The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – Mr. Bear Speaks Without Fear: The Easiest Way to Learn the Hardest Subject by Reesa Woolf PhD

Episode Date: October 12, 2023

Mr. Bear Speaks Without Fear: The Easiest Way to Learn the Hardest Subject by Reesa Woolf PhD Confidentspeaking.com Dr. Woolf understands our struggles and fixes each one with 45-techniques to stop public speaking fear. This book uses 25 years of research to guide the most fearful person to stop fear of public speaking. Before you speak, are these some of your thoughts? They are judging me! All eyes are on me! What if I make a mistake? What if I lose my place or my mind goes blank? I ramble and don’t know how to Get to the Point! You will be helped by Mr. Bear Speaks Without Fear to: Look Confident When You Don’t Feel It Stop your Tormenting Thoughts To recover from Speaking Mistakes To Confidently Speak to Large and Important Groups To recapture attention when you've lost it You will stop saying "uh, um, er, you know..." It fits your learning style if you learn from a fable and if you like bullet lists of the highlights (at the end of each chapter). Mr. Bear Speaks Without Fear allows you to be your best self speaking in front of any group, small and large.

You wanted the best. You've got the best podcast, the hottest podcast in the world. The Chris Voss Show, the preeminent podcast with guests so smart you may experience serious brain bleed. The CEOs, authors, thought leaders, visionaries, and motivators. Get ready, get ready, strap yourself in. Keep your hands, arms, and legs inside the vehicle at all times, because you're about to go on a monster education roller coaster with your brain. Now, here's your host, Chris Voss. Hi, folks. Chris Voss here from thechrisvossshow.com.

Thechrisvossshow.com. Who the hell hired an opera singer to do my part That I do in the show Oh my gosh we did There you go we're testing that out If I can just learn not to talk over we'll be good But that's new today folks We after 15 or 13 years of doing that bit

Singing the Chris Foss show To where you come up to me and scream The Chris Foss show I'm like security There now is an opera singer that we did it. So we have an amazing gentle lady on the show, and she is going to be sharing her amazing thoughts in business, sales, and speaking as well.

How you can be an amazing speaker, how you can present yourself better, and she's probably just going to take me apart on the show and just be like, you do everything wrong, Chris, but I think that's the whole point of my show, isn't it? I don't know who it is. But in the meantime, we have to pay for that opera singer that we hired. Do you know how much it costs to hire an opera singer?

It costs a lot. And we had to, like, have it recorded in a giant hall. No, I'm just kidding. We did five of her. So, this is Gail. I'm just changing. We're for the short. Can I be friends with and relatives, please go to the goodreads.com,

or just youtube.com, or just christmas.com, or just christmas.com, or just christmas.com. And I'm going to have an opera singer do the plugs, too, because I'm tired of reading them. She is an amazing author in mind, and she brings in a lot of time experience. Her latest book came out August 4th, 2022. Mr. Bear speaks without fear. The easiest way to, and then we have me, who's, I don't know, I'm good at fixing trailer homes. Risa Wolf is a TED Talk trainer, keynote speaker, and author with more than 30 years of experience

preparing CEOs and their teams to speak with confidence. She's an expert in demystifying and eliminating fear of public speaking. Share her book is Mr. Bear, Speaking Without Fear, which we mentioned before. And she's here to talk to us and tell us how to be better and present in how we speak and how we do stuff. Welcome to the show, Mrs. Wolfe. How are you? It is a pleasure to be here. I really admire your style.

That's for sure. There you go. Wait, there's a style? She says there's a style. Casual confidence. You have casual confidence. I really like it. Can I finally get paid for this crap now? There you go. there. I've got a style. Casual confidence. You have casual confidence. I really like it. Very, very much.

Can I finally get paid for this crap now? There you go. I'm telling my bosses that I now have style. They tell me I have no style, but honestly, Risa, if you've ever seen me in public, the way I dress in shorts and flip flops and shirts that look

like they, I don't know, I've been wearing them for 10 years without washing them, you would find that I have no style. And really, that's a consensus for most women that meet me in public. Usually people come up to me and they hand me money and they're like, get a meal, dude. I'm just shopping here, for hell's sakes. But I will buy some cheese. So give us a.com. Where can it could be on the interwebs. Where you can find me is confident speaking, confident with a T, confident speaking dot com.

That's what I find in teaching public speaking for over 30 years. I find people take a course because they have gotten through life kind of faking it, and they finally want to be confident public speakers. There you go. That's what I've done all my life. I just fake it until I make it. I'm still working on making it. Maybe 20 or 30 years from now, I'll finally make it. So give us an overview of what's inside.

Mr. Bear Speaks Without Fear, your latest book. I've researched public speaking fear for 25 years. And it happened at the same time that I was teaching public speaking skills. And I was teaching these three-day long classes. I taught at the largest seminar company for Fortune 500 people. And people would say, oh, my God, you kept my attention for three days. And I would say, well, that's what I'm teaching you to do. But I thought, I'm making all this money here, but I could make more if I were a keynote speaker. So I became a convention

keynote speaker and I was really good. But I realized, Chris, I have a skill above that. And that is I can make anyone in the room speak without public speaking fear. And that's what I do, and that's why I wrote a book so that anyone can learn it themselves. There you go. And does the Mr. Bear part, is that a way of giving it a story so that people can kind of identify it? They feel less like it's an instruction manual? People who are afraid of public speaking fear, I'm talking about adults. I mean, the people who usually come see me now are like about 35 years old.

They've been in their careers for a while, but they have been living in secret with public speaking fear for a long time. And what I find is that when I say, well, have you taken any classes? Have you read any books? They never have because it's just too scary. So I wrote it as a simple story of Mr. Bear has to give a talk. He's panicked. And when he talks to the different co-workers, they teach him all the skills. So it's a very easy way to learn a lot of information. But I purposely summarized every chapter in bullets because frankly, I don't like to read and learn from books that are stories.

I like bullets, so I combined the two. And then there are 45 tips on stopping public speaking fear. So it's pretty much my last project. This is my giveaway of my years of research, my years of working with over 3,000 people. And this is something that I'm very proud of because it's a proven thing. If someone reads this, they will learn how to speak in public. And if they don't or else, I don't know what that means. Well, a lot of people are very unhappy all the time. You know what's amazing for people like

you and me who can speak easily, we know that people have public speaking fear, but since I work so, you know, intimately with these folks, these are people who, it's not only that they're afraid to get up and speak. At every meeting, they're afraid they're going to be called on and have to speak spontaneously. They're afraid, they don't like to network because they it's public speaking so it's much more it's it really it really intrudes on a person's life and when they read this book people like us read this book people like you read it and they read each page and go yeah this is good oh i've learned a few things people who are afraid of public speaking, when they read Mr. Bear Speaks Without

Fear, every page they go, oh my God, oh my God, I never knew that. So it's really quite a revelation and I wrote it because I know exactly, intimately, the people who are afraid of public speaking, adults who are afraid of public speaking. There you go. And so when we're talking about public speaking, I mean, this just doesn't go into, you know, being on a stage for a keynote. There you go. And so when we're talking about public speaking, I mean, this just doesn't go into, you know, being on a stage for a keynote, as you mentioned, you know, if you're in a meeting, whether you're a leader, you know, trying to communicate to your employees, whether you're someone who's even like a parent, or you're trying to instruct your child, you know, how you deliver, how you speak to people makes all the difference whether you're

a podcaster uh there's something else that i'm trying to claw to and i can't find it but it passed through my brain very quickly and now it's gone so there you go um people people in the audience like oh no what is it uh there's the suspense i built for you people you can tune in the rest of the show and see if it comes back around to me. That old brain, the dementia is kicking it basically. That's what it is. So, you know, whatever you do,

this, this effective, I know what I was trying to say. So if you're talking to a partner, if you're dating, if you're trying to relate to someone you have a relationship with, you know, being able to communicate effectively from all these different bounds

affects you, uh, and being able to speak well and speak effectively, uh, can make all the difference. You know, I overcame the fear of public speaking, you know,

you know how I did. I just don't give a shit. I just don't give a shit anymore. I just don't give a shit anymore. I just don't give a shit anymore. I just quit caring. Can I give you a hint that that's actually one of the reasons that people are fearful is that they really care what people think. And instead, this is my first tip that I want to give your listeners and your audience that have the attitude of I'm only here to help them. I might not be the, I might not make the most money. I don't have the fanciest

title, but at this moment in time, I have value to give those people. And if you keep that in mind, instead of what do they think about me? Oh my gosh, I don't speak as well as the last speaker. They don't care about that they just want your your content they just want your stuff there you go i want i want to give you a lot of tips as we speak because that's the value of this chat so what is the core of why people fear public speaking what are some of their fears and why is that such a big deal for them? I would say that there are a few top reasons that people are fearful. One is that the antidote is to think to yourself, I'm only here to help them instead of thinking about yourself and how is this coming across. The second thing is they don't know what to do when people start losing interest. And so what you want to do is stop and say, I really want this to be valuable.

And then prepare ahead some questions to check in with people. Is this what you were looking for? Is this too basic? Is this something that I need to give more of a background on? So really check in. And I think the third thing is that many, many people who are afraid of speaking know what they're going to say at a meeting, either in person or virtually, and then they just show up. But without notes, without preparation, without anticipating what might I be asked and let me plan ahead what I'm going to say. So a lot of confidence comes from maybe five minutes before a meeting, putting together

your ideas. And it's very important. I teach how to use user-friendly notes. Because if you write out your talk, it's like saying to yourself, I think I'll make sure I lose my place when I'm there. So I would say stop giving impromptu talks and go in with notes. That's a big antidote. It's good to have notes as a backup. That's for sure to fall back on. But there are times where sometimes you have to change direction during a speech because, you know, sometimes the audience is like, I've had people yell out, you know, questions during a speech. And I've been like, wait, so you want me to talk about that over there? Sure.

Everybody in the room want to? Okay, let's do that um you know they're like we know what you're talking about we just know we need to know how to apply it you know that sort of thing now you had the united nations director call your book the best public speaking book ever that's quite the endorsement thank you there you go well i didn't you know it wasn't me you wrote the book yeah i worked yes i worked in um in the united nations i i several different locations but the longest location i stayed was three months in rome twist my arm someone had to do it yeah that sounds rough all that all that uh ital Italian food and all that stuff, yeah.

Yeah, it was terrible. It sounds really rough. I did get to that. There you go. So is it a thick book? Is it a volumous book? Is it going to take me a lot if I'm out there and I'm thinking, I'm afraid of public speaking?

Do I have to spend a lot of time with this? Actually, that's the whole point when i realized that people who are afraid of public speaking fear they just want to get it fixed fast that's why i wrote it in a story form with the bulleted summaries but look how small it is it's not even the size of a regular book it's purposely everything about it is to make it look like a children's book so when you pick it up it's not threatening like a lot of those books are. You know, speak without fear. All those books are scary. This is kind

of friendly and frankly it could be read in an hour. Oh really? Yeah, so it's not like War and Peace. Yeah, it's like a hundred pages. Every page is packed though. I can tell you that. Every page is packed. There you can tell you that every page is packed. There you go.

Now you coach on your website. From what I understand, you do speaking training individually and I guess coaching, you would say. You help people with their TED talk trainers. There's a lot of people doing TED talks now. Tell us about some of the work you do there. Have you ever noticed when you watch a ted talk how how they hold your attention the whole 18 minutes i'm a ted talk trainer i'm the one who teaches them to do that and i put some of those techniques actually in mr bear speaks without fear so i do that and that is really fun

that's even more i think it's more work for someone to do even than a keynote speech at a convention because it's more like a Broadway performance. But most of the people that I work with who find me on the web are people who are about, let's just say, 35 to 40 years old. They have gotten to high enough positions that they have to give a speech that's more scary than the rest. It's to a bigger group, or it's to more important people, or they've just taken a new job. Actually, sometimes I get people who say, you know, I've even turned down jobs because it had public speaking, and now this job. I love this company. I've been here eight years, and now this job wow love this company i've been here eight years and now i gotta speak so that's why they're really it's been their secret if you asked your friends are you afraid of public speaking they would reluctantly say yes because they can speak one-to-one or one-to-five but as soon as it's a larger group they just won't do it there you go those are the people

who find me it's usually business owners. I would say medium-sized business owners and corporate types that are either C-suite or close to C-suite. And a fair amount of managers. But mostly, I would say that's my demographic. Lots of technical people, engineers, lots and lots and lots of salespeople. You'd be shocked because that's your specialty, that many salespeople are afraid to get up to do the big presentations at the conventions.

There you go. The other way I got over the fear of speaking is extreme narcissism and not giving a shit. Mix that with some dark triad and you've a perfect formula, God damn, of ugliness. But no, I mean, I love entertaining people. I love making people laugh. When people laugh, it's like cracked in my brain. I have one of those comedic brains.

But Chris, don't people say to you, oh my God, I could never do what you do. Don't people say that to you? I could never do it. That's because i suck at it though that's because i suck at whatever they're telling i can never do what you do because you're an idiot and i'm just like i don't know what's your point so there you go um so you work with people there's a lot of people doing these ted talks now there seems to be every week you know because one of my friends is like i'm doing a ted talk and um so a lot of people are getting good at this and evidently it's become a really good way to do these ted talks uh for raising the your brand getting more speaking gigs and stuff like that oh yes no

question that's i would say that's one of the big reasons people do it. Either they have an idea that they want to share, or they have themselves and their company or their idea that they can be traced to so people can purchase their stuff. And a lot of people do it simply so they can put it on their website because it's a lot of credibility to do a TED Talk. And it makes all the difference in the world when you can speak when you can um you know i think i think a lot of i think a lot of people this comes a lot up on the show with authors and stuff talking about this but imposter syndrome and i think a lot of

people have a challenge with that don't they when they speak is like yeah maybe i'm full of shit you know i don't know do you want me to make some comments on that yes if you would please ah so that's usually why we ask questions on the show recently i'm teasing you no noted noted thank you i'm teasing you no please the imposter thing is that people still have a self-image of them like when they were 21 years old. So they come to me and say, you know, when I was new in the business, I didn't know anything. And when I gave my talk, this guy just humiliated me in public. And I've just been fearful ever since.

But now they're 35 and they've become kind of expert in their area and they actually have something to say. So I say to them, well, let me ask you this. If you were in your current company and that same guy who did that to you walked in and did that to you, what would you do now? Oh, well, now I would, and they would say what they would do.

So they have to update who they are. Who you are now is a person that if, you know, some jerk like that did that, you would handle them. Yeah, throw them out the second story window. That's it. No, don't do that, folks. That's the fantasy of it.

But the point is, is that people have to kind of update their self-image. And, you know, over the years, everybody grows and develops. And it's important to kind of take inventory of, wait a second, at this point in time, I have value for people. I don't know everything that everybody in this room knows, but I know my little piece of it. And that's why I earned my seat here. It's a nice, you do a lot of self-talk to overcome that mean mind that's tormenting you with the old stuff. Yeah, mine's the nine personalities that I have that talk me leads me there's someone that says kill kill kill all the time so the judge says i can't listen to him anymore uh and then i get my

ankle bracelet off next week if i do uh so uh this is really deep um in what you go into stop your tormenting thoughts you cover how to recover from speaking mistakes i think i think some people you know they they flub something up or you know i've been known to jump over something in my in in a speech and go oh shit we're now i'm all fucked up where was i uh and uh uh but this makes all the difference if you can't if you can't speak and communicate to people i think especially in the corporate world it hurts your ability to rise through the corporate ladder to to get better jobs to be seen as more value i mean certainly if you can be a speaker for your company you've got you've got more job security than anybody i've got a couple friends that

they're kind of always the speakers for their companies they work at. And they can go, they get picked up by all sorts of different companies because the other company seems speaking and they're like, hey, go hire that people. So there's all sorts of great things that come from it. And then just, I don't know, being more comfortable in your own skin where maybe you don't have imposter syndrome. There you go. There you go. There you go. So on your website, how do people work with you? How do they onboard with you? How do they reach out to you and find out if working with you is good?

What sort of services do you offer? I noticed in your training there's several different services you have on your website. Well, the first thing is that people usually find out about me because they've heard about Mr. Bear Speaks Without Fear. But sometimes people just find me, SEO, just searching public speaking fear. And the good news now is that I do, I would say, even before Zoom, I was using Skype and doing one-to-one training because pretty much six years into my career, ages ago, I started to do international training. I would meet someone maybe in the States, but then they would have me do a program for their company online, and I'd be getting up at four in the morning to do it in different parts of the world. But the point is, right now, people find me, individuals, they often pay for their services themselves. They don't need the company to know that they're doing

this. We meet on Zoom like this. I'm no nonsense. Yes, you can see even now, I really get to the point. And I would say an important thing to know about me in one reason that I work so quickly is that I studied with the man who invented cognitive therapy, Dr. Albert Ellis. And that's why I work so fast. That's why I work so fast. And it's really when people, I say sometimes, so have you taken courses or, you know, have you worked with, oh yes, I'm seeing a therapist now. All I can think of is, I think you might want to consider another therapist. If you've been working with someone and you still have this fear, because pretty much in the first, I would say, first four sessions, it's gone.

It's gone. And that's the thing about cognitive therapy. It's not covered up like, here's how to cope with your fear. Oh, no, it's eliminated. It's really taking out the crazy thinking, fixing it, pushing it back in. And then they have their whole life gets a lot more free. It's very, very, very satisfying work because as I stay in touch with, with former clients, it transforms their life. They think if I can get over this, the biggest fear I've had for, you know, 40 years, what

else am I overlooking? And it's, it's very, very, very cool. You've done that. I'm sure. Haven't you gotten feedback from on your show that you've made a difference in people's lives and careers? Yeah. I mean, we've had, we've had feedback where sometimes people were going to make a decision

to end their life during a day and, and, and somehow we changed their life by something positive. We said, we've had that twice actually um which is really weird because we didn't that wasn't our intention you know we're just doing positive uh communications and outreach and and entertaining people and and uh to have that sort of impact where you're like wow i may have saved someone's life today um is interesting and this is one of the beauties of what you're, what you've communicated and talked about on the show is, is, you know, being able to public speak and be effective and inspire people,

motivate people, entertain people. You never know what lives you touch and what differences you make. I mean, most times you won't even hear about it. So, you know, sometimes somebody would come up to me and tell me something, Hey, you know, you did this thing three years ago, and that really made a difference in my life. And I'm like, wow, really? That's really cool. But yeah, my psychiatrist has me on a 20-year retainer program for most of my other issues other than public speaking.

So I just wanted to make that clear to everybody. Get professional. public speaking so i just want to make that clear to everybody get professional um he's currently it's either that or the frontal lobotomy and we're still in grabs so uh people who listened to the podcast for 15 years ago i thought he already had the frontal lobotomy anyway um so people can do a complimentary 15 minute first step call with you to get the question answered see if you guys are a fit that's a good option to have right yeah they go to confident with a t confident speaking.com and just do a contact us fill it in and yeah 15 minutes no obligation a lot of times people just want to finally tell

someone the truth there you go and you deal with the executives of companies and different things do you find that they usually like that discreet sort of training? Like they don't want to announce like, hey, I'm learning to speak over here, Bob. You know, they're in the office place. Oh, no. They don't want anyone to know because these people have risen pretty high faking it. So they don't want anyone to know. I mean, pretty part of who they are is this, you know, their image.

Oh, no, I'm the best kept secret for a lot of people. But, you know, what's great is I allow people to call me in between appointments. Anyone can have five minutes with me. So if they, you know, oh, my God, I've asked me to speak. Write me a better opener. Anyone can have five minutes with me so it's it's a real ongoing intense intense experience and people are healed but it's our little secret fine i don't care it's very you can can you imagine how pleasing this

field is for me i studied this for 25 years. I'm giving 25 years of fear of public speaking research into each person. It's very, very exciting for me. There you go. And it's important to read the book, too, even if you have, like, even if you have, you know, you've maybe public speaking before. I mean, the one thing about public speaking is you can always get better and better. And so you can read the book even if you are, you know, a novice or a, I don't know, you feel you're an advanced speaker.

Because the more sort of tips and tricks you can come out with, and of course practice is so good. Being in the mindset of pre-programming stuff in your brain, I think helps as well. Being confident, being narcissists where you don't give a shit about what anybody thinks, that helps too as well. What are things that we haven't talked about that we should tease out that are in the book? One thing that's important to know is to recognize that when you make mistakes, you just fix them and keep talking. Most people, when they're in front of people, they fear making mistakes because, oh, if I make a mistake, they'll think.

And then fill in the blank of, you know, I don't belong here. Why is she there? Why is he in front of us? You know, all those other things. And then here's the deal about fear. Once fear raises, the brain stops. And that's why sometimes people go blank as they're speaking. Oh, it's horrific. It's horrific. It's horrific. It's a thing that, that, you know, when you wake up at four o'clock

in the morning, the night before speaking, thinking, what if I make a mistake? So here's the antidote to mistakes. You know how everybody here who's listening, everyone in the audience, when you're saying to your friends, let's meet on Wednesday, no, I mean Thursday. You know when you make a mistake, you just fix it and keep talking. If you say, let's meet at 3 o'clock. No, let's meet at 2. So when you make mistakes with friends,

it's perfect that I should make a mistake then. When you make a mistake with friends, you can fix it. So the same thing with people. So I do suggest that you rehearse aloud anything that you're a little concerned about, even if it's just a section of your talk that you don't usually give. And as you rehearse aloud, you will make mistakes because speaking, when you speak, you make mistakes. That as you make mistakes in your rehearsal, you fix them and keep speaking. In other words, get used to what's going to happen in real life, which is you will skip a bullet. You will trip over something. You will forget to say that,

how to say that word in English. So rehearse getting over those and just getting, getting to your talk. I just usually own it and roll through it and take the, you know, I just did that early in the middle of the show. If you notice when, when I couldn't remember one of the points I wanted to make, I just own it. And I just take the, I just take people on a journey with me and they actually follow it. Cause it's like, wait, where's he going now?

He's going someplace. What the hell, wait, where's he going now? He's going someplace. What the hell is going on now? He's off going someplace. Where's he going? And I don't know if it works, but people send a not care or listen. You're right. It's just saying, oh, I said

rehearse this. Oh, I said that wrong. Let me say it again again but i do it with a smile to show that i take the work seriously but i don't take myself seriously so even that's another tip is to repair saves you know when you see wonderful speakers and they mess up and then they say something cute and adorable and funny and then they go back to their talk well they use that cute and adorable and funny thing all the time so that's my secret the humor i just go back to their talk. Well, they use that cute and adorable and funny thing all the time. That's my secret, the humor.

I just fall back to a joke or comedy or humor and be self-deprecating. And that actually is the answer. That is the answer to the issue. When I make mistakes, what should I do? Oh, just you prepare ahead. You can joke about it. If you're giving a serious talk,

then you say, oh, just a moment, let me say that better. Just make it fit. If you're giving a serious talk, then you say, oh, just a moment. Let me say that better. Just make it fit. There you go. Or I just ask people, boy, what I just said sounds stupid. No, I don't. I don't do that. You can if you want.

You can do anything you want. I mean, that's the beauty of life. So the other thing you teach people, I thought this is really interesting. When you don't know the answer, you will know what to do and say to maintain your authority and credibility. This is one of those important things that CEOs and a lot of leaders need to have. That sometimes when you, there's an art form to when you don't know an answer right away. Or maybe you're trying to figure out what question is coming at you, especially if you're meet the media and this can help with media as well.

If you're in, if you're in the front PR section sections of, of dealing with investors or media people and, and being able to analyze the question and think about it and not give that instant response that might end up in some PR car fuffle or, you know, you end up sounding like an idiot or you don't sound like you know exactly if you're up on the topic. And so giving that time,

repeating the question and what to do can really help. What do you think about that? I would say that everyone who's listening should take that advice. Very good advice is that one, anticipate what questions might I get, and then rehearse the answers aloud because thinking is not rehearsing and kind of mumbling through it in the car on the way there is not rehearsing. Rehearsing as if you're on the Zoom, as if you're on camera on virtual. Rehearse, you know, standing up or, you know, go to the conference room ahead of time and rehearse standing up. You know, get used to your ideas and what you'll say if you get the difficult questions.

And your advice is the best, which is to say, I need to give some that, I need to give that some thought. Let me write back that down. I'll get back to you and I'll email it to you. In fact, I'll broadcast it to everyone in the meeting. There you go. Full disclosure, I stole that off your website. So smart. Yeah, there you go. Full disclosure, I stole that line off your website. When you don't know an answer, you will know what to do and maintain your authority and credibility if you work with Risa here. That's one of the bylines of promotions there. But it's true.

I mean, you'll see CEOs that will make the most stupidest comments because they immediately try and answer an immediate question, and they end up just mucking it when you're like, take a breath, repeat the question, and then you can rephrase. Well, you know, it's interesting you say that. And there's a lot of issues that surround this issue that you're talking about. In the meantime, in the back of your brain going, I don't know what the fuck the answer is for this.

But I've got to come up with something soon, so I'll just keep stalling. You know, recently I saw the technically quote unquote CEO. I mean, what? Wait, never mind. CEO of X, which is Twitter. I think it's called BK next week. And I recently saw her on a tech show.

And the person who was interviewing was very combative. It was almost like a cat fight. I don't know if you saw this. But she was getting peppered pretty hard. And she was getting hard a cat fight. I don't know if you saw this, but she was getting peppered pretty hard. And she was getting hard questions, too. And she was being incredibly evasive because, I don't know, that's all you can do when you're the pretend CEO of a company that Elon Musk runs and you're really just the COO. And he's, of course, doing controversial shit that now you're on stage having to answer questions about. And she was doing a really interesting job of evading,

but stalling and also diversion. And a lot of people, she got a lot of crap for it, especially from some of the tech, really good tech journalists. But when I really watched what she was doing, I was watching how she was doing what we're talking about, where if you don't know an answer or you don't want to answer a question a certain way, how to still try and maintain authority and credibility and control.

And it was a lot of work she was putting into it and roundabout, but just watching the art form of it and how she delivered it. I don't know what worked out better for her, but the answers that she didn't want to give probably wouldn't have worked out better anyway so you know it's kind of one of those things when the media is peppering you or maybe you're getting questions from employees or investors you know you're at that big investor uh annual thing uh you know there's maybe some questions you don't want to deal with um or you know you don't want to disclose certain things.

Maybe you're a politician. Maybe you're a parent who doesn't want to explain to the kid, you know, what certain things are that they found on their Google search. You know, you've got to have that political sort of spin answer. So all these different things can really help do better when it comes to leadership, speaking and communicating. That's my point. I completely agree. And if I can add to what you said, that the big thing is if you know that something's messed up and you're going to get a lot of questions about that, you have to think of what questions will I get and write down

the answers you're going to, you know, I mean, make an outline of the answers you're going to give. And most importantly, what are the worst questions I can get? What are the ones I hope I don't get? Those are the ones that you want to mostly prepare ahead of time. I used to do outplacement training, which is like when an IBM or Coca-Cola, when those companies laid off people years and years, I did this years ago, I would, when they would lay off their executives, they would put them in this training to decide what they were going to do next, write their resume, and just help them with job interviews, which was like the first public speaking that they've done in a while where they're under the gun. And for those people, it was important that they really take a look at

where are they heading? What do they want to do next, and for them when they were doing job interviews, there were things that as I would prepare them for the interview, I would say, you know, we would ask the typical questions, then I would say what are the questions that you hope or you fear that they're going to ask you and they would list those. You know, well, I was, I traded jobs, you know, what, you know, four jobs in four years or here are three years that I missed and I didn't have any jobs at all. And prepare ahead what you're going to say because this is what most people do

when they get a question that they don't want to handle. Their whole body language and everything changes. They've been answering with this kind of eye contact and body language. They get a difficult question and they go, oh, well, those were the two years that I get all apologetic, which brings attention to the one thing they don't want attention to. So it's imperative, really. If you are if you've done something wrong, if something's going on, you know there are going to be difficult questions. You need to spend hours rehearsing ahead of time live with, one, planning what you're going to say, rehearsing the words, and also rehearsing the body language so that you appear the way you want to appear and it's not your default fear look.

You could really help the Florida governor, Ron DeSantis. I don't know if you've noticed, but he's got this thing and somebody pointed out on tiktok and now i can't unsee it but he does a he does a grit grimace when he's asked something he doesn't want to deal with or he's he's not happy or he just does it sometimes when he's like i don't want to be here and i don't know if you've noticed it yet but his that's an example of where your body language really gives it away. And he does like this thing where, um, I,

my PR guy says I should smile. So I'm going to smile. I really don't feel like smiling. Like it's a real dead giveaway. And, uh, regardless of where you're on politics, let's skip that boys and girls,

um, watching his body language sometimes. And once you see it, I'm serious. Like go watch some of his speeches and interviews or when he's on deck with the Republican debates going on right now. He does this grimace thing and it'll grit his teeth like it'll clench his jaw and crap. It's just like, what's going on, dude, in your head? But, you know, that's one of the things people don't think about. They're thinking about more what they're going to say as opposed to how they look in their body language and body language

is just so important as we heard great people on the show teach us that um but yeah it and sometimes i'll laugh it off like a like if somebody asks you a hard question the best way to do is to is to break it down just like a shit test. And you go, you go, yep, that was the question I was afraid someone was going to answer. And I've been worried about all day and then just laugh and people, and people will laugh with you. They're like, ah,

yeah. But if you, if you ask, if you answer that question, you know, with that, you know, people,

people, yeah, it brings attention. The media like, yeah, we got him. This is front page news right here. And being able to have that eloquence to, you know, be able to answer questions and deal with them and make all the difference in the world.

And, you know, you made a really good point right now. And that is that there are really three parts of what makes a charismatic speaker, charismatic speaker. And that is the words, of course, have to be good. But what really counts a lot is the sound of the voice. When someone says, oh, yes, I can do that. That sounds different than, yes, I can do that. You know, I could do it 15 different ways. But if you really pay attention to what is the sound of my voice communicating as well

and then of course the body language yeah those all make a big big difference and many many people i guess people who are afraid of public speaking but i would say generally when i taught public speaking to these fortune 500 people these executives that most everyone was concerned about the words and it's really your demeanor and your way of being with people that gets your message from your head into side of their head there you go with comedy you learn to tune into people so if somebody throws shit at you you focus in on them and you talk to them directly and you try and have fun or you try and make them laugh in fact one of the problems you have as a comedian is whoever's not laughing in the room is the person that you really start focusing on because i want to make that that dude laugh um but yeah if you're if you're

responding with well i'm glad you asked me that question you're folding your arms and putting up body language like i got this again uh you know different body languages language. I'm serious. If you go watch, everyone in the audience is going to be like, we're going to watch Ron DeSantis right now. But if you see the grimace thing, the lockjaw thing, and he actually does this with his teeth, you'll see him grind his teeth and it's like, urgh.

I'm surprised someone hasn't let him know that he shouldn't play poker. I didn't ever see it until TikTok. Somebody went, have you ever noticed what Rhonda Santos does? And now, like, I can't see it because the whole time I ever see him on TV, I'm like, see that grimace there. And so, yeah, someone should fix that for him. But it's a great example of body language and how to do things.

So as we go out, Risa, give us your final thoughts. Tell us how people can onboard with you, work with you, et cetera, et cetera. I would say the first thing to do is to go to Amazon and get Mr. Bear Speaks Without Fear because it really, if you get it tomorrow morning, by tomorrow night, you will have so little public speaking fear. Plus, you'll have written the next talk you have to give. As you learn how to write, just choose the subject of the talk you have to give in six weeks. And if someone wants to see me,

just go to ConfidentSpeaking.com and contact me because it's really an opportunity to see, could I be helpful to you if you work one-to-one? I would say that if what I'm saying at all in this interview is resonating with you, it means a part of you wants to get rid of this fear. You don't have to use me. You don't have to read my book. But do something to help yourself because this is a fixable problem. It does require reprogramming

your brain but isn't it worth it because you have a bunch of junk in your brain that's making you crazy so the point is is that if you have public speaking fear or if you're a good speaker and you want to learn TED talk tips those are learnable and I would say the takeaway is when you see someone who speaks well and you admire one little thing they do, just imitate that for a week, and it'll be yours. There you go. There you go. Well, give us your.com, Risa, so people can find you on the interwebs.

Okay. okay it is confident speaking.com and you can contact me there and you can ask i'll i'll answer a free question be my guest there you go thank you very much risa for coming on it's been insightful and fun to have you oh back at you there you. And thanks to our audience for tuning in. We certainly appreciate you guys. As always, please go give us those five-star reviews on iTunes. Help us pay for the operatic singer we hired for the intro plug. Go to goodreads.com, 4chesschrisfast, youtube.com, 4chesschrisfast, linkedin.com, 4chesschrisfast, the chrisfast one on the TikTok. Tell all your friends.

That's all we need. It's free. You just call somebody up and say, hey, go subscribe to the Chris Voss Show or else. Anyway, guys, don't do that. Thanks for tuning in. Be good to each other. Stay safe, and we'll see you guys next time. And that should have us out.