Ep. 224 Tackling A Tough Topic With Frank King

Oh, Mark Brown. Mark, this is going to be different. We're going to go deep and we're going to go wide as well. What a background story, what a subject. We've never had a subject quite like this before. So I'm pretty pumped because dealing with challenging, tough, deep subjects, that's something we don't often tackle. Yet when we talk about personal stories, so many of our listeners have those deep moments that how do you handle that? How do you talk about that without leaving the audience down? Mark?

Well, that's why I'm kind of really eager to hear from our guest today. And I would advise you watching or listening. Hang on to your seats. We're in for a ride with Frank King, who is a TEDx speaker extraordinaire. Darren, let's do this.

We're going deep.

Anyone can give a presentation. Few deliver unforgettable presentations. What's the difference? You're about to find out. Welcome to the unforgettable presentations podcasts 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.

Stage time. Stage time. Stage time.

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

That was real quick. I gotta be honest here. I know I said TedX speaker and that may not sound like a really great introduction. So I'll give our viewers of this is a little bit more beyond TEDx speaking, TEDx coaching, full time speaker, humorist. And I say humorous because we think, yeah, comedian. But for someone who can take serious topics and make them funny, that's a skill that we will learn about from our guests today. Darren.

Yeah, and by the way, if you heard a little laugh in the background during the intro, that was Frank laughing at stage time. Stage time, stage time. And Frank. I felt the connection, the comedian bond, because you get it. A lot of speakers, some of them may speak at Toastmasters or something like that or some tough gigs. You didn't know tough gigs until you had a comedy tough gig or two or three in a row where you're like, what was I thinking? The back of a bowling alley with the TV still going on.

Yes and yes, yes and yes.

And when we say TedX, we've had TedX speakers and TedX coaches. We've never had. I don't even know of anyone. And is this a world record 11, 11, 11 TEDx talks. That's amazing.

It is as far as I know. Darren, two times plus the number anybody else I can find. There was a guy in England with five who passed away and I can't find anybody else who had five or more.

You didn't have anything to do with that, right?

Nothing that you're aware of.

Nice. Well played, bamboo. So 11 and what I love is that's kind of your focus. Your focus on stage we're going to go into. But let's just talk about getting 11 TEDx talks and they kind of shut you down. They're like, you're done. Like you got to use in a. You can use my name if you want sometime just. Yeah, how did that happen? And if you're Interested in a TEDx talk, we'll give his contact info later. But if you want to get a TEDx talk to a guy who's gotten 11.

Right.

11, like that's one more than 10. Just saying.

Well, the. Seth Godin, my favorite marketing guru, said, tedx, of course, an idea worth spreading. And if you want an idea worth spreading, all you need to do is to find your tribe and a vacuum. In my case, the vacuum is I speak on suicide prevention as a workplace health and safety priority. The vacuum is even though one person dies every nine minutes by suicide in the US every 40 seconds worldwide, hardly anybody talks about it. So there's the vacuum. And my tribe are people with mental illness for whom the option of suicide is always on the menu as a solution for problems large and small. I have two mental health conditions. One is called major depressive disorder, relatively common and chronic suicidal ideation, which is uncommon. Chronic suicidal ideation means for me and people in my tribe, the option of suicide is always on the menu as a solution for problems large and small. And I say to my audiences when I say small, my car broke down a couple of years ago. I had three thoughts, unbidden. One, get it fixed. Two, by new. And three, I could just kill myself. I know it sounds absurd. However, almost every time I've spoken since 2014, there's been at least one person in the audience who has that. They have no idea it has a name. They think they're just some kind of freak and completely alone. Young woman came up after a college presentation. Thanks for your keynote, she said. Said, you're welcome. She goes, but I gotta tell you, it made me weep. I didn't make you weep. She goes, you know your story about the car? Get it fixed, buy a new one or kill yourself. I've been having those thoughts all my life. I had no idea that had a name. I Thought I was just some kind of freak and completely alone. And then I heard you say you have it. And I realized for the first time in my life, I am not alone. And I wept. There's a little ROI for you. Wow. So. So that's what you need. You need. I'd be worth spreading and I have a PDF I'd be glad to share with you guys. You can share with your audience. It's called the six things you can do to kill your chances of landing at TEDX Talk. Yeah, and I'd be happy to share it with you so you can put, you know, link in the show notes or whatever. The reason I did that was people all over the place are telling you what you should do. These six things will get you dismissed out of hand. And number one is too much. Too many ideas. They want one idea we're spreading. As Seth Godin said. Number two is too much about one idea. They don't want a thesis, they want. You know. That's why they ask you give us 10 to 15 word elevator pitch. Give us the idea in two sentences. Give us the idea in a video in 90 seconds. Because they figure if you can sum it up in 90 seconds, you can do it in 12 to 18 minutes. Those are the first two of the six things you can do to kill your chances of landing a TEDx. So to answer your question, you need an idea we're spreading and I believe it should be something you're passionate about. Yeah.

Amen.

Preaching hard to be inspiring if you aren't inspired.

Yeah, that feeling doesn't transfer. Well, the feeling does transfer. So you need to have it in order to spread it. And I don't want people to wait. So where. If they want, I just want to send them to you. Where would they go if they want to get those six? Do you have a web URL link or something we can verbalize?

I do not.

Is it on your website?

I don't know.

Okay, so we'll get to marketing later, Frank. But.

I know there's a lead magnet on there. I think that's what it is. On my. Get this, I was, was I wanted a new URL about making money speaking. So from behind me, my wife says, because I'm on the computer, try howtomakemoneyspeaking.com and I thought, oh yeah, like that's going to be available in 2023. So I typed in a godaddy how to make money speaking dot com. Guess what? It was available, I bought it. And that's. That's my site, howtomakemoneyspeaking.com and there should be a lead magnet there. And it should be the six things you can do to kill your chances of landing at an Sweet.

Well, thanks for your transparency.

Very cool.

Well, hey, reach out to Frank. You also have frankking.com, right?

I do. Well, you know a friend of mine in Bali, an acquaintance guy used to run a audio bookstore where he rented cassettes. Do you remember that? Oh, yeah, it's on. We're on tape. And 20 years after we met, he called me Frank. Said, I'm always cruising to see what's available at auction for a URL. And I came across your name this morning. Somebody must have given it up. And so you need to go on right now and start bidding on it. And I got it for a little over 100 bucks. Wow. Yeah, so, I mean, I'm a big networker. I believe you should, you know, should be wherever you go. Be friendly, be helpful. And in this case, 20 years after we met. Wow. I bet Frank would like to have this.

Nice. Wow. Very cool. So TedX, if you're interested, check out frankking.com or go to. What was it again? How to make money.

How to make money speaking.

Yeah, how to make money speaking. I think frankking.com goes to my mental health comedian site, actually.

Gotcha. So, yeah, two URLs. Check them out. You can find them. You. You can Google now. How many of your TEDx talks are online?

Well, they stopped putting them up at 4. They got pissed off. They don't think anybody should have that many. I'm sort of like a card counter. The blackjack table in Vegas. It's not illegal, but they don't really. But they don't.

They don't let you in the casino. You're escorted out.

You know what's sad, Derek, is that the fifth one is the only one I've ever gotten an audition for. I mean, I've ever gotten a standing ovation for.

Really?

It was one of the two I didn't have to audition for because the title and subtitle were so good. They said, no, no, no, you don't have to audition. You're doing this. It's mental health and the orgasm. Treat your depression single handedly. I love my iPhone, but it's my second favorite handheld device.

Where's my rim shots.

For your listeners? The lesson there is, and the one I did before that also didn't have to audition. It was suicide. The secret of my success, which is counterintuitive. Dead Man Talking, which is a play on the movie in the book of Dead Man Walking. So what I teach my students is, look, you need. They got 300 applications and that poor selection committee has to go through this. They're not looking for a reason to give you an audition. They're looking first reason to throw you in the no pile. Go. Next. So your title subtitle, elevator pitch has got to have a hook. It's got to be something. You know, one of my clients is in recovery, 25 years, alcoholism. Wrote a book called Sober Letters to my Drunken Self. I said, stop right there. That's the title. And then the subtitle explains it a bit. But you have to, after you read the title and wonder what that's about, it forces them to read the subtitle and then maybe it'll read the three sentence summary and maybe they'll read why you're the person to do it. So the farther you can get them to read down the application, slow them down on the scroll, the better chance you're going to get.

Nice. So it sounds like you just snuck in there. Reason number three, your title sucks.

Yes. You need to be creative, for God's sakes. I'm not saying, I'm not saying hire me as a, as a 10x coach, but whoever you hire, you know, I wrote jokes for Leno for 20 years.

Oh, wow.

Stand up comic since the day after Christmas. 85. And so I am somewhat creative. So make sure that there's a big TedX coaching company shall remain nameless. Good company. There's good work. But a young woman I met signed up with him two weeks before we met. Oh, man. She goes, that's okay, Frank. We can still be friends. Sure. So six months later, she calls me crying. She auditioned. She had sent in 80 applications. What?

808080.

No auditions, no callbacks. I said, well, Amy, you got a great subject. You have a best selling book on Amazon in a tough category on that subject. Send me what you've been sending the selection committee. I looked at it and eyes dotted T's crossed. You know, grammar's good, but it just didn't say. And so I said, you might as well put a little of my magic on. She goes, no, what have I got to lose? So I, you know, made it more Creative. And within five applications, she got TEDx, Beacon Street, Boston. That told me the first hurdle is getting the attention of the selection committee. When they, when they got. When they're staring at 300 applications, they got to go through.

Nice all right, I gotta know. We always like to know a little background. How did you go. How did you either become a speaker and. Or how did you become the comedian? How did you finally make that decision?

Well, both are. I think comedian is in my DNA along with my mental illness, my family. More nuts in my family than a squirrel turd. And you're killing Mark.

Mark's dying over here. You're speaking his language.

Yeah, I love that reference. Wonderful metaphor. Thank you, Frank.

My pleasure.

Not a fan of the visual, but go ahead.

Yeah. Depression, suicide run. My family is called generational depression and suicide. You guys know, you probably heard me say it in my TedX. And my grandmother died by suicide, my great aunt, my mom. I came close enough today with the barrel of my gun. Tastes like so. But I started out in Comedy day after Christmas 85. And by the way, when. When we were there in La Jolla, you, me and Mark there, and we. I think we met before, we really never had much time to chat. Right.

Yeah.

And I got up on stage and talked about getting a TedX. But I happen to mention something near and dear to Darren's heart, which is stage time. Stage time, space time. So I said to the audience, you know, I went on the road the day after Christmas 85, said to My lovely girlfriend, now my wife, 37 years, I'm going on the road to be a stand up comic. Do you want to come along for the ride? Thinking she'd go, oh, hell no. And she goes, yeah. So we gave up the apartment, our jobs, jumped in my tiny Dodge Colt, and we were on the road for 2,629 nights in a row, non stop club to club, to club, to club, to seven years and change. So Derek comes up that day, Lahore goes, dude, I had no idea you had that kind of stage time. And Darren is correct. All those weren't improvs. There were beer bars, pool halls, honky tonks, drunk idiots screaming, tell us some jokes we can dance to.

I think I played that.

Yes, I think I played there. I told my first joke in fourth grade. Kids laugh. Teacher was hysterical, laughing so hard she had to excuse herself to go to the teacher's lounge. At that moment, I decided I am going to be a stand up comedian. Yes. And then the high school I went to, 12th grade, had a talent show and the nobody ever done stand up. This is 1975. So I did 15, 20 minutes of stand up. I won. Of course, I was competing with the accordion player and the folk dancers and. And so it wasn't a real, you know, it wasn't a tough victory, but I went home and said to my mama, I am going to LA to be a comedian. She goes, no, you're not. You are going to college first. I don't care what you do. When you get done, you can be a goat herder for all I care. But you are going to be a goat herder with a college degree. So I had to postpone my comedy dreams for four years, went to Carolina, picked up a couple of degrees, and then moved to Southern California, San Diego with an insurance company I was working for. By chance, in San Diego to this day, there's a branch of the world famous comedy club, the one up on Sunset in La Jolla, California. That's where I started. On 4-1-84, first five minutes on stage in my head, I heard a voice that said simply, you're home. And I decided to try. Wow. Wow. I decided that moment I was gonna do it professionally. Of course, I had no idea how I was gonna do that. And since then, boys, I have threatened to write a keynote called what could you do if you didn't know no better. Because I had no idea how hard it was to make a full time living doing stand up comedy. I mean, there were 35 of us my first open mic night and three of us escaped gravity and actually made a living doing comedy or making a living doing comedy. That's how difficult. And we weren't the funniest. We just happened to be the assistant. Yeah, Last. Last person stand. It's the last person standing kind of business. Yep.

Was that last comic standing, Frank?

Yeah, I tried out for that three or four times and got absolutely nowhere. Really. Then what happened was I went on the road, did the comedy, then a 95, 94, 93. 93. I got an offer from a radio station in my old hometown of Raleigh, North Carolina. You know, there was a time during the mid-90s where they were hiring comics to be co host or sidekicks on morning shows. And so I got the job. April of 93 and 8. That's a good number. It was number one morning show number one. And in 18 months I took it to number six.

Nice.

Yeah.

18 months.

Yeah. A friend of mine said, you didn't drive that in the ground, you drove that in the middle earth.

Good to have comedian friends. They're so supportive.

Yeah, that is absolutely true. So my manager said to me, a guy that I'm still in touch with, by the way, a really nice guy, he hated to fire me. He loves people he was crazy about me. It just didn't work out. He said, you go back on the road doing stand up comedy. I said, phyllis, the road is disappearing. Mid 90s comedy clubs were closing faster than they were opening. However, I'd always been a clean cop. Not just no dirty words, you know, you guys know a comedy routine has a tone.

Yeah.

And so I'd always been a clean. I thought, I'll do corporate comedy. So that's when I. Somebody told me about nsa. So what I did was I joined NSA Carolina's chapter and they taught me the business because, you know, even though you're on stage comedy and speaking, you know, staging comedy, it's a platform and speaking and then. And of course, the feast fee structure is a little different. The comic would say to me, what's the difference between a club comic and a corporate comic? About five grand a night plus travel. Nice. Yeah. My purest stand up comedy friends gave me a hard time. You sold out. Amen, brother. You know what? I'm a whore. So then I rode that wave until the end of 2007. Made over 200, 000 bucks telling jokes in that last year. And then the recession hit. Yes. And by the way, meeting planners will say to me, we're paying you $5,000 for 45 minutes of jokes. And I would say, no, you're paying me for seven years of beer bars and pool halls in honky tonight. Experience.

That's it for the experience. So were you like in the Roadhouse with Patrick Swayze?

We played some places like that. More than once. Somebody said, meet me out front. I'm gonna kick your butts. I don't know why anybody ever goes out front. I'm gone. But I was headed to the main player. Look, you're not paying me for the jokes I tell. You're paying me for the jokes I don't tell and the wisdom to know the difference. You're paying me so when I get done my job, you still have a job. And that resonates. Bam. Wisdom. Girls would call me a Frank. We got a new client. They want to comment. We want somebody to go in. This is our first time working with them. We want somebody who can trust to keep it clean so we can maintain the client. A speaker called me one time and they said, we're thinking about booking so and so to do a corporate gig. He says he can do it clean. I said, he can, I'm sure, but he's a club comic. And I'm telling you, this is what's going to happen if things go sideways for him, if they aren't laughing, he's gonna. He's gonna reach, he's gonna go dirty. You will see him. You can stand in the back room and see him grab the ring on the dirty joke parachute and pull it. And two weeks later, my speaker beer friend called me back and goes, oh, my God, Frank, it was just exactly what you said. I'm at the back of the room, it's not going well. I see his hands start to move, and I'm going, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, don't pull it, don't pull it. He had to get the money back. Money back. Yep. So, so anyway, when the recession hit, you guys know, business dropped off 80 practically overnight. I ran every line of credit I could to the very limit. And by 2010, I got some financial advice from a, you know, a hotline. They said, look, Frank, you need to pull it. You need to pull a bankruptcy. It's not like you've been doing, you know, coke and spend the money on ski dues and vacations. You just, you know, it's the business. So I did. And it devastated my wife. And that's when I learned what the barrel of my gun tasted like. Literally. I say to the audience, spoiler alert, I didn't pull the trigger. There's a nervous laugh. I follow it with this. A friend of mine saw me speak recently, came up afterwards. He goes, hey, man, how come he didn't pull the trigger? Hey, man, could you try to sound slightly less disappointed? That's where the humor comes. It's not jokes about suicide. It's funny personal anecdotes about, you know, my. My journey as a mental health patient. So. And to be honest with you, Darren, from the Moment I joined NSA in 95, everybody had content, everybody had a message. Everybody in NSA wanted to make a difference. And I was so insanely professionally jealous because I could not figure out I was militant about it. My tagline with nsa. And they would please welcome Frank King. His. He believes his job in life is to make a living, not a difference. And so I did that. And then after I came so close to killing myself, I contacted Judy Carter, a friend of mine, and said, judy, I want to make the jump from funny speaker to speaker who's funny. She goes, frank, I've got a book, it's called the Message of youf. The Message of youf turn your life into a money making speaking career. I went into the book, Darren Mark, thinking I got nothing. Halfway through, I thought, oh, My Lord. Yeah. I thought given my family history, my history, get some training in suicide prevention certifications, I can keynote on this. So that's what I began to do. Now, I had several other keynotes, but a couple years later, I looked around at some of the businesses in my town to belong to the chamber of commerce. Two very successful ones, auto body shop, and a guy who owns a couple of radio stations. And I thought, what do these disparate businesses have in common? They're very successful, both of them. And it hit me, Duh. They do one thing and they do it well. And so that's when I decided, January 1st of that year, I am a suicide prevention speaker, period, Full stop. If you ask me to do comedy, great. If you ask me to do one of my other keynotes, fine. But I'm not going to market anything right then. I think the second step for speakers is once you decide your lane, as Jane Atkinson would say, then you need to figure out who your ideal clients are.

Avatar.

So I looked at the list of the top 10 list of at risk occupations for suicide in the U.S. and I selected six of the top 10 at risk occupations for suicide in the US and those are the only people I market to.

Brilliant. Brilliant.

Yeah, it's, it's. What you want to do is I tell my clients, you want to become the thought leader, expert in your lane so that you're no longer a commodity in the speaking business. When they come looking for somebody to speak on your topic, they don't look for anybody. They come looking for you. Now, it's a long game, and it's happened a number of times for me over the years. A woman has seen me speak three times. She became the executive director of a mental health organization in southern southwest Washington. She called me up, said, frank, I've seen you three times. I'm now the executive director. This is my first event, and I want to go really well, I want to hire you. What do you charge? I said, are you sitting down? Yes. I said, I'm $7500 plus travel. She goes, I don't care. I'll get a grant. So I tell my speakers, people will tell you non profits. You know, there's no money in speaking to non profits. No, they, if they want you bad enough, they'll. They'll find the money. If you're the person who does this.

The thing that they.

Yeah. I took it a step farther. Mental healthcomedian.com and then I have landing pages dot com, forward slash dental, forward slash construction. Wow. My favorite Forward slash agriculture. Woman called me up. Yeah, a woman called me up. I want to book you to our agricultural bank. I said, how'd you find me? She goes, frank, on a whim, I typed in suicide prevention speakers, agriculture. Boom, there you were. She goes, what's really freaky is I'm reading the first paragraph on your webpage and it says, hey, I'll bet you've been tasked to find the best suicide prevention speaker in agriculture. She said to herself, how does he know this? So the lesson there for your listeners is join the conversation in the client's head. That's why you have a forward slash agriculture, forward slash osteopath. Because they're looking and so don't. If you have a speaker page, you know, homepage. Great. I would delineate, I would do for all of your target markets, a landing page so that when the meeting planner lands there, they don't just see that you are a suicide prevention speaker. They see one thing, you are an agriculture, suicide prevention. They don't know how I speak to, you know, other groups. That's exactly what they're looking for.

Nice. Brilliant. Hey, just on a side note, did you ever hear my Judy Carter story?

No.

So just super quick, only because you know her and you brought it up. So have you. I don't remember if I talked about this, that my story of my first time on stage. Did you hear me say that or talk about that?

No.

So there's a comedian in LA, his name is Chris McGuire. So anyway, when I decided I'm gonna try this one once, I was like listening to motivational speaker, you know, tapes, and they said, go to someone who's where you want to be. I had never been to a comedy club, so I go to a local comedy club headliner that night. His name is Chris McGuire and he was approachable. I was shy, quiet, worked up all the energy I could. And I said, hi, my name is Darren, I want to try this. What do I need to do? He said, are you funny? I said, no. He said, good. I'm like, what? And he said, go get the Judy Carter book, Stand Up Comedy, the book. And so. And he said, number two, go to an open mic night. So I took his advice and I've been telling that story for years. So in about, I don't know, just late 1990s, early 2000s, I get a phone call and it's Judy. She goes, are you Darren Lacroix? I was like, yes. She goes, who the heck are you? And she's like ranting and Raving funny wise. But she's, she goes, I heard you are single handedly keeping my book on the shelf. Stand up comedy the book. Because I've been telling that story and telling toastmasters around the world to go get this book. She goes, why are you promoting my comedy Bible? I'm like, that's not the book that changed my life and gave me the direction. So we just kind of, we had a great laugh and she and I taught a humor booth boot camp together for a while. But she's, she's awesome and I love the message of you. Great book. If you're listening to this, go get that book. If you haven't figured out your message yet.

Yes. And by the way, I met you the same way. Because people would ask me about becoming funny and I would recommend I put in a Facebook post. You know, somebody on Facebook asks one of the comedy, you know, Facebook groups or whatever, I would put in comedy Bible. And then tag Judy. And tag Judy. And tag Judy. And then the message, beauty tag Judy. Finally she called me. Okay, who are you?

Nice, Nice. That's funny. All right, now one of the. I love all this. I didn't know we were gonna get marketing advice. That was brilliant. Love that. Thank you. One thing I do want to talk about is the fact that you talk about suicide and you're a comedian. How does someone who's listening, who has a deep story, a dark story, a tough subject, how do you look at. How do I talk about this on stage and yet leave the audience up at the end?

Well, a couple of ways. One is tell a lot of personal anecdotes. Media planner calls me, I'm doing a keynote for her. She knows good and well I put a gun in my mouth. I say, what do you want me to cover? She goes, just give me a couple of bullet points. So I let that hang in the air. She goes, oh, God, oh, God, oh, God. I'm big on telling you what not to do, what not do. It is, don't make jokes about it. It's not a joke. It's not joke material. Depression, suicide. But there are even in the darkest, there are funny things that happen. In my first TEDx talk, you guys heard it. I say to the audience, you know, I went to Ted.com to see how other people handle the subject of Susan's figuring there'd be dozens of talks on suicide. And there were three. And I said, and it hit me, duh, you're good at suicide. You're not going to be recording at that exit.

Oh, man.

Yeah.

Ouch.

And from a family perspective, my grandmother killed herself with a gas stove. My great aunt killed herself with an old Loctite refrigerator. I said to the audience, what is it with my family and major appliances? I go past Home Depot, I tear up. So the key is, is funny personal agonists or things like the. You know, I went looking for talks. There were only three. You know, there's the funny. I've been asked in the past, this being a comedian keep you from getting a booking on suicide prevention? I go, no, you got it wrong. It's backwards. They want the lived experience. They want the learning objectives and action items. And the fact I can leaven it with some well placed, tasteful, organic humor pushes me over the top. And speaking to your clients, my. My feeling is you need to move them emotionally from. From laughing to tears and back. And. And I do. I. When I tell my story, I get a little choked up every time. And I'm not putting it on because I'm reliving the story.

Sure.

Then I make them laugh. And there's a story at the end about why I don't kill myself. My mother had a great difficulty getting a difficult time getting pregnant, got pregnant, carried it nine months shortly after birth, passed away, got pregnant a year later, carried it to term nine months shortly after birth, had passed away, where she found the strength to try a third and fourth time. When I was born, my sister was born. I have no idea. But here's my feeling, here's why I stick around. I figured she worked so hard and was so brave bringing me here that I have to wear at least as hard and be at least as brave. And man, any woman in the audience has ever had a child is in tears. Wow. And then I said, let me leave you on a high note every now and then. As somebody who lives with mental illness, I get tired of saying, when somebody says, how are you living the dream? Mother Day in paradise. If I'm really tired and a little editor's gone to sleep in my head.

The editor's gone to sleep.

Nice young Uber driver. After I did two three hour suicide prevention ces, back to back, I crawl in the Uber. Our eyes lock in the rearview mirror. He goes, how you doing, man? I thought, I'm gonna tell him I'm depressing suicidal dude. How are you? He freezes. Then he says, what am I supposed to say to that? I said, do you really want to know? Because I do. You're supposed to ask me if I have a plan, thinks about it and he goes, do you have a plan? And then it hit him, turns in the seat, he goes, oh, dear God. Does it involve Uber?

Oh.

That is great. Does it involve Uber?

Yeah, that's, that's where the, you know, that's where the humor is really. And you know, there's a psychological principle. If you, if you tell somebody something really serious, talking about something really serious, like suicide, if the next thing out of your mouth is something where you can move them toward the laughter pole, they're much better prepared mentally for the next piece of serious business. They call it comic relief for a reason. Right. So we go back and forth.

Yeah, Mark, I knew this would be good. I had no idea it would be hitting wisdom. We're gonna have to do an hour of recaps.

I'm writing, I'm writing right now.

Wow.

Frank, just. Man, I hope you know how much of a gift you are to the world. And I can't even imagine how many people's lives you've saved and you'll never even know it.

No, occasionally, somehow, the tweets, you know, or a guy in England watch my YouTube first talk, send me a note on YouTube said, you know, I'm depressed. I got a great life, lovely wife, darling eight year old daughter, good job. Can't remember the last time I was happy. And I watched your TEDx talk and I realized for the first time I was not alone. This wasn't just me. And I mean, that's the, that's the ROI. When I speak there, I always set aside 45 minutes after. Wow. I just say we're gonna do some general Q A, but if you've got a story to share or question to ask and you don't want to ask in front of everybody, I'll hang out 45 minutes and sometimes two people, sometimes it's 10. In Cincinnati, I was speaking on site at a construction project. Almost all men. At the end, there were six guys lined up, which is kind of unusual. Men don't usually, you know, big boys don't cry. Last guy in line, a Black gentleman, probably mid-20s. He's crying so hard he can't speak. So I wait. And I said, what's up? And he said, well, I'm. I haven't slept in two days. I work on the fifth floor and I think about jumping every day. I said, why is that? He said, because I've lost three people close to me in the last year to violence, including my daughter who died in my arms. Wow. Now I'm guessing he's never Told his workmates that maybe the rest of his family that or his friends. But because I started the conversation that was vulnerable on stage and talked about my issues, he felt comfortable enough to come up. The HR guy was standing not six feet away. And I waved him over. I said, wait a minute, you need to take this gentleman by the hand, go find a copy of the EAP binder and get him to a mental health facility right now, because he is circling the drain. And so he took him by the hand. Now a couple months later, I'm talking planner. I'm. I can almost not bring myself to ask. Finally I said, listen, I gotta ask you, how's that nice young man? She goes, frank, you got evaluated, got medicated, back on the job.

Score.

That's what I was, that's what I was hoping for, Darren, when I joined nsa, that someday I can make a living and make a difference for people, man. My goal is to save a life a day. Wow.

That's so noble, man.

Wow. And Frank, since we're talking about this, I was blown away by your closing and your call to action. Are you okay if I share just that clip at the end of your TEDx talk?

Oh, yeah, sure.

Because I just. You can't fake this kind of emotion. And Mark, this could be the best call to action I have ever heard. And I don't say that lightly.

No.

So I must laugh.

Oh, this one? Yes.

I must laugh at the facial expression that it froze on. If you're listening to the audio version. I'm sorry I missed this, but. But you can look it up if you go to TedXTalks.com and suicide. The secret of my success. Dead Man Walking, Frank King. So I just want to play the end of this because, Mark, I don't know if you saw this one. I know you watched one of them or a couple of them.

Not this one, but let's just do it.

The call to action. So just listen up and if you're listening to the audio, listen intently for the emotion. You can see his eyes getting welled up. I hope you can feel the emotion. Check it out.

Well, I had a million dollar life insurance policy. So I was literally worth more financially to her dead than alive. Emotionally, different story. But financially worth more dead than alive. However, I wasn't sure how long I'd had that policy.

Yeah.

So do you know this? Every suicide policy, every life insurance policy has a suicide clause. You have to have the policy 24 months. You kill yourself in less than 24 months, pays nothing after 24 months pays in full. So the rational part of my brain.

Would not allow the irrational part of.

My brain to end my life and leave my wife brokenhearted and destitute. I had two months. So I had a conversation with myself. I said, you know, I can wait two months until the policy is in force and maybe, maybe things will get better in those two months and I won't pull the trigger. But if they don't get better, I can still kill myself. So suicide. In a strange way, the option of suicide saved my life. In two months, things did get better.

Bankruptcy went through.

Harassing phone calls stopped my depression lifted a little bit. Things got better. Woke up in the morning, I can move that rock. So here's the deal. Here's my parting thought to you. If you have a mental illness and you are in crisis, help is available at suicide prevention Lifeline. And for younger people who like to text, that's a suicide prevention text line. 741741. If you are not in crisis, but you are living with a mental illness and you're struggling, see me at the.

Break.

Because as a member of my tribe, I will do my best to help you get the resources you need. So when you wake up in the.

Morning.

You can move that rock. Thanks very much.

Wow. I got choked up and I know how it ended. Wow.

Mark your thoughts.

I'm processing that right now, quite honestly. That is just powerful. And the most moving part for me, Frank, was the raw, gut level authenticity of what you said. That was not a speaker trying to wow the audience with a great call to action. That was a man offering himself to people who may feel what he has felt. And even after all this time, you're still emotional, you're still driven, you still see the value of a life. And I'm a little confused, Frank. How do you handle that responsibility while still feeling those feelings from time to time? How do you do that?

It's like the gentleman who came up to me at the construction site or the woman who came up to me who didn't know it had a name. Those things are very therapeutic for me because I get asked occasionally, does telling your story over and over trigger you? Go know you got it back. Telling it over and over. And helping people is extremely therapeutic. What I. I realized one time, I was in Billings, Montana, University of Montana, Dusk, standing outside the hall where I did a college presentation. Now, picture this is dust, it's snowing. I can hear a river in the distance. And it hit me. I'm George Bailey and it's a Wonderful life. I've been shown what these people's lives might be like as it happens in the movie. He's shown what those people's lives would be like if he simply weren't there. And so I'm being shown what these people's lives might be like if I weren't there. And if I kill myself, then, you know, theoretically I would take some of those people with me who never had a chance to hear me speak. Yeah, it's very therapeutic. It keeps me, keeps me going. Wow.

Well, thank you for what you do and how you do it. Mark. Yeah. You have a great saying that your life tells a story and someone needs to hear it. And that's the greatest example. And if you're listening to this and you have a deep story where we're encouraging you that someone does need to hear it, that you know, Mark, I'm sure you remember Craig Valentine talking about it. That dark place in your life, you want to make an impact. You want to change lives. You need to go to that dark place and don't do it alone. Get help, get a coach, get therapy. But that is where your true not you on stage getting paid and getting the standing ovation, but you having that person come up to you and saying, thank you for letting me know I'm not alone.

Well, and Brene Brown, I've said this many ways. She said it the best, I think, and it applies to me. She said, I am so comfortable in my darkness that I can sit with you comfortably in yours.

That's good. Frank, help me out. You use a line. Just now you mentioned getting it backwards. I think that thought bears repeating. Do you recall what you said just now about how do you. I asked you how do you handle it, helping others while you're going through that and you said, I may have gotten it backwards. Do you recall what you said?

Yes. Because people ask me, are you triggered by telling your story over and over like that? Because sometimes people get triggered when they, like if they're writing a book and they're reliving the story. That's very painful.

Right.

In my case, when I'm doing it out loud and reliving that story, I'm helping people. I know because they come up after or they DM me or you know, they. I put my cell phone number on the screen every time I speak and I say, look, you're suicidal. Dial 988, the new three digit number. If you're just having a bad day, call a crazy person. Here's my cell. Now let Me take one step farther there. Young man called me one time, sounded young. He goes, I can't believe this is your real phone number. I said, dude, how bad would the karma be if I gave you a number to call when you're having a bad day and it was fake? And I said, I'm a comic. I'll make it worse. Hold please. And you know comics, Darren. I said, I can tag that. The on hold music would be another one that bites of dust. Another one, another one.

Oh, my man.

Dark humor.

Dark humor, Frank, 7,000 stage times will do that to you, Mark, just so you know.

Well, and I was on the Clubhouse something one time, and the subject matter was, how do you get confident on stage? So I let everybody else speak. And then I said, okay, here's my feeling on this. You want to be confident on stage, stand in your truth. Meeting planners say to me, do you want the evaluations? No, I mean, I have talk about now. So I get, you know.

Yeah, you can get them if you have.

I do what I do. It is who I am. It is what gets me out of bed. I mean, so if you like it, great. If you don't, as James Gregory said about Star Search, why he did James Gregory, famous southern comic, wouldn't go on Star Search because they were judged by a celebrity panel. He goes, I don't want my comedy judged by Farrah Fawcett's hairdresser. So I, I don't, I don't really care as long as I'm. When I was in Buildings at that, that gig, two nice young men driving me around town because it was a public gig as well as college. So we're. I was, I was in radio spots that morning, and the young man said, me, no comedy on campus, right. Nowadays is very fraught. I mean, you, you know, you step on people's toes and they get their feelings hurt. Do you worry about that? And I said, well, if I was doing stand up here, I would be very careful. I said, I'm here to save lives. So do you want my opinion on that? He goes, yeah. I said, fm. Nobody died having that stepped on. Wow.

Well, Frank, we want to honor your time here. Mark, if you want to put your notes together. And Frank, again, how, how could people reach out to you?

LinkedIn. Frank incomed on LinkedIn. I got a big following on LinkedIn. Go to how to make money speaking.com, where I teach people, you know, kind of like you guys do, how to make money on cruises, colleges, corporations, associations, or do TEDx. Landed TEDx by the way, one of the things you can do to kill your chances is not apply to enough of them people apply a couple times and then and apply. I've never done one Darren that I didn't have to fly to. So they're 200 plus around the country. So apply everywhere you possibly can. And here's a tip for you. Application links are hard to find because TED doesn't want you to apply because they got too many people applying.

Right.

I've been TedX Applications 2024 and do something you never do. Go about nine Google pages deep. You know. You know they say about where if you want to kill somebody, want to hide a body, where would you put it? Google page two because nobody goes there's but go deep because sometimes their SEO is not great and you'll find a link or two. Page 7, page 8, page 9 and you can apply. I mean you just fill out the application, send it in and yeah, so.

Definitely connect with Frank on LinkedIn for sure. And then talk to him directly. Maybe you need some advice. So my last question for you as Mark puts things together is if you were sitting down over coffee to a let's say emerging presenter who really is passionate about being unforgettable, what advice would you give them?

Two pieces. One that I learned at NSA in 95 that I didn't put into practice until 2014. Slow learner, good curiosity there yes is the riches are in the niches. Heard that the first time and didn't essay and then Jane Atkinson, I did her podcast and I think she created this line. Pick a lane speak on one thing to have other offerings so you can do a breakout or a concurrent session but but be known for one thing and market to one small set. Seth Godin said you don't need everybody. You just need the smallest viable number of people clients to maintain or sustain your life. You know the lifestyle you are after. Don't spray and pray. Make your marketing, you know, laser focused. So that would be, that would be I guess bridges in the niches. Piccolane is sort of the same thing.

Hey Regina, we gotta change our marketing plan. Darn it. I was spraying and praying and.

Oh man. Sorry about that.

No, hey you. You've helped me out here. Now I know I have a start my list of what not to do. Everything I have done. Cool. Thank you, thank you, thank you, Mark. What do we got there?

Well, first of all, stop spraying and praying for a TEDx application. Be willing to go nine pages deep in Google to find the right link.

I love that.

Stand in your truth.

I'm going backwards by the way.

Stand in your truth. Make a living to make a difference. Making people laugh prepares them for your next serious point.

I like that one too.

Non profits will find a way if you are the right speaker in their lane. Market to your lane with a laser focus and find out who your ideal clients are. Get the book the message of you.

Amen. Preach it.

I love this one. Don't tell jokes. Use funny, humorous personal anecdotes instead.

Yeah, Mark, on that one. Real quick. Yeah. So Frank, one of the jokes I cracked up about was you said you and your wife were complete opposites. They say opposites attract. Yeah, Mark, I don't know if you heard that one. Go ahead.

Yes. I shouldn't have married my first wife. We had nothing in common. But you know what they say, opposites attract. She was pregnant. I wasn't.

Sweet.

Yeah, Mark, I had to interrupt because I had that as a note. I just had to bring that up. And the irony is you don't have any children. But what I love is your comedy mind wrote the joke, it was pertinent to where you were going, even though it wasn't true. And then you acknowledged that it wasn't true. But you got the laugh. You brought the levity to that tough subject. So love that. Go ahead, Mark.

Also, you'll notice I don't disparage my first wife. Wonderful woman. We just didn't belong together. Comedians, listen up. Speakers, listen up. Male speakers. The woman in a joke must win, right? That's right. Yeah. Especially in a bar because they're dating and guys will look at their date before they'll laugh because they're hoping to get, you know, wow, wow, married guys. Go ahead and laugh.

That's me.

So that's not another one.

The woman in the joke must win. And a few TEDx tips for you. You need an idea worth spreading. It's in their policy. Don't have too many ideas and don't have too much about too many ideas.

Right.

Sell your idea in 90 seconds. Be passionate about your ideas, but make sure your title and subtitle must have a hook. You want to slow the scroll. And last thought is you can't be inspiring if you are not inspired yourself. Thanks so much, Frank. Appreciate it so much.

Oh, my pleasure, guys.

Yeah. If you're a stage time member, join us for the summit live or online in Vegas in March to get more. Frank, thrilled. If you're not a stage time member, what are you thinking? Why would you not spend more time with us and get some coaching. Thank you for being here. Seriously, thank you for for what you do and how you do it and being an open example for all of us to follow. Mark Brown Take us home.

Frank, you have touched my mind, my funny bone and my heart. Friends, friends, there is nothing like being in the company of great presenters, great speakers and great guests. So join us at stagetime and tune in next week for the next Unforgettable Presentations podcast.

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