Don't Memorize Your Speech

Don't memorize. That's really the whole tip today is don't memorize your speech. I would go so far as to say, don't memorize your opening. Don't memorize your closing. There are many public speaking experts who do recommend that you memorize the opening. Here's the problem with memorization. It's really hard. Why start off doing something that's really hard? That most of the time is not going to help you give a better speech? The problem with memorizing a speech is you're putting a lot of pressure on your memory when you're standing up and speaking, especially if it's in front of a larger audience than normal or people you don't know. Your body is feeling stress. When your body's feeling stress, it's sending adrenaline out and it's telling your brain, stop working and start running. That's why you get sweaty palms. That's why there's more perspiration coming out of your feet. It's your body's biological impulse, its evolutionary impulse to help you survive. Because in the jungle, if you're scared because you hear a lion or a tiger or bear coming to eat you, you need to be able to run. That's not the time to be doing heavy thinking. Unfortunately, when you're giving a speech, people probably aren't literally going to come eat you or kill you. You're going to have to do the speech. So the adrenaline pulsing through your body, the sweaty pump doesn't help you, and yet your memory isn't going to work as well. The problem with memorization also is once you get one word wrong, it's like you've gone over a speed bump, the whole thing, sort of. Just to mix metaphors, it gets derailed. Sorry about that. See, this is a perfect example. I didn't memorize that, but I just now spoke to you in a way that's conversational. That was unplanned, that wasn't perfect, and yet it sounds real. Or at least I hope it sounds real, because the way I'm talking to you now is not memorized. I'm not reading a script. I'm simply sharing with you my expertise, based on real world experiences, of having helped people learn how to speak more effectively. It might not be perfect, as in the case of that mixed metaphor. I think you can understand what I'm talking about and it's relatively easy to listen to. And it's a lot less pressure for me because if I had to memorize all of my scripts, it would Take me forever, because my memory really isn't very good. When you see someone on Broadway, a top Broadway star, and they execute a line and a play, and it just sounds so real. Keep in mind these actors rehearsed for weeks and months and months. Maybe they played this role other times off Broadway, high school, maybe. For years they have gone through specialized training. Juilliard, Yale School of Drama. That's a lot of work. That's a lot of pressure. You don't want to compete with them. What I find works best for most people most of the time is focus on the ideas and let the words come naturally to you to describe those ideas. Plan your ideas, plan your messages, plan your images, plan your stories. But then talk it out in a way that comes to you naturally. There are exceptions. I have clients who've given some wildly successful TED talks, and the speeches, for the most part, were memorized. But here's the rub. It takes so much time. Some of these speakers spent months and months rehearsing, practicing again and again and again, getting the speech just right, listening to the audio, watching the video hundreds of times, walking on the beach, on the airplane, on the way to the TED conference. They've said it so many times that the grooves are in their brain and it comes out almost word for word, the same. So there can be times when it works for you, but it's not a decision to be made lightly because there's a huge, huge time commitment for most people, most of the time, you're much better off. Simple outline. Have your messages planned, your stories planned, your images planned. But don't try to memorize.