Ron Ploof argues that clear intent is what makes storytelling persuasive. Audiences judge your actions based on what they think you're trying to do, and they'll fill in the blanks with their own assumptions if you don't tell them. Without explicit intent, facts and emotion alone won't stick.
Chapters
We establish connectedness through common experiences. Most of the photographs here come from my friend Dan Steinhardt. He is a street photographer, and he's got the coolest photographs. This is from the Urban Iditarod. You know the Iditarod in Alaska where they do the dog sled races? This is up in Portland, Oregon. It's called the Urban Iditarod, and I guess people dress up in costumes and go from bar to bar to bar. Mm-hmm. So think about this. This is interesting because I've never seen guys with chicken heads and drinking beer, so it's interesting. But think about it from their experience. They have a common experience, a bond, because they're all inside the chicken heads. There's us and there's them. And so they can get together maybe 10 years from now and say, hey, do you remember when we wore the chicken heads? Right? They connect by a shared experience. And that's what we need to try to do to be persuasive. We need to find some sort of shared experience. Aristotle said in his treatise Rhetoric that if you want to persuade anybody to do anything, you need 3 things. Ethos, logos, and pathos. Logos, the logic, the facts. You need the facts. However, if you stand in front of somebody and just give them the facts, you're not going to persuade them. Why? Because remember, they're telling their own stories in their own heads. You also need pathos. You need emotion. There has to be some emotional connection. And when I say emotion, I'm not saying I want you to go up and make people cry or make them laugh, but to have that bond, to find that commonness beyond just the logic. Is there a way for them to say, yeah, I can feel what you're saying? And then last but not least is ethos, the ethics, the— are you a credible person? The only way to persuade someone is to make sure that you're a credible person, you know your stuff, and that there is an emotional connection with your audience. You do those things and you persuade. And so now we get to— there's one character trait that has the most influence over an audience. This also came out of Kendall's research, that as he was watching people's brains on story, they noticed that if they kept changing this one thing, it had the most effect on what they thought What the character did? Anybody want to make a guess on what that might be? The one thing, the one thing. Motive. I'll tell you. It's a tough one. I'll tell you. Motive. Why are they doing what they're doing? Why? If you change the why, it doesn't matter what they're doing. You change the why, you have the most influence. You can change the way a person looks at the situation, the motive. When you're standing in front of this audience, do they know your motive? Do they, do they know why you're doing what you're doing? No. They better, because that is the most important thing to be persuasive. And something you need to think about. Let me give you— I'll tell you a little story. About 25 years ago, my wife and I are in a diner, and we just finished, and we're walking out, and we're coming up against one of these revolving doors. Now, as I'm walking, I'm pretty close to the revolving door, and that this little boy comes running right past me. And he's running and he's reaching his arm into the door just as there are 3 teenagers who've squeezed themselves into one of the little pie suits and they're pushing really hard. And so this little guy's arm's in there and I'm watching this door close. And I'm the closest to him. Now, have you ever had one of those moments where time stands still? Yes. This was one of my moments. Time stood still because what went through my mind at that time was, oh my gosh, I have to save this little boy's arm. The emotion side, right? The human instinct to protect a child. But the logic side said to me, wait a minute, there is a cultural norm that you never touch anyone else's kids. You never— even if you're a relative, you don't even touch their kids. Well, instinct took over and I pulled him really hard and he's Get it across the floor, right to his mother's feet. And she looked like she wanted to kill me. She didn't see why I pulled him. All she saw was a 6-foot-2, 225-pound guy, a brute who threw her kid across the floor For no apparent reason. If looks could kill, I would not be here today. And she came after me. I swear she was foaming at the mouth. Luckily, Dad saw what happened and he bear hugged her. He mouthed the words thank you to me, and she looked pretty wiry, so I just got the heck out of Dodge and I left the restaurant. But think about this for a minute. We all saw the same actions, but it was that intent— why did I throw him? It totally changes the story. It totally changes the story. And so you need to make sure that you have some way of explaining intent, why you're doing this. Otherwise, they may be like the mom who's coming up with their own intent. If you don't tell them intent, remember, your brain is wired to make sense, to make meaning. They're going to make up their own. And you don't want that to happen. Make sure they understand your intent. Audiences evaluate actions through their perception of intent. Their perception of intent, not the actual intent. I can't get into your heads and understand your intent. So I have a perception of your intent. As a storyteller, your job is to close that gap. It's another Dano photo. I guess he likes taking pictures of people with animals on their heads. But if you just saw this person walking into a store or whatever without knowing their intent, right? Let's say they were walking into a bank. Maybe they're going to rob a bank. I don't know. What if it was a reality television show and they said, hey, you have to go in and Get someone to give you service. Well, then it becomes funny. It's the intent. The most important thing you need to do is, is think about, do people understand my intent? My intent of being here is to teach you some storytelling skills, and hopefully I've conveyed that. That's what I'm trying to do. There are always 2 stories, always. There's a story being told and the story being heard. Very rarely are they the same thing. 2 stories. Same with your intent. You need to use these skills— interesting, memorable, persuasive— to help you communicate. Thank you.
