Transcripts
1. Introduction: The ability to tell a
story is a timeless skill. It's one of those skillsets that allows you to be remembered because there's so much
information around us nowadays. But few people are creating narratives that capture
the mind and the heart. In this class, we're
going to change that. We're going to make sure
that more people are feeling confident
in order to tell stories in conversations that they're having with their peers. My name is Armand children, the founder of our money talks, a media company which helps engineers and
entrepreneurs improve their communication skills
so they can articulate their ideas with
clarity and confidence. In this class, you're
going to understand the basics of what
storytelling is. A couple of topics that you can practice telling stories about. Who you should tell stories too, along with other
topics which will help you prepare for
a final project. Where you're going
to tell a story and a conversation with
one of your peers. Are you excited? Are you ready? If so, I look forward
to seeing you inside.
2. What is a Story?: A story is a sharing of ideas
connected to make a point. That's it. And the more that you imprint this simple
definition in your mind, the more that you
are going to master. Simple division. I
don't know about you, but I don't want to jump
straight into long division. I want to understand
simple division. And the more debt I
understand the simplicity, the more that the complexity
takes care of itself. Right now, you may be scared of storytelling or feel
intimidated by it because you're following
the long division of storytelling you're
thinking about. Okay, how do I think of
compelling relatable characters? How do I design vivid settings
are, what about the plot? What about the narrative? All this stuff matters later on. But for the time being, and just focus on a story being, a string of ideas connected
in order to make a point.
3. Finding Beauty in the Mundane: What's your thoughts
on Jerry Seinfeld? I don't know, but for you,
but for me growing up, I didn't like it show too much. I thought it was a little too obvious and I didn't
think it popped enough. Like a lot of the other shows
that were showing on TV. As I started to get older, I started to appreciate
Jerry Seinfeld show more because Jerry, he had this miraculous ability to find beauty in the mundane. He's not over here
talking about dragons, berries or monsters or
anything like that. Which typically when someone's thinking about storytelling
for the first time, they're thinking that
something has to be grand in order for it
to make an impact. But Jerry Seinfeld, he's
almost a billionaire. Finding beauty in the mundane. He talks about long wait times. Whenever he's going
to a restaurant. He's talking about bad dates. He's talking about
pants that don't fit the typical problems
that a human experiences. So our goal in terms of
stringing together ideas, we want to observe
our own experiences that we've been through. I know you, I know me. There are certain things in terms of a human
that we all share. Certain things that annoy us. That's correct. Annoys us. What annoys you? For me. I don't like to wait in traffic. I don't like cold weather. I don't like waiting in lines. Now if I just stop there, what annoys me, then
I'll feel very angry. But if I find what
annoys me and I view this as the
conflict for my story. Now I can at least try to find some
beauty in the mundane. I can start to experiment. Will there ever be a time
when traffic does not exist? Where anytime that
I go on the road, no matter how busy
of a city it is, there's no traffic is empty. And you know what? A no red lights are
yellow lights for me. Either. I get green lights every time I get on the street. Is this possible? I don't know, but may simply articulating it out
loud allows me to find certain creative
connections in the mundane. So what you wanna do right now is find some things that annoy you or make you highly excited
and try to work it out. Why are you feeling
this certain way? Use your body as a compass on where you're going to
articulate your ideas.
4. Who to Practice Stories On: So right now you've
been practicing telling stories or to yourself, you're getting certain
things that are no, you, uh, certain things
that excite you. And you're telling
pretty compelling tales about stuff that you notice. It's simple, nothing
to advanced as of yet. Now you gradually want
to work your way up. You want to share stories
with people that you know, key word or words. People that, you know. You don't need to go
up to a stranger or sign up for a comedy club and start telling
stories on the spot. Instead of find people that
you routinely speak to, open up your phone and see the last couple of people
who texted you are called, You are called them back and
share a story with them. I talk about what
happened in your day. We're just focusing
on the simplicity. Because the more that we ground ourselves
in the simplicity, the more debt we turn
our lives into a story, the more that we view
ourselves as a character. And once we understand
the nuances of us, our desires or fears or noises, it becomes much
easier to articulate the experiences of other
characters that we know. And if you're really
advanced from there, you can talk about
imaginary characters who you've never met. Just because you've
never met them does not mean that there are
completely made up. Instead, what eventually
begins to happen is that you're taking pieces of the characters that you
already articulated for yourself through your
life and other characters. And you're assembling
something new. That is what I call
long division. Right now. Call your mom, your dad, your brother, your
friend, someone, and go in with the intention of entering the call to
just tell one story, articulate stories with
people that you know. And eventually you'll feel comfortable telling
stories to strangers.
5. Conflict Plus Delay Formula: I saw this very
interesting post on Facebook a while back that was debating on what
better grilled cheese or a peanut butter
and jelly sandwich. And the pole was right
down the middle. It was a toss up. I couldn't believe
it because I'm like, what kind of savages
would possibly choose grilled cheese over
peanut butter and jelly. I love peanut butter and jelly. I thought everyone would
love peanut butter and jelly around that day. I was mistaken. The reason that I like
peanut butter and jelly is because there are two fundamental
forces that are in the sandwich that
appeals to the census. There's peanut butter,
it's highly creamy. And then there's
jelly which is sweet. You could even say
tangy at times. When you combine the two. That's when you get
peanut butter and jelly, a great sandwich. Now, imagine if I take away the jelly and someone is just eating a peanut
butter sandwich. I know some people that do that and I think that is nasty. You need both. And likewise with
assure you there are certain parts that you need. And one of the things
that you need, the conflict, the
conflict is the tension. So here's a very simple storytelling formula
that you can try. Introduce the conflict,
delay, the resolution. The reason that this is
so simple is because with these two simple variables, you're going to be able
to create characters, settings, resolutions, and much more to
give you an example. A couple of years back, there was a teacher of mine who was struggling with mortality. He was in his late seventies and use fearing that
he was going to die. And one day he proof read one of my essays
for a college admission, a master's program
that I was working on. And I said, Dr. Holt, if you ever need some
assistance from me again, then do not do not
hesitate to ask. That's when he
asked for a favor. He wanted to go to Hawaii and climb one of the biggest
mountains in Hawaii. And he was battling
with this for years. Each time that he went, each time that he
chickened out and he asked me to accompany him
up the mountain. The only problem, I'm
afraid of heights. So boom, at the conflict
has been introduced. Now, imagine I'm over here telling the story for the next, let's say 20 seconds or so. I'm talking about
how I went to y, how we ate at different spots, how I am battling my internal dialogue of how I'm going to break the news to him that I'm afraid of heights. This is me delaying
the resolution. And this is one of
the other person. I've got them hooked. They're like, okay, well, what does this guy do? Does he go up the mountain
or known like what happens? And this is also known
as the Law of Closure. Whenever we introduce a gap, understanding the other
person just wants to fill it. It's sort of like
I'm just holding my fingers like this
in front of you. A part of you just wants to get my two fingers and
just connect it. So I'm over here talking for some time delaying
the resolution. And by the end, I'm like, the first time I chickened out and I was like Dr.
Holt, I cannot do it. And this is when this man, the man who had been
trickling out for years, started to console me. Once he started to console me, he started to build
courage and himself. As he started to build
courage and himself. That's when i2 felt
courageous as well. And we both climbed up
the mountain together. Resolution. So you can go ahead and
practice with this as well. Introduce a conflict,
delay, the resolution.
6. Analyze Good and Bad Stories: As you're working your way up, you're going to
notice that there are certain times that a
story just sticks. It doesn't matter who
you tell the story to. They're either highly curious or they're just
laughing non-stop. This is actually how
a lot of comedians go from the small stage
to the big stage. Whenever they have material, they start to test it out
on local comedy shops. And these places normally don't have that much
of an audience. It just for the comedian to get a feel for what's working. And once he has enough data, he's analyze the data and
he found out what works. That's when he goes
to the big stage and he delivers his
greatest material. So the more that you're
telling stories, it takes some time to
also be a scientist. See what's hitting Z,
What's not heading. And every now and then, ask them questions like why did this hit the
way that it did? Is there something
in this experience that touched into other
human experiences? How come this story worked
with parties a, B, C, but it fell so flat with D. The more debt you
ask yourself questions, and the more that you
try to answer it, the more that you build
your storytelling literacy.
7. Welcome Failures: Anytime there's a
creative field, you need to build a certain
level of tech scan. Because increase the fields. At times, you're going
to be surprised. There's a story that's working with a large bundle of people. And you're thinking that
it's going to work in this high pressure meeting
that you have going on. But unfortunately,
the story falls flat. Not only does the
story fall flat, it enriches the other person. And you're thinking, Whoa man, like, I don't know if I should
ever tell stories again. This is one of those
moments where it's make or break sort of situation. Are you going to be
one of those people that throws in the
towel so quickly? Or are you going to be one of those people who understands, look, I'm going to
create a field right now and I need to
welcome and failures. Failures will only
strengthen me and allow me to build more
conviction behind our words. There are two paths
you could quit. You could keep going on. But I recommend that you choose Pattern number to keep going on. Because with storytelling, you're sort of like
Plato. At first. There's not much
that's going on. But the more that
you keep practicing telling stories in
different interactions, the more that you will develop
a feel for what's working. And you will also develop a feel for what's
not going to work. But you're not just
going to stop there. You'll build the
proficiency to adjust and insert different
things that will work. But the ability to notice these little nuances
and micro-expressions, it's not going to be
presented to you until you keep on moving forward
despite the failures.
8. Bonus Tip: One bonus tip in order
to tell stories and conversations is to make content creation a
part of your life. I mean, there's so many
different platforms out there that you
can start with E's. There's blogging, There's
podcasting, there's YouTube. And so much more. If you can introduce a
content creation space, let's say a YouTube channel, where you're sharing
a small little story. Let's say once a week, you don't even need to make it public. You could keep it private. And you're just
getting into the habit of telling more stories. Well, when you're
in conversations, you're not going to have
to really think about it. There's not going to feel like, Okay, well, here goes. I mean, I haven't told
the story in a while, so let me just get in the zone. Now. It is going to flow out
of you because you've introduced a space where huge strictly go for
storytelling is very similar to a guy who agrees
to help his friend move, but he's not taking okay, well, this is the day
where I'm going to lift this box from here to here is because this guy consistently goes to the gym
and is always lifting heavy. This is just another workout. Two is already existing routine. So the bonus tip is to
introduce some sort of content creation practice
that keeps you creative.
9. Final Project: You made it to the end. Now the top of the
final project, I want you to contact
someone that you're close with and start a
dialogue with them. In this dialogue, you
have the intention of sharing at least one story. The story is going to
be a string of ideas where you introduce
a conflict and you delay the resolution as you're telling the story, remain
situationally aware. How's the other person behaving? Are they behaving the way that
you wanted them to behave? Are they behaving in a way that you didn't want
them to behave? Are they behaving in a
way that you weren't expecting in the
initial stages at all. Get detailed. And along with that,
remain self-aware. How are you feeling as
you're sharing the story? Does it feel congruent to you? Is it flowing out of you, is being pushed out of you. Get as detailed as
you possibly can, and create a report
that you will post in the final project
section right below. There is no set
guidelines on how your experience of
the report should be. Just get as detailed
as you possibly can. Because the more
detailed that you are, the more that you objectify yourself and the
more that you're capable of seeing what you did right and what you did wrong. I thank you for making it
to the end of this class. And if you want more content
from the Armani talks brand, be sure to check out our money talks.com and this website, you will be introduced
to a lot of my blogs, podcasts, my YouTube
videos, books, and much more that deal with
storytelling, social skills, public speaking, and much more, our money talks.com, go
on and check it out.
Arman Chowdhury, Confidence thru Communication
