214: Mike Parkinson - How to Love Up Your Audience (even if they aren't loving you)

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 we're waiting for everybody to figure out the alphabet. Hey movers, it is Sally Koering Zimney here at This Moved Me, and I'm super excited to bring to you a podcast interview. Oh my gosh, yes, I still do podcast interviews. It's been a while, I know, but I gotta tell you, I have a slew of interviews that I have been waiting to share with you, and now is the right time. And today's episode is with Mike Parkinson, who is a friend of mine that I got to meet at the Presentation Summit a few years ago. And I've been wanting to bring Mike on the show to share with you about his amazing ability to bring energy and depth to his talks. Mike is a fabulous person. He and his wife Jennifer were people that I got to hang out with at the Presentation Summit, which is an awesome conference, by the way, if you are in the presentation industry in any way. If you're building PowerPoint or Keynote presentations, if you're building content, if you are coaching speakers, and if you are a speaker yourself, If you're in the industry and this is such a tight-knit, beautiful, family-oriented, awesome group of people, it is a super fun few days. It's just some of my favorite times at conferences have been with this crew at the Presentation Summit. We call it the PreSum. You'll hear Mike and I talk a little bit about it on this episode. But that is how I got to meet Mike and and really experience his approach with audiences. And I wanted to share some of that insight with all of you here. So Mike and I recorded this a while ago, but part of the reason that I'm bringing this to you now is because, as you know, I've kind of gone deep the last 6, 7 months or so doing some big digging and big building in my business. And we've been talking the last few weeks about leaping. Well, the leap is coming, my friends. We are just 2 weeks away from the big leap, and I've been talking a lot about it, and I can't tell you exactly what's happening, but it's gonna be big, and I'm really, really excited about it. So I wanted to share with you some of my favorite interviews that I've been saving as we step up into this leap. So be on the lookout. It's T-minus 2 weeks. We've got Mike this week, and then next week we're going to be talking with a man named Travis Thomas. And Travis also, I just had this really great conversation with him about how he takes his content and makes it work for a really different audience. And so I'm super excited about that. There's more info coming about Travis Thomas's episode next week. And then it is launch day, my friends, March 2nd, 2020. I know sometimes these podcasts live outside of time and space, so I know that may sound like a long time ago for you, depending on when you're listening to this, but know if it's pre-March 2nd, 2020, we are getting ready. We are digging deep for the big leap. It's coming! Woo woo woo! Now, until then, I want you to take in these episodes. They've got some really wonderful strategies for you and reminders for all of us to stay really connected to our audiences. So without further ado, here is Mike Parkinson.

I learned something spectacular a few days ago about the elephant and the rider that I am just freaking blown away by. I, I, I'm hoping we'll get to share it today.

For sure. Well, I love that actually we're starting this conversation with that level of depth, Mike, because one of the things that I've always enjoyed about you that became really clear to me when you did your keynote last year at the PreSum, um, was that you, you hold in both hands this delightful, engaging, contagious energy to you. The first time I saw you present, which was 2 years ago, I was like, holy cow, I love this guy. I mean, you were just taking the room by storm. And I love that. I love that you are in some ways larger than life. I mean, it was just like, boom, there's Mike. And then when I heard your keynote this year, it was like, there is equal depth to that. It's not just like, woo, woo, woo, woo, woo. It was just also this depth. And I, I, that's what I wanted to bring you on the show because I think that there is a, uh, a skill to that and probably a personal development that happens in order to live into both of those places in such a powerful way. And so, uh, I just really want you to know up front, I appreciate that about you and about your approach and your style. It was It, it's so fun to be a part of it from an audience perspective. But then also, as I bring you on the show here and we're talking to other people who are bringing their messages out front, like, how can we live into both of those spaces more? Not just the high-energy fun and not just the, the depth of this, but like, how do we bring both of these pieces out front. So that's what I'm thinking about as I bring you on the show. And, uh, I just want to maybe start, Mike, with how you— I mean, you're like a tech guy in a lot of ways, like the technical side of presenting a lot of ways, but you've also then developed this keynote side of you. So, uh, around a message and an idea. And I definitely want to hear more about your elephant and the rider, because I think that's really cool. So what's the short story about how you are at the point where you're up in front speaking to people about stuff?

A short story is, years ago— have you heard of Edward Tufte? Yes. OK, so Edward Tufte was out there speaking. He is one of the foremost experts on visual Communication. Yeah, and we said— we were at a retreat in the Outer Banks, and I said to my business partners, what would happen if Edward Tufti worked at our company, 24 Hour Company? And they said, well, I would think that our reputation would go through the roof because Edward has a really great reputation. And so I said, well, obviously we're not going to hire Edward, and what makes him him?, and the fact that he's helping people, he's sharing information, he's trying to help people achieve their goals through visual communication, and we were all passionate about that, and therefore I said, "Well, let me become my version of Edward Tufte." So I started writing a book, I basically broke down what made him awesome. And he did a lot of research, and he shared information, and he tried to be as empirical as possible. Even if I didn't agree with the guy, and I pretty much agree with him on everything except for one thing, even if I didn't agree with the guy, he had figured out some pretty amazing things that other people too have as well. Excuse the cough, I'm getting over a cold.

No, that's okay.

So I wrote the book, started throwing my head into the rain for conferences to present, and was scared poopless. I was so scared. I was so afraid to do it. And I remember I had notes and I would sit there with my notes and I was literally trembling as I spoke in front of the audience. And a good friend of mine, Bob Fry, he's a great public speaker, author. He said, I think his pen name is Robert Fry, Dr. Robert Fry, but he said to me, "A little advice, Mike?" And I said, "Yeah, sure." He said, "Lose the notes. You know this stuff. It's okay if you forget a little bit. It's okay if you embellish some place and take away another." You know this stuff. And that's it, that changed my life. I do know it. And then flash forward a lot of years, a lot of presentations, now I'm keynoting, I'm doing what in my industry is called orals coaching, which is helping people present information, not in the way that you do, I mean your style is brilliant, more for my business, so it's going to be a lot of oral proposals and things of that nature, sales presentations, sales pitches. Cool.

Awesome. You call it orals coaching?

Yeah, that's what, that's what it's called in this industry, in the business development industry.

Oh my gosh, that, for whatever reason, that is a new phrase for me. It sounds like this mashup of like, uh, speech, like a speech team, oral, oral interp, and you know, and like dentistry.

Yeah, well, yeah, it is weird because coaching— I know, I know, when I first heard it I was like, what are you teaching?

What are we coaching? Oh my gosh.

It could also mean putting the slides together and coming up with the messaging and the narrative and the architecture and things like that. It depends upon what the audience, what my customer wants. So if my customer wants, you know, all the way from— we call it cradle to grave— basically from the creation of the slide deck all the way to the delivery, then sure. Usually, usually for me, it's I'm either involved at a segment or another segment. So they'll bring me in for creating the slides and maybe creating the slides and delivery, or just creating the slides, or they'll bring me in for discovery. It just depends.

Cool.

It's not usually every—

What do you mean by that? They bring you in for discovery?

Like, uh, discovery would be before the, uh, in the, in the world of business development, before the RFP, the request for proposal, hits the streets. Then we're doing things like shaping the opportunity, understanding the problem, so that we can be more prepared when the RFP comes out. Because typically when the RFP comes out, it's about 30 days to respond, 30 days 30 to 90 on a, on a good one, but, and that's for commercial and government.

Cool.

Um, and it's Ikki style.

So, I mean, you, what's I think so fascinating is how methodically you went at building your, uh, speaking side of your business and recognizing that it was a powerful tool for your business in particular. Right? So it wasn't like— because you're a real natural up front. Like, you are— you have this wonderful delivery to you. But that's not, you know, some people who, if I saw you, I'd be like, that guy has always loved being up front. And maybe that's true. Maybe that's true. But I love that you were like, okay, if Edward Tufti does it like this, I guess I'm going to research how he did it. And You know, you talked about going about it empirically. So, you know, what drew you up front was this is a smart way to do business.

It is a smart way to do business. We learned very early on that if you help enough people achieve their dreams and their goals, we'll achieve ours. So we've always been our audience first, our customer first, people first, people before what we want. And that has 26 years later, you know, 24 Hour Company, I got two companies, 24 Hour Company, the services side, is doing very, very well, and Billion Dollar Graphics, the product side, started in '06, so I can't do the math, what is that, 14 years?

13?

13, lucky 13. So 13 years, and I would credit the success of both to putting, helping other people achieve their goals first, And it seemed like a natural evolution to say, well, how can we help people more? And that was the, uh, the, the, you know, what is, how did Edward Tufti do it? Cuz he definitely has helped us so we in turn can help other people.

Cool. Uh, that is wonderful. You mentioned that you were nervous, you were scared outta your mind. I have a hard time believing that. I just want to say that, and I'm sure that it's true because you said it. But tell me about that evolution, because like I said, you, you just come alive up front, and most people who approach right now and are like, I'm nervous about this, can't imagine ever getting to that place of comfort.

Well, the, the There's a few things, and this is me doing knee-jerk analysis, so forgive me if I'm not as thorough. I— my gut says it's because it's me sharing information that I know and believe in, so my enthusiasm is going to be a large part of that, and I'm very enthusiastic about what I share and helping people. That is a natural place for me to be. I get excited when I get to share a golden nugget that I think would help people. Then I also think that it is learning through trial and error, fail forward, figuring out what works and what doesn't, and things like accepting corrective criticism like, "Hey, lose the notes. You know this stuff." Knowing the stuff, being passionate about it, and failing forward got me to where I am. Oh, and I was presenting, well, I want to say 3 years ago at a conference, and they asked me to do a, I want to say it's like a Tiger or something, or it's similar to Pecha Kucha, if I'm pronouncing it properly, where they have time, you have time slides, kind of Tiger or something, or so you present and your slides auto-advance every 30 seconds, and I was almost as nervous as the first time I presented because I'm used to being in control of the narrative and the pacing, and I feel the room, and I think that I know that I'm doing the right thing. And by the way, I have failed many times, some in recent— and I'll tell you this really cool story. So I presented, and I was so nervous I couldn't hold a laser pointer or anything because it was obvious it was shaking like this if I pointed it. So I just had to gesture. Because I was so nervous. It was, it was crazy. And this wasn't that long ago. When people— when I change up the control that I have, and I have a firm belief that if I look at all the things that cause me to do wacky stuff, it kind of boils down to lack of control. When I feel like I don't have control, I make some pretty wonky decisions, or my brain gets into a fight-or-flight mode or something like that, which now I'm responding emotionally.

Right. Yeah. Oh, that's an interesting insight that for you, what, what makes you feel anxious or nervous about it is the sense of like you can't control what's going to happen. I completely agree that when I did an Ignite talk a few years ago, which is the same thing as Pecha Kucha, it's like—

That's what it was, Ignite.

That was Ignite.

Okay. Yes. It's insane. Isn't it crazy? Yeah.

I was so scared. I was like, I understand this is 5 minutes and most of the people here have had way less experience speaking than me. Like, what is my problem? Why am I so freaked out right now? But it's this idea that if you get caught up or lose track, like normally I wouldn't stress about that at all because I could move my way through it and find it again and whatever. But, but this timing thing. It's crazy.

I agree. When I lose a part of my control— I was approached by a company that said, "Hey, you're really good at presenting," and I said, "Well, thank you. That's very kind of you to say," and training and things like that. "Would you present our content?" And I flipped out because now I no longer have control over what the content is. Do I believe in the content? Do I know the content? If someone asks me a question, am I going to sound like I'm lying to them? So, um, after, uh, going back and forth a little bit, I said, no, no, I'm not comfortable doing that. I don't want to present someone else's information if I don't believe in it. And I didn't know if I did. I probably would, but I don't want to say yes and get 50% down the rabbit hole and find out that I disagree with the content. And here I am presenting it as fact or something that I'm passionate about.

It's a journey. When I work with people who are presenting content that is not from them, that is, they're representing a company. It— the journey to what I would call authenticity, where you can really in integrity, stand in integrity and deliver something that you mean, uh, it takes a long time to get there. And it's this really interesting, uh, tension between your own voice and your own thoughts and your own, like, finding yourself in the content and also being true to this brand and their message and their content. It's, it's kind of— it's a really interesting dilemma.

Yeah, it's critical. It's critical because we have, uh, this will dovetail into the whole elephant and the rider thing. We have amazing lie detectors. Our brain can sniff out bull stuff. And so when someone's not being genuine and real and authentic, that is perfect word, and I've heard you use it many times in your training. Your training is spectacular, by the way. When you, when you've used it, it— you, you know you're an expert. One of the things I can tell if someone's an expert is because they can take a lot of complex stuff and explain it very succinctly. That's someone who's run at it multiple times and not work, didn't work, this isn't the best way, I explained it to my class or my student or my participant and they didn't understand it, so let me try this, let me try that.— and to figure out the most succinct, clear, easy-to-remember way. You do that often. You have mnemonic devices. You have rules of thumb in your training, in your presentation style. You make it very easy to understand, very easy to recall, and very— you increase the likelihood of adoption because you are aware that there's two parts of the brain, and that's the elephant and the rider. I don't know if you saw the keynote, the elephant being the emotional part of our brain and the rider being the intellectual part. What I just learned, and we always want to speak to the elephant first because the elephant responds faster than the rider, so what I just learned was that presentations are often meant to change something, change how we do something, change what we believe, educate, education is change and growth and evolution. When we present simple facts, like, "Hey, by the way, you know, what president is on the $100 bill?" "Haha, it's not a president." So when we present simple facts, we just accept it. We go, "Oh, that's cool," and we accept, we absorb the fact, and we learn it. However, when someone presents information that challenges our belief system, there is what scientists are now calling the backfire effect that it causes. It causes people to be more entrenched in their belief system. For example, they had people who did not believe in or had issues with flu shots. Like, ah, flu shots, they're sketchy. And they said, well, let me tell you facts about why flu shots are safe. And then they became less likely to get a flu shot. And the reason why this happens is because of something called the identity protective cognition. It's called identity protection cognition. Uh-uh, I will call it IPC for short. So when someone presents information that challenges who we are, our identity, we are forced to respond emotionally. Well, our emotional brain is faster than our intellectual brain, our analytical brain. And so when the information comes in, we respond emotionally. And if the information is not threatening us, we go, "Oh, I'll let it come into the intellectual part." If it's threatening us, our identity, then we respond emotionally first because, right, we put up the wall. And then what typically happens, either with verbal or internal, we begin to argue emotionally in a way that can't be defended or argued against. So I would attack the, "Well, you think you're an expert, but you know, you don't seem so smart," or, "Those facts came from dubious resources. Maybe they're in the pocket of big oil," or whatever the thing is. We defend it in a way, how can you argue? Well, no, they're not. Yes, they are. No, they're not. So then we hide behind that. So what you have done in your training that is brilliant is that you've, you're engaging the elephant first, the emotional part of the brain, and you're opening up the door to make people more receptive to change.

Yes.

Because your belief system may not necessarily be may coincide with theirs, or you may say something that challenges their identity, and so then the IPC kicks in and the backfire effect would be the result. Instead, you've given them a reason to open the door, trust you, challenge— they're invested in challenging their own belief system because you've told them what they're going to get out of doing this, and that's— you do it naturally, or at least I don't know how you came to this point?

Uh, well, by working with teenagers and trying to talk to teenagers, because they are an amazing— amazingly initially defensive audience, right? And they, uh, just by nature, by being an adult trying to talk to them about things like respect, you know, they're just like, "Wah wah, heard it before." Wow, you know, they're just so uninterested. So it was like the, the tactic became very clear very quickly. It's like, we need to connect first. We need to have some kind of emotional opening where they are not thinking anymore, they're feeling with us. And once we could get them to be like, "I've been there," the empathy, once we had empathy, then we could say the thing that would make them go, "Oh." Put your hand up to the camera. Damn.

High five. Empathy. Empathy is it. To understand that we all, unless there's a brain anomaly, we all think the same way, pretty much. We just don't think the same things. And to empathize with someone, it teaches us that wrong or different isn't wrong. Just because someone voted for somebody different, it doesn't make them wrong. It means that their life choices led them to believe that this was the right, the best choice for them. It doesn't make them wrong. And if we— and I'm having— I am guilty of this with my mom. She voted differently than I voted. And every time I have a conversation with her, she gets defensive. And I'd like to think that I'm not one who's very judgy. I'm merely presenting facts. We can't argue with, you know, hey, it's raining outside. No, it's not. Well, how did— why did you say no, it's not? I don't understand. It is raining outside. And I realize now that I was guilty of the backfire effect. I was presenting facts that challenged her core belief system. And so then the identity protective cognition kicked in. And she started either internally, because she did not want to start an argument, she began emotionally responding to the things that I said and built up a wall, and all I'm doing is infringing her further in her belief system. We are going to— people often have a hard time of telling good facts from their own biased beliefs. When I say people, I mean me. I mean you, I mean everybody listening to this podcast. That's the way the brain works. If we understand that, I think that we will all be more likely to be understanding when someone says something that seems so either not divisive, but definitely contrarian because it's like, hey, it's raining outside. No, it's not. No, it's totally raining outside. Why are you saying this? Oh, because I'm challenging your quote belief. I got it. So then we again take control back and realize that it's not them, it's us and how we engage in it. We forgot about the elephant first. We were like, hey Ryder, here's a fact. See how I'm right? Oh, here's some— oh, this is mind-blowing.

I love it. Yes, go.

So if someone, someone says something that goes against our core belief, it literally, literally hurts us. The same when we're, when we're found wrong, the same part of our brain that feels physical pain ignites. So we feel the pain. So emotionally we feel the pain. And so we want to move away from the pain. That's why we, oh, and this engages the fight or flight. Which causes us to respond emotionally. So if I say something that challenges your core belief and then you feel wrong, then you are going to be emotionally hurt and respond accordingly. "Oh, you hurt me. I'm going to say something to shut you down to stop being hurt." Right.

It actually hurts. I mean, I agree.

It's actually weird.

Feel like— have you ever heard this? Um, oh gosh, I can't remember the name of the speaker, but I'll put it in the, the notes on the podcast page about this. But there was this woman, she's giving a TED Talk about being wrong, and she was like, how does it feel to be wrong? Um, and people, you know, people are like, it feels bad, you know. And she's like, actually being wrong feels the same way as being right. It's realizing that you're wrong, because that's what hurts. Because we don't know we're wrong, right? Oh yeah, being wrong feels just like being right until you're like, oh, because we don't know we're wrong.

Yeah, we're like, yeah, I'm totally— I totally voted for the right person, or I totally— whatever, whatever your thing is. That is the best paint color in the world. Pink dilly dilly, everybody likes pink dilly dilly.

Yeah, and then there's the moment where you're like, oh shoot, I can't go back. I was wrong.

Yes. No, it's true.

There is something, you know, what I love about these conversations, Mike, and what you have brought into your keynote that I saw, it was so interesting, is a lot of really interesting information about what's happening just under the surface, like how to really convince people, persuade people, move people, and that really human understanding is so essential in this work. It is not just, I mean, having a skilled, tactical, clear, formatted well, beautiful slide, all of that is great. But if you do not really understand the people you're talking to, what they're probably thinking about you, right? What their reaction is likely to be to what you're talking, like real EQ, we've gotta have really high EQ to do this work.

Yeah, absolutely. Completely agree. And the concept of— the thing that I'm learning, the concept of— this is a little bit of a divergence from what we were saying— the concept of IQ is formally suspect, or actually it's incorrect, because IQ tests, for example, test how knowledgeable you are on the topics that we agreed to is demonstrative of intelligence. Well, this person may not be really smart on, um, on boating, which was something that was important to the person who made the test, but they're really smart on being an electrician or being a teacher. And so the IQ test are unfairly putting us in levels of intelligence. EQ is kind of similar because you've got someone that may have a way to really empathize with teenagers because of trial and error. You've got somebody that's really good at getting in the heads of CEOs. You put the CEO person in with the teenagers and whoo, Can you imagine what's going to happen if they're teaching, if they're talking to teenagers like they talk to CEOs? It's not going to work very well.

And vice versa. I can't use my strategies that I used on 9th graders when I walk in and do a keynote. It's like, no, not going to work.

No, it's important to understand. Yes, I know, making, uh, uh, references, pop culture references that they're like I have no idea what you're talking about. Yes, yes, it's lit. So then, even then I wouldn't say that to teenagers because they'd be like, why is this old dude saying lit?

I said something last night at dinner. I was like, that is so legit. And my 6th grader was like, mom just said legit? What?

Yeah, but legit's almost— well, it was our generation. I have no idea how old you are, but it was my generation. To say something like that.

I know, totally.

And I heard words coming back, by the way, which I'm desperately fighting for. Word meaning yes or truth. So if you say something like, wow, you know, this Sally's podcast is awesome, I'd say word.

Word. Yeah, yeah, I see.

Because that's what I said when I was younger, and I'm bringing it back.

Everything that was cool when we were younger is coming back. I just cleaned out— this is a super random thing that has nothing to do with what we're talking about, but I was like Marie Kondo-ing my butt off for the last few weeks, obsessed, and got rid of all these things that have been in my closet forever. And then literally 3 days later, somebody was like, you know what's coming back? And it was— I don't remember exactly what it was, but it was the exact same thing that I just threw out. I think it was a flannel— flannel shirts are really—

oh yeah, flannel. Look, flannel is in, man.

Look at how cool you are. You're so cool.

I don't know about that.

Oh my gosh. I was like, the high—

the high-waisted jeans are coming back in some places. I was like, wow. Because, you know, for a while there, it was like the jeans were, you know, way low, and it didn't work out for me very well.

Me neither.

But, uh, me neither. I don't know that I want the high-waisted jeans either. Can I just have Regular or wasted.

Find the happy medium, please. Please, no.

Yes, exactly.

Yeah. When the mom jeans are back in style, I was like, wow, I don't know if I can go there because I am a mom. I think it just won't go over well.

Right. You can't. Right. It's this weird thing where you don't want to try too hard. Then again, I don't want to be a stereotype. No, it's— the good news is, is for us is that we don't have kids, so we're clueless. So for all we know, we're the dorkiest, like, thinking we're cool people. I know exactly— I have no idea because our friends' kids don't know us. Well, they know us very well, but they don't know us well enough to bust on us. Not to our faces anyway. When we go away, they're like, did you see Mike's Wayne's Metal shirt? What's wrong with him?

Trying to be so cool.

Yes, and that's exactly how kids talk. Did you see Mark? Kids don't talk like that.

Well, you know, there's bliss sometimes in ignorance, right? You just like do your thing, live in your lane, wear whatever you want. Sometimes kids can be so brutal, just like, um, are you gonna wear that? Like, that's why I put it on.

You have a personal question? I thought it was cool, but now you've— hey, man, what is it? The backfire effect is about ready to happen because I'm going to wear this more proudly. Yeah, I forgot what I was going to say.

Sorry, I took us off.

No, no, no, no, no.

But sometimes, like, some of my favorite podcasts really take wonderful detours. And I'm going to leave that one in. I like that one. Cool.

Or did you? Oh, Jennifer, she's a favorite writer, and the writer said, I believe from the '40s, she said, "What other people have to say about me is none of my business." Yeah. That's pretty good. Yeah, I think too. Unless it's constructive, yeah, keep it to yourself. We've all got strong opinions.

I thought I would bring this up to you because I knew you'd appreciate it. You know, we got feedback from the presentation summit and lots of really amazing feedback, but there was clearly one person who was not a fan of me. It was like, "I cannot handle her energy." That was the criticism though? Yeah.

That's not criticism. That could be sarcasm. That could be It could be, you know, it was not sarcasm.

It was like, her energy is too much. She's too much energy to me. I was like, well, just not for that person. That's okay.

Exactly. Yeah. Different strokes. And I've heard that as well, because you and I are both pretty high energy presenters. Yeah. A friend of mine, BJ, was a comedian for years and worked with comedians like Joe Rogan and stuff. And he said, here's something that I've learned, Mike, is that you'll have 100 people in the room, 99 people laughing, and the comedian's playing to that one person who's not laughing. The reason why, I believe, is that we pay attention to things that are bad because they can hurt us. We pretty much forget things that are good because they ain't gonna hurt us. So if we walk into a room and it looks exactly the same as it was when we left, Oh, but there's a lion in there. Our brain automatically says, oh gosh, there's a lion in here. So every time we have some— every time we have something that's contrasting, and because you're a wonderful presenter, most of the people are going to be engaged in what you're saying and what you're doing. And if you scan the room, you may catch that one person. And if you're like me, if I catch it, I'll try to pull them in, which again can have the backfire effect. So careful. Because I lost them a long time ago and now everything that I am saying and doing is simply making it worse. So I have learned that I will very gently nudge or shepherd, and if I get pushback, I let it alone and do my best to put it out of my head. I had one person throw their book down and leave my class. Saying, "This is a horrible class and I'm leaving." So flash forward to lunchtime, I'm talking to the powers that be at the company and they said, "Oh, he does this at every class." I wish you would have told me!

It would have been good to know because it's been really wreaking havoc in my brain.

Oh, this was like 12 years ago or 10 years ago. I was just mortified. I was like, "This has never happened to me. I'm such a bonehead. What did I do wrong?" And I think I mentioned earlier about a story. I'll glaze over it, just a high 10 view. I was in training, and I've done this training class many times, and I always tailor it for my audience. This one time I was in, God only knows, Colorado at a company, and part of the class turned on me, and I never experienced this type of behavior, and I'm 100% sure now that it was the backfire effect. I said something that challenged their identity and they built a wall up, and then it devolved into an emotional discussion, which we're going to get nowhere. Well, I feel that. Well, then I'm sorry, you know, it's 100% on me. What a lesson learned for me. That was a hard— I felt so bad. And afterwards, I was told that, yeah, these particular 3 people are known for in every class being argumentative and difficult. And I thought, well, why would you put them in the class then if they can derail? But they didn't. They really didn't. They were conscientious of the fact that we would agree to disagree. And then we both said, hey, we'll take it offline. Just a new experience. Oh, and it was all on me. It really was, because I could have presented it differently.

Yeah, kind of what you're saying, I think, is really important, that we up in front need to approach our audience with so much compassion, because they— we don't really know what's going on, and it doesn't serve us. I mean, even if they don't really deserve your compassion, if they're just being negative, you know, poop heads which is, which is their right, right? The best thing you can do for yourself and for the rest of the audience who is there and wants to experience you is to love them up with compassion, even if they, they're not interested in what you're saying. And you, you know, you have a responsibility to try But you also just, you know, they're adults, they can choose.

Yep. And that's okay.

It is, it is. It's hard to not take it personally in the moment. And that's why I think if we can shift our brain into, they have something else that they need to do. Something else. There's ways to let them go. With compassion.

One of my favorite stories— oh, is this it? I don't want to keep it longer.

I want to hear Mike's story.

It's very short. Uh, well, a minute. This person was on a train in New York, uh, and a father and two kids. Kids are running around causing noise, interrupting other passengers and making it difficult for this person to read. And so, you know, he's sitting there and getting more and more frustrated. So finally he walks over to the dad and said, excuse me. And he's trying to be polite. You may not be aware of this, but your kids are running up and down in there. And some passengers were asleep and they woke their passengers up. And he said that the dad kind of was staring down and then went, oh, excuse me. Oh, I'm sorry. We just came from the hospital and their mom died and I'm not sure how to move. Forward with this. So understanding that everybody's dealing with their whole, you know, spectrum of challenges and pluses and minuses and their life choices and their belief system that may or may not coincide with us, which we absolutely don't know anything about because I have no idea where you grew up and how you grew up and how your parents raised you and how anybody else. So understanding that that there is a sea of things that could be going on in someone else's head, and that actually almost all the time their reaction isn't about me, although I triggered something. It's about some other gunny sack or carrying around something that they're dealing with. That is— that keeps me from taking it too personally. And I heard someone said you can't— you don't get angry at other people. If you don't do two things, and that's take it personally or justify it. Meaning that if someone beeps at me in the car, it isn't because they're mad at Mike Parkinson or they're mad at Sally Koering Zimney. It's not it. They're frustrated because they're in a hurry and you're in their way. It doesn't— you're just something in their way. And then justifying it, I call it being God's hall monitor. I'm not God's hall monitor. My job is not to give you a demerit because you were inconsiderate to someone else. So if— If I can't say, well, that person's speeding, so for the making sure that they don't accidentally cause an accident and kill a baby, you know, whatever goes on in my head, then I'm going to beep at them and I'm going to teach them a lesson and I'm going to slow down. No, no, no, don't justify the anger. So anyway, completely went off on a tangent. Sorry.

No, but it actually brings us full circle, Mike, when we were talking at the beginning about that the human beings in our lives and in our audiences, to make this really directly applicable, we don't know what they're dealing with and what they're going through. And there's some people who are dealing with really big life stuff because that is life. And their ability to take in what we're saying may be compromised and it may have nothing to do with us. And so just, you know, loving them up. And, and I love how whoever that person was on the train came up with a lot of compassion, right? And just said, I don't know if you're aware or not, but, you know, instead of it being like, hey, get your kids in line, your kids are waking up other kids, which is a— I could see that really easily happening. And the assumption is this person is not doing the best that they can versus this person is doing the very best that they can right now.

Right. I agree. Yeah.

Okay. Well, Mike, it is time for a This Moved Me moment, something that has moved you recently so that we as speakers can really stay in tune and connected with The ways of moving. So what is something that has moved you recently? It could be a conversation, a show that you've watched, a talk that you've seen, a speaker, a quote. I'm throwing this at you.

Yeah, sorry. Uh, there's a few things that come to mind. Yeah, I've been watching this great show called, uh, Adam Ruins Everything. And it's a show on TruTV, and it's this guy who goes around and presents information in an effort to educate people. And a lot of what I just shared about the backfire effect and the identity protective cognition, the IPC, I got from watching the show, which is brilliant. I love it. So that moved me and made me share this and a few other things, but that is the first thing that comes to mind. I feel bad because it's something we already talked about though.

What? That's okay.

Okay, cool.

I love it. No, I think it's awesome. What's it called? Adam Owns Everything?

Adam Ruins Everything. He comes across as this nerdy guy who— he's this guy, well, actually you're wrong because— but he doesn't say you're wrong. That's why the show is called Adderall and Everything. It's like, oh, you want to go see— you want to go to see Mount Rushmore? Let me tell you why it's probably not the coolest thing to see. Or, you know, going to college or something like that, you know, that we absolutely definitely want to go to college for these reasons. However, the process and everything around college is actually kind of broken.

Yeah.

And he goes into how it's broken. It's a clever show. And it does challenge some of the, some of my, uh, beliefs that I hold core. However, uh, it, it's done in such a way because he's self-deprecating and isn't coming across as you're wrong and I'm right, haha, but rather you may want to consider this.

Yeah. Oh, I love that. There's some really wonderful echoes in everything that we've talked about. It kind of keeps bubbling up all these Great things. Oh, I'm totally going to watch because I want to see how he utilizes some of the strategies we've been talking about. So cool. Well, as you were talking, I had something else in mind, but as you were talking, what jumped to mind that I think is actually really apropos to the conversations we've been having is this show called Magic for Humans. Have you seen it?

No, I'm writing it down now.

Oh my gosh, it's wonderful. I can't remember the magician's name, so sorry, magician, but he is this really delightful magician who, um, is so gifted at delighting the people that he's, um, working with, that he's magicking with, you know, like If I compare him to, um, what's his name, Blaine?

Uh, David Blaine.

David Blaine, right?

Right.

Kind of creepy and dark, and he's like, he freaks people out, right?

He's very sullen.

Yeah, exact opposite. He's just like, hey, how's it going? You know, and, and it becomes, it's really about the interaction that he has with these Humans, you know, so it's the perfect title for the show, Magic for Humans. And they are, they are just the, the situations that he brings people in. He does a lot with kids and it has so much to echo what we've been talking about, so much love and compassion for the people who are there. He's not out to freak them out or embarrass them, or although sometimes that happens, but he's really just trying to delight them. And it is done with a really light touch, but really, really skilled, amazing. You're just like, what? How is this happening? It's so cool. And it's great. So as we talk about having compassion and loving up our audience and really understanding who they are and remembering that this is not just about skill and tactic and, um, doing everything to the best of our ability. It's about really showing up and being present with the people.

Caring. Yeah, yes, I agree completely. So what was your— is that your, uh, that was your move to me?

That's my this moved me moment. Magic.

I like it. I love it. Thank you.

Brings and delights the humans. Oh my gosh.

Right.

And let us go delight more humans. So good, because I do think, Mike, like, that you do such a great job of delighting and loving up the people in front of you. Like, as I was talking about compassion, I was like, Mike does that. I remember you just handling questions with a lot of compassion too, and there's this wonderful trust and connection that gets built up when you sense that the person really— you feel loved by them. Like, what? That's such a gift. It's not just, I'm here to give you all of my insight and smarts and I know things.

No.

And you are sitting there.

Oh, nope, I'm there to learn too.

Hey movers, it's Sally, and I am so grateful that you listen to the show and that you are staying connected here on This Moved Me. And if you are not yet a subscriber to this podcast, you know that that would be awesome, right? Because you don't want to miss anything. It's been quiet here in 2019, but 2020, big things are coming and I don't want you to miss it. So if you haven't yet hit that subscribe button, and if you haven't yet left a rating or review for This Moved Me, now is the time to do it because things are growing and changing and I want more people to discover these resources. We need more speakers speaking with authenticity, clarity, courage, and connection. So let's do it. Thanks so much. See you soon.