The Storytelling Advantage: Connect, Communicate, and Grow with Brigham Blackham

Welcome back to the Infinite Gold Podcast. Today we've got the amazing Brigham Blackkam. How are you doing today, buddy?

I'm doing excellent, Anthony. Bree, you guys have such a great platform here. So excited to be part of it and just further your mission with Infinite Gold. Congratulations on getting these things out here.

Thanks, buddy. We appreciate it.

Yes, thank you. We're so excited to have you on today.

I appreciate the invite for sure.

Yeah, so not too many people can speak 2 languages, let alone 5 languages, so it's gonna be awesome. I know we're gonna get some of those languages in here on this podcast today. I'm not gonna understand a single one of them, but you know, I mean, the English, I might, I might get that part.

Oh, you'll get some English? Okay.

All right. Yeah, I'll understand that. Um, but One of the big ones that you speak Mandarin/Chinese. I know there's differences, but right here we've got a storytelling specialist. We had to have him on because why not help us tell our stories by interviewing a storytelling expert? Yeah, for sure. He likes to be called a specialist, expert specialist. You know, they're both really good.

Either way, he knows what he's talking about and he knows how to tell a story.

So good. So good. I mean, one of the things we're going to talk about today is a— in the back, you see that Stage Fright Costs? Boom. He's got an ebook. We've already looked it over. It's amazing. People are going to have to get it.

And I got to sit down and actually do some deep work going through that. That's going to be helpful.

It's so good. But he was a high school teacher for 7 years. This is where he really got to know kids. He really got to understand himself, understand the community, and just starting from the ground up of kids and getting them out there and realizing that a lot of people for starters don't even know what their story is, let alone how to tell it. So that's where he changed his tune and was like, you know, I love teaching. I love kids. I love the community. Why don't I just take it to the next level and do this as a full-time job? So I know you touched into a little bit of Airbnb. That's kind of what got you out of that and you continue to do it, but your biggest point in life now is putting the hands of personal growth, which is all of us. Into everybody. And how do you do that the most is by telling your story, telling who you are as a person, what have you gone through life. And as we know, is the best way to help somebody is to help your old self. Where were you at one point in life? And you can now help other people. And that's where you being able to get our story out, get everybody else's story out, is going to be just perfect. And I know today's episode is just going to be phenomenal. So thank you again for being on here. I appreciate it, buddy.

My pleasure. My pleasure.

So let's go back. Let's go back. You're teaching high school. You're an actor. You love theater. This is just— it's a strong passion of yours. So why leave?

Oh, that's a great question. Thank you so much. If that was a question, that was a girl I'd probably marry her. Why leave? Oh my goodness. There's multiple reasons. Here's the easiest one for most people to connect with. I was able to look at my steps as far as how I could progress in my job. And I could say, well, 30 years out, how much money am I going to be able to make? How much impact can I actually create? Max amount of people that I can serve is around 150 to 200 per year. Okay. That's like full classes every single year. So it's like, okay, I can help about 200 people per year. I do that for 30 years. That's going to be quite a few people, right? Like, awesome. I wanted to help more people though. And then the other thing was I looked at how much money I was going to make and I was like, oh, after 30 years of effort, will I even gross $1 million? Not even close. Well, will I net $500,000? Maybe, maybe. But here's the thing, if I want to serve more people, I have to increase my value. And what I chose to do was, I am an actor. I love to be able to tell great storytelling stories, and I love being able to help people be able to articulate their message and have it be impactful for other people. Now, I know every single one of us have a dream. Every one of us have something that we are passionate about. For me, I love storytelling. I love connecting people and letting them see what's possible, letting them feel like this is something that is magical and it means something to them. So for me, I want to put personal growth and personal development in the hands of more people. And, you know, 200 people a year was just not cutting it for me. To be honest, that was one of the biggest things. I love seeing kids' eyes light up when they actually got something. They're like, oh, I get it. I'm understanding. I get this. But there was walls that I was in, and I didn't realize how restrictive my job was until after I left. Fast forward a few years now, I've been part of the Final Percent Network, which is how we got connected, helping more and more people every single day, being able to step into their genius zone, be able to say, well, this is the story that I want to create. How do I help other people do that? Now, I've been running my own podcast for a little over a year. I've done 124 episodes.

Just killing it, by the way. I can't wait for us to be on there as well.

Yeah, it's going to be great. Oh, we'll get, we'll get you there. But the biggest thing that's shifted for me is it's no longer about what can I do within the confines of my own classroom. It's how do I equip leaders to go help more and more people? Share their story and live into the very best versions of themselves, step into their genius zones. A lot of times you think about stage fright, it is only in the context of being an actor on stage. The reason I wrote this book was not because that's not what it's going to solve. It definitely will solve that, that problem on stage. But every single one of us, if we don't share our experiences, if we don't have the courage to open our mouth and converse with someone and share why your experience matters and how you can help somebody else, you are letting stage fright cripple you from your opportunities. You're stopping yourself from living in your genius zone. So think about Infinite Gold. I love your podcast name. Every single one of us have an infinite amount of gold inside of us. I like to call this as story mining. Okay. Since we're going to go, we're going to step into them hills and go deep, right? We're going to find every single one of us have stories inside of us. But here's the thing, you sometimes have to not only dig for a little while, you have to go through a lot of crap to be able to hit pay dirt.

Yeah.

And if we're going to hit pay dirt, we have to be willing to do the work. We identify the work. You're like, man, I've got all this stuff that I've processed. Where's the gold? And that's why I came up with this story framework. That's the main value that I can create for people is giving them something that they can take and use in their own storytelling in business, on podcasts with different people so that they can have a way to make it mean something, not just share information. That makes sense.

Oh no, that's right on point. Cause I mean, we all think about it is when we're in school, right? When we're kids, right? What are the majority of things we loved? We loved stories. We loved the movie time. We loved all that stuff. We did not like just the teacher or the professor standing in front of the stage and just ruin us.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You're the Charlie Brown voice in there.

Oh yeah.

Oh, they're, they're all thinking ham sandwich while the teacher is up there giving a lecture. I felt that in college for sure. It's like, I feel like I'm being talked at instead of talked to. Tell us a story and bring it to a level that we can connect to it in some shape or form. In that way, it makes learning so much more fun. You know that as an educator.

Absolutely. If you can't tap into the story and make it relevant for your audience, it's kind of like playing baseball with someone and they don't have a mitt and they don't know you're going to throw the ball at them. You throw it and they're like, ow! Oh, what the heck, man? You're like, yeah, I told you good information, but I wasn't ready for it. And you didn't ask for permission to play. Like, there's so many things wrong with that. But how many of us are sharing stories online that that nobody asked for.

Oh yeah.

That aren't valuable.

Too many. Too many.

So many, so many people. You think about it, if we're putting out a podcast, we're attracting people to come and connect with us. We're saying, this is what value we can create. If you like this, keep listening. Guys, if you like being able to share meaningful stories, this is what this podcast episode's gonna be about. We're gonna help you not just share stories, we're gonna give you a framework that you can take, whether you ever interact with me again or not, you can take this framework and apply it for years and your stories will infinitely be more golden.

I love it.

Yes.

And the best part of— the best part is those golden ideas, those golden ideas aren't gonna come out. Yeah.

Yeah.

They're not gonna come out if you don't tell a story. Like, you have to be able to tell a story to really dive in. And then the person listening on the other side, they're not going to pay attention. They're not gonna listen unless there's a story or there's some meaning that comes behind it.

Now, let me clarify one thing. I know a lot of people think of storytelling as like, oh, this is a book. That's not what we're talking about. It could be a portion of it. Yes. When you are creating a story, all that is, is meaning for your audience. You're creating a meaningful experience. You're using your visual, audio, kinesthetic, your gustatory experiences to allow them to feel what you felt. If you don't let 'em feel it, it doesn't go through that cathartic experience. You really missed the boat. You just gave them information. It went, yo, Arjun, Zor Chu, in one ear and out the other, just like that Mandarin. You're like, what did he say? Yeah, in the right ear, out the left.

There it is.

Yeah, you knew it was gonna come.

You're like, I knew it was going to. I prefaced it at the beginning. I said, just, just from our interactions together and going to the Gamma event and doing all that stuff, I was like, it's, it's coming. I know.

It was funny.

Intellect. The intellect that is from that language is next level. Obviously I don't understand it, but I know that there's just so many intricacies that help provide stories and provide ideas to come out. I mean, for me, one of the big things is it's not Chinese, but it's the, the sword, the mirror, and the jewel. And it has to basically come down to a lot of metaphors. So I know like in those languages, it's the metaphors and it's the stories that are told to you that allow you to remember. Certain concepts and remember certain ideas.

Absolutely. Here, let me give you a concrete example. Yeah, I'm writing my book right now. It's a little bit longer version of what this is. Yeah, it's so good. There was this moment where I said, well, I want to really figure out how do I package this and give it away to my audience in a way that's really meaningful. And the gift portion, I'll— I won't even go into that. You'll have to go to my ebook and ask me a little bit more. But the G is to give. And in Mandarin, it's gay ni. I'm going to give ni you this. So not like gay, but like it's to give, right? Gay. Yes. And then ni, not this type of ni, but ni as in you, like ni hao, hello.

Yeah. All right.

So gay ni, that character has two parts. On the left side, there is si, which means string, and it is a silk string. When you give things to other people or you give of yourself, Do you have strings attached?

That's so good because there's so many people that go through life—

yeah, well, they think it's if I give something, I expect something back, right? When really it should— it's just like you give out of the kindness of your heart, out of the generosity of just caring for somebody and showing them that kind of love in that way and not expecting anything in return just because it's something that you enjoy doing, right? I feel like we're big givers and we never— we don't— we're not the kind of people that expect something in return. We just want to do it out kindness of our heart, and because this is a way that we like to show our love and our generosity and show how much we care about you.

I mean, think about it, right? You're probably gonna touch into it is with the stories. People can read through it too. Are you just— are you just trying to give me something because you're expecting something in return, or are you truly trying to give me something? And I know the way that you express it by telling a story, or just express it the way you're verbalizing it, is it can come off either way for sure. Yeah.

So coming back to this idea of gaining, like to give you, if you have expectations with saying, hey, I'm going to give you this, but you, oh, you better give me something back. If you don't give it back, I'm not going to give it to you. That changes the way that your interaction is. But we talk about this open hand principle. If you are going to have an open hand, you give with no expectation. And that means that God or other people can give you back, and you're not worrying about that person that you gave the value to. You're saying, I know God's got my back. I'm not going to worry about whether I'm going to be taken care of, because he even takes care of the sparrows. He takes care of the birds. He takes care of the lilies. You've heard that expression, consider the lilies of the field. Yeah, all of us, we're going to be taken care of. But we have to be open and willing to give without expectation of getting. So important in storytelling. So we're going to give you guys some amazing opportunities to connect more with the Goldners and Infinite Gold with the Final Percent Network. And we're going to give you a way that you can tell stories in a way that you will be able to apply for the rest of your life. That's how exciting the rest of this episode is going to be. So keep staying tuned, guys.

Exactly.

Amen.

So on that note, what is— when people come to you and they ask, hey, I'm trying to tell my story, I'm trying to get on stage, like, what is usually the biggest fault? And I hate using the word— oh man, what's the biggest, um, issue that most people have coming to you, um, that they need resolved to try to get to where they want to be?

Well, it comes down to what you just said, trying to tell their story. Are you actually telling your story? Are you trying to tell your story? If you're trying to tell your story, it's kind of like I'm trying to take a sip. I'm just trying though.

Just trying.

Oh, it's so close. Oh, I'm just shaking. Stop trying. Just do it.

Just do it, right?

When we dive into this, my storytelling framework, I'll give you this. It's really knowing what is significant versus what's not. Because there's a lot of ways that you can tell a story with tons of detail, but how many times have you had someone do this? They share a story and you're just like, wandering, like, what is the point of this story? So many details. You like, you have one of these things, you're like, you're good, lost for a second. You know what I'm talking about? You've been there. I've seen that in your eyes. You're like, oh, that, that was my teacher. Yeah, he definitely did that lots of times. If you have to apologize after your story, there's a good indication that you didn't focus on what was significant. Okay, the first S in the Story Framework is significance. I'm not saying this is going to be significant for every single person, but it's significant for you and it's significant for your audience. That makes sense.

This is a distinction for each audience, right?

Some audiences, wherever you go, there will be things that I could share about short-term rentals with some audiences. They're going to be like, whoa, that was so cool. And on this context, you'd be like, cool. Not relevant.

Next.

You're like swiping left now. Okay.

Swiping left.

Okay. So you think about this, guys. You have to be able to translate your content, your story in a way that's relatable to your audience. They have to see how this connects to them. They have to see it connect it and then go with whatever your story is. So think about this. If you translate poorly the value of your story, why you're sharing them this story with them, they will not listen. They will not be as engaged. And even if you have good engagement questions, they'll be like, oh, I'm just going to listen to the next part because this part's not relevant for me. How many of you have done that in a class before where you're like, is this going to be on the test? And you're like, oh, it's not, but it's really interesting. Like, oh, tuning out. It's like putting in the earbuds. You're like, eh, not on the test, gonna just pass. That's very different if you're telling a story in the context of business. As soon as you tie in, this is what it means for you, X, Y, or Z, whatever that benefit is, or so what that means for you is, and then you fill in the blank. Those two key phrases, if you can really dive in and help someone see the benefits for them to listen, you've done the work to identify the challenge. And give them a solution. Because if you can clearly articulate the challenge and the problem, people already assume that you know the solution.

Mm-hmm.

Does that make sense?

Yeah. No, honestly, that's on point. Because we've even realized it when we've been doing these podcasts. We're brand new with them. Yeah. And we're still trying to, you know, find our groove, find out what works, what doesn't.

And we've found the groove. We've definitely found the groove.

Well, we've got the groove of getting them out, but now it's making them better. Obviously, we're always trying to grow. We're always trying to be better. Fine-tuning. And one of those things is keeping people engaged. And I love fine-tuning. Oh yeah. All the knobs, all of it.

All the knobs.

What you just said is keeping them engaged. And what are they going to learn and get from the podcast? If we don't express it enough throughout, they may start tuning out. They're like, oh, this part means little to me. So now they're gone.

Yeah.

But we gotta, we gotta bring them back in. So that's really good on that.

Well, because they're thinking too, like, what's in it for me? What do I get? What am I getting out of this?

Right.

It's that WIFM principle. What's in it for me? Right.

Yeah, exactly.

And they have to know that this is something they need. Yeah. Oh, the T. I'm so glad you answered. Oh, dude, it's to translate. To translate. So S is significance. T is to translate. And that's cool for me because I'm a language guy. I love translating things.

It works out perfectly.

So even if your message is in a different language, if you make it relatable, comprehensible, compelling, and giving them a reason to really see what you're doing, suddenly they're going to be like, oh, I see where I can use this. I'm going to pay really close attention because if they can't see it, hear it, feel it, know that it applies to them. Next.

Yep.

All right. So that's your translation. Next is an objective. O is for objective.

Okay.

Okay. Here's the key thing with your objectives. If you don't have a point to your story, you wasted everybody's time. Literally, you are rambling. That's the definition of rambling. You're saying things that have no purpose. As soon as you can take your story and say, this is the point of sharing this story, there are some details that will not help me get that point, insignificant, you cut it out. But if all of those details are strategically put in there, they're relevant because you've translated them. Now you know that you can be on point. Now, this doesn't mean that you can't have tangents that will be entertaining. What that means is, does this further my point? Help me drive this farther, or is this taking me away? If it's taking you away, don't do it. If it's helping you bring in your audience, keeping them engaged, sometimes you have a pattern interrupt. You're like, oh, that was good. It's okay. As long as you keep them engaged. So that's the objective, because every story has a point and every point has a story. I heard that from multiple people. My top of mind is Woody Woodward. Love that guy. He's helped me lots of times. But here's the thing, if you don't have a point to your story, it's pointless. Let that sink in for a moment, guys. All right, you ready for this next one? This is good.

Of course.

You ready? Okay. R is to relive. Okay. Not relate your story, to relive your story. This is a key distinction. If all you do is relate your story, it's boring.

Yeah.

People will be like, oh, okay, cool. Thanks.

Whatever.

Good story, dude. Mm-hmm. Didn't mean anything. But if you relive your story, you are engaging all elements of who you are and you're allowing your audience to go through an experience with you. Okay. We talked about visual, audio, kinesthetic, your gustatory, all the different senses. You allow them to experience it, to go there, and then you go all in with them and you relive it. You perform it in such a way that they're like, oh, I want to be there with you. I was there. I felt it. This is the difference between going to a crappy play, like, let's say a high school play. You're like, oh, wow, that was only $5, but I feel like I got ripped off. Like, I lost my time. You're like, I lost my time. That was so bad. And going to a Broadway show where you're just so immersed, you're like, I can look anywhere in the story. Happening. It's immersive. You have an experience. When you have an amazing experience like that, you're able to bring out the best in your audience. They can see this is applying to them and it's something that will change their life. As soon as you relive the story like that, you give your audience the connection that now it's our experience, not only my story, it's our story. Is this making sense?

I love that. Oh, 100%. And it's one of those things is A keyword you just used in that is the emotion. Like they are now emotionally vested in the story that you're providing and not just, man, that's, that's cool. So you had that one, I think that happened and it was just, oh, whatever. But when they're like reliving it with you, they're like, oh my gosh, I feel it. Oh yeah, that's happened. Yeah. I felt it. I was there. I mean, I wasn't there, but I was there.

Like we talked, you go there up here. And then it like attaches to like the rest of your body, like being upset.

I'm like, that's perfect.

It washes over you.

Yep, it does. We still got more stuff. We still got more stuff.

All right, now the last step here in the Story Framework is Y. Y stands for yes. It's a call to action. If you don't have them actually agree to something and do that work, then you're not serving them. You could have spent so much time telling them some amazing story, letting them relive it. They see themselves in there, but you didn't ask for the sale. You wasted your time still. Oh my gosh. Very rarely will someone say, you know what? How do we work together? Those people are golden. You can't say the wrong thing to the right person. But think about this.

You do a lot of door—

You do all the work and you don't ask for a sale. You don't ask them to do something with your message. It just lives in that moment. Nothing happened. Oh, Bree's like, oh my gosh, I've been there. I've seen this. Oh my gosh, there's so many. I've left so much money on the table. Exactly. Exactly. It's so frustrating, right? You got to ask for the order because how many people are going to just throw their money at you if you don't ask for the order? Rarely, if ever. I mean, you'd have to really slay it for people to be like, take my money and just throwing credit cards at you.

Right.

But if someone is loving your company, they love your product and they love your service and who you are. You don't ask for the order. You just lit your opportunity on fire. Great storytelling is the key to making sure that someone has an emotional connection with you. To build that know, like, and trust factor. Think about it. If you don't know, like, and trust someone, are you ever going to do business with them? No, I don't think so, man. You're like, oh no, yeah, I'm not gonna do business with that guy. But as soon as you know, like, and trust them, you see where they're going. You're like, you know what, they have similar values to me. I, I want to do that. I want to get their materials. I want to understand how I can take what they're giving and apply it to myself. For sure.

Oh yeah.

People buy easy, right? They say, oh, it's simple. I want to do that. If it's too complicated, they'll be like, oh, nope, nope, don't get it. I don't want to take action. So if you have to have a very clear call to action, they actually have to say, yes, I want this. So we're going to review the story framework really quick so that everybody's got this because I'm a teacher guy, right? We're not just going to tell you once. I'm going to hit some repetition. Repetition is a mother, guys. Repetition is a mother. Not the mother of all learning, but it's a mother. Okay.

Here we go.

S is for significance. Okay. T is to translate. O is for objective. And then R is for reliving. And then Y is for yes. If you hit that story in every single one of your stories from now on, you will not recognize your business in a year from now. You will not recognize yourself on social media because people will be able to connect with you. You ever thought about this? Social media is just a storytelling platform.

Mm-hmm.

That's it.

It is.

People want to connect with great stories. They want to be taken on a journey. They don't actually want to be sold to, but they love to buy. They freaking love to buy. I'm one of those, like, you pitch me a cool book that's going to help me, I'm like, I want to buy your book. I'm probably lay down sale on, on that. You can't say the wrong thing to the right person, right? It's love me some reading.

It's so good. Yeah. I mean, you, you You pitched me something that's for $9.99 on Audible right now, and it's gonna help me out and it's gonna be great. I already bought. I mean, you already talked about it. How many, how many Audible books do you have in your catalog?

600+ on the account, but not listened to all those yet, but I haven't bought them.

But you see, there it is.

I listen to it a lot though. I literally almost every single day I'm listening to those. I'm listening to something because consistent and never-ending improvement. That Kanae principle, it's so important. In Mandarin, that's gai shan. That's actually my word for this year. I always choose a word of the year. Yeah, gai is to change, shan is for the better. It's not just improving, it's improving on who you were yesterday. And I'm not comparing myself to others. I'm saying, how do I improve myself? How do I get better at myself? If I look in the mirror and I see the same person in a year, I am really disappointed. But if I look in the mirror and I say, wow, barely recognize you, man, well done. That's a huge difference. Oh, can I share a little story with you guys? This happened last week.

Yeah, let's see it.

We're talking about significant moments, right? Making sure that you share things that were significant. I didn't realize how significant this was until it happened. Belinda went to the Kappa retreat, which is our ladies group with the Final Percent Network. Absolutely beautiful experience. She was able to connect with a ton of people. The day she was leaving We had a realization. I have 4 kids, okay? All of them have been able to nurse except for the first one. She was not able to nurse very well. But our last little baby Benjamin, on the last day that Belinda was here before she went to Kappa, we realized she's not going to be pumping at the Kappa retreat. She's going to be gone a long time, like basically 4 days. He's getting weaned today. And she brought that up and I was like, we need to savor this moment. So I just sat on the, sat on the bed next to her, kind of squished in there, nuzzled my little boy and ruffled his hair a little bit and just enjoyed that 5 or so minutes of him nursing on his mom and hearing the little suckles and just enjoying that and savoring that moment. I didn't realize how special that was until she left later that day. And I was like, that was not only the last time for Ben, that was the last time for me. And for Belinda. We might not have more kids. You never know which moment is going to be the last moment with someone. You never know which moment is going to be the last time you do something. I just read a book that just absolutely floored me for a moment. I remember hearing that, you know, some people, they have these experiences that, that change them forever.

Right?

And I got to meet Griff, this guy's name. Let me pull it over here. One second. Yeah. So this is Jeff Griffin. Okay. He had a fall off of a ladder, right? And he was this brilliant athlete. He was playing football. He's going pro. Awesome. He's painting with his business and he falls off the ladder. Anthony Goldner breaks his back, shatters, and he is paralyzed. You're like, what's next? Mm-hmm. There are so many sensations, so many things that rush through your mind that you're like, I, I don't know what I would do if I got paralyzed. His dreams gone in a second.

Mm-hmm.

We never know when that moment of impact will happen. You know, I was talking to my buddy Dan this last week. He got hit by a train, literally. This last week. I was talking to him today. He survived. He, he had half of his car basically ripped off, and if it would have hit the other side, he would not be here.

That's crazy.

And I was just like, you know, Heavenly Father is watching over you because people don't usually get hit by a train, literally, and survive. Yeah, his car was just trashed. But it makes you really pay attention to what really matters in life. For me, my family is so important, right? That's why I love The Final Percent. We're not just about personal development because we want to actually do our family development. We have TFP Kids. I actually wrote a book for TFP, which is really cute. It's the, uh, ABCs of TFP Kids. So you guys come to the event, I'm only going to be selling those at the event. I'm not giving those out. It's super awesome. Oh, I have a video. One second, I'll show Yeah, here's what it looks like. It's so good.

Yep. Right.

It's so cute.

Oh my gosh, that's awesome.

You've got all of these cute little things that you can literally only get if you're coming to the event. So it's going to be sick.

Oh, I know.

I want to color in it.

Yeah.

My inner child is like, I love coloring.

We're going to be at the event, so we'll be able to get one.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Definitely. I'll probably get one for myself, to be honest.

So if you're not coming to the Colorado event yet, and yes, this is a plug right now, you need to be going.

Definitely need to go. And you have to be. And here's the thing, if you guys are coming at this, you're like, oh, I missed the event. We have events every single year, and if you just go to the events tab on thefinalpercent.com, you'll be able to interact with, with us. We're going to be able to interface. We're never going to stop doing events, guys. It's just we might not be in your city this month. We will get back eventually. So for all of you repeat listeners, remember, there is an immense amount of value that we have here, and we want to make sure that we are putting personal growth in the hands of everyone on planet Earth. That doesn't mean the final percent in every single person's hand.

Nope.

That means we are going to equip leaders to lead their organizations, to change people's lives one story at a time so that they can take their message, monetize it so that they can continue to build that message and really impact the world. It doesn't, it doesn't happen one event in one event. It happens year after year after year, consistency. So you think about this in 5, 10 years down the road. You can come back to this moment and say, my story will never be the same because Brigham shared this framework. I applied it. I was— it was significant. Like, oh, I know the significant points. I translated this. I know my audience now gets this. I was on point focusing on the things that matter. I related it and relived it in such a way that the audience felt it. And then I gave a clear call to action. Your stories will never be the same. Now, if you don't apply this, guys, you cannot blame me for the work that you didn't do and the results you didn't get because of the work you didn't do.. But think about this. If you do the work and you actually understand those 5 principles and you go and all in finish your stories, they'll never be the same. You'll always be able to—

very, very valuable tools right now.

Super valuable.

Right? So, and if you're like, I can't remember my outline. Oh yeah, go ahead. Go ahead.

Yeah. Let's dive real deep into one. Cuz this one is, this one hit both of us really hard is the objective part. Because Bri and I, we love to talk and we could start talking and we could start talking and we could just keep talking and then we could start talking about other things. And then, uh, next thing you know, we're still talking and we're like, what were we talking? So how— yeah, exactly. Meta report. How do we, if let's just say that's our issue, how do we dive deeper into, okay, we're off track or how do we stay on track? Let's get a little tidbits for that.

Excellent. What is the information— with this information you're giving me, what is the purpose of it? You could say a question like that, or you could say, well, with what you're telling me right now, is this what we're trying to accomplish? All you need to do is refocus. Have you guys ever heard of Straight Line Persuasion by Jordan Belfort? No? Okay. Anyway, he's talking about going from where people are. It's kind of like Suckville to Awesome Town. This idea of going from the worst place that they are to, wow, this is the land of finishing the sale. You have to take them on that journey. And it's a straight line in between where they were to where they want to be. Okay. And where they are right now is somewhere on that line. If you want to take them from that place of I don't know to I know, and I know what I'm doing next, it is a matter of What's the objective? What is the thing that matters? If you're way off in la-la land, you have to figure out, how do I get them back here? What are we trying to accomplish? Yeah. If you dial in your story in a way that allows people to say, oh, this is the principle that I'm teaching, are you getting it? Are you— is this making sense? There's something called an engagement question, guys. This, this is a really long topic, but I'm going to give you the 10-second version of it. Yeah. Okay. I like an engagement question as a speaker and as a storyteller is making sure that your audience understands where you're at in the story and whether or not you threw that ball and it got caught. Okay. If you throw the ball and they weren't ready, bounces off their face, you're like, oh, oh, you're going to have to throw another ball. Okay. And maybe you have to like, you ready? You ready? You do this with your dog, I'm sure.

Like, hey, ready?

Yeah. Where you throw it?

I got it.

I'm going. I'm ready. I'm going. Canine guy, like, you know, he's playing with a ball.

Oh, oh yeah, absolutely. It's a ball or a tug. It's one of the two.

Or a tug of war.

Yeah, perfect. Or my arm, you know, whatever. Minor details.

The purpose of your story, you have to make sure that your audience knows it and you know it. If only you know it, there's a really good chance that your audience will be like, why is he telling me this? Like, I don't know if I'm following. But as soon as you say, this is where we're going with this, and then you stick on it. How much clearer is your communication? How much more certainty are you providing? If you are unclear, so good, you're like, I don't know what's going on right now, but here's some things that might fit. You're like, you've heard the expression grasping at straws. Imagine you're like falling off of a, like a barn, and there's straw there, right? You're grasping at straws as you're falling. That's like telling a really crappy story. Okay. Grasping at straws. There's no purchase. You can't grab onto it. You just fall, broken back. Sorry. Anyway, sorry for that visual. That's one of the things that pop into my head with Jeff's book, which is kind of crazy. But here's the thing. Whenever you are off base with your story, it's okay to be like, guys, Let's recenter. This is the purpose of why I'm sharing this. Are you getting my message? If not, let me back up so that we can make sure we're on the same page. There's nothing wrong with repeating portions of the story so that your audience doesn't get lost. Here's a way you can know your audience is lost. You ready? You'll see this in little kids. There's like this glazed look and then maybe they start picking lint. Sorry, what? You know this because your kids do it, right? You're like, oh, I've been there. I've felt it.

I've done it. Oh my gosh. I've done it.

You've done it. I've done it too. Anytime you start picking lint, you're like, that speaker lost me. I don't know why this matters.

Doesn't make sense. Where did that string come from?

Where is this string? What happened?

Is that a hair or is it a string?

Right. You have to investigate. But here's the biggest portion of this. If you want to go deep with understanding objectives, this actually dives into the performativity of your story too. Anytime you understand a character, you understand their super objective or the real purpose behind what they're doing. Let me give you an example. You have Frodo, right? If you've ever listened to Lord of the Rings, he has the One Ring and he needs to get to Mordor to throw that into Mount Doom. Otherwise the ring will just keep, keep going. And that's the whole purpose. That's his super objective. However, Every single little scene within that, he will have smaller challenges that he has to deal with. Those micro challenges are like the little beats within a story that you're like, hey, I need to overcome this to be able to get to the next step. It's almost like a closed door. As soon as you find the key, oh, now I can open it. If you don't find the key, then you're stuck in that portion of the story. As soon as you're like, oh, I got through that door, you're like, oh, now I have a waterfall to climb up. Are you kidding me? This is ridiculous. How do I do that? And they're like, oh, here's my harness and a rope. That looks awful, but I'm— this is the only way I will make it happen. After you know your super objective, right, the main purpose, that objective so hard that you're like, I will be able to do everything in my power to get there. Your audience will be able to follow you. If they don't know what you're trying to do, you're going to lose them. They might be like, I think, I think this is what he's trying to do. But if they don't actually know it, your audience most likely will get lost. It doesn't mean you tell them the end. You just say, this is why I'm doing this. Here's what I'm working towards.

Yeah.

And as you're working towards that, especially in a speech, you give them, hey, this is the main point, guys. I want you to be able to see this. I want to drive this point home. You'll hear people will often repeat and then they'll have a variation. Repetition with variation is the key to all learning. If it's only repetition, you will have the glazed eye and you'll see the kids, you'll feel the shame. You're like, oh, I don't get it. You know what I'm talking about? Yep. Oh yeah.

Oh yeah.

Toddlers. Repetition with variation. And I love that. That's what happens in storytelling, guys. We could go way deeper.

Get the book. Oh, we, we could honestly, we're probably gonna have to do multiple podcast episodes. We really are. Uh, yeah, that way we could really drive home the importance of being able to tell your story, the importance of being able to tell your story in a way that you can serve more people. Because that honestly, let's, let's be honest, the majority of people want to serve, they want to help others. But if you can't tell your story or if you're not willing to tell your story because you're frightened, then you're not able to serve as many people. So on that note, from your ebook, from the storytelling idea, from branding, all of the above. What are 3 golden nuggets that every single person should know when it comes to telling their story and/or their brand?

Ooh, I'm going to overdeliver. This is one.

I like it.

I'm going to give you my framework. It's called CROW. This is not even in that book. This is something that I learned in the way you're developing your characters.

Okay. So you heard that? It's not in the book. So we have to listen to this podcast. You gotta listen to get this. So let's go.

Have to. You ready? Let's go. Okay.

CROW.

It's character. Character development happens not just on stage, it happens off stage and in every new stage of your life. Character. That's the C. The way that you use this framework before I even give you more of it is anytime you have to develop a way to engage your audience by portraying another person. Sometimes when we're telling a story, we have to step into that role. We might use an affectation in our voice or a different posture. That is not the character. The character is much deeper than that. They're actually people. So C is for character. All right. On stage, off stage, in all the different stages of your life. Now, R is for relationships. How do you tie in and have that relationship with the different people? That's so good. When you have a clear relationship, You say, this is how I interface with that person. Now, a relationship is not necessarily father and mother. That is a type of relationship. But I'm talking about a character's relationship is how do I interface with this person in this context? How do we treat each other? Who has the status? Who has the power? We can go super deep in this. This is— oh yeah, I literally went to years of school so that I could learn how to improve my relationships in the context of acting and theater. But relationships in general, knowing what's your actual connection. Sometimes people, especially in storytelling, will have a false idea of what their relationship is. Luke Skywalker and Anakin Skywalker, they're like, that's so good. Operating under the idea that you are my enemy. And then you have this revelation. This is how you are. And then you figure out this is your identity. You're like, you're my dad.

Oh, flip.

Uh-oh. Everything's different. And you notice the way you treat each other shifts when you have added information. That's where revelations happen. You can kind of picture a soap opera. You're like, you did not know he is your son? He is your son. You're like, oh, he's my son. Oh my goodness. You have this complex going on. You're like, oh, this is awful. This is so gross. I can't believe that happened. All the things. Okay. You have to be able to identify the relationship and you play the relationship based on how those characters within that context, understand their relationship. Because if you played Luke Skywalker in the beginning of the film as Luke Skywalker, how he knows his relationship at the end of the film doesn't work.

No, it doesn't.

He doesn't know his dad.

He doesn't.

He thinks his dad was this Jedi that did great things and then was killed. Yep. That's the relationship. Okay. The O is an objective. So I didn't come up with this framework, CROW. I just used it for years. So I I learned this when I was in my improv theater class. Okay. I was absolutely loving it and I've used it for years. I taught it for years. So yeah, the objective. Now here's the key thing with objectives. Since we already talked about this a little bit, I'm going to go a little bit deeper. An objective is simply a want. What does your character want? Yeah, in this moment, not necessarily all the time. What do they want right now? As soon as you understand what they want, You can do something with it. Sometimes a character's want can be as simple as, it's really uncomfortable. I'm going to move. Maybe they want to get comfortable. Yeah. One of the reasons people move is because they're feeling uncomfortable. It might be heat. You're like, man, it's so hot in here. That might be all they want is they want to cool down. You see how simple that is? And you can add texture to your storytelling based on that want. And that's the objective we're talking about in this context. All right. The last one is where you're like, wait a second, where? Yeah, the circumstances that that person is in will often dictate how you portray that character. Because if you take Ronald McDonald and you put him in Mount Doom, that— I kind of want to play that scene. That sounds hilarious.

I mean, it sounds kind of— it could be funny.

It could be really funny. Changes everything. Changes everything. If you take The Hobbit, right, Bilbo Baggins, and you put him in a soap opera, Again, it's going to be hilarious. Things that you're like, this is really weird. If you change the context, suddenly there are things that are said that you're like, this doesn't fit. Just like 2 and 2 do not equal 4. This does not make sense. You have to be able to figure out, is this character in this context able to respond the way that is natural? And a lot of times people think, oh man, you're being melodramatic. Melodramatic. You're like, wait a second, if I was in that given circumstance, how would I respond to it? That's a better question than how do I make this as dramatic as possible? Like, that question doesn't serve you. How do I make this given circumstance as real as possible and play that magic if? That's a Stanislavski— no, it's Anton Chekhov. Check out this idea of the magic if. If this were the given circumstances, how would I play in those? Yeah, a really useful tool as an actor and as a storyteller. So there you go. I over-delivered. Not 3, I'll give you 4.

No, I loved it.

Character, relationships, objective, and where. Very simple framework. Anytime you're telling a story and you want to step into somebody else's shoes metaphorically, yeah, go through that little exercise. If you're doing improvisational theater, character, relationship, objective, where. Now you can build a character in 3 seconds.

You're trying to see how it was you be a coach, trying to do a lot of things. Utilizing those terms is going to make the world of difference.

Exactly. I'm already going to have to go back and re-listen to this so I can notate in my reMarkable.

So if anybody else is listening and you need to backtrack, you need to listen again, definitely. And on top of that, you really need to check out Brigham. He's on Instagram, he's on LinkedIn, he's on YouTube. You gotta check him out. He's amazing. He's awesome. Uh, if you're not going to the Colorado event, you should go to any of the next events that we have. New York, we've got Wyoming, we've got, what do we have? We have Washington, we've got Colorado again. We've got the Gamma event coming up.

And guys, if you're not going to any of those events, sucks to be you. Really, it does. They're awesome. Yeah.

Get started in the app.

And yeah, you gotta jump on.

Um, that's a whole nother Facebook page app. There's so many, so much value behind just in the app alone. That's right. Just even on the free side, like, you get to interact with everybody who's a part of the community that's so willing to share information and their wisdom based off of their journeys and their own stories, and that people are able to relate to. And then on top of that, what, over 200 hours of, uh, Training on there.

Oh yeah, I think it's probably more than that now.

Oh, more than that. Well, the free stuff, check this out, guys. This is how I like to pitch it to people. Let people even see what's the value. We have something called Project 100. If you're following Infinite Gold, I'm sure you guys have heard this. That's 100 days of free content. Hmm. What? Who does that? Who's so generous they'll give you a full quarter of the year's worth of content for free? It's freemium for free. Now, here's the cool thing, guys. As you go through that, it's not just hearing about what's helpful. We're not talking about doing push-ups. We're encouraging you to go out, exercise, do those 33 minutes of exercise or more. It's not stopping at 33. That's your minimum, right?

That's your floor.

Yeah, you're drinking water, right? That's what I'm drinking, drinking the water. Then going and connecting with, with books. I think there's 3 books that we encourage people to read every single 30 days, 33 days. If you think about it, leaders are readers. You've probably heard that thousands of times. I know I've heard it all over the place. I don't know who's the originator of it, but it's just true. In Mandarin, if you learn to— if you grow up right, if you're getting older, you live till you're old, you gotta learn until you're old. Just keep discovering. Because we could do the whole thing in English. We say, what is it, an old dog can't learn new tricks? That's not true, guys. That's garbage. Right. Have you ever taught your dog something that you're like, oh wow, I didn't think he'd get that. Now he understands it.

I don't know. My 11-year-old, he's kind of just gives us the middle paw now with a lot of things. He's on the do something. Little paw pad. He knows what we want him to do. He just says, you know what, I'm going to do this instead. And he's 11 years old and we kind of just semi let it happen now. Now my working dog, on the other hand, oh no, you're listening. That's a whole different story.

You're listening, you're outside.

Yeah, he wouldn't listen. And you try to, uh, give him like the bark command because like what I get him to do when I go out to feed him is I'll get him to bark. I'm like, hey, you have to bark. But he does this like, like half whine. I'm like, no. I'm like, get out. And then he finally like picked up on it. I taught him how to bark.

Yeah, that's true.

That's not a bark on command. I was pretty proud of myself.

When you want food, you listen.

There is incentive there.

It's incentive.

But again, give me the kibble and it's all good.

It's all good. Brigham, thank you so much for coming on. We appreciate it. We're also going to shoot the link for your Stage Fright Costs ebook. You definitely need to check it out. You need to follow him. You need to do all of this stuff. Also with us, if you guys have any questions, if you want to see any other people on our podcast, if you have any questions for upcoming Friday Fuel,, podcast, reach out to us and, uh, we'd love to communicate some more.

Thanks everybody.

God bless, guys. Take care. And then if you can stay