Ep. 179 How and When- Narration vs. Dialogue

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Hey there, Mark Brown. We are doing this again, version three of the podcast live. If you're watching this online in a live stream, please put your comments in. If you're listening to the recording, we can't answer your comments, but we would love your comments. So, Mark Brown, how are you, man?

I am doing so well, it's almost illegal. Nice.

Nice. And I'm just loving this live. Like, my notifications are coming in. All right, so, Mark, enough about us. This is about the listeners. So please again, comment, ask questions. But this time, we are going to talk about narration, dialogue. You might have heard us talk about that before, and you know the importance of dialogue if you've heard us before. If you don't, you're about to. However, we're going to go deeper and we're going to talk about literally why and when to use dialogue versus narration, because it shouldn't be dialogue all the time. Step one, dialogue is important. Step two, how and when.

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, world 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.

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Ready for some powerful presentation. AHAs. Let's dive right in.

All right, Mark Brown, he's still dancing in the studio. Nice.

So the theme music, man.

Theme music.

So it's bad.

It's good and cheesy, but in an adorable way. So, Mark Brown, I'm gonna let you lead on this one. Dialogue versus narration. How and when? What are your thoughts?

Well, it's funny you say you're gonna let me lead because my mind goes back in time almost 22 years to 2001, when a very eager speaker who had qualified to be in the Toastmasters World Championship and our audience called it, tired of hearing this. Detail is important. When you asked me to work with you and I agreed, one of our most, shall we say, animated conversations that we had was about the concept of choosing dialogue. First of all, what was dialogue while talking, but it was when to do it, how to do it, and most importantly, why to do it. And I remember you told me later it was a bit of a game changer for you. And I made one specific suggestion of converting some narration at one point in your speech to dialogue. And today we're going to look at the the how and the When? But I also want to, as a bonus tackle, why dialogue as well, Darren? Because the why, I think is the foundation of appropriate and effective use of dialogue. My first why is this? A speech can become simply a narrative. It can become what we call a harangue. H A R A N G U E. It can become almost pontificating if we simply talk at the audience for 20, 30, 40, 60 minutes. You're talking at the audience and you're relating and you're reporting. And that borders on the boring. And if nothing else, if anyone knows, Darren Lacroix, Darren Lacroix tells you boring loses business. I'm not saying you were boring. You simply weren't aware. And many presenters, particularly emerging presenters, don't realize that dialogue can be a transformational game changer. And here is why I say all that to get to this. Dialogue can transform the speech from a narrative and a report to an experience. The audience has. Has. Dialogue can change a speech from a report into an experience. And I always say, don't report transport. Why? Dialogue can change a speech from a report into an experience. That's my first why. What are your thoughts on that, my friend?

My thoughts are. I'm typing really loud, so I had to mute myself.

Well, look, we're both. You're typing, I'm writing as well. And because we're doing live on streamyard, Darren, who already multitasks, is now accepting the role of stage time octopus. He's managing the chat, he's putting up banners, and he's doing all of this while we're having the conversation. So Darren, shoot us to you for doing all of this. But I mention that because you and I talked about this during your contest run way back in 01, where I said, darren, this is a crucial part of the speech. Change it from narration to dialogue. So if you want to get a catchy phrase, go from narration to conversation. Go from narration to conversation. And your eyes kind of got big that day. Like what? You're like, what are you talking about? We make dialogue. What do you mean? And many of us don't realize that the conversion from narration to conversation changes the experience. It's like going to a play and being there and seeing the action take place on stage. Nothing wrong with audiobooks. You can hear it, but when you actually see it play a narration in a presentation, the audience can actually see a scene play out because it also gives you the option or the benefit, and I will probably dig into this later, of adding the associated emotion which magnifies the experience. I'm going to pause so I can write down my own wisdom.

Well, and Mark, I'll pick up the ball from here because I kept asking myself, I have 1492 words for a contest speech. By the way, all the things that we are talking about definitely apply to keynote speeches, Mark. And I just used the analogy of the contest for that seven minute speech. But it absolutely applies in keynotes. So My challenge was 1492 words. Had to get it down to 750. How do I say it better in fewer words? How do I say it better in fewer words? And one of the most powerful ways to do that was to take the narration and turn it into dialogue. But it's not just the dialogue. It's the emotion and delivery behind the dialogue. So now you're infusing the dialogue, infusing it with emotion, and that's what makes it more powerful in less time. And so I think one of the whens. When do you use dialogue? I think it's those transformational moments when. When there's an emotional shift of a character. When I went home to tell my mom and dad, I want to be a comedian in my championship speech. Mom, Dad, I want to be a comedian. And I was met by silence. So now I stepped out of the narration. Excuse me, stepped out of the dialogue to narrate. I was mad by silence. So I was clarifying what I was said. But I showed the emotion of the shift of the character going from excited to deflated when my parents had nothing to say because they couldn't process that knowing me. And I get it now, but in the time, in the moment, it was devastating. So I'm showing that emotional shift. So I. And we see this, Mark, a lot when not just the dialogue, but the reaction to the dialogue is part of that scene. And I think when a character changes their emotion, when the emotional shift happens, I think that is a key. When to dialogue is also why to dialogue? Because we need to feel the shift, Mark.

Yeah, and I want to tackle the how. Because you may ask, well, Darren, Mark, is there a general commonplace where this happens or in a common way this happens? One is tagging on what Darren said about emotion. Think about having heard speakers who say, oh, when that happened, I was so livid, I was so angry. And I told him how angry I was. Many people will do. They'll tell you they'll talk about an emotion. I heard my puppy died. I'm telling you what, man. When my dad told me he was dead, I was so devastated, I couldn't imagine it Right now, that's fine. Let's take the poor puppy you had for the last eight years and look, if you're an animal lover, you know how this may feel. And you come from school and dad says, I'm sorry your puppy died. And you say, I was so devastated. But if you pause and take that narration. Dad told me my puppy died and I was devastated. He's a howpiece. You become the characters. I walked in and I could tell something was wrong. Dad, what's the matter? Mark? Son, I, I, I hate to tell you this but you know Fido was hit by a car this morning and I, he didn't. Daddy. What? Why? What happened? Daddy, my voice tells you I'm almost crying. I am devastated. My dad. Mark really is hard to tell you this. You can hear that he doesn't want to share it with me. He's struggling emotionally. How do I tell my son his beloved animal is dead? All of that in literally 15 seconds is different from I got home, dad told me the dog was dead and I was devastated. So the how is, is in the way the characters come alive and how the characters reflect the emotion. A little deeper on the how when you become the characters. My voice was lower for dad. Mark, I, I don't know how to tell you this son, but he got hit by a car this morning and, and you feel that and the motion and the little kid. What Daddy? What Daddy? He's my pet. And you hear the voice is different for a six or eight year old kid. And his emotion, he's lost his best friend and all of that takes place. The how adds to the why and the what. So generally when there, as Darren says, when there is an important emotional shift, what we call a moment in the presentation, ask yourself, would it be more effective if I took the, the narration and the reporting of what happened. Invite the characters in, use dialogue, make sure I'm able to clearly identify the characters by what they say and how they say it. And then the audience now has the experience of being in the front row at this play and seeing this heart wrenching conversation with between dad and his little boy over the death of a dog. Any emotional circumstance, happy or sad, you got the job, right? You got notification, you're going to be hired. Oh, the house came through. We're going to buy the house. Baby gender reveal or when the husband finds out that, that his spouse is pregnant, they're going to have a baby. There's so many different. We mentioned that. Paul Ekman psychologist, identified initially six common basic emotions There are many more. Happiness, sadness, anger, fear, surprise, disgust. Any scene, any situation where any of these emotions are used could be prime. Prime time to change the narration to the conversation.

Mark Brown, you're on fire, my friend. And by the way, when you did the squeaky high voice, I think a couple glasses in my broke. Is it Memorex or was it live?

Sorry, that was live.

Or Memorex. That's funny. Hey, had an interesting comment come in from Dennis Hamm. Thank you, Dennis, for listening live. This is an interesting thought. We usually talk about conversational style of speaking, but not narrational style of delivery. Well said, Dennis.

Thank you, Dennis. I appreciate that. You're right.

Nailed it.

I'm hoping that this will help people to dive and dig a little deeper into the value of bringing your audience into the scene and let the emotional impact touch them as well, because you want them to connect emotionally to your presentation. Go ahead, Darren.

Yeah, and if you think about it, there can the narration. I love Craig's analogy. It sets up the dialogue. It like, puts it on the pedestal. So we need narration. Short, specific. Think about this. The classic. It was a dark, stormy night. So you don't have. It was a. So we want to set the picture. Picture the scene as we teach in storytelling. Picture the setting. But what's the emotion of the setting? What's the feeling, the establishing shot. If we're looking at a classic Brady Bunch sitcom, we see the outside shot, slow zoom into the classic house there in California. But you don't say, it was a dark, stormy night. And then, oh, they were happy. We want to set the mood, set the tone. But make no mistake, even though we focus on dialogue. Because the biggest mistake that we see people missing is all narration, no dialogue at all. Or we hear them narrating the emotion, narrating the emotion, telling us what the emotion is, instead of letting us feel and sense from the delivery in the dialogue what the emotion is.

Mark, as I look at this, Darren, I know we say how and when narration versus dialogue, but my heart is feeling rhythmic. I'm thinking how and when narration versus conversation. We'll work on that later on. You said just now about having the audience feel the emotion. And when you think about this more closely, perhaps you want to invest some time and look at your favorite movies, the one, your Kleenex movies. And moments. You don't find in the movies, the actors or those that the players aren't talking about the emotions they feel, they are showing the emotions they feel. And think about the times you say, I was mad, I was disgusted. Yes, that's true. But if we can hear what you said in the moment and then your responsibility and opportunity as a presenter is to literally go back to that moment in your life experience when you had that emotion. I'm not saying to reenact it, I'm saying relive that emotion. It becomes more authentic and real because you are remembering what you went through. You're delivering from the memory what took place when Darren said, mom, dad, I want to be a comedian. He was remembering the conversation he had as a young guy living at his parents house when he was 44 years old. Right. And what it was like for them. And the narration that Darren used in that particular example. You can imagine how my parents felt after having. What did you say? Darren paid for business school. Right. And then they can hear this. So he set up the emotion and the beauty of that particular scene was your mom, dad, I want to be a comedian. We could almost hear the range of emotion as you reveal to your family what you wanted to experience. I'm going to ask you who are listening to this. Can you recall a portion of your presentation where you remember an experience you had or you recall a memory? Can you then resurrect the emotion you felt in the moment and transmit that to the eyes, the minds and the hearts of your audience and look at the response, Darren, I'm going to kick it over to you because you also said, in addition to that dialogue can be so powerful or the conversation becomes powerful when we transmit the reaction of the person who hears the dialogue in response to what was being said. In other words, I said, darren, I cannot believe you're being so thick headed. And I could say, and Darren was hurt, but then I've got to go back and show his emotional reaction to my reaction. So when we say dialogue and I say conversation, it really is conversation. Because you also run the risk, Darren, of giving one side of the conversation and then narrating the other side. That can happen as well. I tell you, I told Darren he was so stupid. Well, he didn't like that very much. He was upset. I only told you, I. What I said, darren, you're being an idiot. He didn't like that. No. And of course Darren is never being an idiot. It's a bad example. But he loves me, so it's okay.

I'm not quite so sure. My friends and family might agree with.

You, but Darren, you're being so stubborn about. What are you doing, man? Clearly he didn't like could be, Darren, you're being stubborn. What's wrong with you, dude? I can't believe you told me that. You really said that to me. Now we're getting both emotions from both characters based upon their language, their response, their pacing, their. Their volume. There's so much you could do in literally 15 seconds of conversation that will transform the experience for the audience. I hope we are understanding this. It's, it's. It can be so meaningful. It can literally be a game. And absolutely, literally three times. It can be a game changer for what you present, not in terms of acting, but in terms of reliving in your presentation. Darren?

Yeah. When I tell the story of my dad, I show a picture of me on the sidelines in football. And I said my dad was all excited because he bought a brand new camera with those telephoto lenses. You know, that was the big thing and my dad loved it. And he's taking pictures and he goes to my football game to take pictures of me. Except I'm on the sideline.

Wah, wah, wah.

And I remember seeing my dad do that. I pulled him aside after the game. I'm like, dad, don't take a picture of me on the sideline. I don't want to remember being the sideline. He said, but, Darren, you're never in the game. That's true, but I don't want to remember that. So it's a quick. By the way, if you're watching this live stream, if you're listening to the podcast, you'll have to visualize this. But when I play my dad, when I take on the Persona of my dad, I'm looking in one 45 degree direction. When I take on the perception Persona of me back then, I look at another angle. So by changing the angles and changing. But, Darren, I'm never in the game. Like changing the delivery in the dialogue that shows the reaction. So we have a reaction to the dialogue and then a reaction to the reaction of the dialogue. But I'm changing back and forth. Because here's the key. Clearly, now we're doing this live stream live, so you're looking at a camera in a streamyard or a zoom thing. So we can still communicate it effectively by changing that. If I was on a stage, I would also change maybe the height or the direction that I'm looking up. So there's different ways to do this. But. But it goes right back to what we learned from Patricia Fripp. The audience needs to know who's talking. The audience needs to know who's talking. And one of the tips that she gives is you would put the recipient's name in the dialogue. The recipient. So if I'm talking to my dad, I don't wanna. But, Darren, you're never in the game. So the recipient's name is in the dialogue. We know it's the other person talking. So, Mark, we had a few comments come in. Dennis Ham had said, I like that. Relive it, not reenact it. Yeah. You've got to be in the moment. And when you're in the moment, that day, that moment. I've told the stitches story my first time on stage a thousand times, but when I relive it, I go there. It's always a little bit different, but it's how I feel it in that moment, going back to that moment. So in front of that stage, that audience, that time, it may come across a little different, but I'm going back in my mind because I have a different connection to that audience than I did the day before to a different audience. So, yes, reliving it makes it so much more authentic. And let's see. H.W. bud Brown says, the reason I made it to the district level for the international speech contest was because I was reliving living the moment. Congratulations. That's one of those little secrets that I would have never learned without my coach. And Helene said, very well done, Helene.

Merci. I'm guessing it's a French name. I could be wrong, but I saw Helene with the accents. I'm just saying, thank you. Merci. If I'm wrong, forgive me, but I tried to honor the name. So there you go.

Yeah. Mark, this is so cool. Having people interact with us. It's even more interesting.

It is interesting. And you kind of wonder, you know. And by the way, we're getting options. Sorry. Reactions from Facebook, from LinkedIn and from YouTube at the same time. We've got Dennis on. Dennis is on YouTube. We got it. Bud is on LinkedIn and Helene's on Facebook. Thank you so much for your comments. We really appreciate that. We want to provide as much value as we can with the years we've learned and the message we've made, the errors we've committed. And we found that when an audience can have an experience of what takes place, it lifts them to a place of, I can connect with you. I can relate to what you've been going through. And for me, a bonus. The audience has the opportunity to recall from their own experience a similar emotion and a similar situation, and that deepens their connection with you as a Speaker gives them greater reason to listen to what you have to say and accept. Adopt and adapt your ideas because they say, yes, you know me, you can relate to me, you understand what I have been through or what I'm currently experiencing. And therefore I value what you have to say. That's really, really powerful. And I pray we catch that. The opportunity we have to establish an emotional connection with an audience member who can relate to what our story is sharing with them. And the key, I want to go back to this because it's key. The six basic common emotions, happiness, sadness, anger, fear, surprise, disgust, and any other emotion you may feel when there's a part of your speech where these emotions pop up. Ask yourself, might this be a good place to use the conversation instead of the narration? And after a while you'll be able to discern and decide when is the most appropriate time to use narration or dialogue. We said the how and the when. That's a key question. When do I use it? I said before, you don't want to go through all narration. And Darren, you, you don't like all dialogue. A one man show or a play as becomes a play, it's finding the appropriate mix and being selective about the best places to insert each or the other. Little head scratcher there, Jared, right?

Absolutely. There's so much to this and sometimes we're way too close. So if you don't have a coach, find a coach. Now obviously Mark and I do coaching, but find the right coach for you. We do have a podcast episode about how to find the right speaker coach for you. But I just think we're so close to our own stories that it's sometimes so obvious. But we need that person who kind of can step back from our story and point out this is kind of blah, blah, blah, this is where the gold is, this is where they'll connect. And we learned from David Brooks that we all have different stories, we all share the same emotions. So when I show a video clip of my mom, my classic speech opening where I show a video clip of my mom at the world championship, running up and hugging on me and embarrassing me and then she doesn't let go. And I even put a little graphic, let go, mom, let go. My internal dialogue, that's what that is in the video clip because you can't hear me think, thank goodness. And I ask people if they feel a connection after. And now look, I tested that video. I tweaked it a hundred times to get it to work. Right. But here's. That's just the principle of what David Brooks was saying, people relate to the emotion of embarrassment, whether it's them embarrassing their kids or their parents embarrassing them when they were kids.

Yeah.

So they weren't in there in that moment literally, but they relate to the emotion in their life of that embarrassment.

You said something just now. I cannot let this slide. You subtly inserted the term, the internal dialogue. For those who may be unfamiliar with the term those, that's a dialogue in your head when you're considering contemplating, when you're beating yourself up, when you're giving yourself a boost. I knew I could do it. A little engine that could. I think I can, I think I can, I think I can. For the old, those of read those old stories, we can be easily tempted or think it nothing at all to let the audience know, well, I realize it wasn't a very good idea, so I didn't do it. But if you transfer that into the internal dialogue, I realized, wait, Mark, you're an idiot. That's never going to work. Why you want to do that doesn't make any sense. Or you go, oh, how could I have been so stupid? Oh, I dodged that bullet, boy. Woo hoo. Man, that was close. And we wonder, we ask ourselves, wait, you know what? If I can get to that train, maybe I'll make it in time for the game. And my daughter would be so surprised to see me. That'd be great. Think of your current presentation or the one you're working on, your most recent one. Are there portions of your presentation where you tell the audience what you thought about but didn't give? The internal dialogue, what was really going on in your mind? When we share what was going on in our mind, the internal dialogue, we to ourselves, I know that displays a level of vulnerability. Let me ask you this, how many of us talk to ourselves, question ourselves, doubt ourselves, encourage ourselves, praise ourselves? Man, you did a good job, buddy. Awesome. I knew you could do this. That's part of dialogue, that's part of conversation. The conversation we have with ourselves. And there are individuals who will talk about self talk. That is their bailiwick, that is their expertise. I'm not saying either way self talk in terms of negative thinking. I'm talking about just thoughts you have in your mind. Go through the day that may fit in your presentation because your audience also thinks alike. Darren has taught forever, the most important part of a speech is the thought in the audience's mind. And if they can think like you think, and if you can identify to them that you think the same thoughts and then you make that conversational. It's just one more deeper means of connection. And very often it's easy for us to not realize if we simply relive the internal dialogue, the words we say to ourselves, there's somebody in the audience who's going to say, yep, been there, done that. Another point of connection by turning narration to conversation. That said, I caution, I do not recommend turning everything into conversation. We don't want to create a one person or a one act play. Be selective. Which is why we recommend examine the emotional moments and ask, are these the appropriate times to convert narration to dialogue? Darren? Yep.

And change it from a report into an experience. And by the way, if you're watching live, the little banners that go across, I type those so if there's a typo, I'm dyslexic. Don't blame Mark. Don't blame Mark. It's all on me. Thanks for being a part of the Stage Time podcast live stream. Dennis, thanks for chiming in. H.W. bud Brown. Laina. I'm not sure if I'm pronouncing that right. Hey, thanks for being here. Thanks for being a part of this. If you want to join us in Stage Time, go check out stagetimeuniversity.com we got a lot of people who are getting coached. Who we have weekly coaching calls every Wednesday where you can get world class feedback to help have that experience, perspective looking at your story because sometimes it be so easy and so simple for someone else to point it out. But what happens is that's going to affect every time you tell that story for the rest of your career. But now you'll also start to see it and be it. Because dialogue can be more powerful, narration can set up the dialogue. So your presentation is unforgettable. Mark Brown, take us home.

Thank you all and thank you Keith for coming in also. We appreciate that. Here's the assignment, my friends. Take your most recent speech, one you're working on right now and ask yourself where would be the most appropriate place to change narration to dialogue? Test it, deliver it and look at and listen for the response your audience gives. That can be very, very instructive. We'll see you next week. Have a great week.

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