Ep. 63 WHY?

Hey, Darren, back in 95, I had my contest and I won that thing. Somebody told me they knew I won that world title when I said one word in my speech and the word was why. I kind of laugh about that, but over the past 25 years, I've been asked a lot about why I do what I do, and I think that it'd be a good idea for us to talk about why as presenters, we, we do what we do and maybe it's time for all of us to re examine our why.

Why?

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 Brow, 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.

Darren Lacroix, my man. Listen, I know you're saying why, right?

I gotta get serious for a second.

Because here at stagetime University, we do a lot of coaching, either group or individual coaching. And you know this. There have been times people have written us emails and they tell us we want to be coached because we know we're going to be the next world champion of public speaking. And I know you have your own reaction to that when that happens. What goes through your mind when somebody tells you, I want to be coached because I will be this and I will attain that. What are your thoughts about that?

I want to ask them why? Why do you want to do that? What's that going to do for you? Why? Why? Why, why? Why? And this isn't Six Sigma, this is just why. We're just going deep on why. Like, why do you want to do this? Why do you want to be unforgettable? What will it do for you? What will it do for your audience? What would you do for your career if you're unforgettable? And I think right now, Mark, you know, some of our friends are still out there killing it. Some of our friends who are professional speakers are honestly having a real tough time moving over to virtual because there are very few, if any live events and some of them, they just, you know, some of my people that I know are a little stubborn and are coming late to the game about upgrading their home studio. But it's like, why? Why do you want to do this? Well, I want to help people. Okay, if you want to help people, then it's not about speaking alive on a stage. It's just one format. You know, we've heard it over and over again from Ford and a lot of other marketers that, like, don't say you're a speaker, you're an expert who speaks. So now you're an expert who speaks through the Internet. And granted, hey, I love the live audiences. I do. I miss that. However, if I want to pay my mortgage, if I want to stay doing what I do, because I love doing what I do, I. You know, we've got to step back and look at why. Why do we want to do this, Mark?

And, you know, you say stepping back.

I want to.

I should bring this up very briefly. When we've gone from live to virtual, a lot of people begin to focus on the technical. On the what? And because we want to be better on stage or we don't, I mean, on camera, or we kind of resist the whole virtual thing. What happens is the focus becomes on the what and not so much on the why. We've taught so many virtual workshops, Darren, and people are so concerned, and they buy different cameras, and that's good. But they may have lights. And we get so caught up in the what, we tend to forget the why. So there's two things to consider. One, technical expertise is great to have. You have to be good on stage. As our dear friend Mike Rayburn says, if you aren't getting the bookings, it's your speech. Yes, you've got to work on it. And now with the shift to virtual to be successful, we're all making adjustments, but we must never forget why we do what we do. And some people have resisted the change. I'm also told some presenters are completely backing away from presenting because I don't want to do this. And sometimes, Darren, quite frankly, our ego might get in the way a little bit.

What? Oh, sorry, that's a different podcast. This is the why podcast. That's the what podcast.

And we really have to think about why we do what we do. We said earlier, some individuals see themselves with a goal. I'm going to win a trophy. I'm going to get recognition. I'm going to be great on stage. And we get caught up in what.

We want to achieve for ourselves.

It's time for us to step back and just say, to think about what truly motivates us to do what we do. Whether virtual, whether live on stage, whether podcast, whether recorded, whatever we deliver to our audiences in whatever form or format, we have to stop and ask ourselves, why are we really doing this? It's a difficult question. And I know you have some very strong thoughts on this, Darren. So let's talk about this a little bit. What is your perspective on our why? What trends have you seen, what shifts have you witnessed and what are your thoughts about all that?

So, Mark, I'm going to take it a little different direction. If you think back to my accredited speaker speech where I did the little boy. So if you're watching this, one of the reasons, one of the deeper whys for a lot of people is because of that scar in their life that they want to help people. Like our friend Rena, who gave an amazing TED Talk about her abuse and rape. When you want to help people, if you're listening to this, definitely check out last week's episode. Last week's episode, we sat down with Linda Marie and I just one of my favorite parts of last week's podcast is when we talked, when we quoted Kevin Burke, when he said, the heck with the contest, I have a message. And I think when we get to that depth of a why, you can't help but help people. So in my accredited speaker speech, I asked the audience, what would you go back and say to that 8 year old you? And so I'm asking you as a presenter, what would you go back and say to that 8 year old you, that person who was in the middle of getting that scar? When you go back to that and realize there's a deeper reason, all of a sudden it's like that enthusiasm bubbles up. You don't worry about the little things. Oh, the lighting's not. Who cares? You know, get that message across. This doesn't work. That doesn't work. I was a guest on a podcast last night with two comedians from Boston from the old days and the technology didn't work and it's easy to get upset. And I was just like, hey, let's just do it next week, you know, and they were like, what? Look, this technology happens. Let's go deeper. So for you listening to this, what's your why? What's the reason you want to present? Why did you choose this absolutely crazy, silly platform that most people don't want to do? And I think if we take inventory, Mark, on our whys, there's that little eight year old kid that wanted to be funny, that was dreaming of being like my cousin and brother and just was told, that's not for you. So if I go back to that and then I bring that to my humor camp where I Want to help those people who were like me, who had that childhood like me, and show them there's a process you can follow. What? There's a process. And that was my whole goal of the humor camp, was to just get them to see that you can in fact learn how to be funny. Mark, we've got our program coming up, Mastering Virtual Presentations. Hey, we talk about technology, we talk about some of the basics. We get to see you, we get to hear you. But unless we're reaching through that camera with our eyes and almost like, forgive me, but making love to that camera, my why is coming through the camera and the techniques that we give people, the different ways to engage, that engagement is big. Keeping them engaged, coming at them from different directions. But I think, Mark, if we go back to that why, we're gonna come from a deeper place. We're not gonna worry about stupid things. Yeah, email doesn't work and da da, da, da, da, the camera's not working. Okay, how can I do it in the dark? Who cares? Mark?

Well, you mentioned that you're now gonna make me go back 25 years. When I first got involved in speaking through the Toastmasters speech contest in 1995, I wrote a 6 minute, 43 second speech based upon Disney's Beauty and the Beast. And I talked about intolerance, indifference, and ignorance. That speech was born out of me watching a Disney cartoon, Beauty and the Beast, with my kids. I wanted that message I gave to my kids to go to the audience. Now, ostensibly on the surface, I wanted to win that world title. I really did. But the proof of the depth of the why is this. It may seem like a brag. I'm simply informing everyone here. Yes, I gave the speech and I was blessed to win the title. But that speech became a one hour program that I have delivered in the past 25 years to over a million kids on three different continents. Here's the thing. The first why was man, I want to win that world title. I want to be a world champion. But the deeper why is to take a message. I taught my kids in 1994 watching a cartoon and to share that with other kids around the world. Along the way, I got some rewards. Yeah, it became a full time career for 20 years. But the deeper why was the message the world I believe needed to hear.

Now, will everyone watching the video or.

Hearing this podcast say, well, Mark, Darren, I have a message for the whole world to hear and I will tell it. Toastmaster, I have no clue what your vehicle will be, but as Darren said, you have to dig deep in your own heart, in your own soul, in your own spirit, and ask yourself, why? So for those of you who say, I'm going to be a world champion toastmaster, really, why? But I've met others who say, you know what? The contest is a vehicle to hone my skill so I can go out there and deliver that message. But only you can determine what your why is. For some people, I want to be a skilled, articulate professional. Yeah, that's the technical what. But why do you want to be that person? What message do you have for the world? And when all is said and done, how will you be remembered for technical skill or for leaving a message? It's a serious question to ask yourself if you're so caught up in I don't want to do tech. I don't want to go buy a green screen and work on a computer. I want to be in the main stage. I want the live audience.

I feed off that energy, man.

That's my style, baby. Maybe you're saying, I feed off that energy. That's my style. So maybe your ego is kind of shining. If you say, ouch, that's on you. But I gotta be honest here. Let's think about what is your true reason for delivering the message? Last night, Barry, we had that coaching call with our Stagetown University, and our host, Michael Davis, gave a tip of.

The week, and he asked the questions.

What is the goal underneath the goal? What is the why underneath the why? Really good discussion last night. And I want to leave that, but I want to place that question in the lapse in the hearts and the minds of everyone hearing this podcast today. What is the goal under the goal, what's the why under your why? And is your ego per chance getting in the way?

If you're not egotistical, be super egotistical. And here's what I mean by that. I encourage it.

Why?

Because, Mark, if you think about, in marketing, we've always heard, when things like this happen, people, the first thing to go is sales. The first thing to go is advertising dollars. Well, the people who shift now, who pivot now, I know it's overused, but who pivot now and get their name out there now, they're gonna be the ones when the stages open back up, that they're gonna be top of mind. So if you're waiting, good luck, you may lose that momentum, you may lose that yet if you pivot, if you get the content, if you get in front of the right people who perpetuate your message, Just like the AD spend, now is the time to step it up. Why? So that on the other side you're more relevant than you are today. And I think that's one of the messages. My other thing is the mvp. So Mastering Virtual Presentations, the event you and I have coming up with Ed, I just remember I was like a man possessed. I was passionate. You know, I put together a two day event in like two weeks. The whole structure of the whole event. 562 slides. I wish I was exaggerating, but I'm not.

It's two days though.

It's two days. So it's all good.

Yeah.

And here's the thing. I realized we had this unique solution that we've been doing for years. And right now, like Mark Sanborn said when we interviewed him, what's the newfound pain? I realized we had a great solution for the newfound pain. I want to help people who are serious, who, who are serious about helping their audience. Cause Mark, part of our why is we know that the people who listen to us, if you're listening to this podcast, we know you're gonna be in front of audiences we'll never ever be in front of if we can give you one great nugget to help you to carry with you throughout the rest of your career.

Woo hoo.

We have done our job. We happen to dedicate our careers to helping people do just that. Why? Because people like Mark helped me. People like my original mentor Vinny helped me. All right, now we want to help people, but guess what? We only want to help people who are serious, who really want to be out there. Because there's. What are we at, like 20 different pace elements we've created. Now the cool thing is you're only going to use five or six of our 20 pace elements, but your five or six are going to be different from Mark's. Five or six going to be different from my five or six. Why? Because of style. So if you're listening to this, you want to check it out, just go to stagetimeworkshops.com any one of our podcast listeners, you can get 25% off of our program. There's an early bird discount if you check it out early. But just use the discount code PODPOD25. We'd love to have you join us. And if you don't join us, we'd love to have you tell other people about this podcast. Look, we know you're getting your money's worth on this podcast.

And just clarification, you hear pace elements, there are different things you do to change the experience of your attendees in a virtual program. But check out the workshop to get details on that. I also want to clarify one more thing. Darren said, I talked about our ego getting in the way. There is a difference between confidence and cockiness. And the ego says, I am good and I want to win a trophy. But the ego Darren talks about is the ego. Ego that says, I am good at this and I want to help people with my expertise. That ego says, I want to share this. I want to give, I want to help, I want to offer nuggets. The selfish ego says, I am good. I know I'm good. I want the world to know I'm good for what I can get. The good ego says, I know I'm good. What can I give? That again, goes back to our why. Why do we do the podcast every week? Why do we have these monthly workshops? Why are we doing Built Stage Time University? Because we believe that by helping other people with our expertise, they can then go out and help others. It becomes a wonderful snowball effect. We're not just saying, okay, pat ourselves on the back, but we're privileged, we're blessed. Over the last year, we've got to meet some fantastic presenters, some unforgettable presenters. We've brought them on this podcast. Why? They say, hey, we got to talk to Mark Sanborn and Josh Eng. We got Marilyn German, we got Jeannie Robertson. That's true. But why? To deliver their expertise, their ideas, their experience, to serve our audiences who are listening to our podcast. And I'm kind of proud to say, Daryl, we got 40,000 downloads on this thing going so far, so we're going well. But again, the why is a why of service. As you prepare your presentation, as you decide, okay, I'll do virtual, but you gotta ask yourself why? What is the ultimate goal? And over the last several months, and you know, a couple of years actually, I've been hearing individuals actually shift their why, Darren. From what they saw. They could get to know what they see they can give. And I believe you had some experience there when you first joined Toastmasters back in the day about the why being the getting and the giving. You want to share that story one more time, Darren?

Yeah, I mean, if you heard this, I apologize, but maybe it's good enough. It's worth hearing again. But when I first came to Toastmasters, I came to increase my stand up comedy skills. I didn't know what a speaker was. I didn't have any interest in being a speaker. I had a Group of people who will listen to me and give me feedback. What? That was early on in my career when I was still doing amateur nights, and nobody really wants to listen to somebody who got no skills, got no stage presence and is boring, but thinks they're good. So, anyway, so I came to Toastmasters, and Dan Jones, my club president, brought me aside in a photocopy room before. And he said, darren, what do you have to give? I'm like, give? I'm not here to give anything. I'm here to get stage time. That's what I want, more stage time. I'm gonna join another club. I'm gonna join four clubs to get more stage time and get on stage every day, because that's what my mentor said was most important. He said, but, Darren, you are taking comedy classes. Every speaker wishes they were funnier. Why don't you do a teaching speech, a mini, tiny, mini workshop on how to add humor to your presentations? What? Why? Why would anybody want to listen to that? I said, I'm not a headliner. Why would they listen to me? He said, but, Darren, you're a step ahead of all of us. You've read books, you've done exercises, you've been on that stage, which is the scariest stage most speakers would avoid at all costs, because it's about the comedy and not the content. So when I thought about it, I took him up on that challenge, and it was the weirdest thing, the weirdest effect I ever had, that point in my career, because I'm teaching and I'm used to when you're doing good, they're laughing. In a comedy club, everyone knows the difference between success and failure. If they're laughing, you're succeeding. If they're not laughing, you're failing. And everybody knows it's not any secret. So when I gave the presentation, people were like, taking notes, and I was like, how rude. I'm working here. What are you taking notes for? And that was the first time in my career where someone came up to me after and said, thank you. I was like, what? It didn't make any sense to me because I was not a teacher, or so I thought. But they could see it in my heart. I went for the Ha Ha's originally, but then I realized over time, when I found out what a speaker was, I realized the HAHAs were just my bridge to the AHAs, which is my bigger why. And so what I realized, I could help people and it would be multiplied by every time they get on stage. It was like the Grinch my heart grew 10 times because I had that energy, I had that enthusiasm. And, Mark, you brought up a point, too. I have a name for this. This could be a keeper. What's your now why? What's your now why? You know, we've heard when we sat down with Craig Valentine in that episode, he talked about his championship speech, which was about a breakup, a woman who broke his heart, and he kept getting asked, why don't you give that speech? And he's like, I don't live there anymore. I don't live there anymore. So over time, your why is going to change. At the beginning, my why was about making people laugh. Then I wrote the book Laugh and Get Rich. And my why was about humor in business and having a motivational, inspirational keynote, humorous keynote. And I don't live there anymore. Now I want to add humor to what I'm doing, to uncover it organically in what I do, but my intention is not even close to that anymore. Now it's about inspiring people the least likely. It's about better stories, better business. It's about mastering virtual presentations. That's where my energy is. So maybe there's something. If you're listening to this podcast, maybe there's something you need to let go of. Maybe there's a subject that you had been pursuing, but there's another subject from that dark area of your life that maybe this is calling to you right now. That's your now why.

That's powerful, Darren, because like I said, I look at your life as this progression from give me, give me, give me feedback. I want to be funnier. And now I know, having known you for almost 20 years, that you built Stage Time, University, to build other presenters and to make people go from good to. To great to unforgettable. I will say this. That's true. Your why certainly can and will change very often. But some things are going to be constant. Some messages are going to be timeless. I mean, I didn't know in 95, 25 years ago my speech about intolerance, indifference and ignorance and understanding those who are different would still be resonating now in 2020 and in America. Whoo. Is that ever relevant now? So some things are going to maintain a constancy, but as we grow, as we mature, as we change, as we uncover from our own life experience that there are messages and values and principles to be shared and we understand the impact they can have. The why can shift and change. Or you may find a why beneath a why. And the secondary why comes to the so, yeah, I want to be better. I want to improve. I want to win a trophy. But wait, I have an opportunity now. I want to touch people's lives. Darren, before you competed in 2001 in the finals, you've often told this story about what I said to you about the opportunity you had when you knew a trophy was there for you. But I said, darren, you have the privilege of 2,000 lives for seven minutes. What will you do with that? And so I ask everyone listening to this, every single time you get a platform, whether virtual or physical, whether it's 10 people or 10,000 people, you have their time and their attention for whatever number of minutes you have. What will you do with that many? We've invested money and time to hear from you, to hear how good you are. Why do you really want to get to that audience? And let me ask you this. If you hope to get an audience of 10,000 and you get 1,000, your level of disappointment will probably tell you what your why really is. Darren, I see you reacting to that why that reaction, Darren, why that reaction?

Well, because I know exactly what you're saying. And quite honestly, I was guilty of that myself early on. There's moments where I'm still a little disappointed. But like you said, I go back to that Mark Brown question. There's supposed to be 250 people on a webinar I'm doing tomorrow. I know if 70 show up, that will be cool. We'll have fun. But what if 25 show up? Like, I can't let that bother me. I gotta realize, hey, here's 25. It's an hour out of my life. It's 30 minutes out of your life. It's 10 minutes out of your life. Well, it's multiplied. And one of those 10 people in your audience might know someone who they can pass your message on to pass your contact information on to hire you as a speaker, live or virtual. You gotta look at it that way. That when Regina started working for me on day one, I sat her down. I said, here's Darren's best use of time. Number one, me being on stage or online, giving a presentation, doesn't matter. Number two, creating free content, whether it's YouTube videos or articles. And number three, creating programs that I can offer to people step by step, programs that I can multiply to many people. I said, your job is to keep me doing those three things. So if you're a presenter, I don't care if you have 10 people right now. It's a great use of your time of that one hour, you still got 23 hours in your day to do something else that you need to, want to, should do for your business or for getting your message out there.

Darren, there's something else you once said, and I, you know, you've mentioned it.

A few times, but I want to revisit it. You said, there is no such thing as a practice speech. And you gave some context, which I don't think everybody here may have heard before fully understood. But I believe it connects to the idea of why. Because you had a practice speech with a small audience, but the impact really made you rethink your why and how you viewed practice. Care to share that with us?

Yeah. There was a gentleman at a Toastmasters Club when I was creating a keynote for. I think this is the story you're talking about creating a keynote for lady and the Champs. And we were doing this 3, 2, 1. It was about getting people to execute. So I gave the speech with my best heart, my best interest, my best intent, to help anyone who's there, but really in preparation for Lee and the Champs. And I went to 11 different clubs, and when I went back to one of those clubs, and I'm just going to say, Bob. I'll just use his name, Bob. So Bob happened to be in the audience again, and he pulled me aside and he goes, I have to tell you, I heard this message before. And I was taking a class and I was getting behind in nightlife class at a local college. I was getting behind every week and I heard your message and I changed my habits. I'm ahead of class. I'm doing everything I should do. I'm doing really well in the class. I like it more, and it's because of your message. And that just reminded me there is no such thing as a practice speech. I don't care if you got four people in front of you. Give it your all. Like, there's 4,000. And give it your all. Like, hey, there's four individual lives that they all know other people, that if I care about what I'm saying, they may pass it along to help other people.

And that was so cool because I.

Know you said small audience. And at one point, you actually show a photograph of you in an auditorium.

With like eight people in your auditorium.

Four.

Four people.

That's a famous picture. Four people.

It seemed like you got an auditorium and four people show up like, what's the point? But still you chose to deliver it with everything you had. Because the why by then was clearer. I want to make this presentation Better to better serve my audience, to be impactful. So here's the thing, friends. If you are rehearsing a presentation, are you rehearsing it to see how well and how smoothly you can get your PowerPoint to flow in a virtual presentation, or are you rehearsing it to make sure clarity is there, the audience is connected to you, and you can reach them with a message that changed their lives. This one simple three letter word. Why is not that simple. It has depth to it if we embrace its true meaning and apply it.

In every area of our.

Not only our presentations, but the way we live our lives.

Hmm. Mark, this is just. It's an important question. And I remember when you had me work on my speech and you had me ask yourself, if you were going to die tomorrow, what one lesson from your life would you pass on to your nephew? And that forced me to go into my why. That forced me to go deeper to figure out what message do I have inside me that I truly care about? And using the child analogy, if you will, or the filter that helped me find my deeper why. That message that I cared about and it took me a while, it took me several days to just come right down to you can only choose one. Well, that's why I like the idea. Step back and what's your now why? Take inventory on that because it may change and we've got to adjust. And if you do and you get on track with your now why, you're going to give better presentations, you're going to help more, more people and you greatly increase your opportunity to be unforgettable.

Darren, I'll say one more thing real quickly. I started by talking about technical things, how we do things, all our language, our words.

Think about this maybe as an assignment for you.

As you think about what your why may be, as you work on your skills on your studio, you want to get the right lights on the backdrop on the virtual background as you work on all of that. So it looks, looks good. The why is I want to be a better online presenter, but go one level deeper.

I want to be a better online.

Presenter because I want to.

And that should be your secondary deeper now why will make you that much more comfortable, that much more confident, but hopefully, hopefully that much more unforgettable. Darren, take us home.

All right, so hey, if you want to join us for one of our upcoming workshops, just check out stagetimeworkshops.com use a discount code podpod for the podcast pod25. Join us in a couple of weeks for mastering virtual presentations. Unforgettable presentations. Coming up in January Humor Bootcamp. There's a few there. Mark and I are doing one called Get Coach to Speak. It'll even help you on one of the VIP seats. But seriously, what is your why? Re Take inventory Re inventory yourself on your now. Why? Because that's the key to helping you be unforgettable.

Unforgettable.

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