Ep. 108 Nitay-Yair Levi's Yellow Brick Road

Hey there, Mark Brown. I don't know about you, I don't have any kids. When you have one of your own, one of our own Stage Time members grows up right before your eyes and then kicks butt in the world championship of public speaking. I am just so thrilled to have knee tai with us, Mark.

Yeah, it's good to know that people who like you, people who you like, do well, work hard and achieve as well as he has. And for those who don't know, we have with us today an industry individual who was climbed to the very top of the Toastmasters contest world, finishing second in 2021. We want you to meet our friend, Nitai Yair Levy. Let's do it, Darren.

Anyone can give a presentation. Few deliver unforgettable presentations. What's the difference? You're about to find out. Welcome to the unforgettable presentations podcast with your hosts, champion speakers and coaches, Mark Brown.

Mark Brown, your life tells a story and there's someone out there who needs to hear it.

And Darren Lacroix. And Darren Lacroix.

Stage time. Stage time. Stage time.

Ready for some powerful presentation, Ahas, let's dive right in.

And Mark, not only that and I, I want to, I want to hear from him, but I do have to brag a little bit. He joined Toastmasters two years ago, like doing his icebreaker. So not only did he do an amazing job, did it virtually created a new technique that we had never seen before. I am just thrilled that he nailed it. He was so sincere, so compelling. And Mike Davis, I've asked you to join us because Mike Davis, one of our coaches at Stage time. And Mike, you saw the process, you saw all the iterations of this and were involved in the coaching. So Mike Davis, I'm going to have you lead this and Mark and I will kind of back you up. So congratulations, the first co host host we've ever had here.

There you go. So thanks, Dan. I appreciate the opportunity to be here and it is a thrill for me tonight because two years ago, if you're not familiar with Stage time and what we do, one of our ongoing programs we have is what we call weekly core call, therefore core elements to speaking. And the core calls are every week and we get people to submit videos. I manage the videos and then we determine who's going to be on. So I get this video from this man who I've never seen before and I look and I say, okay, I don't know who Nettie Yair Levi is, but while that's a pretty interesting talk I look forward to seeing him. Well, I completely destroyed his name. And it was. He was on. It was on stage. It wasn't even a good sound recording. And but there was something about him that he had this enthusiasm and energy. And I think, Mark, you might have been on the call with me that night. And so we look at this, this. This germ of an idea, and then a couple months later, we see another video, and it's about Nitai is talking about his baby and his mom and this laugh. And it was a really interesting idea. And we thought, okay, there's a germ there, but he needs some work. And he followed this path and just a couple of weeks ago, finished second, roughly 30 to 35,000 contestants, second in the world in the world championship of public speaking. So, Nitai, we're going to remind you again, it goes without saying, we are so proud of you and just love hearing about your journey. That is why we want you here tonight. So let's go back to two years ago. And by the way, just so you know, if it hasn't happened yet, there are a lot of people who love and respect you because you did this two years ago. And there are a lot of people who don't like you because you did this just two years ago. And here you are. So tell us what got you into Toastmasters?

Thank you, Mike. And what a pleasure to be here. I mean, I'm a big fan of stage time. I joined literally as soon as I joined Toastmasters, and I've learned so much. And as you said, Mike, the evidence is the speech that I delivered at the finals and the version you've seen nearly two years ago, what made me join Toastmasters? The answer is very simple. I got married. And when I got married, I did. They're laughing. I mean, I'm still married, thank God. Second marriage going well with a beautiful daughter who laughs like me. But the reason I joined is my wife delivered the speech, you know, the thank you speech in the wedding, and she did a fantastic job. And then it was my turn. And I think I did a fantastic job until I saw everyone looking at the glass of wine and daydreaming, and I thought, it wasn't that bad, was it? And then I saw the recording and I thought, oh, my God, I'm surprised they stayed at the wedding. And I made a new year resolution to get better, which sounds like cliche. And I joined. It was in December. I joined in January, and the rest is history.

What was that first speech like in Toastmasters?

Oh, God, I was so afraid, Mike. It took me six months to do my icebreaker. I was so afraid and literally afraid. And then when I went to the club, in the days that we could meet physically, I can't do it. I'm going to cancel. I'm going to cancel. I'm not going to go. I'm sick. I don't feel well. But I went there and then I delivered my icebreaker and I got positive feedback. And they said, oh, you can improve on this, but this was great and this was good, and it just gave me a confidence boost. And that confidence, I think, is the key to really anything in life, because we're afraid to do so many things. But when someone encourages you, when someone coaches you and someone gives you the positive reinforcement meant you just grow. And that's really what happened to me in the first pitch. I become obsessed straight away. Like, this is amazing. It was like flying. But just in speaking, that was my.

Feeling anyway, so you got a taste of it, you got some positive feedback. Now, what led you to compete?

So, my second speech ever in Toastmasters, which is the final speech in Toastmaster that I've done in the World Championship. That was my second speech in Toastmasters. I delivered in the club in a humorous competition. Nothing big. Someone said, hey, might as well deliver your second speech as part of a competition. And I lost. I lost. But, Mike, Kenneth McCallum, who is a member of the club, straight away came to me and he said, he. I call it Voluntold. He volunteered me and told me at the same time. Voluntold. He volunteered me and he said, you are going to do the International Speech Contest with the finger pointed at me. And I said, of course I will do the International. Yes, I was always planning to do the International. International Speech Contest. And then I looked at the member next to me and I said, what's. What's the International Speech Contest? So that's how I did. Two months later, I've done the International Speech Contest, which is the first version that you've seen. That was my second speech at Toastmasters, and I got. I got the bug. Literally a bug. It's a. It's like a obsession, not a contest. Writing speeches become an obsession, because I.

Don'T want to miss this. For those who may be listening for the first time or those who've been here for a while, you were talking to somebody who finished number two in the world, and he said it took him six months to make the commitment to join a club. And I know that it took me four months to Join my club. It was a corporate club, and the company was paying the dues. It still took me four months, wouldn't cost me anything. That's how difficult it was for me at the first time to join. So when you tell us it took you six months to join, join, how it inspires me is simply this. The journey it took you two years to take, it began with that first, very tentative step. But when you did take the step, you said you got bitten by a bug. So maybe you're listening to this right now or watching the video and saying to yourself, oh, I can't do what these guys have done. We are just individuals who know what it's like to have been there. And Nita is living proof that despite the fear you may have, once you get involved, you may get bitten by that bug, and you may find your desire to share your message becomes just as real and as powerful as his has. So thank you for sharing that nugget, Nita. I really hope it encourages someone who's listening tonight.

It also goes to the power of having people around you who support you. And Darren and Mark, what you did for me over the years as you saw things in me, I had no idea. And you just kept encouraging. And Darren was, that's why I host the weekly calls. He said, I know you can do this, even though I was terrified and said no. And Nitai had the same experience. Darren, you also had that same experience, right? You had no idea about international and semifinals and when you were competing, right? In the beginning, yeah, I didn't even.

Know it went past the district. You know, I competed for my own growth because I wanted to work on stories I was already telling in my keynote speech. So I saw international speech contests, and I just thought that was like some fancy name they made up to make it sound cooler. I had no idea it actually was.

You mean like most airports now? The regional airport's called international just because it sounds good.

I used to live in Tulsa, Oklahoma. I'm like, is there one flight that goes to Canada? Like, how do you call this international?

It's the same feeling. So you did not know the scope of this competition. So, Nitai, let's talk specifically about the speech that you finished second with this year. I remember the early version. You came with this idea, and this is the beautiful part of having coaches and people around you to work with just come with an idea. And it was creative, and it started with this laugh that you and your mother and your baby share. Right.

I just have to tell you, when I Saw it for the first time. The actual. I didn't see the early version, but when I saw the actual, I was just like. I was like, instantly hooked. I was like, what? And you had me. I drew it, man. That took confidence and it worked for me as a listener. Mike.

Well, I remember the first time you did and you had, you self described your laugh as a combination of a chihuahua and a goat, which endeared you to me immediately because I have two Chihuahuas. If I imagine them crossed with a goat, that's exactly what it would sound like. Now, we're not going to have you do it for this reason. We want people to go watch the video. So you started with this idea. What was the original idea you wanted to share?

So, you know, the laugh is an interesting concept to talk about. And this is partly of the coaching, this is partly of the growth that I had to take in this journey. When I first thought about the laugh, it was. I was walking in the street where to work. I walk about an hour every morning and every night. That's why I do most of the thinking. And I was talking to my mom and she laughed and then I laughed and it was very awkward, obviously, very awkward laugh. I thought, oh, that's funny, I can maybe use that. And the first time I used it was purely to get some laugh, right? But then it went deeper than that. It went deeper than that. The reason I continued to use the laugh in the version that Darren seen, so at first it was, this is funny, you know, people are now laughing. But as I went further and further through my personal exploration of public speaking, or rather the art of public speaking, and maybe there is a better term for it, I just made it up at the time, but. And for those who listens, the world champions are here. Mike is a TEDx coach. Listen to them, not to me. But the journey with that laugh and the reason I kept it, it's because it creates an emotional reset. An emotional reset. And I looked at psychology, I went and read psychology in terms of what it does. And it's not just that I believe every speech needs to have an emotional reset. Because what happens, the audience come at different level of emotional tethers. Someone, say, is very tired or someone is very happy. And it doesn't matter whether it's over zoom or face to face, someone is bothered with their phone, someone is just in an argument what it is, I'm very happy. And I realized, you know, we, we need to sculpture emotions. But to start that clay, it needs to be consistent. So I Use that love as an emotional reset. It comes from nowhere. People go, what? And I want them to say the what that. Because now I'm starting. I'm creating this unified clay, and now I can start shaping the emotions that follow. But the next line is very important because you don't want to be resentful of your life or whatever emotional resets that you're doing. But it needs to be like this. It needs to be out of. To me, I'm sure there's professional attempts for it, and now they're looking. Now you start building the. Start molding that clay. That is the art of public speaking. I also did it in the semifinals with the boom. It was. To those of you who haven't seen it, there's a scene where. Which is literally 10 seconds, and then I said, very violent boom. Emotional reset. Now, emotional resets can be in different levels, in my opinion, depending on the type of speech that you're doing. Obviously, don't do it in a work presentation, you're probably going to get fired. But there's always an emotional reset that you can. That you can use in the speech. That's why I kept it. So originally, I had it for a completely different reason. At the beginning of my journey, it was funny. I thought, hey, it's funny, it's weird, it's funny. That's my laugh. Let's do it. Right. But then later on, it signified something much deeper to me, and that's emotional reset, because the audience is not clay, but the clay is not consistent. So you need to add water, you need to put more clay, whatever it is, I don't know. And then you start sculpting those emotions, you know, take them through that journey. I hope that makes sense.

It does. If you're just listening to this podcast. Nitai, you said, listen to the coaches. Don't listen to me. But when you said emotional reset, three heads went down and started making notes. So that's a powerful term. Love the concept. It is an anchor throughout that helps reset the audience and get them ready for the next point. I haven't heard that concept delivered that way before.

I borrowed it from psychology. Okay. So I looked at psychology as part of this journey because the concept of emotions to me is very important because. And I'm borrowing words from Mike Brown, which I listen a lot to him and obviously to Darren, too. We are messengers of a message. That's all we do. We need to dedicate ourselves to the message. And as soon as you start speaking, you need to take the Audience through this journey with sculptures of emotions. That's what I believe we are as public speakers, especially, especially in this type of setting of the International Speech Contest. We sculpt our emotions. That's the only thing that we do. And we take someone, we reset that emotions that they have, whether they're happy, sad or whatever it is, it's now unified across an audience. And now we slowly start to take them through that journey of happiness, of sadness, of this roller coaster of emotions that at the end of it, they're left with an emotional state that enforces the message that we have. I strongly believe in it. Have I mastered it? Of course not. I have so much to learn, but I enjoy it so much. I enjoy that journey and I can't wait to work on the presentation because I think that's something I'm lacking on, on that. So that's. That's my journey. Throughout this process, we have sculptures of emotions. And in seven and a half minutes, you need to take them through an emotional journey that emphasize your message. It all goes back to, I'm a messenger of a message. How can I take the audience through an emotional response to understand the message? That's the key. And then you look around and say, what tools do I have? And we can talk about it in a moment, but sure, but that's how I believe I'm going to push back.

On you just a little bit. And in those seven minutes, you did master that for sure. Absolutely. This is a new concept. We've never talked about this. This is brilliant. And that's why we love to talk to great speakers, because we learn new things, because they come at it from different angles, to be able master it in those seven minutes when you're on one of the biggest stages, quote unquote, in the world. Like, you nailed it, Mike.

Absolutely. Now, you gave this. This was actually the second speech you gave in Toastmasters and it evolved. How long into the process, Nitai, when you felt like, okay, I believe I've got the message I want to give. How long from the first time you gave it to, all right, I've got to fix other parts of it, but I got that message.

The error I've done at the beginning of the journey, I was focusing on the tools, not on the message. And that was a big, big, big error in the sense at the beginning of the journey. And I still do a lot of errors, but that was a huge one. And, you know, I've listened to Mark and I've listened to Darren, who always say, start with the message. Start with the message. Start with the message. Start with the message. And what did I do? Oh, a laugh will be funny. Completely off of the track. It took me a journey to understand. Forget everything else. What are you trying to say in a clear language? And it's hard. It's hard because you have all these ideas, but you need to put them away to your question. Mike, When I started this speech, the speech started in the wrong path. It didn't have a unified message. And I had stories in the original speech that you've seen. They don't really. They're not cohesive, they're not pushing. They're kind of kids trying to push a square peg into a round hole, trying to make it into a speech. And the journey was to kill your sacred cows, I think that's the phrase. And try and reshape that speech to a unified message. And in my case it was always show your love. Now, I can talk about the complexity of the message or not complex message, but that will be another two hours of discussion. But today I've learned, if I had to do this speech again, you start from the end, what's the message? But then you build everything around it. The emotional roller coaster, emotional reset, the laughs. The journey needs to be around the message. So that's the learning that I had. When did I realize that the second time I picked up the speech and said this is potentially either a semi final speech or a final speech, then I literally tore it apart and started to unify it around a message. And that took longer than if I would have started the speech with the unified message. So that's again another learning that I had through this process.

Well, would it be fair to say that you had an emotional attachment to that original version and you had to let go, as our dear friend Darren did in his world championship speech, he had to let go of the idea that spurred that speech. Right, Darren?

Yeah, thanks for bringing that up.

That's why I'm here. Bring the pain.

No, no. And that's part of the journey. But we have to honor the fact that that original version got us to do the speech in the first place.

I think we have to be, especially for someone so new like me. At first I was driven by ego. Yeah, I was driven by ego. And I'm brutally honest here, I was driven by ego because all of a sudden people listen to you and if you tell them stand up, they'll stand up. I mean, you have that area of respect for a minute or so before they start doubting you. But for that period of trust that they give you, if you say raise your hand, it doesn't matter whether it's 10 people or 30 people, they will raise their hand again unless you do something incorrect afterwards. And then there's resentment and they will hate you. But you have that power and you need to respect that power in the beginning. But the audience will turn on you if you're not consistent, if you're not serving them and rather serving your ego. So that's lesson number one. Lesson number two. Very quickly I realized that I don't know much. At the beginning of the journey, I still feel like I don't know much. So I have to be intelligently naive. I have to look at this in analytical mind, but I have to be very naive in the way I look at stuff, question everything. You know, My daughter comes to me and she says, she's two years old and she says, why go put your socks on? Why put your socks on? We need to go outside. I'll go to the park. Yes, okay, I'll go put my socks on. Right. So I had to adopt my two years old daughter. Mental state of intelligently naive. So I questioned everything. You know, I stand in the center of the screen. Why? Well, because from an audience perspective, maybe that you know. And then I delved into photography. Why? You know, because you look at this screen and in the case of zoom and the rule of 2/3 or the golden triangle. So always question why Intelligently naive. You need to be intelligently naive in everything that you do. And I believe that pushes you to explore whether it's a medium or whether that's public speaking, whatever you do in life, you know, intelligently naive. I hope that answers the question. I feel like I'm going, no, it's good.

And I want to. I have a follow up question. I also want to talk to you about a delivery technique you use that we've never seen before. But before we do that, I want to go back to experience Mark had with his world championship speech. Correct me if I'm wrong, Mark, on the timeframe, but your coach, David Brooks clearly saw that that speech was not working. Did he tell you to change it or what did he do?

Well, in my particular case, he knew I was questioning the speech. I told him it was not good enough.

Okay.

And he said, well, would you consider looking at something else you have done and maybe make that work for you? He simply planted a seed. But he let me do the work. I had to find what might work for me. And I went back A year and found what was my regional speech, it's now called semifinals here, which was not really very well scripted. It was largely impromptu. Quite honestly, had the idea, but it wasn't scripted very, very well. And as I said, that could work, and I began to work on that. But he guided me without telling me what to do. He made me do the work to think for myself. If I need a change, what change can I make? That was just brilliant mentoring and knowing. I had to realize, and I had to confess, this was not good enough to compete at the highest level. And I'm sure, Nitai, there are times you look at what you have and you go, you know what? This is not my best work. I need to make some changes here and be unashamed. I mean, you're nodding now, Nita. I'm assuming over the last two years, there have been times you thought to yourself, this is not really the best thing I can do. So what is your next step? When you face the truth about the quality of what you've prepared, what is your next step? What do you do differently to make it better again?

At the beginning, I was driven by ego, so I wouldn't change it. And then very quickly with coaching, very quickly with hearing, you know, circle of confidence that I have around me, that sometimes you need to take a deep reflection and stop focusing on your ego. And that to me was a journey too, you know, to put the ego aside and say, and I'm using similar words to yours, Mark, you have to be a servant to your message. I know you also refer to the audience in a sense, but servant to the message. And you need to do everything you can to serve that message to the audience. And you need to stop thinking in conventional terms of what, you know, what it should look like. And you need to think what is going to serve the message best. What it must look like, not what it should look like. And we can talk about the transition later and why we've done it. And once you put your ego aside and once you focus on that, what it must look like and what it should look like, it's so much easier because it doesn't matter anymore. It's so much easier. When people say, that is a complete failure, what you're doing. You ask them, what's the message? And say, oh, the message is always show love. Great, it worked. So serve the message. Obviously, don't be too extreme that it distracts from the message. You don't want to do that, but it needs to enhance. In my opinion, it needs to Enhance the message. So in a roundabout way, Mark, you need to look at the message and you need to chop and change and put the ego aside of your greatest ideas and understand that it's not about you or what you wrote, it's about whether that serves the message. And you start changing if it's an existing speech in my case, to what it must be, not what it should be in your head.

It's interesting to hear you talk about ego because I tell people all the time, look, you got to have an ego to stand up and speak to a group of people. But on the other hand you have to remember that if you weren't there speaking, somebody else would be. So it's one way to keep the ego in check. Every time you have ever come on a core call, I never sensed an ego issue with you. In fact, I would tell Darren and I think Mark, it was at least on one of the calls with you. He's very coachable. And Darren, you often say if you're not coachable there is no hope. That's not a problem for you, Nitai. And I think that's why we've seen such growth in you just within our community, Darren.

So I want to ask you and be honest, you know, obviously we've helped you along the way, which is a thrill, but there's nothing better than someone who is open and who is coachable. But what would your advice be as far as the importance of coaching in your journey? If you're, you know, people who are listening to this, what difference did a coach make for you night and day?

But you need to find the right coach. You need someone who's running at the same theater as you. Obviously the state champ community is incredibly welcoming and the cold call that I attended, I think the amount of knots that I have is 3km long from each call that I have. And I'm always, always testing speeches there too because I can't wait to get the feedback. Always be open to feedback. Find the coach that on the same wavelength as you and also coach to give you freedom that doesn't try and mold you to the way they speak or the way they think that recognize this is you. I'm going to coach you and kind of direct you in the right direction because obviously I'm, oh, we don't know everything but let you fly, let you use your own wings.

Yeah.

And give you that. It's absolutely critical. I don't think you can do it without coaching. That's my view. The right coaching.

Yeah. One of the most Important ideas that Darren has instilled in our whole community is we, the coaches, are there to coach and advise, but you are the CEO of your speech. And if you. If you and your gut feel like that's not for me, you got to trust yourself enough to say, you know, that may work for someone else, but not for me. Mark, did you have a thought?

I have a question, actually, because, you know, I'm hearing that he's new in Toastmasters, humorous speech, didn't win, but someone says, you will enter the contest. You say, yes. At what point after saying yes do you finally come to an understanding and a realization of what you've gotten yourself into? And how did you respond to that?

So he was a division director, and for me, the. The club president was God. So when the division director come to you and say, you are going to do the international, it's like, yes, I will do the international speech contest. And remember, I was so new, it was maybe six months in, so I entered out of fear, let me put it that way. And then. And then when I started, I won the. I actually competed in three clubs, and I lost the first one, and I lost the second one. And then I went to my whole club, which happened to be the club I represented in the world championship this year, City Tattersault Club. And I did. Just pure timing. That was the last time I competed. And I was successful in that. In that contest. And then I said, oh, okay, that's nice. I lost. I just lost twice, or really three times in a row. And then I went to area, and mind you, this. I don't know what words to use. You know, it's funny, we talk about public speaking. I don't. I'm out of words when it comes to this. It's just this thing inside you. It's a heartbeat, you know, every heartbeat that you have. And it starts very small and very small, and you're like, oh, this is interesting. And then it just consumes you and drags you. And then you do the area and then, oh, wow, they're actually listening. Okay, here you go. Wedding speech. And then. And then you continue. And then. And then you realize that I first year, I didn't know what it required as I was running in the contest, going through division, and then I won district. I was still. You know, it's like running. I used that analogy before. You run a marathon. You got, oh, do I need shoes? Okay, shoes. How do I tie my shoes? And you run and you say, oh, I need. Okay, I'll drink water. To be able to run. So that was my experience in the first contest. I had no idea what I was getting myself into. But I think it was pure passion that carried me to win the district last year. It wasn't technical, it was pure passion that did that. Once I finished district and I didn't progress beyond the regionals, this is where I had the ego battle. How can I not progress beyond regional? And now I looked at that speech again and I'm surprised you got to regional with that speech. But the journey then was beyond the contest. And this is where I had a self realization. Forget the contest. This is something that when I don't sleep, if I don't spend time with the family, if I don't spend time at work, I always think about it. It's always here. It's like this being that all of a sudden is coming out. I feel like this, what this journey did in the context, and I'm going a long way around it. It's like you walk around the world with something buried in you and it's just like this, you know, it starts like a small crack and then not the drugs, the physical crack. And then, you know, and then, and then you, you, you happen to be in this supportive environment and with the right coaches and the right feedback and it's no longer a crack. It becomes this, this dam opening. It's a waterfall of. Of things that you're holding inside that all of a sudden you can bring outside. If I have to describe my wedding speech internally, it was like Barack Obama, you know, 2016 speech. But when I listen to the speech, it sounds like a gorilla running away from the se. So there was a disconnect between the gorilla and what I felt inside. And to be able to express the inside to the outside, that was the magical moment. So back to the question. It didn't become what these contests required. It becomes something much deeper. Forget the contest. I would have done it anyway. That deep dive into the concept, or rather the art of public speaking. And I keep emphasizing the word art because I didn't realize that word exist before. I would have done it regardless. I would have done it for free. It just consumes you from the inside. So it wasn't about the contest. It was. I'm really enjoying this. I'm really. It's like a purpose, right?

Absolutely. Absolutely. And if you're not a speaker, you can't truly understand what Nitai just said. Darren summed it up years ago when he stood in front of a group of us or about 100 people in the audience. He looked at us and said, you realize you're sick, right? You're speakers. You go through all this to stand a message. There's a sickness to.

To us.

We get it. So it's a healthy sickness.

All right?

We cannot go any further without talking about this incredible visual that you had in this speech. Now, I will tell you, I saw this, the speech evolve, and when I saw the video, I said, where did that come from? It was so clever, so brilliantly executed. And it's hard to describe if you're listening, but what Nitai did is he used his hand to cover the lens, and the next thing you know, he was in a different part of the speaking area, as if a. Some type of Star Trek machine had literally moved him on stage. He executed it flawlessly. So where did you get the idea for that?

You know, I don't know. It came from different places. And that goes back. Forget what it should look like and what it must be to serve the message. And in the past, I just used to do just a stage timeline. You know, I did it on stage. That's how I competed originally, two years ago, before COVID and I would just move from position one to position two, you know, left to right to the audience view. And then this year, I thought, okay, there must be an artful way of creating a further hook on that and really emphasizing or using the medium a bit better. So when I was talking to the audience, just me and the audience, I came close and then all the stories were at the back. So I tried to create this distance of, hey, I'm not talking to you emotionally, let's speak frankly, one on one, and then come, I'll show you what happened and I'll come back and closer to the camera. And at first I just used to walk and I said, oh, that's, that's. That's not serving the message. That's a bit boring. It doesn't create that distance. And this is where the word art comes through. I looked at different art form, and I think it's very important in whatever we do not to be confined to rules that we believe should govern what we do. We have to be intelligently naive. And my sister sent me a TikTok video randomly. Again, as I said before in different interview, I'm not a TikTok user. And I love that because they covered the camera, right? And then when they opened the camera, they were on a beach on a holiday. It was obviously video editing, right? And when they come. So I said, oh, It'll be nice to. To talk to the audience and say, hey, let me take you to when I was whatever the age is, 17, 27, 37. And just have that instant change. So covering the camera. I knew I wanted to do that as a transition. So that's from the art of movies, or rather changing a scene or editing. Then I wanted a sound effect by going back in time. And I found the sound effect. I googled sound effects. I researched a lot time travel sound effects, but they were all too complex and I couldn't do it. And the one that I liked, I tried to do it. It didn't sound well. So I deep dive into beatboxing. I'm not the type of person to do bitboxing, but I really wanted to know how they can do that sound. So I researched beatboxing. So I know now a bit about beatboxing. That's how the sound came. But the biggest issue is, to those of you who knows me, I am not a great dancer or not really good on the moving part. Not with the COVID killers attached to me. So I try to find. Find how. And I have a back issues, which I won't elaborate now, but I do had a physical issue that I had to struggle with. I thought, okay, how can I. How can I move quickly? Because it needs to take a second. It can be an hour of a transition. And I looked at the art of dance. Yeah. Now I'm not a dancer, but I picked up two steps from Latin dancing salsa to be in fact. And I do those two steps, I combine them into the transition. And that takes me back in the speed that I need to without causing any damage to my back or without causing any. I don't need to be an expert in that. Right. Obviously I had to practice, but coming up with the transition is a combination of a number of art forms that I kind of mashed together. And it looks like a second, but it took a long time to work on. And that's the emphasis. But you have to be obsessed to do it, otherwise no one is going to do it.

How many times? Everybody listening? What he just described was a lot of back research. And then how many times do you think you practice it? Because I didn't do a good job of explaining why you do it. It was to denote change in time. You took us back in time. It was so expertly done. You could make the argument if we didn't know it was edited and it wasn't. You did this live. I was like, wow, that. I mean, it Literally looked like you were being sucked back in time. How many times did you practice that?

I don't even know. Countless times. And even the fingers, the way the fingers come in or whether they just come like this is I think, I think 100 takes. Just standing in front of the camera covering it. Should I do this? Should I do this, should I do that? I don't even know. I don't even know. A thousand times. I'm making this up. I don't know. Plenty, plenty, plenty of times. But again, if you're not passionate about your message, you're not going to stand in front of the camera like an idiot and say, should I move the fingers 3 inch to the left or 1 inch backward or should I smile when it moves? Should I do something? You have to be passionate about your message and then you'll communicate and then you commit. And if you commit, you'll do all of that.

That's a great keeper. I know Mark's going to cover keepers when we close out, but if you don't have the message that you're passionate about, you're not going to put in the extra work to make it an experience more than a speech.

Mike, you emphasized it, but I want to make sure everyone gets what he just said. It was a healthy obsession. He cared so much about his message that he perfected this in the speech each time he did it. It's seconds. It's not even a two seconds, it's a second or so. But that helped him stand out from everyone else in this tiny little medium. You know, last year we saw Mike Carr use the medium and like, yes, when you're live, that's one thing, but now you have a different stage, a different platform. But I am so blown away and impressed by the work and the energy and the effort that you put in in for those few seconds, but the difference that it made. If you're competing, look, if you're in a competition, you're in a competition. If you want to be a professional speaker, you're in an even bigger competition where you're competing for business. How good you are is your marketing. But I just want to emphasize the effort he put in for seconds. Mark, any thoughts?

Yes, I have a thought on that and I want to elaborate on that because if you watched Nitai's semifinal speech, he also had a camera effect with a lens that was different. And what struck me is the amount of effort and the research and the options. He sought to perfect literally about five seconds of a seven minute speech. The dance, the Art, the movie, the editing, the sound effect, the beatboxing for the right. I'm wondering, how does it get so black? My hand is kind of. You don't get black. You get, like, brown. How did he do that? I'm asking that question. But you go back to a semifinal speech. What I thought was even more masterful. He was giving us a picture of what it's like to hide behind the wall with mom and to hide behind the border wall during a conflict. And he said, I hid behind the border wall, and it was black, and you could see just enough looking behind it. And to cover four fifths of the lens and have half your face showing. Must have been countless, numerous rehearsals, numerous tests. And then to do it again for a different effect. How much time do you think you put into these two different effects for the semifinal speech and the final speech?

I don't want to lie to you. It won't be hours. It'll be weeks. Weeks. Because you need to think. And what led me with the world that you were describing? And if you haven't watched the semifinals, I particularly like that speech.

Is it available on YouTube?

Do you know it is on YouTube? Yes, I put it on YouTube.

Everybody. You got to see that speech. You got to see that one. Yeah.

And this is how it started. It's a fantastic point, Mark, and I'm glad you raised it. The issue I had is I was talking about war or about getting bombed in a war. And one of the comments I got was, and this is before that, half covering the screen was, I've never been in a war. I mean, it's nice. I hear it, but it's like, I read it on the news every day. I don't know what it means. And then I thought, and this is, again, it goes to. Not what it should be like, but what it must be like to serve the message. And I thought, okay, I need to put in Australia, anyway, a person who has lived in Sydney, say, for most of their life, which is my first audience, to test that speech. And I need to put them in a war zone, not to narrate. You know, you talk a lot about Mark and Darren, about narration, you know, versus dialogue, which, again, I'm an avid listener to the podcast, so I've learned that from you. Narration versus dialogue. But there's another element. If an audience has never been in that environment, you need to pull them from the seat. Mind. The mind is such a great tool. And this is when you sculpture those emotions, and you need to take them from where we Are. And you need to plant them into the war zone. And they need to see the bombs and they need to feel the fear and not just hear you talking about it. They need to feel it. So I thought, okay, how do I take the audience? And I put them in a war zone. That's the only way they can understand it. I can describe it. I can say the bombs were going on and the sirens. No, I want them to hide when they. Behind the wall. How can I get a wall? And I had different concepts. I thought, maybe I'll put a cardboard maybe. And then it was just too complex. So I came up with the idea of covering half of the camera and putting my hand next to my ear and closing my eyes and closing the camera and picking through and saying, hey. So that's how it started. I needed to put the audience in the war zone. And that's why the transition I do in that speech. If you haven't watched the semifinals, please do. It's my favorite speech, is a violent transition. And I got criticized for it in the early days was your transition from the meal to the war is too violent. And I said, that's exactly right, because that's how it looked like. It is a violent transition. The bomb just goes and the siren goes, and you don't know what's happening. It was also an emotional reset. But. But. But it had to be violent. It had to be violent. So the reason I mentioned that, how do I came up with the idea to cover half of the screen? I needed the audience. Audience not just to hear the scene. I needed them to feel the scene. And I actually borrowed from you guys. You always talk about foundational phrase, foundational phrase, foundational phrase, which is absolutely critical. And obviously I have foundational phrases in both of them. But the intelligently naive me goes, hold on a second. Why not have a foundational gesture or a foundational sound that ties up the audience even more to your message? It's not always appropriate, but why not experiment with that? So I had the sirens. I had the sound again. I'm making stuff up. I don't know if it's real. I call it foundational sound throughout the whole speech. But it signifies something more because the first time you hear it is in the war zone with bombs. The second time or the last time you hear it is when I'm in the library. But now you know what it means emotionally, because you're emotionally reset to that sound. That's how I approach Nitai.

I just want to point out, you keep. I appreciate Your humility. You have three world class coaches here taking notes, listening to you and you've been doing this for two years. Like I just want to point that out. I love that. And I want to just emphasize, if you're listening to this, I want to emphasize something as well that he has taken what he learned from us and took it to another level. A foundation. What did you call it? A fundy show and gesture. Sound and gestures like that's awesome. I love that. And I want to emphasize that he puts so much time and energy and effort into those things, but they're not gimmicks. We've seen many speakers try to come up with that gimmick to stand out. Yet he remains in a pure format that it was a servant to the message. So all that energy and effort was to help deliver the message in an unforgettable way rather than just how can I be different? Which is incorrect. Incorrect if that's your philosophy. So I really want to emphasize that. And by the way, if you compete next year, do not use either of his techniques. They are now his. Linda Marie Miller with her cards. Those are hers. Figure out your own. Well, I don't know what to do. Figure it out. Ask people. Be a sponge. So I just, I just so proud of you. You're amazing, you're intelligent. You earned your way onto the podcast.

Mike Darren. I love that I had written down not gimmicky and and this is your fall on your face that Darren had nobody. Anybody after Darren. We'd all look if they fell and said that's Darren. Anybody in the future who ever covers that screen, I've seen Ne Tai do it.

Can I make a comment on that?

Please do.

Yeah, please.

So Darren was one of my inspirations to get outside of the books and be an artist. Right. And I'm not an artist yet, but I'm to going, going through the journey of expressing my artistics inside to the outside. Because when I covered the camera, I don't know what you remember how I finished the speech, the final speech, it was black and it says contest chair.

Yes, yes.

And I was so fearful of that. I'm like, is it respectful? Do people not going to get it? Yep. But there was this guy who on his face lying down said contest chair or whatever the word was. I'm like, yo, why not? Why not? Why not? And that gave me the confident boost to go forget what it should look like. What do you need to do? What it must look like to serve your message. And I can't Emphasize it enough. And then when you remove the ego from the equation, too, the sky's the limit in what you can do. Right. But experiment again. Don't distract the audience. It needs to enhance the message. So thank you, Dan, for giving me that confidence boost of addressing the contest chair from not even looking at him or from the floor, because that enables.

And that takes guts, too. That takes guts. You know, you took a risk and it paid off.

Yeah.

And you said a phrase, knee tight. The word. I think the word should should be eliminated from the language because especially in speaking. What do people expect? Well, that's what you should do. That's when you start to sound like everyone else. And the three of you have each done something different, not just in contest, but when you're speaking that you do not fall into the should category. And that's why you stand out.

Yeah. And I know we've talked for a while. I do have two questions for you, Nita. The first is based on something you said about your semifinal speech, favorite speech, best speech. My understanding is once you get to past your regional quarter final, you were semifinalists with an opportunity to go to the finals. You know you're going to need two speeches. Did you have both speeches already ready at that point? And I think you did. But how do you decide which one goes first and which one goes second? What was your process for that?

So that was. I'll be very blunt here. Yeah, very blunt and very honest. My dream was always to deliver a speech of the magnitude of the scars of the past in the finals because to me, that is. And I'm getting emotional just thinking about it, and that's how connected I am to that message. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to do that. My plan was to switch them originally, and then due to unforeseen circumstances, I'll put it at that, that was not possible. And also the period I allocated in my timetable to polish the second speech just wasn't there. In fact, all my practices of the second speech was sitting down and not standing up because I couldn't deliver standing up. So my original plan was to deliver the final speech in the semifinals, and then the semifinals are the finals, which is the scars of the past. Unfortunately, that did not material outside of my control. Actually, I take it back. It is always our responsibility. I should have prepared better. I should have had the two stories ready in January. And that's a lesson I need to learn for the future. So the both speeches were ready. One was more polished than the other. And the reason I stuck with the scars of the past in the semis is because it was a more polished speech and I wanted to make sure that that message is delivered rather than not delivered at all, if that makes sense.

I certainly appreciate your honesty about that, Nitai, because you talk about what you wanted to do, you really wanted to have that one be the magnitude, the big one for the final. But I admire the fact you gave the best you had at that time. And I'll tell you why I say that I've been going to contests for 28 years, since 1994. It's a long time, 27 years. And I mean, I threw the world championship. I've only missed two conventions in my life. But I'm seeing speakers who had given that choice, went with, I'm going to hold my best speech for the final and they give their second best at the semi, then they finish second or third or they don't place. And the one they were sure would really nail it, they never got to deliver it. So I always think to myself, I always think to myself, were I in that position, I would give myself best in the moment. And I believe you did that and you earned your place in the final and it was wonderful. It's a long way to get my first question answered. But my second question deviates slightly from the contest itself. You used two words several times, actually three in the last 40.48.251 3976 minutes. And those words were art, path and journey. I'm going to set art aside and focus on path and journey because I've got a personal interest in this. What our audience may not know is that over the last several months, you and I have corresponded by email several times.

And from year one month one, you're the first person I ever sent an email to.

Yeah, and I appreciate that because you had a theme running through all your emails to me, which I thought was kind of unique. And I'm going to let the world know this, if you don't mind. May I share this with the world? Yes, sure. The theme with which our emails have been going for the last year has been Dorothy from Kansas with the red shoes going to us on the yellow brick road. And all our emails. In all our emails, the yellow brick road has been the underlying theme. So my question to you, Nitai, for the world to hear, why was that theme, that idea of your journey along the road, why has that become your personal journey?

I think the answer is very simple. Because I felt, and I still feel that I don't have the Courage. I don't have the heart and I don't have the brain to do this. And, and, and this journey is to discover that.

Well, simple as that. I'm to going, going to beg to differ because what you did, the courage to get involved after a six month fear to say yes to a director who says you will be in the contest. The heart. I don't care. You told me. You told me. I don't care. Really, I don't care what the judges say. I want to get this message out and the brain that says how can I be creative and get this message across in a unique way that is memorable. The brain, the heart and the courage to do all that. I applaud you because I always wonder and I always encourage you. I wish you the best on the journey. We talked about heart, brains and courage. But I beg to differ. I think what you have done in two years shows all three. And I admire the fact you want to use all three in ever increasing measure. Because in your mind, as I understand, understand it, the journey continues.

It never ends. I don't want you to end. Imagine if it ends and you don't speak anymore. God, I don't, I don't want it ever to end. You know, you always, you have to be the servant of the messages, as simple as that. Or the messages that you have inside you. And as soon as you have no more messages to deliver to the world, what's the point? What's the point? I don't want the wrong to end. I don't want to meet the wizard of Oz really inside. I just want to keep walking and so singing a song and have Toto running around and have the red shoes and click them three times. That's the joy in my, in my humble opinion. But also, you know, it's, it's an ego stripping road and journey. You have to put your ego down. In my view. You have to put ego down. And one, and I'm going to be controversial here and perhaps that's good for podcasts, but I'll be controversial here. Part of this journey. I realized that a lot of people do this, either professional speakers or doing the contest is to have the name embedded in history, the name embedded in history and part of this journey. What I've learned, this is the ego stripping part of this journey and it's the hardest, right? Your name or my name or our names. One, they don't matter. Two, they won't be remembered. They won't be remembered. In 400 years, no one will know who we are. This is the controversial part. Unless your message is so strong, you know I have a dream. I don't even need to tell you who said that. Small step to you, mankind. Whatever the line is, you already know who I'm talking about. The message will survive generations. I name want. Who was the greatest public speaker in the 15th century. Century. I don't know. I mean, if you know, tell me. Right? But I bet you there's a message from the 15th century that still impacts us today. Brilliant.

Well said.

That's. That's the key to all of it. So if you. And I'll correct you, Darren, the word obsession. I think the. Maybe the more politically correct one is passion. Because my wife doesn't like the word obsession. She says I'm obsessed. But passionate.

I prefer the word passion.

Passionate. Obsession. Yeah. But to deliver messages, because the message echoes beyond when our name is just an ink on a page. 466 that will disappear in the big book of life or of history, but the message won't.

And Mark, I just have to admit that I just had my ego stripped because I thought you and I were the wizard of Oz to him. And apparently not.

What?

Just kidding. Just kidding. I have one more question for you to help the listeners. One of the things that really impressed me about your speech was your writing. You had eloquent writing. You had tightened it right after the first classic laugh. And by the way, if you're watching this on YouTube, go below in the comments and I'll get the other two videos of his so you can hear what we're talking about. But right after that, right after the laugh was instant. The only thing worse than getting her laugh was getting her advice, like, that's great writing. I loved, loved, loved. And just to show you, these are my actual notes when I was watching with Mark and Ed Tate. Love at first fight. Brilliant. Brilliant.

I have a confession to make on the. That's not my line. That particular line came. Came from one of my coaches, which is Lou Beaton. She's a dear friend. And she said the writing is mine, but that particular line is. I have to give credit when it's due to Louise Beaton. She said, when you talk, she said, it's the world championship for public speaking. You can't be simple. Right? So I elevated a lot of my writing, but she said, hey, again, English is my second language, so I'm not necessarily familiar with the phrases like love at first sight. And she said, maybe use love at first sight and change it to fight. And that's how the theme of boxing analogies came through wedding ring to boxing ring. You know, then it all kind of fell through. That particular line is fantastic line. I would like to take credit for it, but also I need to be humbled and acknowledged that that line came from Lou Beaton. The other parts of the writing I feel improved a lot, especially in my semis final. My semi finals when it started was 89 pages. 89 pages. And when it finished, it was 504 words. The final speech when I delivered one diversion that Mike seen was 711 words. And the version I did in the finals was 499 words. So. But I did have coaching this year that helped me focus my writing. Focus my writing very quickly.

Darren, before you ask other question, I hope everyone catches this. He said, that line is not mine. It came from one of my coaches. Even the best has a coach and in some cases more than one. And for clarification purposes, Nitai and I have been corresponding by email. My role in his life has been an encourager. He did not hire me to coach him. I was just a friend to him. And I'm honored to call him friend, you know, as I am many, many, many toastmasters. But please understand I'm not here to say, well, I coached Nita and he came second in the world. So look at me. No, no, no. That was not my role in his life. He had other coaches and it goes back to his point, you find the coach that works well for you. My role in his life was different, but I'm happy and honored to be a part of it. So I wanted to clarify that. I'm not saying this to say I was the one who made him who he is. No, no, no.

But you definitely gave me a great boost of confidence. I sent and this is a full disclosure, I hope you don't mind. I sent Mark an email two years ago or thereabout and I thought I'll just email him. He'll never reply. The world championship public speaking. He's never going to reply to me. But he was very kind. Not only did he reply, it was a very kind reply. I'm like, okay, this is, this is unexpected. And that again gave me confidence boost to do what, what, what I do to.

But you had the courage to ask, you had the courage to send the email. And one other quick writing tip or insight that I thought you did brilliantly was the brown eyes. So you start off with blue eyes. Brown eyes, baby brown eyes. And for everyone, we talk about naming your characters and I Just love this. That blue eyes, baby brown eyes, baby brown eyes. I just, I love it. And you could just see these big beautiful eyes looking at you. And then when you held your baby, those big brown eyes looking at you. And I. It was emotional because of their word choice and how he said it.

Mike, meantime, we could talk with you for hours. You're not just, you've only been speaking two years, but you, you have so much wisdom that goes beyond speaking. I know I picked up keepers. Mark will cover those soon. I will kind of start to wrap this up with an idea that I got from Mark through his coach, David Brooks, who once told Mark, correct me if I'm wrong, Mark, the average speaker takes about eight or nine minutes of material and tries to jam it into seven. A world class speaker takes a six minute talk and makes it a seven minute experience. You created a 499 word experience, and that's through hard work, being coachable. And I admire you so much for what you were willing to do to get your message out there. And I cannot wait to see where you go from here. Mark, final thought or question from you?

My final thought is actually a thank you because even though we've corresponded for the last couple of years by email fairly frequently, I did not understand the magic magnitude of the effort, the work, the dedication, the commitment that you have made. And I know there are many, many other toastmasters who are equally committed to delivering strong messages and to putting whatever work they need to put in to make sure the message gets delivered in a good way. So I want to thank you for encouraging our listeners, our viewers, and other toastmasters who may not have had success in this particular context, but who are willing to put work in to serve the message. And I think that's a really good example to leave behind. And I applaud you for that. I thank you for that. And I also want to congratulate and thank all the other toastmasters, speakers, emerging speakers, professional speakers who are doing the same thing, putting that work in to serve the message. And I really, really appreciate that. Darren.

Yeah, thank you for that effort. Thank you for your time showing up. If you, if you're listening to this, please check out both of his speeches, both of them, and study them. He's worth studying. He put the time, energy and effort in. And the question I always end, as you probably know the podcast with, since you listen a lot, is if you were sitting down over coffee with an emerging speaker, what advice would you give to them?

Your success in delivering a message is directly tied up to the level of uncomfortableness that you're willing to take. Because you need to be uncomfortable on so many level to be able to deliver a message to an audience. And uncomfortable is not just in the same this context. The seven and a half minutes that you have to be vulnerable but uncomfortable in the exploration, the uncomfortable in the failure. The uncomfortableness of waking up at 1am in the morning to visit a club who maybe say opposite time to you and there's six people there and you still show up because that's uncomfortable but you deliver the message. The level of your success is directly linked to the level of uncomfortableness that you're willing to take. It's as simple as that in my view. It's as simple as that.

You forgot one uncomfortable diss when you get coach coached.

I truly believe coaching is critical. It is absolutely critical.

If someone wants to reach out to you. Is there a website? Are you on social media? How could someone reach out to you?

The easiest way is to find me on Facebook. My name is Natalia Levi. There's only one and it won't be hard to find. I am, I must say a admit I am discovering the world of social media as this process goes on. I'm not particularly tech but now I know how to respond to messages on Facebook. So reach out on Facebook. I'm always happy to help and always help you to share my thoughts and nitai.

Just wait a year your then 3 year old will be able to tell you how to get on social media.

And my last comment is this as far as your journey is concerned concerned, Trust me, you're not in Kansas anymore.

Oh nice, nice.

I'll do my keepers for the day and I have quite a few those who are new to us. Our keepers are little nuggets or snippets that we get from our guest. She want to reinforce and share with you and the first came very early. Your job as a presenter is to create an emotional reset. You have to sculpt the audience's emotions. But to do that you must respect the power of the platform and don't focus on your ego. We must be intelligently naive and question why. Because at the end of the day we must be servants to our message. All also deliver what it must be, not what it should be. That's how you serve the message. Coaching is critical. If you find the right coaches for you, put your audiences into the scene. As Mark Brown says, don't report transport. We've always heard use a foundational phrase. Consider a foundational sound and a foundational gesture to deliver the experience for the audience. And when you use these techniques, don't distract the audience. Reinforce your message and remember your level of success is directly linked to your level of discomfort.

Aaron wow. Well, hey Mike Davis, thanks for helping us co host the Call and the podcast.

Thank you Darren.

Thank you again for your time. Congratulations on your success. We're, we're happy to be a little tiny part. You multiplied whatever we might have showed you by your effort, your energy and we are just so, so thrilled that you could spend some time with us. And we couldn't be, couldn't be happier. Three proud papas, we wish you well. Thanks for being here. If you're listening to this, hey, he's just this amazing example. We love what we do at stagetime. Join us, get coached on the calls, get the insights that we've been putting together for two decades. We'd love to have you as a Stage Time member. Congratulations. One more time. Nitai, you rock. You earned this. You had told me beforehand you couldn't believe that you were going to be on it. You earned it my friend. Thank you so much. And for everyone listening, join us next week. See ya.

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