’t get enough applications from women each year.
• If you like a conference you are at, go up and speak to the organizer about
you speaking next year
• other ideas?
33. Getting paid
• When?
• How?
• How much?
• What is the difference (other than the money)
• questions?