Two speakers argue that presenters should focus on giving value to their audience instead of getting likes, book sales, or followers. They say treating a talk as an act of generosity lets you be authentic, experiment, and recover from mistakes without worrying about self-promotion.
Very often when we do these things.
We show up with a selfish disposition. Right.
I hope they like me. I hope they like my work.
I hope they buy my book.
I hope they, you know, go to my website. I hope they follow me on social.
Media and, and we act that way. You know, we put a picture behind.
Us on the PowerPoint and it has our. All of our social media handles on it and has a phone number and a website and an email address. Right. And we say at the end, you know, somebody asks a question, is like.
You know, question, whatever, and they.
And we reply, well, you'll have to read my book, or, well, that's on. That's from my book, you know, and it's like, it's. We put ourselves and that's.
People can tell.
And in those cases, we're not rooting for you. In fact, we're going to try and trip you up.
Right.
We can't help ourselves.
It's entertaining. Yeah.
You know, you put yourself at the front.
We'll have fun with that. And so I've, I've learned early to show up with a giver's mentality where I don't care if, if they like.
Me, I don't care if they buy a book, I don't care if they follow me on social media or not.
All I know is I have something that I think is really valuable and I'm gonna give it to you. I want to give it to you, and I believe I'm giving to you.
With all of my gusto and all of my energy. And so, like, I remember, you know, people would apologize because they, you know, know, they said there's going to be this size event and like, only half the number of people showed up and they're apologizing. And I know a lot of speakers.
Who would get angry.
You promised me this size audience.
And I was like, well, I just.
Feel sorry for the people who didn't.
Show up because the people who did show up are going to get all of me.
Right.
You know, I hold back nothing.
And I think when you show up with a giver's heart, and I literally.
Will say that before I go out on a stage, I will literally say under my breath, before I step on.
The stage, you're here to give. I will remind myself that what I'm about to do is, is an act of generosity. I think I have something pretty and.
I want to share it.
And people can tell. Yeah, authenticity. People can tell. And so you have a wide berth when you show up with a giver's heart. You can make mistakes and you can stumble over your words, and you can. You can talk a little bit too.
Much, like I am right now, and.
People are just fine with it. Yeah.
You know, so I think, you know.
We'Re highly attuned social animals, and. And if you show up to give, believe it or not, you can experiment a lot.
AI Won't Tell You the Full Truth | Arthur Brooks + Simon Sinek | A Bit of Optimism Podcast
How To Make the Best Decision | Arthur Brooks and Simon Sinek | A Bit of Optimism
