Ep. 79 Your Failure Story

Hey there, Mark Brown. I've got a riddle for our listeners. What do Jim Morris, Bethany Hamilton, Michael Orr and Chris Gardner have in common?

That's a good one. I know Jim Morris was a rookie. I actually met him. And Michael Orr was a kid who was playing high school football. So I think I know the answer, but maybe our audience doesn't.

Well, I'm guessing if they're listening to this, they know we're going to talk about failure stories. All four of them. Not only have a failure story, it's became so amazing and powerful that Hollywood turned all of them into movies. Your failure story should not be our shame, it should be our fame. For us as presenters, this is our gold. And we talked about the battle, the blessings in the battle a few episodes ago, if you want to go check that out. But this is a little different spin. But on your failure story, Mark Brown, do you have a failure story?

Jeez, which one do you want to hear?

I should say, how many failures?

Exactly. Right. I remember one time, though, I was very new in the business. I was doing a lot of youth speaking, and I was asked to speak at an event upstate New York. And I thought maybe I shouldn't, but, ooh, they got a special guest there. This guy's a movie star, an actor, straight screen and stage. I'll get to meet him. That'd be good for me and my career. Besides, he lives a few miles from me. It'll be perfect. So I said yes. I went up there. I didn't think too hard about it, but the thing is, they wanted me to talk to high school kids. No problem. I do it all the time. They wanted a nice, you know, an African American model. Yeah, it's me. I'm a guy. I could show these kids how to be inspiring and. But they wanted me to discuss politics and young people. Politics. What? It was not my lane, but I saw the opportunity to meet this famous actor, director, producer. I figured, you know what? I'll just do a little research. I'll give these kids some concepts and tell them, hey, you make your own choices. You're growing up now. You gotta choose what you do politically. And it was a mess. I bombed. I knew. I knew I failed, but not even one kid wanted to talk to me afterwards. And the worst part, the meeting planner has never spoken to me since. And it's only been about, I don't know, 23 years since that happened to me. And that was really a mess, man. I did it for the wrong reason, to serve myself. And I really, man, that was a major bomb and I had to pick myself up from that and go on to do bigger and better things. But man, I really blew it. And I know it was a serious failure story.

Yeah, I remember NSA used to the National Speakers association used to do in Voices of Experience. I blew it. And I knew it and what I learned through it. So stay tuned for your failure story.

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 powerful presentation? Ahas, let's dive right in.

Oh, Mark Brown, the failure story. I think the audience loves a good failure story. And if we're the quote unquote presenter, the expert on stage, I think they love it even more from us because it helps connect us.

Look, you and I have both been on the platform for a while, both virtual and live, and with our experience and our credentials, they're those who tend to look up to us. Well, more me more than you and taller than you are.

So look up to me more than you.

Hahaha. I know, first bad joke of the day. But seriously, what happens is it's often the idea that, well, these are world champions, you know, certified professionals, these guys got it going on. And in reality, the we make our mistakes, we have our blunders, we just mess things up. And sometimes things happen to us, not always our fault. It's a combination and it's difficult for us to get back up. But when we share the truth of who we are as individuals and cannot knock ourselves off a pedestal they put us on, they realize in many ways they are just like us. And I think that connection gives them permission to not only hear what we have to say, but to believe that what they want to achieve, what we're teaching them, is viable and doable and they can accomplish what they set out to do. And the vulnerability piece. I always say authenticity plus vulnerability equals credibility. And our failure stories give us credibility.

Yeah. I think it also reminds the audience, hey, just because you failed doesn't mean it's over. I remember listening to a interview with Steven Tyler from Aerosmith when he sat down with Oprah and. And Oprah interviewed him about being a judge on American Idol and he said it bothered him because he had to Send people home when they didn't become the American Idol. And he said most of the people who are there are more talented than he was when he first started. And he said, I feel bad, but guess what? I'm not saying you're not the American Idol ever. I'm saying you're not the American Idol today day. It just means you need to go back to the clubs. He meant obviously music clubs to learn a few more lessons to come back. And I think our failure stories can be so powerful and that inspiring insight that our audience needs. You know, we mentioned Jim Morris, the rookie from the movie the Rookie, the oldest rookie in baseball, Michael Orr, who was homeless and then his career and what happened in his story, as well as Chris Gardner being homeless and then, you know, fighting for his son and survival. And then of course, Bethany Hamilton when she had that unfortunate accident where the shark bit her arm off and she's a professional surfer. And all of them had this failure quote unquote by society. And yet they came back and it's that struggle. It's actually if they didn't have that low and that challenge, it wouldn't have been powerful enough to be a great story. We need those huge failures in our life to learn the lesson, but then us as presenters to pass on that lesson through the credibility that we offer from the stage. So I think it's so important for everyone to know that your failure stories are your gold. We all have them. And some people, as we mentioned at the beginning, some people have shame in their failure. It ain't your shame, it's your fame.

I like that.

It's that reason we want to listen to you.

There's a cliche, I shouldn't say cliche. A well known line, failure is never final. I get that, you know, but I always say, just because you have failed doesn't make you a failure. And some people embrace the idea, well, if I fail, I'm a failure, why bother? But you know, I need not be in a sensational world, a changing way. But you may have encountered a failure that could have knocked you down and kept you down, but you picked yourself back up. You learned a lesson from the experience. And the beauty is, as presenters, we have a wonderful opportunity to share those lessons of our failures. Sometimes great, sometimes small. Because sometimes a small failure for us might be a big failure for someone else. For some who are in Toastmasters, I didn't win my speech contest, so therefore I'm no good at this. I have seen reactions to loss that were unpleasant not only in Toastmasters. But I played sports, and I've lost there. I've won and I've lost. But if we understand, what can we learn from the loss? You know, when I was coaching high school football, soccer to North Americans in New York in the 90s, the school, as at the head coach of the soccer program, and I was, you know, assistant coach, goalkeeping coach and so on. He always told the teams, both the boys team and the girls team, you win or you learn. You win or you learn. So in our lives, when we experience failures, when we do have a bad presentation, when the audience gives us a scathing review and we're like, oh, I can't believe they said that about me. They're telling you something. They're teaching you something that you can change, that you can fix and go back and then do it again. I remember when I had a bomb. I got a job to speak at a municipality. The mayor hired me to go in to talk to all the city employees. They opened an hour late, and they went to a central location. They brought in the bagels, the muffins, the breakfast, and I was going to inspire this entire team to make your city awesome. And I was. I blew it. I failed. And I called a fellow champion, Morgan MacArthur, the 94 world champion, and he is a veterinarian by trade. And Morgan, of course, being Morgan, said, hey, buddy, get back on the horse. I think it's a horse metaphor, but he's telling me, okay, learn the lesson. You've got to pick yourself back up and then go out there and do it again. And if I don't know what happened, a year later, she rehired me. I went back and did a much better job this time. I don't know if she pitied me or what, but I don't know why she did it, but I'm so thankful that she did. And many of us have failures in a presentation with a seminar, with a workshop in other areas of our lives. And we may think, man, this is not for me. Maybe it is for you. But you had to learn the lesson from that failure to make yourself come back stronger, be better. And then the wisdom you gain through the experience, you include that in your presentations and, wow, the impact on your audience can truly be unforgettable.

As presenters, we have the only profession in which it's encouraged to share the lesson. I was. I was close on the rhyme.

Trying to get rid of the rhyme, Becky.

But, Mark, if you remember for a few years, Lance Miller's failure story of how many times Lance Miller had competed and that was. That became the new failure gold standard of how many times? Because what did it take him several years to even get out of his Toastmasters Club? For those of you listening in the World Championship, Lance is a fellow world champion. And that was the. The big failure story. Then Jock Elliott came around and Jock. Jock had been competing for what?

Yeah, and he was in 21. He was in finals from 1990 until he won 21 years later. So he was. Been around for a long time before he finally won.

So that's the new gold standard. It's like, look, if you, look if you competed two or three years, you got, you got a long ways to go. So. But, but again, looking at that, you know, there was. Jim Key came in second, came in second. And then the third time he won. Okay, that was a great, inspiring failure story. And then Lance Miller and then that was a great, inspiring failure story. And then Jock Elliott, that was an even bigger failure story. So just to compare them now, it doesn't matter. There's really no comparison. It's your life and your failure. And I think we should have changed the title of this to your failure stories.

Don't you know it. I already told two of mine. Right, so there you go.

Yeah, I used several of them in my championship speech. But this isn't about Toastmasters again. This is just about your failure story. But one of the big revelations was when I bombed early on in my career at the credit union and I called my mentor and I was done. I was ready to quit. I am not cut out for this profession. And I called up Rick and I told him I bombed. I died. They hated me. And Rick said so I didn't know how to react to that because as a newbie speaker, I thought my career was over. And he just said, hey, Darren, we all fail. It's actually part of the process of succeeding. You just like Steven Tyler said, you just had to learn another lesson along the way. And that was a big one that everyone who's been great at anything has failed at that same thing. So it kept me going and it was the words of my mentor, two letters and a question mark. So.

I think there's also another dimension to this. Darren, one more piece to this I've discovered and learned over, over time is that sometimes our failures are magnified in our minds when we compare ourselves to other people. I want to pick on you for a second.

You told me what's different.

But on a much more serious note, you told me early on in your common Humor career. You would go up and you're like, you know, not getting many laughs, and some newbie guy comes to open mic and he just kills it. And you're like, I've been doing this for so long, and I get like a half a laugh and this dude comes up and gets 15. And the impact on us when we compare our failure to someone else's success, what that can do is it can magnify in our minds the size of our failure when that is not really the truth. If we can look between the lines and say, okay, what could I have done differently? What did he or she do that I maybe didn't do as well? But I can adjust, I can shift, I can change. What can I learn from my failure and their success to put me on a path to be better tomorrow than I am today? I can't speculate about how you responded in your own mind. You might want to expound upon that. But it occurred to me, sometimes our failures are magnified when we compare ourselves to somebody else's success, and that can really be damaging.

Yeah, we can't compare our journey to somebody else's. We can be inspired by other people's, but it's really challenging to compare it because we have a different background. There's a different journey up until this point. So you can't compare your journey to someone else's, no matter what. You just can't. You can, again, be inspired by it. And yeah, Mark, the one thing that gentleman did, the open micr that night, one thing he did differently is he got laughs. I didn't. That was very clear. But I learned the lesson that day. When I turned to Vinnie after that happened, I said, how do you know who's going to make it? And he said, really simple. Whoever keeps going, Bam. I didn't see that coming. And, Mark, I had since realized that that guy that night who killed it, and I didn't. His name is Gary Goman, and he's actually had his own specials now on Netflix. He's become uber successful, and he's lately been. His latest special was about dealing with his depression, but he's a comedian, and it's very, very funny and I assume very powerful. I haven't seen it, but I'm just thrilled. And here's a guy who went on to become super successful. So I can't compare my first time on stage with his first time on stage, because we have different journeys.

Yeah, you said that we have different journeys. And different journeys means, yes, one, we can't compare. But you know what? If we can see the failure as an opportunity to pick ourselves up, learn something new, apply that, it can make a huge difference in the world of speaking. You may not be a toastmaster competing, but you may be an emerging speaker and you have a message. You want to have an impact on your audience with that message. And your first few presentations may not go as well as you would like. And I will confess, I used to dread reading the evaluations at a conference session. Evaluations. Because somebody always gives you like a one out of a five. You know, it's like, oh, and they tell you how awful you are, and it happens. But I realized, and I really had to learn this, Darren. I really had to learn. My audience gives me a review. They're telling me what they liked, they're telling me what they didn't like, and they're telling me what I can do to make it better for the most part. So I had to view the evaluation that was not so glowing with the mindset of how can I take this misstep, this mishap, and this mess up and make it better? Using the information I received and working on my craft to make it better every single day. Because even the seasoned pros and the champions, we have talked about this before. They work on their craft. The superstar comedians go to the small comedy club and they try new material out. We bounce things, you and I, off each other. We go through our process of saying, okay, that didn't work so well. Why? Let's figure it out and let's make it better. And if we have the mindset to learn from the failure, there's no telling what we can accomplish.

Yeah. When I think back too, to when Rick said so to me, then Rick expounded that we all fail. I learned from his journey, even though my journey wasn't different. And that's when we're on stage. I think that's the critical idea that we need to understand, is that we're. We're helping people who are in front of us, listening to us get past their own failures. So how are we gonna do that if we don't tell our failure story or stories? Why? Because there's that lesson in it that then becomes powerful, like you said, because of our authenticity. We talked in the battle episode, you know, that struggle, that's what people wanna see. That's really the part that inspires other people because we see other people who didn't give up and kept going within our subject area, whatever we're talking about. So your failure stories in line with your subject are going to be different from someone else's failure stories in line with their subject. So I think that's really a critical issue, that every subject, it's almost like that secret ingredient is hope. And that's what we're giving when we share our failure stories is hope. And the audience needs that. Absolutely. I don't care what level you're at, because even if you're killing it, you still now you can fall farther from grace, but we still need that reminder to keep going, to keep being a sponge.

Indeed. You know, several weeks ago, we did a podcast. We had, I think it was Jim Key and Ed Tate. We did a podcast on how you can get up after losing and bombing. And it's not quite the same thing in terms of, yes, we may lose a contest, we may bomb on stage. And Ed Tate was very open about that. But it's the willingness we have and the level of comfort, almost having the desire to tell the story, knowing the benefit it'll have for that particular audience on that day within that context. And I'm glad you said your story in line with your subject matter. So it's one thing to bomb and to come back, but it's quite something else to bomb to come back and then open your heart and your life and talk about it and share with the audience why it's important to tell your failure stories. And I know there's a movement around the world now where people get together and they share their failure stories. And one reason is you can help somebody shorten their failure learning curve by sharing your own story. You don't need to reinvent the bad wheel to realize, hey, his failure can inform my life and maybe I can learn more quickly. And then you want to pass it on if and when. Not if, when I do fail, how can I use this story to inspire my audience and help them grow through my own process? Right. It's like, what's the phrase you and Craig always use?

Yeah. Your long road can lead to their shortcut. A Craigism.

And a long road can involve falling down several times, rolling back down the hill, and trying to find a new way to get there. But the experience that you and I bring by sharing that journey through that failure might be just a shortcut by shortening their failure learning curve that your audience not only wants, but they desperately need as well.

And, Mark, as the coaches coach, we didn't plan this ahead of time, but I'm going to put you on the spot because you coach so many people, by the way, if you're listening to this and you're looking for a Coach, go to getaspeakingcoach.com and check out Mark Brown. Work with Mark Brown one on one. He is awesome. So please go check that out and see if you can work with him one on one on your failure stories or your success stories. But, Mark, I'm going to ask you this. For failure stories, what are some of the details or critical elements to telling a good failure story? We talked about authenticity, but in the actual delivery of the story, what do you think? Maybe some of the mistakes people say or what makes a good one?

Well, you know, for me, well, yes, certainly you want honesty. You want authenticity. And when I say authenticity and honesty and vulnerability, to me, a good failure story doesn't hold back on the truth, doesn't dilute what really happened for me. In my failure stories, I talk about decisions that I made. I talk about why I chose to do what I did. And by doing so, I give the audience a detail that makes them question their own motivation, their own mindset. Again, this is how I operate. So when I tell my failure story, I don't just tell what happened. I want to give the backdrop, the context within which I made the choice. Like the youth program, I went there, I wanted to meet the superstar movie star, and I talked about my motivation behind that led to my own downfall. Sometimes if we talk about simply ignorance, not knowing what was going to be involved, let the audience understand the why behind it and also show how your mind was changed, how your life was changed, how your motivation was changed. And in my failure stories, I include those details. And of course, again, any other story, you want to try to make the characters as vivid as possible so they can understand what took place. When you told your failure story, you gave us a very clear picture of what took place. The mindset, the emotion, the feeling behind it. And when people hear those details, they can connect their own thinking, their own mindset, their own hearts. And I don't know if you wanted more detail than that, but I certainly found that the context, the backstory, the mindset, the motivation, what was going through my head. When I reveal that to the audience, then the aha has come. And I can see them going, oh, I know why he did that. Of course they're going to want to know, how do you then pick yourself back up? What did you do with the lesson learned? And that can come later. I hope I've answered your question, my friend.

Yeah. And for if you're listening to this, understand when Mark Talked about his wrong motivation. Had he left that part out, it would not have been a good story. It would have been ego driven, and it would not be as relatable. The cool thing and the power of the story is we don't have to admit that sometimes we have the wrong motivations, but we can still learn that from the lesson of Mark telling his story. So he's not calling the audience out, he's calling himself out. And that's why the audience will be more open to what he has to say. So understand that that is a critical piece in your failure stories, did you have the wrong motivation? Did you have the wrong expectation? You've got to share that. What was your mind at? And let us picture the scene. You know, we teach this in our get coach to speak program. What is the moment? Can you share with us that moment when the revelation happened? What was around you? What could we see? Can we picture the characters? Can we picture the scene and the setting? And then also, what's important is your why. What's the motivation behind it? And then where did the lesson learn? What did you take from it? A failure story without the lesson learned is just entertaining.

Yeah. And really quickly. I learned some. Some simple lessons. You want to serve your client? Okay. The client came. She knew as a youth speaker, she knew. I talked to young teens. They wanted somebody of color. I was a perfect fit for all of that. But I just saw I could meet this movie star. So I was not by any means truly serving my client. I also learned this. Serve your audience when teenage kids don't even say hi to you when you're done. I mean, I'm used to kids saying I'm cool. I am used to. When I was 53 years old and a kid who was 13 came to me and said, you're cool, I would rejoice, but these kids were like the crickets in the room at a comedy club. Not even a high or hello or goodbye. And when the meeting planner just totally ghosts you for like 20 plus years, it can't let you know you totally messed up. Here's the. Here's the best, worst part, Darren. I got to meet the celebrity for about 15 to 30 seconds as they were being escorted out. And I never got in contact with them again. I was like Persona non grata. They didn't know who I was. Took half a day, went to an event for the wrong motive, for the wrong reason, failed my client, failed the audience, and I even failed myself. I didn't really gain anything, but a huge lesson from failing and the wrong motivation. And after 20 years, I still remember that. I'm not going to forget it. And I hope no one ever makes the same mistake I did, because we tell our failure stories, hopefully to prevent you, our audiences, from making the same mistakes.

Yeah, I think we might do a future episode about matching the message with the audience, because in that case, it just wasn't the message with your story with the audience. But when I think of your brush with frame that you just described, that sound like a couple bristles at best.

A stray hair or two at the end of one of the bristles, you know, and. And the thing is, I don't want anyone to miss this. One of my other mistakes was I knew deep down, I knew it wasn't my lane. Teams and politics was not my lane. But, hey, teens and me, I do this all the time. I can kind of wing it. Big mistake, huge failure. So, subsequently, I have turned down opportunities for wonderful assignments because I knew the worst thing I had done was I had betrayed my own integrity. That was the worst thing I could do. So I will not accept an assignment I know I'm not qualified for, even though the client may think I am, because I seem to check all the boxes. So in your hearts, you know what is best, you know what is right. And hopefully, you and I will all act with integrity. And my failure story taught me that very critical lesson.

And we've done an episode about this before, too. But think of the moments in the story when you're telling your failure story. What are the key critical moments? We see this mistake all the time, Mark. When we coach people that they tell us about the moments, they don't let the audience stand there and see and witness the moments.

Yeah. And the thing is, we always talk about a moment. Some may call it a turning point, Some may call it a climactic point, But. But when the moment happens, and in some stories, you escalate, conflict is more than one moment, but that moment where everything shifts and everything changes. That can really strengthen the impact of your failure story. Because when you got it and you pass that on to your audience, that moment becomes meaningful not only to you, but to them. And some audience members will take your story, your failure story, and examine their own life, and they'll go, aha. That was a moment I should have. I could have, but I didn't. So now I face a new moment. And going forward, I can do these things differently. So if you're an emerging speaker just getting started, you're pretty experienced, or you May be the super high pro. You and I both know there have been your failure stories and chances are there will be other failure stories to come. The question becomes how will you use those failure stories to inspire, to educate, instruct, inform and uplift your audience?

Yeah. And one final quick thought. When telling your story, it can be really helpful to make sure we know that moment. We know where you're at. But also who was the Yoda, who was the hero to the hero? Who was that mentor that helped give you the realization, help you learn the story? And maybe it's a book, maybe it's actual person, maybe it's just your own aha moment, your own realization, realization that it happened. But make sure that is also a critical part of your failure story. And then the aftermath. What do you do now differently because of that failure Mark just talked about that he realized. I mean, I love that authenticity. You realized you compromised your own integrity. Why? Because you wanted to meet the famous person? I would never do anything like that. Joking, joking. Jk, jk, jk. Yeah, just kidding. I know I'm a little fame alicious. I put fame too much on a pedestal. But I've learned my lesson and it's stories like yours that remind me of that, that we gotta be careful what our motivation is. So Mark Brown, failure stories, your failure story. Any final thoughts for a speaker I.

Mentioned earlier the dreaded evaluation. Sometimes the Yoda, the wise person, is an anonymous individual who sends you in an evaluation form and writes a comment on it that lets you know why you failed and gives you some instruction and some guidance as to what you can do going forward. So don't be like me. Don't ignore the speaker evaluation. At times they can be painful, but oh, at times they can be so instructive. The last stop I have for you is this. Maybe to this point you didn't think it was important, or maybe you were too embarrassed to share your failure story. But as Darren says, if you're willing to get over yourself and realize how you can truly help and serve your audiences, I'd inspire you to share your failure story.

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