Story Spark - Fear to Flow

So welcome to day 2 of StorySpark session. Today's session is called Fear to Flow, where we are going to acknowledge some of our fears When it comes to storytelling, when it comes to public speaking, we're going to reflect on some of our past experiences, and then we are going to reframe that as a stepping stone towards confidence, towards making sure that we are becoming better storytellers. And so what— why this is important? Because a lot of time this fear holds us back. And that is why we need the story of courage. So what we are going to do right now is, first of all, let's acknowledge that we are here and we want to work. So give yourself a pat on the back if you want to. And now we're going to do a small visualization exercise. I'm going to start the music and I'm going to ask you to close your eyes, and then when I ask you to visualize, just start remembering those experiences. And then, um, once we are done with the exercise, I'm going to ask you to share your experience as well. So we're going to do a small visualization, then we'll also have time for 1 or 2 minutes for you to write that whatever the reflection comes, and then we'll have the sharing experience. So close your eyes, start the music. Close your eyes and think of a moment when you had to speak in the public, or you had to share something which was personal. Was not the best, not the most comfortable situation. Yourself to that particular time and try to recall how did you feel, what was your body behaving, what were the sensations happening. I want you to zoom out a bit and again think about yourself from a third person perspective. Who was observing you at that particular moment, somebody who saw your courage, somebody who saw you struggling but yet going through. What would that person noticed What were the learnings out of this whole activity or exercise? I want you to take another deep breath, and then once you open your eyes, I want you to write in your notepad or your digital notes what it comes to your mind when you think about this whole exercise. So slowly open your eyes. I'm going to again give you a small prompt and start writing down, and then we'll have an experience sharing. So open your eyes and think about the experience that you just had and What did you feel? What did you do when you felt nervous when you were asked to speak and you were afraid? And what happened? And what did you learn about yourself? Give another 1 minute for you to reflect, journal if you want to. Morning, Sir Chinji. You just joined, so—

Yeah, yeah.

I'll just give you a quick recap of what we just did, and you can also do while others will share. So today we are actually reflecting on our past experiences of when we felt nervous, when we had to speak in public, when we had to tell a story. What did we feel and how did we respond? And then we think from that a third person perspective, or as somebody who was observing us at that time, how would they observe and what were the learning out of that? So we just did the visualization. Now we are doing a reflection and then we are going to have experience sharing. So I'm going to ask others to share the experience, and in the meanwhile, if you want to write down, you can write down as well. All right, so yes, Venkat, are you okay to share your experience and what did you feel?

Yes.

Yes, uh, in year 2022, June month, um, there was a farewell to me, my old ex-company. In that, they said everyone in the farewell, um, they normally said the positive things, but in the— in that last company, they shared all the my negative points. They said, Venkat, for going to next level, you have to speak, you have to share your opinion, um, in the meetings. So this is lacking to you. This is said not only one person, said 4, 5, 5, 5 persons. So I understand that this is very important to my life. Then in the next company, I, I, I was working, uh, work from home job, so I couldn't get a direct face-to-face experience. So that's the reason I voluntarily go to college and presented presentation in front of the students.

So my—

because After that, all I expose myself to audience and create situation. And one of the reason I came to Japan is also that reason. When we speak with stranger, the flow comes. But when we speak with our known person, then we check our grammar, vocabulary, or sentence making. Everything. So that's the reason I want— I, I came to Japan, and now my fluency is somewhat improved. This is my story. Amazing.

Awesome. Thank you, Venkat, for sharing. Everybody write SPTY, story power to you. And Tanay joined in between, so Tanay, we are doing this exercise today where we reflected on our past experience of when we struggled to speak, when we struggled to tell stories, and what was the experience like as first person and also as third person. Now let's go to Dr. Anka. Would love to hear your thoughts as well. Unmute yourself.

So the first experience that I have of stage performance was when I was in the school. We were, I think, must be 7th or 8th standard. And we were asked to speak on the subject of love for one's country. And I, I did not know much what to write and how to speak, and I was scared. My— I went to my dad and my dad said, I'm not going to help you, you write it yourself only. And I started writing. We were looking at the books, you know, Vivekananda book, and then we were looking at Mahatma Gandhi books. And those times, whatever books we had, I went to the library. Then love for one's country, all the stories I was trying to gather. Then my father said, now you write down. What do you want to write down? So I wrote down some quotes by Vivekananda, by Neta Ji Subhas Chandra Bose. He said this and he said that. And then I sat with my dad and I completed my structure of my writing. Then he made me start speaking now. So initially I remember with that paper I used to read. And then my dad said, now no more paper. Now start to remember. And then I started remembering it and remembering, and that put me into the habit of remembering the speeches right from my childhood. So he has told me that no looking at paper ever when you go on the stage, never go to look at the paper, try to think of the point and all that. And he used to make me remember the points. First will be this, then you weave the story in that. And I still remember that when I went on stage, so at home I was practicing many, many, many, many times, and my non-English speaking friends used to come home. And I used to stand in front of them and I used to practice. And they used to say, we only know the names of the leaders, but we don't know what you're talking about. And then I remember when I went on the stage, I was the youngest child because I was in 7th or 8th, I think. But there were 9th and 10th students also were there. So I was the youngest. I mean, I thought I will never get the prize or anything. I went and I spoke and I came. And then it was a sports day. We were standing in the stadium and we were speaking. And then my papa and myself and all, we were going back. They were taking too long to announce the results and all that. As we were, as we were walking back, they announced my name, that I've got the first prize. But that stayed with me, that has stayed with me, because writing the speech and practicing it, no matter whether somebody understands, they don't understand, practicing, practicing, practicing is very, very important. And writing it yourself, it makes you remember the speech better. If the AI is going to write the speech, you're not going to remember the speech. So when you dig into the books and you write down the points, that's what stays with you inside yourself. Thank you so much.

Amazing story. Thank you so much for sharing. And yes, everybody write Story Power to You, SPTY. And now let's go to Sachinji. I hope you have by this time you have remembered some of your stories as well. So would you like to share?

The first and foremost thing, I, I hope I'm audible. I was reaching you. Yes, yes, because I'm on Bluetooth. It's always a question with Bluetooth whether the voice is reaching or not. Uh, I'll take one extra minute. Let it— it feels very great to be, uh, to be a part of this again. I've been passive observer and keep, uh, each and every part what Haritosh Srivastav does. Compliment to you and it is gratitude. You. So nice to see Alka ji back. Venkat, you the regular member. I am irregular member because I'm involved in some other activity during this particular time. Okay, regarding today's topic, what I could understand, uh, about my presentation part— well, uh, when I was told to take education slot in BNI, okay, in the first part, I was bit confused, you know. I did not know what to take in that education part. Um, so I would be confused. My person who's supposed to guide me did not guide me properly. No, it was a bit confusing. Somehow or the other, I found in my way because I was a novice in that particular part. So a little bit knowledge what I had, I tried to gather the information, and it was absolutely failure. It was absolutely failure. My ED also started looking at my face. Come on, you can't know, you can't just be 5-6 minutes among these things. And that's what has happened, you know, that put me— as I always believe, habit happens in two parts. One is CSR and the second is DEI. And that DEI affected me and it took deep emotional impact and that really had impacted on me. And after every— from every stage after that, I took it as a challenge to prove myself in front of others. So that's what my story is all about. And currently I've taken education coordinator from 1st of April. In my particular thing, and it's a wonderful thing. And I will be guiding others how to tell stories in proper way so that how can they have presentation part is concerned. And somebody who is a non-speaker, a timid, was not able to speak two words, and that was some complete transformation. I believe, of course, book teaches you, but life teaches much better than what you have.

Back to you, Haritosh Srivastav.

Story.

Yes, sometimes we feel like we have to give the childhood story. You don't have to. I mean, it could be as recent as this, and I know BNI and education things and all. So amazing story, story power to you, SPDI. Keep coming back, keep sharing your story. Very inspirational. Awesome. Let's go to Thanas. Thanas, you might have got the idea by now. We're talking about when we faced challenges and fear when it comes to speaking and, and what happened afterwards. Over to you.

Okay, so let me tell you a story about my childhood. So it was my 12th class, so it was, uh, it was first time my principal pushed me to do some stage presentation. The first, it was in, uh, in Hindi. It was like an assembly. They, they called me in to, uh, tell something about, uh, Santra Vidas. Uh, it all went good. I, I was able to speak. It was a Hindi medium school. I, I was comfortable with, with that. When— and then on the Independence Day, they again post me to give a speech in English. So this time, uh, my teacher from my school gave me like a two-pager, or maybe more than two pages, to present, and I have to memorize it. So I just like, for two days, I will keep on like memorizing, memorizing, memorizing, but, but I I was not very good at like memorizing, especially when it is not from my side. I don't have a story. It was like a lengthy speech and with like, I don't remember it now, but it was like, but when I went to present it on stage, so first 2-3 paragraphs I remembered. Okay, I keep on telling, means this happened, this, this, this, this, and then I forgot. What to say. And it was like a 15th August, a whole school was in front of me, okay? There was a chief guest and all those. The students sitting in the front said, 'Bhulgiya!' Now I have to do something. So I started creating my own speech, means whatever I remember, remember, I keep telling. And I was able to finish it. And, and then after the assembly, uh, Principal came and said that you have given a good speech, and, and the way you presented it, it said that you are— you have created your own. It's not a memorized speech, uh, you're presenting in front of everyone. It boosted some of the confidence. And then, uh, I also like— it was a good thing that, that they used to push students to present in front of people. And it was, it was good. Overall, it was a good, good experience. Still give me goosebumps, me, how, how it went. That's all from my side.

Thank you, thank you for sharing. And it's amazing when we look at our own stories, so much joy. And, and maybe we were so fearful at that particular time. And yeah, I'm, I'm not not the exception here. I remember when I was in class 4th or 5th, then I had to go and I felt all those experiences we have. I had the script, I had the paper in my hand, and I was shivering, and my hands are like shaking, and I'm like, I'm never going to do this again. And look at me now. So yes, we all learn from our experience, we all learn from our failures, and more importantly, how do we frame that failure as a learning experience. That is what is most important. So next, we are at 6:21, so we're going to take couple of minutes, we'll do one small affirmation, and then we'll finish for the day. So I'm going to start the affirmation, and then you all can repeat. So please unmute yourself. I honor my fears.

Everyone, I honor my fear.

I honor my fear.

I transform fear into flow.

I transform my fear into flow.

I transform from my fear to flow. My fear to flow.

Yes, last one. My voice grows stronger every time I speak.

My voice grows stronger every time I speak.

Every time.

Every time.

Awesome. Story power to all of you. Thank you so much for joining day 2 of StorySpark session and would love to hear any of you want to share the experience. I know we're a little bit over time, so If you want to drop, that's also as good as well, but would love to hear your experience. Wonderful.

Can I share? Yeah, half a minute I'll take. Okay, it is wonderful, no, wonderful experience. And let's put in this way, you have been doing wonderful job. I've went through some of your thing videos and pretty impressive. So keep the good work going. You're blessed to have as a mentor. Keep on giving power to us. You have given gratitude and affirmations. Thank you. Just a request, whatever just now affirmation you mentioned, we could not speak in that way. Could you just write it down or type something so that next time we'll be much prepared with those things and will be much in the flow? Thank you. Back to you, sir.

Thank you so much. That's a good feedback. So I'll keep writing in the chat for everyone. That's great. Okay, awesome. Okay, Venkat.

Yes, when I listen Alka ma'am's story, I recall my college days. And in the college days also, I, I experienced the same. Uh, from her story, I, I got another story to, uh, express in the next time. So when listen other story, we get a new story to speak.

Absolutely. And you can still share, you can just record a video and post it in the group.

And Tanay's story also so good, and I feel There is a— in the Taniya story is a failure story that makes more powerful and have great things to listen. That also so interesting. Thank you.

Thank you, Venkat.

What opened up for me was that the fear, when you say the fear may be to speak on stage, but the fear can be to speak to somebody else also. So when I, when I met my boyfriend and I was not knowing what to talk to him, I didn't even know that he's going to be my boyfriend and he's going to be my husband for my future life. But that time, it is the initial talking to the person also is a fear story. So fear story can be, it could be in an interview, it could be anywhere. The fear can come from anywhere. So that was what was opening up inside me. But then I told this story which I didn't want to tell actually. I wanted to tell the other story. Maybe tomorrow I'll tell that.

Tomorrow maybe record a video, you free to post in the group.

So the video we have to put in that, we have to put it without any theme, no? Any video we can put?

Yeah, any video.

I'm not going to be so strict, you have to put it thing. I mean, yes, structure is important, but for me, sharing stories is more important than the most polished video. So of course everything has a time and place, but in the group it's all open communication and we love to support each other. So you can share if you want to. Yes, Tanay.

So today I want to compliment Sachin Ji. He got like lot of energy and his energy is contagious. So normally I speak very slow. So when Sachin Ji speak like just before me, I also tried to imitate that same speed that I can speak with like that confidence and that flow and that pace. So this is like a student learning, like you have to like change your pace and all. I'm not very good at that, but today I just tried that.

Stop saying that I'm not very good at it, say I'm learning. That's again a leaf for every— instead of saying— yeah, yeah. Thank you so much. Me, and we'll continue this for as long as I can. So, but have a great day and see you tomorrow.