The School of Greatness - 236 Tell Your Story and Steal the Show with Michael Port

Episode Date: October 5, 2015

“We can be critics or we can be performers.” - Michael Port If you enjoyed this episode, check out show notes and more at http://lewishowes.com/236

This is episode number 236 with New York Times best-selling author, Michael Port. Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, former pro-athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin. Welcome everyone to this podcast episode with my man Michael Port. And the top five things you're going to learn today are all about how to become a better performer, which includes stopping to criticize.

Also, how to tell if you should include a certain story in your performance, the power of using contrast in your speech patterns and in body language in your daily life, why not to curse at the beginning of your performance, the five key components in every speech, plus how to steal the show in every moment of your life and always get a standing ovation. I'm very excited about this. Michael Port has become a good friend of mine. He's a New York Times bestselling author. He's written six books, including Book Yourself Solid, The Think Big Manifesto, and the brand new book out today, Steal the Show. He's also probably the only New York Times bestselling business book author to have also

been a successful professional actor, guest starring on shows like Sex and the City, Law and Order, Third Watch, All My Children, and other movies as well. He is a great human being. I've had the pleasure of working with him to teach me how to enhance some of my speaking opportunities and performances. And after working with him, I noticed an incredible shift in my performances. And if you're looking to be a better speaker, if you're looking to give better presentations, if you're looking to do better sales pitches, to get a better job interview, whatever it may be,

or to even have a better date with someone and a first date, then this is the episode for you. And I'm super pumped for you to dive in. And without further ado, let's go ahead and dive into this episode with the one and only Michael Port. Welcome everyone to the School of Greatness podcast. I'm very excited about my guest today. His name is Michael Port. Michael, how's it going?

It's going great. How are you doing? Hi, I'm doing great, man. We've got some things we're working on together that I'm excited about, so it's good to have you on the show. This is the first time you've been on the show, so I'm sure there's lots of fans that already know about you. So I can say long-time listener, first-time guest? There you go. Exactly.

And there's a bunch of things I want to cover today because you are the storytelling master, the speaker master on stage. which I really feel like your feedback and suggestions and advice helped me craft a better story, which created a deeper experience for people. And I think that we have an opportunity every time we get in front of an audience, whether it's on a stage or one-on-one with anyone walking down the street, we have that opportunity to move people into a specific direction in their lives. And that's a gift. And it's our duty to cultivate that gift to the maximum,

to literally make people better, make the world a better experience, and make our lives better. So I'm excited to dive in about how we can all do this better. Because for me, I know it's an ongoing process for mastering the art of speaking, pitching, enrolling people in my vision, and I'm excited to hear from the master himself. So thanks for being here. Yeah, happy to be here. And you've got a new book called Steal the Show, from speeches to job interviews to deal closing pitches, how to guarantee a standing ovation for all the performances

in your life, which I'm really pumped about. I've got the copy right here in my hands. I want to make sure everyone go pick up a copy. It's out right now everywhere. You can go buy a book, go buy a copy. We'll have it linked up here on the show notes. I'm curious, first off, before we kind of get into how everyone can be better storytellers and enroll people in our visions on a daily basis, why did you feel like this was the book you wanted to come out with right now and what really inspired you to do this?

This is the book that I've always wanted to write. I started my career as an actor and I had a modicum of success. I have an MFA, a master's from the graduate acting program at NYU. I have an MFA, a master's from the graduate acting program at NYU. And then I worked on shows like Sex and the City, Third Watch, All My Children, Law and Order, Another World. And I did some films. I did Pelican Brief, Down to Earth, The Believer, Last Call. But I did a lot of voiceovers.

That was my bread and butter. So for brands like AT&T, Coors, Braun, Pizza Hut, MTV, I used to do the tag for the Box Music Network. Remember that one? All music, all the time. That was my thing. And I left the business because I was immature. I really wasn't willing to wait for success. I wanted what I wanted when I wanted it. And I would have to go into the room and, and prate and prance around to try to get somebody else to give me a job. And at that time, I, that just, it wasn't tenable. So I thought, well, I'll go into business and I'll make something of myself. And I did. I went into the fitness industry on the business side and I had a modicum of success.

And then after about five years, I went out on my own and started writing and Book Yourself Solid came out in 2006. And I was fortunate that that did very well. And then here we are about almost 10 years later and I'm back focusing on performance and public speaking because when I look at the accomplishments that I had when I left acting in business and then as an entrepreneur, I can, I can pretty much, I can pretty much say that most of my professional success has come as a result of me being able to perform when the stakes are high. Because think about life for a second. Our life is made up of lots of different moments.

And how we perform during life's high stakes situations often determines the quality of our life. So if we fall flat during those high stakes situations, then we play a small game. But if we can steal the show when the spotlight is on us, well, then we get to do whatever we want to do. And that's why I wrote this book because, you know, performance is not just about speaking on a stage. It's about all of these situations. Even meeting your future in-laws is a performance. Now I want to make something really, really clear. Sometimes people hear the word performance and they think fake. Yes, exactly. And that is absolutely true for some people. There are definitely people who are out there who will manipulate, who will pretend, who are fake. But if somebody says to me, Michael, I don't want to be a performer because that means, won't that mean I'm going to be phony? So then I would ask, are you phony? And they say, no, no, of course not. I'm not phony. I say, well, then you don't have to worry about it because you're not going to be phony. The best performers in the world are the most authentic performers in the world. And, and I want us, this is chapter three in Steal the Show is about playing the right role in any given situation and not letting anybody else cast you in a role. else cast you in a role. You choose the role you want to play. And if you want to play a leading role, then play that role. But we can play lots of different roles in our life and we don't have

to get stuck in one style of behavior, one role. So essentially our whole life is a performance, is what you're saying. And unless we're performing in a powerful way, then we're probably not living a powerful life. Yeah, I think so. And, you know, part of it, you know, for some people may just be, you know, sort of moving, shifting the way they think about this word performance. I mean, Shakespeare said all the world's a stage and, and to a certain extent, you know, I think, uh, I think he had it, you know, I mean, look, I don't, you know, I don't think this will give you an explicit rating on your show, but even when you're making love, there are elements of performance in there.

So all aspects of life have an element of performance. And that's why I wrote this book because so many people are scared. And why are we scared? We're scared because we don't want to get rejected. Yeah. Yeah. And that's perfectly normal. I don't want to get rejected. Yeah. Yeah. And that's perfectly normal.

I don't want to get rejected. Do you? No. No, of course not. So then what happens is we spend a lot of time going for approval rather than results. And anytime we focus on approval, we're going to pander. We're going to water ourselves down. We're going to behave in the way that we think somebody else wants us to behave. And then we will not have a voice.

So how do we shift out of that approval mindset to results mindset? that you think you want to produce and what's driving you to produce those results? Is it, you know, some, you know, some need to prove your parents wrong? Is it some need to, you know, be better than your neighbor or is it driven by a deep desire to be in service. So here's something. One of my clients called me up in a bit of a panic because she got an interview on one of the big network broadcast morning shows. And she had been trying to get this interview, but yet she was freaking out. Right.

So, oh my God, I don't know what to do. I just want to be really good. What should I do, Mike? I said, well, you God, I don't know what to do. I just want to be really good. What should I do, Mike? I said, well, you cannot be good. It's not possible. And there's just silence. Yeah. And I think she fell off her chair because because she she got really upset. I said, no, it's not that so that you're not good, but you can't go into a situation trying to be good. You can go in there trying to be helpful. And then if you are, you will be perceived as good, but your job is not to try to be good. Your job is trying to be helpful. So in every single presentation, every single speech,

every single pitch, there's a promise. And when we make a promise to an individual sitting across the table from us or a theater with a thousand people in it, our job is to deliver on that promise. So it no longer becomes us. It's not about us. It's never been about us. It's always about them. So people often ask, well, how do I overcome, you know, stage fright? I get really nervous. What should I do? and so the assumption is well maybe i should focus on my breath my breathing or meditate or do jumping jacks and all of those things are fine but ultimately we need to take the focus off of ourselves yeah because you know the more you think about yourselves the more obsessed you get and the more you know obsessed

you get the more neurotic you get and then next thing you know you all you can think about yourselves, the more obsessed you get and the more obsessed you get, the more neurotic you get. And then next thing you know, all you can think about is, did my hair look good? And, oh, no, I wore the wrong pants and these shoes. And it's not about your shoes, your pants or your hair unless, of course, you're a man and your pants are pulled up way too high. You don't want to do that. Right. OK. I mean, I do actually dedicate a part of one of the chapters to wardrobe, you know,

is to choice of clothing because they are costumes, aren't they? You know, you either have great style naturally or you have a great stylist because, you know, when I see pictures of you online, you look really great and it's part of your brand identity, but it's a representation of who you are, your style, your playfulness. Right. And that's a costume and it's a choice. Interesting. Yeah.

I've got a pretty good stylist. You're not wearing – what did you say? I've got a pretty good stylist who hooks me up for those. There you go. But that's exactly right because there's a performance element to it. But you're a super authentic guy. So you're able to balance both of those things. And that's one of the things that makes you very successful.

Exactly. Yeah. I like that. I'm curious, you know, what was opening up for me is what about all the introverts in the world who feel like performing or just like getting up to perform on a day-to-day basis? It's hard for them because they're much more introverted than, you know, someone who's willing to go out there and put

themselves out there constantly. Sure. So I'm not an expert on the introvert, extrovert concept, but it's often used, this term introvert is often used to suggest shyness. And I don't necessarily think they're one and the same. Someone who's an introvert might also be shy, but I am very introverted in my nature. I don't do well in crowds. Like I don't like going to concerts when there's too many people around. I often get overwhelmed and I need to go spend some time by myself. You know, I spent a lot of time on my boat out in the middle of the bay. There's nobody around. So, but people might not assume that because they think, oh, well, he's a performer. He's gregarious. And that means it's just how he is all the time, but it's actually not how I am all the time. When I'm sitting around at

a table for, you know, a dinner with six people that I don't know, I'm not the life of the party. I'm not the one that's entertaining everybody. I can do it if I know that that's my role because I think about how do you play that role. But it's not how I am normally. So I just want to try to separate these two things because introvert, extrovert doesn't necessarily make you a better performer one way or the other. But if you are very shy or you label yourself as shy and you don't like people watching you, having this big, huge personality, that's definitely not necessary because ultimately performing is about connecting. That's what it's about. And all of us can connect with one person or 1,000 people.

So when I coach, one of the things that is really important to me in all of our heroic public speaking training programs is that you will never see one of our speakers look like another speaker. Like nobody would watch anyone that I've trained and say, ah, that's a Michael Port method speaker. It's just not going to happen because it's an art. It's an art. Performance is an art. And each one of us is an individual. And what I do with the book, Steal the Show, and in all of our training is find the individual

and give you an opportunity to express yourself as an individual. So one performer may move a lot on stage. And that's the way that we're going to direct them and coach them. And they use their physicality in really extreme ways. And it works very well for them. But another, we may have them very still for most of their presentation because that is a much more powerful place for them to be. So there is not a one size fits all approach to any kind of performance. There is not a one-size-fits-all approach to any kind of performance. Performance is an art, and often the performer's job is to break the rules, not necessarily to be controversial or just to break the rules, but to try to create something better in its place.

And to that end, I think we have two options. We can be critics or we can be performers, but I don't think we can be both. What do you mean critics? Well, I think that there's a place for people who are professional, um, critics, you know, someone who in the New York times, they review movies and plays. And I think there's a place for that. But if you spend any time on Facebook these days, many people have a lot of very strong opinions about what other people do or don't do. And I think one of the reasons that we're so afraid of performance is because we're afraid of being criticized. And if we spend our time criticizing others, how are we going to get up there in front of others and take

the risks? So you're saying people that do criticize a lot of the time usually aren't the ones taking the risks themselves and performing. Let me ask you a question. When's the last time you wrote a negative review about somebody's podcast book or anything else? Have you ever done that? I don't know if I ever have.

Yeah, exactly right. And when I ask, uh, all my colleagues and I really, I very rarely use absolutes, but every colleague at a high level that I've asked the same question to, they've said, Hmm, no, I've never done that. Too busy creating. Exactly. Yeah, exactly right. So one of our students, um, called up Amy and he was really upset because somebody blasted his video. You know, oh, you're like Joel Osteen and blah, blah, blah. And I don't, you know, I don't know why the guy hates Joel Osteen. But, you know, for whatever reason, this guy just blasted him.

And his video is fantastic. And he's a wonderful speaker. But rarely will everybody like what you do. But he took it so personally. And I asked him, who's the guy? He's like, well, I don't really know him that well. I said, okay, what does he have to do with what you do for a living?

Nothing. What does he have to do with the people that you're trying to serve? Nothing. But yet it's still so powerful when other people criticize us. And look, there are two types of critics. There's the external critic,

and then there's the critic in your own head. Mm-hmm. And when you criticize yourself, you tend to hear the external critics even more. Yeah, so, you know, those are the, like I always call them the people in the cheap seats who like to push other people down to lift themselves up. Yeah.

Yeah, so we don't really have any time for that. That's not interesting to us. We're trying to make things because anybody can break things. The question is, can you build something better in its place? And that's what we're focused on. But if you can work on silencing

those voices of judgment in your head, the ones that tell you you're not enough, you don't know enough, you'll never be enough, what do I have to say that already hasn't been said? If you can quiet those down and you won't hear those voices out in the cheap seats quite as much and you won't hear those voices out in

the cheap seats quite as much, and you don't need to be different to make a difference in our world. And when I say world, I mean, our industry often there's this real strong push to try to be different than other people. And somehow the idea of being different is conflated with being unique yourself, as if that's what you're supposed to do, be different, be different, be different. And I don't think trying to be different is a way of finding your voice. And I don't think trying to be different is a way of finding your voice. Trying to be more honest is a way of finding your voice. And if we focus on being different, then we will feel either like a fraud or we'll feel insignificant because we don't feel that different. You know, you and I and the 250,000 people or a million people that are listening to

this particular podcast, we're all more similar than we are different. Now you are six, five, you know, you're, you're brawny and manly and I'm five, 10 and ball.

Um, but we, but we're so, we're so similar. We're looking for, and manly and I'm 5'10 and bald. But we're so similar. We're looking for meaning. We're looking for love. We're looking for peace. We're looking for respect. We're looking for all of these important things. And the people who are listening are looking for the same things too.

So why are we criticizing so much? And I just think it's very hard to be a performer if we spend a lot of time criticizing. I love that. I love that. So stop criticizing if you want to perform better. That's step one. Would you say that having a normal conversation with someone on a day-to-day basis or going to ask your girl out or going for a job interview, any of these daily conversations, would you say there's the same three to five part structure or act, whatever you call it, as there is in a speech? Is the performance very similar or are they different? Giving a speech in front of a thousand people to talking with one person about something.

There are some things that are very similar. I'll give you an example. in person about something. There are some things that are very similar. I'll give you an example. When you create any kind of content for a speech, and you can apply this to any kind of writing that you do or any other type of information product, so to speak, you need to have a big idea. There's got to be something that drives you. There's a reason that you're bringing this topic to bear. And as I said before, the big idea doesn't have to be different to make a difference. If you think about Martin Luther King's I Have a Dream speech,

his big idea was that all men and women are created equal. Well, that wasn't exactly different. That was in the constitution. But the problem was it didn't actually exist. So that was what made it so important and so pressing and that it had to be addressed, but it wasn't different. And so that's important to remember. The big idea is something that you care about that you feel needs to be addressed. And then if you have a big idea, you can make a promise. And that promise is what you deliver. And it's got to be, of course, incredibly relevant to the person on the other end of

the promise. Number three, you need to make sure that you can demonstrate how the world – that you know how the world looks to the person on the other end of that conversation. What do you mean by that? Well, you know, if I'm speaking about, say, public speaking performance and I say, look, it's easy. Any dummy can do it. I mean, come on. And you know what? Being funny is just easy.

Any dummy can do it well there i'm gonna have i'll say three people will listen to me that's about it because they'll go this guy's so out of touch he doesn't understand how i feel right he's and so and so even if if you started out saying listen i get it public speaking is notoriously difficult and it's rated as like one of the top three things that people are afraid of the most yeah it you know people are paralyzed by this it can consume their entire mindset like and i've been there before i get it then you'll be able to connect with 98 of the room exactly right as long as it's true you know we can't pretend you know like i i can't i i i wouldn't want to make up an origin story that says, well, I was once a young man who never spoke and, you know, like,

and I was given an opportunity to go in front of my town council and I froze, you know, you, that's just, it's just made up. So you, you need to be honest about, you know, how you are and they won't mind if you have some talents that they don't think they do, as long as you understand how they feel. That's what's important. So that's number three. Number four is being able to demonstrate the consequences of not adopting this worldview or not adhering to this big idea, not going after this promise. Because, not adhering to this big idea, not going after this promise. Because, you know, if we don't feel some pain around a change, we may not be willing to move forward. And then, of course, number five is being able to demonstrate the rewards of, you know, realizing this promise. But if we introduce

the rewards first, they may not be enough because people may see, you know, I mean, that would be so great to have or so great to do. But it's just it's so far off. It's not possible, you know. negative consequences of not making a change, then they might be more willing to get into action and then eventually see that those rewards are actually possible. And this is true for a speech and it's true for say an interviewer, for example. And I'll give you an example. I'll give you a specific example. When, when I was trying to get my very first job after, after leaving acting, I was a little bit nervous because I had just been an actor. And my undergraduate degree from Tulane was in theater and psychology. And then my graduate

degree was in acting. So it's not like I had a long resume that would suggest I should be hired to do some high power stuff in the business world. But I was able to get an interview for a mid-level job in the fitness industry as a manager, as a manager of the group exercise department for one very high-end luxury health club. And I had taught one spinning class. That's how I knew them. That was my connection to them because I used to race bikes. And so I teach a spinning class in the winter during the off season. And I said to them, look, here's the thing. I don't have any of the qualifications that you think the person who you hire is supposed to have. So I was already demonstrating that I was honest. You see? Okay. So that's, that's number one. And I, I introduced, and I said, but here's why I think you should consider me. And I introduced my big idea.

My big idea was, I think that you are promoting people who are very talented at the performance side of group exercise, but they don't have the requisite skill set or talents for managing and business development. So that was my big idea. Then I had to go about making a promise. So my promise is if you hire me, here's what I can produce for you. And I said, and if you don't, here's what I think will continue to happen because this is what I've seen. And I said, and if you don't, here's what I think will continue to happen because this is what I've seen. And then, of course, the rewards would be X, Y, and Z. So in that situation, I have to be bold, but I have to do it with grace and with a little bit of charm and respect.

Because if you don't do it with respect, then you come in there and you seem very arrogant. Yeah, right. But, you know, if they weren't a serious company and they didn't take their future serious, they might've, you know, said, I'm not listening to you. You don't know what you're talking about, but they did. They said, you know what, I'm going to consider this because we really care about moving forward. So I got the job and then I cleaned up that department three weeks later. They, another one of the clubs in the same company called me and said, listen, we want you to come and run our department also. Uh, it's really messed up over here. The woman who was running it, uh, is, is, uh, disappeared for three days. Then she showed up and we got to get somebody else in here. I said, great. And I said, what are you going to pay me? And they said,

$5,000 more than you get now. And I'm going, hold on a second. I'm sorry. I did. Maybe I didn't hear this correctly because that, that math doesn't really add up. You want me to have two clubs instead of one, but you want to just give me $5,000 more. And they said, yeah, it's a real honor to have two clubs. And I said, I really appreciate that. I'm not doing this for the honor of it. You know, this is a job, right? And I want to produce. So I said, I'll tell you what, I'll make you a deal. You tell me the top three most important things for you to accomplish in that department realistically within the next three months. And if I achieve those, you'll give me this salary. And if I don't, I'll take the five and I'll do it as if I got the big salary. Right. And they snickered and laughed a little bit. And then they told me the three things and they thought those three things were just impossible.

Sure. Okay. 90 days later, what happens? You achieve them. Of course. And I sat down with my boss and I said, okay, so we did it. Let's get my comp package, you know, uh, reorganized. She said, what do you mean? I said, you remember the promise you made? And she said, no. And her assistant looked up from her desk and goes, yeah, Chris, you told them you were going to do that. She goes, oh my God, I don't even have that in the budget. We're going to have to figure something out. So I would say, yeah, well, they did is actually interesting.

What we did is, so we paid all these instructors per hour. And so we had, you know, hundreds of them. And we had me teaching classes that I didn't teach to supplement the part of the salary that wasn't in the budget assigned for this managerial position. And then of course, when the corporate office found out that they were doing that because they tried, they gave me another promotion to another job, which was, which the salary I thought wasn't really enough. And I said, well, cause I'm making more than that now. And they said, how the hell are you making more than that now? I said, well, here's what's

happening. So the point is, is that you've got to take some risks and raise the stakes and take chances. And that's what the performer does. That is, you know, in, in, in part two of steal the show, I outlined six performance principles. And if you adhere to those principles, you can, you can take that kind of action. You can, you can take those kinds of risks. You can make those kinds of promises and the the majority of the time, you'll deliver on them. I love that. I mean, the thing that used to get me really hung up idea so that I feel like I can speak for the next 30 to 60 minutes and keep them connected. And then it's like how do you keep them connected and constantly in through the stories you tell?

How do you tell better stories? Can you speak on some of those things? Sure. And there are many, many elements and there's a big, big conversation around that throughout the whole speech. But if you focus just on the opening, often when you read an article about public speaking, they'll suggest you tell stories or open with a joke. And that may work very well for some people, but telling jokes is a particular art. It is a craft as well. And it's not always very easy.

And if you go out there and open with a joke and it bombs... That's not good. It's not a great feeling, you know? It's not a great feeling. Now, if you open with a story and it's not a really compelling story

that blows them out of the water. Same thing. They may have felt like, oh, well, there was a ubiquitous opening story from the speaker. I think they read the article about telling a story at the beginning because all stories that you tell need to be directly related to the promise and supported by the big idea or else they shouldn't be told or else they just seem like filler. Right. And so you're using stories, of course, to illustrate points, but not just stories to tell stories. So if you feel like you have a story that nails the big idea and gets them really fired up about it, you use that and you need to craft it. And we should talk about how to craft

stories because it's an essential component of public speaking. How do we do that? Yeah, well, let me let's get to that in a second. I just want to give a couple more things about the opening. So that's good. And if you have got a joke that works all the time, you know, go for it. If you can get a little bit of a laugh, great, no problem. But you can also not put as much pressure on yourself as you're currently doing, thinking the opening has to be a fireworks display and just go out there and make the promise. and make the promise. Seamless, easy, light, and then build. Because a great speech has an arc. And that arc, it starts, say, if you look at a graph,

it starts toward the bottom of the graph. And then it goes up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up, until the climax. And that's the end of the speech. So sometimes if you start a speech, say, on a scale of one to 10, if you start it as a 10, where do you have to go from there? It's a state of 10. Yeah. And also, you want a lot of contrast in a speech.

And audiences like to get to know you in the beginning. So I often start my speeches very easy, very conversational. And then I build into it from there because sometimes it takes an audience a little time to get used to you. They're not used to the way you move. They're not used to your voice. Just like a mother or father can understand their three-year-old perfectly. But if we heard the three-year-old, we'd have to ask for a translation because we're not used to the way that they speak. And the same thing is true for the first time you hear a speaker. You have to get used to them. So that ease is very, very important.

So how about if you're doing, you know, if you're talking about public speaking, how to give a great, great presentation, if you're giving a speech on that, which I'm assuming you have that speech, what would an opening look like for you? If you wanted to give that? Well, there are two different things. So there are four different speeches that I give. One is the Think Big Revolution. That's a show. It feels more like a show. People can see that, a 16-minute excerpt of that. If you just go to YouTube or you go to MichaelPort.com, you can see Think Big Revolution.

You'll see it there. And then I do, of course, a Book Yourself Solid speech, which is a curriculum-based speech based on the book. And then Amy and I do a keynote in one act, which is something that we've written and is quite fun with two characters. I play myself. She plays a woman named Amy, who's not actually Amy. And Amy, for the record, is my business partner and my fiance. And actually, maybe people will be hearing this later and she'll be my wife by then. There you go. If I'm lucky and she shows up, the altar. So that's something else entirely.

And we don't expect anybody to do that kind of thing. It takes place on an airplane. It has lots of sound effects and props. It's a show. But then what I do is I do something that I call heroic public speaking unscripted. speaking unscripted because when I give a speech on speaking, I want them to see people just like them transform in front of their eyes because if they see me giving a speech and they go, well, he's the expert. Of course he can do that. They don't necessarily see themselves. So I do it unscripted and I do it.

I come out with an opening that's very easy to relax them, to calm them down, because when it comes to public speaking, people get nervous and I tell them, look, I don't think there's any one way to do anything. I'm going to show you a particular methodology. I'm going to introduce you to my way of seeing the world and hopefully you'll resonate with it. And you might resonate with some parts more than others and that's okay. Yeah. So really easy, really, really, really like calm. And I tell them, here's what's going to happen. I'm actually going to take a few of you out of the audience and put you on the stage.

But it's your choice. I am not going to force anyone up here because, and I'll tell you, I'm not telling them this. I'm telling you this because all audience interaction needs to be proportionate to the amount of trust that you've earned. Right. That's critical. Sometimes you'll see somebody start a speech and, and they'll say, okay, so raise your hand if you are in debt.

Right. I'm not sure people want to put their hand up in an audience about – or raise your hand if you're an alcoholic. It's just I'm not so sure that's what people want to share with an audience of people that they don't know. And so we need to make sure that we have enough trust in order to ask, you know, people for things like that. And so if you're going to bring somebody up on stage, they need to volunteer and want to be there. And then I spend the time actually working on their speeches in front of everybody.

And it's I mean, you're going to see it when we do our event together. It's, it's cool. It's, it's pretty, uh, it's pretty spectacular. Okay. Well, what about, I'll give you another one though. You want another one? Yeah. Okay. I have lots of different openings and I will adjust them depending on the audience. I mean, that's, what's really, really important is that you need to be so well prepared that you can be improvisational. It's different than winging it. Right. And a lot of natural communicators wing it because they go, well, you know what?

I know my stuff. I'm quick on my feet. I'm charming. You know, I can, I can woo an audience. So I'll wing it. And what happens is they come off the stage and they're not exactly sure how they did. And they feel like, you know what? I know I could do better.

I just don't know how. Right. And that's where rehearsal comes in. And I think most people need a lot more rehearsal than they realize. And the better rehearsed you are, the more spontaneous you can be. Because you always get right back to where you were.

And that makes you very comfortable. And the more comfortable you are, the more in the moment you are. And the more in the moment you are, the more connected you were. And that makes you very comfortable. And the more comfortable you are, the more in the moment you are. And the more in the moment you are, the more connected you are. And of course, the better your timing is. And timing is such a key component of any kind of performance. So one of the things that I will sometimes do when I open the book yourself, Solid Speech, especially at a conference where they've heard a lot of speakers on the same topic is I'll say, listen, guys, I've got a secret and I want to tell it to you, but I don't want the other authors to hear this. And of course it's tongue in cheek, you know, they're cool with it. They, they, you know, may have heard me say it before.

I said, listen, so what I want you to do is lean in, just lean in. So I'm not going to say it very loudly. And so the first interaction we have is they're leaning toward me and I'm not working hard to try to get to them. I'm actually talking more quietly. And that is an important dynamic that gets set up pretty quickly. Now there may be one or two people in the back who don't lean in and they're always guys, by the way, you know, it's like, yo dude, yeah, exactly. And so I say, and I say, yeah, even you come on, come on buddy. And you know, I'll play a little bit now. Rarely have I have ever had anybody that won't do it. And, and if I feel that, you know, they really don't want

to do it and there's some reason they can't do it, you know, then I'll just let them go, of course. But if you ask an audience to do something, you want to make sure that everybody in that audience does it. Because you've asked them to do something, and then you, they don't really do it. And then you kind of just move on, then you charge of that room. And then, of course, group dynamics really help reduce the neurosis that an individual inside that group presents. So then the whole group starts looking at that person and is like, come on, lean in. We're waiting. Okay, good. So I said, so how can we tell how much BS, I don't curse at the beginning, how much BS exists in any one particular field or industry. And I pause, pause, pause, because timing is critical and power is in the pause. And then I, I lean back because I'm leaning down, you know, with my hands on my knees, leaning toward them, they're leaning toward me. I stand up, which immediately has them sit up because they follow my physical energy. And I say, count the number

of books written about it. And I've written six. So what does that tell you? And, and they always laugh. And the reason that I do it is because my bio pumps me up is pretty impressive. And again, they may feel like, oh, here's comes the guy who's super impressive. And, you know, he's got all the answers and he's New York times this. And he's, you know, guru this and all that stuff. And I think, you know, some of those things should be in a bio because they need to know that, you know, what they want to know and that you've done what they want to do. But they love that. They always, it just what you want to do. But they love that.

They always, it just, they always love it. It just always works. Then I say, and guys, look, my promise to you is there's, I'm not going to BS you at all. You know, I'm not going to make any outsized promises. I'm going to be straight up with you. And again, I always do that. I don't think there's one way to do anything.

I'm going to offer you this particular perspective and then we're off. I like that. That's great. I love that. That's great. I love that. And the challenge is how much, you know, you talked about this as being critical as preparation and really crafting a speech, but what if you don't even know how to craft it? You're like, okay, I know I want to talk about this, but I have no clue really what to do, what stories to put in where, when to add these effects or elements, when to make the call to action.

So what's the process for preparing yourself, crafting, let's say, a 15, a 30-minute presentation, whether it's a big speech or five people? Sure. Yeah. So that's a big, big, big issue. And that's why we usually get stuck because it seems like a monumental endeavor. And if you're actually going to prepare a big speech, it's like writing a book. It's it's it takes as much work.

So, you know, if you really want to do this in a really big way, you've got to put in a lot of work. So here's what you do. That's the thing. It's a lot of work. That's what people should know. It's not like this easy process where it just flows out of your mouth and you can wing it if you really want to make an impact you got to do the work you got to do the work that's exactly right just like you know when you go see a broadway show you don't you don't expect that

they just read the play that day and went up and did it you're not going to pay $250 a ticket for that. So why should it be the same way if, you know, if, uh, if the, if you have in your audience 3000 people at an event, that's a lot of people. So in any event, so that's really important. That's my soapbox. And I teach a rehearsal process inside steal the show. That's very important, uh, to work through so that you're prepared for those kinds of situations. The content development. So we talked about this, the five key components that are in every speech. We talked about the big idea, the promise, the demonstration that you know how the world looks to them, the consequences of not adopting this promise, and of course, the rewards that

come with achieving it, realizing it. So we have that in place. Then we can start to look at frameworks. And often there really isn't a massive difference between people, some people who are perceived to be experts and novices. The big difference is often that the perceived to be expert, The big difference is often that the perceived to be expert, their information is better organized. So if you can organize information very well and present it in a way that's easy to consume, well, then you are perceived as an expert because you've delivered on your promise. And that's what makes you an expert. So we want to look at the different frameworks we can use to organize our information. The first framework you could use is the numerical

framework. It's very popular. You know, let's use some books as an example, as examples, because most people have read the same books, but not necessarily seen the same speeches. So Stephen Covey's Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. Seven, seven habits. It's very straightforward. And one of the reasons that it's an excellent framework to use is because it's a pretty straightforward way of you organizing your ideas and constraining them. One of the big problems that many people have is they put way too much in a speech, way too much. Too much plain, not enough runway. So often we do a lot less in a speech or should do a lot less in a speech than we think. And one of the reasons we put so much in there is because

we want everybody to think we're really smart. Like, look how much I know. I'm really delivering a lot, but it ends up being complete, you know, a wash over them because it's too much. So that's a great framework to constrain you to organize your ideas. It's a great framework for them to be able to consume those ideas. And it also makes it easier for you to remember when you're delivering it because it's very linear. Because consumption is king. Content is very important, of course, but the greatest content in the world, unconsumed, doesn't matter. So that's what our job is, trying to get them to consume it.

So that's one framework. A second framework is the chronological framework. And this, of course, is a step-by-step type process. First this, then this, then this. And it's, of course, numerical as well because there are a number of steps, but you can't pull the steps out necessarily. You can't really start with three and four unless you have one and two, which is different than numerical where you could just teach keys three and four or you could teach just key three or you could teach from seven to one or one to seven. It doesn't matter because they are each independent.

So chronological is very, very effective for a number of different types of curriculum-based speeches. And then there's the problem-solution framework. And the problem-solution framework is wonderful because you can identify a number of problems and just offer a simple solution. Here are 10 problems that I see that every mother has with a newborn, and here are 10 ways to solve it., with a newborn. And here are 10 ways to solve it. It's really straightforward. And the audience appreciates that. Easy way for you to organize your ideas, easy way to remember it, easy way to deliver it. And then a compare and contrast framework. Good to Great by Jim Collins used this, and he uses it when he gives

his speeches. Here are 10 companies that are good. Here are 10 companies that are great. And here's the difference. Oh, okay. Well, I should probably make sure that I have all of the elements in the great companies in place because now I see what makes a difference. Good. I have something to do. I can go and act on that when I leave the presentation. And then the modular framework. And I use this a lot because my books are very comprehensive. And so what it does is it allows you to break up lots of different ideas and organize them around particular themes. So Book Yourself Solid was like this. Steal the Show is like this. I call them parts in Steal the Show and modules in Book Yourself Solid. So there are three parts in Steal the Show. And then what

I do is inside each of those parts, I use different frameworks. So in one chapter, there may be four different frameworks at play in the speech. I may use nine, 10, 15 different frameworks inside one large framework. And what it does is it creates a lot of contrast because the audience is more engaged when there's a lot of contrast. The same note over and over and over gets bored, even if it's the most beautiful note. Even if it's the most beautiful note you've ever heard on a violin, 10 minutes into it, you're like, I can't listen to this thing anymore. Right. Right?

So the contrast is what's exciting. And that's these frameworks you can use to organize your information. And that's one of the ways in, one of the ways that I introduce among others that you can use to get into the content development. And then let's talk about stories. I think that might be a good place to start to close up because we all want to be better storytellers. Yes. Yeah. This is we dream of being the one at the table who comes in with the great story that just crushes it. And everybody goes, oh, my God, that was fantastic.

Oh, the life of the point. You know, we want to be able to tell that story. And just because we lived a story doesn't necessarily mean that we're ready to tell it. We need to mold it. We need to sculpt it, craft it. And it's different. It's much easier to tell a story to one person. Like I can tell you a story here without doing hours and hours and hours

and hours of work on it. It's very different than telling an audience in a theater or in a conference room a story that you've never rehearsed. It just changes. The dynamic changes. It's almost hard to explain why, but we know that it does. So here's what we need to do. We need to make sure that we know the

three-act structure. And we sculpt our stories using the three-act structure. And the three-act structure was Aristotle's three-act structure. Most the three-act structure was Aristotle's three-act structure. Most plays, most films, most TV shows rely on this structure for the overall story of the production. And inside, there are lots and lots of three-act structures used in each story that's told. And the first act is the given circumstances. So if you're telling the story of when you got hurt as a football player, there are certain given circumstances that are important for us to know. The time, the setting, the place. If we don't know that you were a professional football player, the story doesn't have as much weight. And if we don't know,

you know, what your dreams were, it doesn't have that much weight. So all of those are very, very important. However, if when you're giving us that story, you start talking about, you know, uh, three years of stats from Peewee league, we're like, what, huh? It's too much. So we need an, we need just enough exposition to understand what's about to happen if we have too much the audience gets a little frustrated and they want us to keep going keep moving on let's go let's go let's go and if not enough then we're confused we're like wait what's happening he was a he was a astronaut no he's cricket player wait no what so we need to know some really critical details. And then act two,

that's the conflict. That's when there's an inciting incident. Something happens, something goes wrong that creates tension. And of course, in your case, you get hit, right? So you go down and boom, you have this major injury. Okay. Well, that then fuels some kind of action, which then might create another problem or another conflict, you know, puts another obstacle in your way, which then spurs you into action again, which then puts another obstacle in your way. engaged and go, oh my God, that happened. Then that happened. Then that happened. And it's all working toward the resolution. And the resolution is what we're waiting for. And it's got to be worth waiting for. So if your resolution to the story about your injury is, oh, and I ended up, um, you know, uh, working in a cubicle, uh, you know, uh, nine hours a day. And, uh, you know, uh you know nine hours a day and uh you know you just be like what that that's that's it but the resolution is really quite impressive and that's one of the things that makes it a

wonderful story and that's your origin story and it is an important part of your life and it's important part of of your work and it means a lot to people and so we want to sculpt our story want to craft our story around that three-act structure. Now, one of the problems that people have is they say, well, I don't know what stories to tell. There's a prompting methodology that you can use to source your stories. So I want to play this game with you if you don't mind. Can we do that? Let's do it. Okay. So what we do is take out a piece of paper and we'll just do one or two. The people when they do this at home should do this and come up with five, 10, 15. And it's great to do with a friend.

You'll see how much more fun it is to do with somebody else than to do by yourself. Your brain fires up a lot more when you're doing this with somebody else. So I'm going to ask you to think of a person. And then I just want you to just randomly free associate and think about a story that comes to mind. You don't have to tell us the whole story, but just like, oh, the time when that happened. Okay. So I want you to think about like the first girl that got away. First girl that got away.

Tell the story about it. Well, just what story comes to mind like from that particular – Oh, the first girl that got away what comes to mind is heartache uh leaving high school going to college and being really sad that i wasn't with my my my girlfriend anymore and it breaking up that's right so there's a particular instance a particular situation like a conversation that you had or some action that occurred that is sharp in your mind when you, okay, well, there's a story in that. And so what you do is you write down breaking up with so-and-so, you know, um, you know, in the summer of whatever year at my parents' house. Okay. You just write

that down. You don't go in, you don't have to tell the story. You don't go deeper into it, but there's a story there and there's a, there, a message there. Now, we don't know what we're going to do with that yet. We don't know where it's going to go in our speech, but now we've got something. And then we do it with, okay, so the worst coach you ever had. Oh, man. Worst coach. Don't say his name. Yeah, the worst coach. i've got a story there okay exactly i mean you know like i remember i had a football coach uh i i uh i went down i came up my pinky was pointing out the side you know like it wasn't straight anymore oh man and he just took it pulled it and popped it back and i get this and that was the guy i think he was drunk you know

he's one of those guys you you know, rub some dirt on it and go back out there. I'm like, no, but I'm just a little kid, you know. Exactly. So in any event,

there's some story that will come to mind and this finger thing I hadn't thought about in, you know, probably 30 years but when I asked you about it,

it reminds me. So that's why we do it with our friends. Gotcha. Okay. I like that. Right. So you keep going through people,

then you go to places. All right. So, um, we're going to think of a place. Was there a particular place, uh, that you,

that you went to in the summers when you were younger that had meaning to you? Yeah. I went to summer camp. Okay. Any particular memory from summer camp come to mind? Yeah. Uh,

fishing, uh, rope swinging into a lake water slides girls yeah right all of the above and there are probably some stories i mean i match there's there's a there's a fear maybe you were nervous on the rope swing and you challenge yourself to to do it or go farther than you had before. And, you know, Tommy was really pushing you and you were scared. You know, there's probably something there. Exactly. Yeah.

And so that's what we do. So people, places. Now we look at things. Okay. So maybe your first car. Think of a memory that's your first car. Yeah, 1983 Honda Prelude. Yeah. It was amazing. Wait amazing wait i'm sorry how did you

fit into a honda prelude you know it was a two is a two uh two door as well yeah the reason i liked it is because the seat went all the way back to the back seats i was able to fit but no one fits in the back seat exactly right so it was not a family car, that's for sure. No, it was not. So did anything ever happen in that car to that car? Man, I think it just died after about a couple of years because I got off like a thousand bucks. But, you know, I would drive friends to school in the morning, you know, and, you know, it was a good time to drive around. So, right, like something like that, like nothing particular came to mind right away. But for somebody else, maybe something right away came to mind. Like I thought of a time that my high school girlfriend poured a strawberry milkshake down the radiator of my car.

Oh, wow. OK. Good stories. Yeah. Yeah. And now she's on a reality TV show. So go figure. There you go.

So we keep doing this until we find things. You think about a piece of jewelry or a gift that you got and then places. So, for example, maybe the first time that you went to Nationals for handball, you know, the location, you know, what pops to mind? Yeah. Being with the team, being in a crummy hotel, you know, feeling like it was Bush League, you know, unorganized, but it was in Vegas. So it was a fun time. So then we start to look at what, you know, what are the specifics and you start to, you

start to tell your friend about the experience and go, oh my God, I totally forgot that that happened. You know, Johnny went to the, to the jukebox, he put in 20 bucks. He pulled it and out was 1,000. Right, right, right. These stories start to come back to you. So this is how you source your stories. I love it. And you start to sculpt them.

I love it. This is powerful. I feel like we could go on because you have some way more. I have like 30 more questions here that I wrote up that I want to ask you. And I really want to ask you how to get a standing ovation every time. But I want to wait because that's the last part of the book. So I want people to go get the book and learn how you can get a standing ovation every single time you do a presentation. Because I think it's going to be really powerful for you guys to get this.

So make sure to pick up a copy, Steal the Show. You can get it right now. You can go to Barnes & Noble or you can get it online on Amazon. Or you can go to StealTheShow.com, I believe. Is that right? That's right. And check it out. Follow Michael everywhere.

This is powerful information. Whether you want to be a professional speaker, speak in front of thousands or not, it's going to be important for you to enhance your life and the relationships in your life by how you show up. And this is going to support you showing up in a bigger way. So I highly recommend getting this. And if I may, Lewis, if people are interested in going deeper into these topics, they should go listen to my Steal the Show podcast because I do short episodes where I go deep into the technical how-tos related to the topics at hand. There you go. Perfect. New and noteworthy on iTunes right now. Steal the show. We'll have it all linked up here in a second. I want to ask you two final questions before I do.

I want to acknowledge you, Michael. Thank you for coming on and acknowledge you for your professionalism. When I think of you, I think of professional. I think of prepared, grounded. I look at you as like an anchor for so many people of helping them see the light of where they need to go in their lives. And you provide such context for them to create content that gets them to their next level. for them to create content that gets them to their next level. So I want to acknowledge you for being that anchor for so many people, for grounding us and being better presenters, storytellers, and performers in our own lives.

So thank you for all that you do. It means the world to me. It really does, Lewis. Thank you. My pleasure. Two final questions. One is with everything you've written and everything you've learned, if it could boil down to three truths that you know to be true about your experience in this world that you could leave with people, and this is the last thing that you could leave behind, what would these three truths be? Continue to increase the amount of responsibility that you can handle.

Because as you get older and as you play a bigger game, your responsibility increases. And I think your success is in large part directly related to how much responsibility you can handle at any one given time. at any one given time. Number two, I would say that our reputations are in large part based on our ability to make commitments and fulfill them. And if we don't make commitments, then, you know, I don't think nobody really wants to play with us because there's nothing to do. And if we make commitments and then we don't fulfill them, nobody wants to play with us again. So I think this is a really important part of reputation building. And then number three, I would say love, love, love. And just remember that, you know, the person next to you is probably going through something that you don't realize and just a hand on their shoulder, you know, a hug, a kind smile is so much more important than anything you can,

you know, think of to, you know, solve the world's biggest problems. If we just touch one person at a time, we can really make a difference. And I can go on for this, like gratitude. I mean, you know, there's just so many things that are so important for all of us. But yeah, love and gratitude are really important to me. I love that. And final question, what's your definition of greatness? For me, it's actually peace. If I can feel peaceful and that I have enough, then I feel that I've achieved a level of

greatness. And for me, that's particular. You see, I don't have a hard time thinking big. I don't have a hard time, you know, going out and pursuing tough objectives. You know, for me, it's, it's sometimes I have a hard time just settling in, you know, and just saying, you know what? I've got enough. It's all good. And feeling a deep sense of peace. So for me, that would be great. Michael Port, steal the show. Thanks so much for coming on and sharing your wisdom. I appreciate it. It's my pleasure. I never take it for granted. Thank you. And there you have it, guys. I hope you found this useful and helpful and supportive

for your professional speaking and daily performance needs if you did find it useful then make sure to share this with your friends send them an email and say hey go check out this episode uh that my friend lewis house did with this guy mich Port. lewishowes.com slash 236. Just send it over in an email to a few of your friends right now. Or you can click, if you're over on iTunes or your iPhone, you can click on this podcast. And there's a little button that will allow you to share this out on Twitter, on Facebook. Just click on your phone right now and push to share over to Twitter or Facebook

and let people know they should check this out and listen right now as well. I hope you enjoyed this. Make sure to check out the show notes again, lewishouse.com slash 236 and where you can get the book with Michael, how you can connect with him. If you're looking to take your speaking performance to the next level, how you can connect with him there for what he offers as well. I've seen it in action. It's incredible. And you're probably going to sign up for some of his stuff. I appreciate you guys so much. So much good has happened in my life lately. There's been some other things that have been mixed feelings and some emotional lows as well. But I also look at them as great lessons. You know, the pain and the suffering that we go through sometimes, the emotional uncertainties with relationships that we may go through at times. Sometimes I

think about not understanding why it's all happening, but I always look back on it as some of the greatest lessons and growth periods of my life. So if you're experiencing that right now, then I'm with you. I appreciate you. I'm looking out for you. I got your back. Hit me up online at Lewis Howes. Let's connect. And you guys know what time it is. It's time to go out there and do something great. Thank you.