In the final episode of the "Speaking Truths" series, host Sally Koering Zimney delivers a solo, reflective monologue on the realities of creating talks that move the world. She argues that transformative speaking cannot be shortcut; it demands a full, iterative creative process akin to birthing a talk, with continual refinement even after the talk is delivered. Sally shares anecdotes about coaching a busy keynote speaker who wanted her to write his speech, illustrating why skipping the hard work undermines authenticity and connection. She discusses the tension between "good enough" and digging deeper, noting that sometimes constraints force a speaker to settle for an okay talk, but true transformation requires deeper investment, time, and coaching. Sally also highlights that the creative work continues subconsciously when a speaker is not actively preparing, referencing insights from her husband Andy Zimney on creativity. She ends with reflective prompts for listeners—how much time they spend preparing, what part of the process they would eliminate, and who serves as their coach—emphasizing that while there are no shortcuts, compelling, courageous speaking is accessible to anyone. She directs listeners to supplemental resources on her website, including an email series, PDFs, and visual aids.
Chapters
Hey everybody, and welcome to This Moved Me, a podcast about creating talks that move the world. With me, your host, Sally Koering Zimney. Together with some fabulous guests, we will have a casual conversation about the art of public speaking, because a good talk can move the world and it'll be fun. Yeah, I would think making alien cows meaningful. That's not a small task. I love your giggle. Wow. Oh my gosh, so waiting for everybody to figure out the alphabet. Hey Movers, it is the final day of our Speaking Truths series. I hope you have enjoyed this and and just been reminded of the power and the importance of your role as a speaker in this world now, maybe more than ever. I've been saying that phrase a lot, now more than ever. So true. So we are at the final speaking truth, number 7, and that is this: if you want to be transformative, there are no shortcuts. I wish there were. Mrr, mrr, mrr. I know. I started out in this work, especially as I was kind of building my blog and trying to build an online presence, and I would see people online, other coaches, you know, sharing their expertise, saying, "Here are the top 10 ways to blah, blah, blah," and it just kind of bugged me because I— and I know that they work, and I have created a handful myself, so I really don't want to throw too many stones at other people because people like them, they love them. There's such a great response to them, and I totally get why. Because something like a top 10 list is simple and it's clear and it makes things seem easier. And I have no problem with simple and clear, but easier is a lie. A few years ago, a speaker of mine was creating and prepping this big keynote speech that he was giving And he had asked me to coach him, and he's this really incredibly busy kind of big-time dude. He's always flying from one coast to the other, and I was amazed he knew what time zone he was in at any given time. I was always like, "Where are you now?" You know, he's just a very busy person. So understandably, given the chaos of his life, He came to me one of our sessions and he was like, "Could you write this for me?" And I was like, "Um, sure, but it won't be as good as if you wrote it." And he was like, "Ah, I know, I know you're right, I know you're right." And he really wanted to skip that part, and I don't blame him, I totally get it. And I could have written him something, and he then would go through the process quite differently, right? Try and memorize it. And, and certainly there's a lot of different ways to skin this cat, but we can't skip the hard parts, not if we want our voices to be authentic and our connection to the material, to our content, and to our audience to be substantive and real, to authentically take on this moment and this process. Because it's just, it's a process. And the process of creating and delivering a moving talk isn't easy. It's just not. I wish it was, but it's not. I'm not saying— it sounds like, oh my gosh, it's just such a drag. I'm not saying it isn't fun or isn't rewarding or isn't worth it. It can be all of those things too, and I hope that it is for you. But, um, it's certainly not, uh, easy, and it's certainly not quick. Um, so once our talk has been I've heard people use this metaphor before, and I think it is totally apropos, and that is that we birth a talk. And even once that talk has been birthed and it's out there and you love it, it's still not done. One of the most frustrating aspects of speaking is that it's a process and that it's iterative. Speaking is a reflection of who we are as human beings, and so it's never done. We go back again and again and adjust And, and that's what makes it exciting, and that's what makes it so challenging. Or sometimes we don't, and we say it is good enough. And you, you can do that. You can, you can bypass some of this process, and you can skip some of the iteration because there are other things that are more important. And you can give a merely okay talk, and honestly, sometimes that is necessary and the best we can do. I myself had to do that recently. I— all I wanted to do was spend more time on it, and my husband, who is currently my strategist and my strategy coach, was like, nope, this is not what you should be spending your time on right now. I was like, oh man, this is really, really hard. I still spent more time on it than I probably should have, and because I know it's not good enough yet. But it had to be okay. And sometimes we have to do that. I just want to give you a pass there. Like, sometimes that's the way it needs to be. But if you have a vision for yourself that it is something else, that you know it can be better, that you really want it to do something transformative, well, then we have to dig in. Then we have to take the time and challenge ourselves and go into instead of away from. Then the big work of moving this world might just happen. And I also want to say that sometimes the process of creating a talk happens when you're not working on the talk. And I think that's really important to point out. That's part of the iteration. Is, especially when these talks are about our lives and about things that we're passionate about, then these ideas are circling around in our brains and they're processing. And there's some really, really, really cool ideas on the creative process that I talked about on this show with my husband Andy Zimney, who is an innovator and talks about creativity. And so I think this was incredibly helpful for me to sort of name that process. So you can go ahead and listen to that if you want. But some things for you to think about: How much time do you spend preparing for your talks? And is it enough? Or are you somebody who's on the other end of that spectrum? Over-prepares. There's— there, it does flip over to that at some point. And if you could wave a magic wand and delete part of this process, what part would it be? Like, if you could hire somebody to do this for you the way exactly you would do it, what would that be? And I'm just curious if you could identify that for yourself. And then what's one thing that you could do to make that slightly less painful? For you, or slightly more doable, or to embrace that part a little bit more. And I think finally, this is really important, we all need a coach, every one of us. So who is that person for you? Who is that person who you can run stuff by and help be a mirror for you? Because I think, um, we can't do this alone. In fact, it's part of the creative process is verifying it out to someone else in some way. So though there are no shortcuts in this work, being a compelling, clear, courageous speaker is absolutely available to everyone. And I think it's one of the great joys of life. It is one of my great joys, and I hope, I hope, I hope for you too. So here's to all of you and the long and joyful and worthwhile road that we are on as we create talks that move this world of ours. Yeah, so that's it. Those are my 7 speaking truths. Again, if you are interested in seeing this in a way that's besides just hearing me talk about it, then I say go check it out over on my website. It's an email series, and in the email version of the series. There's extra resources built in there, some great, um, uh, I direct you to different episodes that help illuminate some of these ideas, and lots of PDF downloads for you, and some really cool visuals for you to take and live this out into the world more. All right, that is it for me. I hope you've enjoyed this. I have so enjoyed diving in. Here with all of you. I think, like, I don't know, this is it. If we can do these 7 truths, if we can just, like, really wrestle with these, I think we've got it. I think we've got this, people. I am with you. All right, time for lunch. Gotta go. Ba ba ba ba ba ba ba. Ah, that was, ah, really super pumped. To— yep.
