TJ WALKER - THE HABIT INFLUENCER - Personal Development | LIVE STREAM

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Speaking the show about effective speaking in public to the media at work and in life speaking with tj walker.

My guest today is as close as it comes to a natural born salesman as i've ever encountered justin ledford is with us by the age of eighteen he'd sold more than one hundred twenty five thousand dollars worth of cutco knives i don't know what that is but it sure sounds difficult by the time he was just out of college he'd sold more than a million dollars almost two million dollars worth of other products he he's also the author of visions to the a millionaire's secret formula to productivity visualization and meditation justin thanks for.

Joining us tj thank you so much for having me i really appreciate it.

So is it a myth or is there such a thing as a natural.

Born salesman i think it's a myth because anybody can be taught how to communicate with people effectively and anybody can be taught how to sell a product especially if they find a passion behind what they're selling you know at the end of the day we're all selling ourself and meeting with people i mean we're always selling ourself and so i believe it's a myth i fortunately had great training great mentors and i literally learned from the best of the best in the business and just followed after them and did what they did and had great success from that philosophy follow the best i want to hear about.

Your mentors in the beginning in a moment but first share with us one of your top nuggets from the book visions to the top what are people going to learn from this wow that's.

A great question i truly believe that more and more people need to access their inner spiritual self what i mean by that is we all have the ability to close our eyes focus on our breath and we all have the ability to some people call it meditation it's actually known as visualization olympic athletes they they all do this stuff michael phelps he just won the gold medal two girls in the volleyball arena in the olympics they just won the gold medal as well and in their interview they talked about visualization as being the key to their success visualization is a practice where you in the quietness of your home or your office you close your eyes and you see your day as if you want it to happen so i have put together the four phases of visualization and basically i teach people how to access a calm state phase one is just being focusing on your breath phase two is past successes where you're focusing on you literally go back in time and you see past images in your mind images that where you want in life or a moment in time where you were happy somebody gave you love a moment in time where you were celebrating and that's in your past and you cycle through multiple times of your past that's past images future vision future visions is phase three that's where you focus on how you want your day to go and you see your day as if it's happening right there before you at the highest level of success what you want to achieve for the week see those things unfolding before you and what you want to achieve for the month or the year i go as far as five years ten years fifteen years and the practice is anywhere from five minutes to thirty minutes every morning and i've studied literally like some of the most successful business people spiritual leaders athletes celebrities and there's one thing in common it's visualization so let me play devil's advocate with.

That a moment because i certainly think that visualization can be an important part of any successful person's toolkit and i've heard michael phelps talk about that as well but i also know that for example michael phelps has watched in detail all of his gold medal wins from the swimming sessions he's actually not just visualized himself winning gold he's watched video of himself watching gold and he's been able to see the ultimate vision a video in front of him so my frustration is when it comes to communication is i often hear so called public speaking experts say close your eyes visualize a standing ovation or visualize your audience loving you and my point is don't even think about doing that until you've practiced your speech on video and actually seen a vision of yourself on video speaking the way you want tell me are we contradictory or am i off.

Base no you're absolutely correct you actually have to practice i mean there was a study published by some russian scientists and they took four group of olympic athletes group one did one hundred percent physical training group two did seventy five percent physical training and twenty five percent mental training group three fifty fifty physical and fifty percent mental group four they did twenty five percent physical training and seventy five percent mental training and they found that over and over group four was the one who outperformed all of them yes they did their physical training twenty five percent of the time and seventy five percent of the time they did their visualization the reason this is because our mind literally the neuroscience behind it our mind gets wired even though we're just sitting there closing our eyes and tapping into those emotions and feelings and senses and imagery our mind knows no difference it wires itself as if it's already happening and yes you do have to take action you do have to practice some of the greatest speakers tony robbins zig ziglar jim rohn they all you know as well as i know tj they practice their their presentation or their pitch or their whatever they wanted to come across multiple times before they went on stage the book is.

Visions to the a millionaire's secret formula to productivity visualization and meditation justin ledford thanks for being our guest you're very welcome ok timeout let's pull back the curtain now that was sort of the typical length of an interview if you were on let's say a public radio show or nbc's today show good morning america five six minutes now let's step back for a minute justin and tell us what were you trying to accomplish there how did you prepare how do you typically prepare for an interview like.

That how do i typically prepare for an interview like we just had i literally get in a power pose there's something called power poses and weak poses and imagine you're standing there with your chest out you have one hand on the table you're focused on your breathing that's a power pose and then imagine the weak pose where maybe one hand is on your chin or your arms are crossed you're slouching over they've done studies on power poses and weak poses a person who's in a power pose their brain releases testosterone and decreases cortisol levels whenever they're in a weak pose it's the opposite they lose testosterone and increase cortisol so long story short what that means there was a woman in the olympics recently and all ten girls or eleven girls were about to race and run for the sprint jumping over those little things and one of these ladies was in a power pose jumping up and down constant state of a power pose and the other girls were just standing there literally not doing anything and it was mind boggling to me because i knew what she was doing i knew she was increasing her blood with testosterone and reducing cortisol from the power pose long story short once the gun was fired she flew down the track and beat everybody how is this associated with communication when you're in a confident state or also known as peak state you feel confident you feel ready and that's how i prepare i show up in that state of mind confidence in a peak state with my chest out ready to take on whatever somebody.

Has to offer and justin this probably won't surprise you it might surprise some of our listeners i'm standing right now.

Are you standing or sitting i'm standing both hands on my hips chest out.

Okay we're two peas in a pod and we didn't we didn't coordinate that in advance the other just practical reason i think it's a good idea to stand for podcast interviews radio interviews is you're more likely to gesture move your hands you're more likely to breathe more deeply and i'm not someone who historically puts a lot of emphasis on the whole breath thing but i do think standing and not being all slumped over is an advantage for any sort of.

Spoken presentation i agree whenever you can breathe in you have more time to think and respond instead of being so like it's easy i've been on stage before in my first you know presentations in business and i wasn't breathing and i noticed i started getting nervous so it's important to take a breath when you're in front of you know we have we have professional communicators here listening to us it's important to take a breath calm your mind and focus on what you need to focus on to close that deal or get your point.

Across let's talk about focus what was your specific goal in the interview we just did and what were the three or more or fewer messages you really wanted to leave with the audience my.

Specific goal i really truly believe i've had a crazy amount of success before the age of thirty i've made millions of dollars i have multiple businesses that produce millions of dollars in business and it's all because my goal is i want more people to tap into their inner power self their their level ten life i want more people to understand that we can all visualize i give keynote messages all the time literally twice a month and whenever i do the visualization practice i see people with huge smiles i see tears coming down their face while their eyes are closed going through the practice so what i want people to realize is we all have a great power within us we sometimes forget you know it's like going to the gym the first time you go you might not be so strong you might run and it might be difficult but the second and third and fifth and tenth time you start to enjoy yourself running that's your physical body i'm talking about your inner mental clarity and focus and and that whenever somebody starts tapping in that regularly that's when they start to become more powerful so my purpose is to help people tap into visualization and meditation ultimately so they become more productive and fulfill their dreams.

So let's ask our audience let's ask them to give you feedback if you picked up on those messages from the interview feel free to send a tweet to justin and your twitter handle is what's.

Your twitter handle oh my goodness it's that's a great question i my wife.

And for that you know i'm being.

Presumptuous shame on me my wife handles all that well but you don't have.

To use twitter my question should be actually what is the social media outlet you prefer people communicate with you on.

It so they can find me on instagram just ledford dot com somebody took justin so it's j u s t l e d f o r d or you can obviously find me on facebook justin ledford or of course my book visions to the top comm it has a contact form or justinledford dot net.

Good rule for those of you hosting podcasts don't assume everyone thinks the same youtube same as you do i'm assuming people like to give out twitter for instant feedback but instagram is a perfectly fine social media outlet where i am profoundly ignorant so i'm showing my bias there so thanks for sharing that and go ahead and contact him on instagram with any thoughts you have on the messages now you mentioned anthony robbins it's been probably ten years but i've been to one of his seminars he does an awful lot with visualization so do many of the other self help gurus you mentioned what's different about your approach how do you communicate differentiation in your brand of and i don't mean this pejoratively self help but it is help for business people in more than just business but life how do you differentiate your take on visualization well one.

Of the things that i do with the audience that is listening to me whether it's in a keynote environment or if they're reading my book or listening to the audiobook is there's something called a dreams list and it's you know what does a gps do a gps takes you to point a to point b as fast as possible and we all have dreams that we might not be fulfilling because we forgot about them we are busy with work our family and whatever the case might be so what i do is i tap into people's dreams and simply put i allow them to just get out a pen and paper and we write dreams list physical intellectual spiritual emotional material psychological and we go through several others and then we list out three to five per category and the thing about it is when people don't know what they want in life how can they expect to get it when you go shoot a bow and arrow you have to know what you're trying to hit and that's the concept with the dreams list so i tie the dreams list into the visualization practice and when i'm guiding somebody through the visualization practice i say certain things where they're able to see what they want to happen in their dream so i might not be i'm not a guru or anything i'm just a normal guy who has had a lot of success before the age of thirty and i attribute that to hard work and visualization and our guest today is.

Justin ledford he's the author of visions to the a millionaire's secret formula to productivity visualization and meditation it is available on amazon i read the kindle version a lot of good nuggets there i would urge you to check it out by the way this program is brought to you by media training worldwide if you would like free no obligation media training or presentation training course more than one hundred videos go to mediatrainingworldwide dot com and click on the online school and you can get that no obligation course course justin you do several keynote addresses to various audiences conferences all over the country and the world every month what is your signature story that is.

An awesome story so when i was eighteen years of age i was having great success like you mentioned selling cutco knives which is a really high end kitchen knife that's made here in america and i cut my i was about to cut a pumpkin i sat down on the floor to get better leverage i pulled a brand new knife out of a sheath i put the knife inside the pumpkin with my right hand i put my left hand on the pumpkin and i pushed down and before i knew it i dropped the knife for some reason and i felt this rush of heat go straight through my hand i stood up and my hand was on fire and then all of a sudden it just split open from from my from my thumb all the way down to near my pinky and at that moment i said to myself do not freak out i literally said that over and over don't freak out don't freak out what i i think i would be freaking out and because i knew i could die if i freaked out blood i mean i don't straight up man blood was gushing hitting my ceiling i was hitting my fan it was all over me all over my house my couch everything so i ran inside my bathroom grabbed a purple towel rushed wrapped it around my arm went outside started screaming for were you by yourself by myself this is the day after halloween i went outside and i'm screaming help help as loud as i can and two people walk by me because my my apartment was facing the the parking lot they thought i was joking they were literally pointing at me like that's funny and good prank and i'm screaming for help fortunately somebody showed up by the grace of god at the nick of time dropped me off to the hospital and dropped me off at the wrong location i had to run to the er and with every run blood was pumping from my arm with every step i get to the window and i'm like help help the lady said no no you're fine just go sit down we'll be with you in a minute i remember saying some curse words to her and hitting the window that she was behind because i was dying you know and i go to the door the big blue doors and i kick through the doors with all my might i scream help as loud as i can and the doctors they all they're pushing patients this is behind the er where doctors are supposed to go only and they all look at me and start running to me i fall on the ground and and i'm on the ground bleeding out and this guy comes up to me he takes the purple towel off me it was blue but now it's purple and he looks at my hand he's like oh my god what cut you and i looked up at this guy right in his eyes and i said cutco have you ever heard of it i was still trying to sell the guy even though i was dying.

But.

That was a great moment in my life i'd say that was a signature moment in my life from that moment i realized i could make the choice to because they were prescribing me drugs because of the serious pain that i was in i could have made the choice to be a victim and play the victim mentality and oh woe is me but instead i realized that we are powerful we we can accomplish anything we want in life and i decided to say no to what they're prescribing me and heal through my mind through meditation through prayer through visualization there's a guy named doctor emoto he studied water and the cells of water something i highly recommend your audience look at and i decided to heal myself and within the doctor by the way the doctor said you'll never use your hand again he told me right in my eyes and i looked at him i said i will not accept your diagnosis and then i woke up and a couple days later you know within a week i was back out in the field closing deals meeting with people having a good time because i live by the five minute rule if something happens in my life and it's bad or good let's just say it's bad it happened i can't change it so why dwell on the past you know some people get upset and bring it up a week or two or a month later for me the five minute rule i found out when i first learned about this about eleven years ago i can be super upset stop my feet you know bicker and moan but then after five minutes i did that for like thirty seconds and i'm like okay well i'm supposed to do this for five minutes and i'm already done i don't have anything else to complain about so after doing that the fourth or fifth time i realized you know what i can't change it so let's just focus on what i can focus on and what i can achieve so that's the moment in my life i'd like to share with your audience anytime we go through challenges those are really just opportunities to see how we're going to take it are we going to grow from it or put our tail between our legs become weaker from it i chose to grow from it so how did.

You really start selling your career at age fourteen now i was someone who was more comfortable public speaking certainly than most kids i was one of these little student government nerds running around giving speeches all the time i had no problem doing that but i could never sell anything i always came in last place for the magazine sales and the candy sales for the various your baseball team your cub scout troop and i did try to sell i don't know if it was cut coat knives but some sort of direct sales thing i went out three days i think i sold nothing i was a kirby vacuum cleaner salesman for three days sold nothing so i have tremendous respect for anyone especially at a young age who can.

Do that how did you do that well i was actually mowing yards and doing odd jobs painting houses anything of that nature at a young age i grew up in kind of a humble background you know we didn't have everything some of my friends were blessed and fortunate to have a nice home nice car and my family went through divorce at a young age and it was really challenging i never wanted that to happen with my future family so i realized it was mostly about money the fights and stuff in my growing up so i realized i never wanted that so i started as an entrepreneur at a young age i was that weird guy you know selling candy in school i was you know selling the football tickets and just having car washes and i was always like always very entrepreneurial and one day i was painting a house i got a phone call while i was on a ladder and it was a guy named matt storm i can never remember it he called me it was super hot outside in texas and asked if i was looking for work i spilled the paint all over the house so obviously i was upset while i was talking with him but he told me one of my friends has had a lot of success which i knew that guy was very successful i went in for an interview and the rest is history i just knocked it out of the park once i got trained and started learning under the top people in the business and what.

Was the key to that just the ability to walk into any store or home and not worry about doors shut in your face or rejection is it a numbers game or how much of it is about just being a great communicator and good listener once you've got.

Someone well you know in any business whether you're dealing with ceo's or you're trying to close a prospect or you're dealing with your wife or husband or children you have to know you have to listen to them and i wasn't afraid of hearing no because you're right it is a numbers game so i'd go in people's houses and just first and foremost how to win friends and influence people it's a great book i wanted to become their friend first and foremost and by doing that if they like you and they trust you then they'll do business with you so that's what ended up happening people liked me because i was friendly and i had a great product so they ended up buying it.

So how have you continued to improve you obviously started honing your speaking skills even if it's just one on one when you're fourteen fifteen and selling knives how do you continue to improve as a speaker and what what motivates you do you watch ted talks do you watch old zig ziglar videos.

What do you watch oh that's a great question i'd say what motivates me i listen to podcasts literally every day on my way to my office i rarely watch tv unless it's something very specific beneficial knowledge because we are what we put inside of ourselves and if we're listening to you know top performing people speak and we're listening to you know the best of the best then it's going to rub off on us you know our level of income is in direct proportion to the level of how much we're growing personally and we are who we surround ourselves with so i try to surround myself with you know very successful people i like i said i don't watch very much tv unless it's a documentary or something specific i do listen to ted talks all the time i love your podcast and multiple other people's podcasts those are the.

If you could share with and thank you by the way but share with us some of the names of other podcasts you find particularly helpful very very.

Good question i'd say matty a with millionaire mindset is one very good podcast another one is hal elrod with achieve youe dreams another one is the front row factor with john vroman the smart passive income podcast with pat flynn those are a couple that just stick out to me but i'd say the one that inspires me the most is john vroman the front row factor and how elrod achieve your dreams never heard of.

Those so i will check those out i certainly have heard of pat flynn and do subscribe to his podcast but the others are new to me so i will check those out can you think of the best speech you ever saw of someone in person not necessarily on video or franklin roosevelt inaugural address but someone you saw in person the.

Best speech i ever saw in person was in two thousand eight with a man named matthew kelly he wrote the rhythm of life that book changed my life he also wrote the dream manager that book also had a big influence at who i am today matthew kelly is from australia he's got this crazy awesome australian accent and he went up on stage and just dazzled me with how he spoke his words and told his stories and it was just great man i left that conference feeling like i was on fire and that was the best speech i ever listened to.

Okay and my next question it's okay to not mention somebody by name but can you think of the worst speech you ever saw in person to me it's peter lowe of the whole success seminars to me he always seemed like sort of a bad parody of a motivational speaker but is there anyone you can think of and if you want to just describe them that's okay too.

I can't honestly think of like a bad speech that i've listened to i am i could say that i've seen speeches where people weren't prepared where they were shuffling through their notes where they weren't connecting with their audience where they weren't getting their audience engaged those are i can't nail one person as the worst speech i've ever heard but i can say those simple things that if you're not connecting with your audience you know shuffling your papers you're not prepared if you're standing in weak poses like i mentioned people can sense this stuff and those are some of the things that i would say i've noticed bad speakers do.

Any other major influences on you as a communicator when you were growing up any particular tv announcers or politicians you admired or respected because of.

Their speaking skills honestly my baseball coach he wasn't like a you know famous or anything but he had a really really big house and he had a baseball field in his backyard and he was a drill sergeant in some in the marines or something like that and just the way he spoke to us he was caring but at the same time he was stern he was you know passionate in the heat of the moment like when we were in our baseball championship games but he was also you know calm and collected when he needed to be i didn't really watch much tv growing up sorry nothing to.

Be sorry about i'm sure you will not be on your deathbed regretting how little tv you watched you just gave me a flashback talking about your baseball coach i remember for completely different reasons the speech of my little league football coach i was in fifth grade and everything out of the coaches there were two coaches mouths was and i was brought up in a very sort of cloistered protective leave it to beaver family great family and parents were mild mannered conservative southern baptist and i just had never really heard a curse word other than once every five years in a major crisis and i just remember it having this terribly like depressing almost like a slap in the face when i heard it from the football coaches so it is amazing the things that can stick with you now for me that was more than forty years ago and.

That'S amazing that you brought that up because things are ingrained in our subconscious mind forever that's a fact and sometimes we can get rid of those things but our subconscious is like it's like the you know hey you say the tip of the iceberg well our conscious mind is the tip our subconscious is underneath the water it's deep it's vast it goes on and on and on and on and that's your subconscious mind clicking and saying hey i remember that moment and i truly believe i mean i'm not the only one like i said i'm not a guru if you know how to program your subconscious mind you can achieve anything you want in life i learned this eleven years ago when i first started in business and i've been doing it since and it's helped out a lot.

Our guest is justin ledford he is the author of visions to the a millionaire's secret formula to productivity visualization and meditation available now on amazon especially the kindle edition the one i read by the way this is speaking with tj walker if you have any questions comments suggestions for guests in the future criticisms critiques send it to me directly on twitter j walker you can also email me tjediatrainingworldwide dot com is there anyone else you respect now in the business world political world media world as a communicator and we're not really talking about their politics or even what business they're in but just their ability to communicate yeah as far.

As ability to communicate i would say hal elrod he is the creator of the miracle morning which is an incredible book that changed my life he's one of the best speakers that i've ever listened to same with john berghoff john bergoff is not very well known but companies hire him like vitamix he helped that company go from i think it was fifty million to over two hundred million in one year he's a very effective communicator i don't really keep up with current events as much as some people do i'm kind of in my own bubble of personal growth i like to listen to your podcast and the other podcasts i mentioned and then go close deals with people that's pretty much what i'm doing throughout the day or giving speeches at conferences let's talk about.

Speeches you were speaking at an early age making sales of your painting gigs everything else one on one but when was the first time you spoke and said to yourself okay that's an actual speech it's more than five people it's not just a school room what was.

Your first speech my first speech i'd have to say would be actually at a cutco event when i was eighteen years of age i had an awesome summer i produced over one hundred thousand dollars in sales personally and over one hundred twenty five thousand dollars as a manager i trained people and taught them how to sell and i was in a room with five hundred people in arizona at a big conference and i remember just the feeling of just nailing that conversation that that speech people standing up clapping it was a great feeling.

Man well that's if only we could all have so many nice successes to start with that is a good benchmark some people have great first speeches some like barbara corcoran the famed real estate investor who is now on shark tank always talks about how her very first speech she stood up in front of a thousand people and her just froze nothing came out of her mouth and she ran out of the room but things turned out for hers you know speaks all over the place it's a.

Muscle tj it really is my first speech ever it was a childhood play in school i don't know how old i was i was a sheriff and i remember being nervous and you know feeling anxiety as a kid i remember these feelings today and the first time i didn't do so well and then the second time and third you know you get better with practice they say practice makes perfect but i like to say if you try to practice perfectly that's how you get it perfect and.

Any star athletes had bad days had strikeouts what are some of your bad speeches surely you must have had some that weren't quite as smooth as the.

First one some of my bad speeches let's see i was trying to i'm trying to think my my worst speech.

I mean i've been booed off stages before i've fallen off a stage before.

That'S tough my worst speech ever happened when i was i was young you know nineteen years old i started to try to sell to real estate agents inside of their office so i'm used to one on one person to person i tried to do business to business sales but the thing is i have to go in and do a team meeting where there's like a hundred or two hundred real estate agents and i tried that and there's people in my business that do that phenomenally but when i tried it i didn't do so well and i didn't have that immediate success that i was used to having so i decided to stick with my strengths my strengths were one on one with the people you know i've been referred to and that's the thing with your with your communicating your audience that communicates find out what your strengths are and focus on those strengths that's what you want to focus on that's what i do in my business and in all parts of my life as well and it's really helped me go very far by focusing on my strengths i.

Do agree that that's generally the best way to go too many people obsess over the two percent area where they're not doing something right so so for example i am just not a good stand up comic i took a stand up comedy class twenty years ago never got to the point where i really felt like it was working even with a test audience of friends in the standup comedy class and you know what i just don't do stand up comedy and no one's been disappointed on the other hand i was doing an interview at abc a couple years ago my wife was with me and she said you started every single answer using the word well i didn't say ah or but i said well so i did have a problem there and i decided to improve so i wrote out the word well put the international no sign around it like no left hand turn no parking and i taped that sign on my cell phone computer and a few other places and drastically reduced it so we all have flaws i know i'm certainly not perfect do you see any flaws you have now as a speaker where are you still trying to improve as a communicator yeah i feel.

I definitely have flaws and i feel i always find myself doing things last minute i like to rush i like that feeling of showing up in a peak state and just nailing that moment so i should probably spend more time planning and preparing and by what i mean by that i kind of live in the philosophy of ready shoot aim instead of the philosophy instead of the philosophy ready aim fire so it's helped me in the past but it's also hurt me in the past so i should probably be more prepared that's one of my flaws.

Speaking of not being fully prepared can you think of your i'll give you the opportunity to be positive too your worst media interview ever and your best media interview my worst.

Media interview ever and my best okay so i'm going to start with my best my best interview ever or speech ever it was funny enough it happened last week i was a keynote speaker at a conference in arizona or it could have been two months ago in houston they both felt the same just awesomeness if that's even a word the speech was titled visions to the top obviously my book and i basically felt like tony robbins because the room was interacting they were answering questions people came up on stage and i did some mental psychological techniques on them the connection in the room was it was really on point at the end of it people were crying during and at the end people were crying with joy the negative ones in the room they ended up being cheerful and happy and the managers of each division they contacted me afterwards and they said their teams were noticeably doing better in performance and more productive so that would have to say one of my best training some salespeople.

In different states especially that last statement that people were contacting you after the fact seeing an actual change of performance because that's the hard part getting a tear or standing ovation for a lot of people can be easy but it's all forgotten sometimes hours even minutes later.

Yeah you got to give them like a plan of action you know okay so what did we learn here today one two three and then you know you get them something to do rather than feel people they will remember how you made them feel but if you give them a plan of action with that feeling they'll go home and do that action since you made them feel great now my worst interview man that's i don't want to sound like i don't conceited or anything but i'm really trying to have a hard time my worst interview okay so this was here we go i was on bourbon street at the crowne plaza hotel it was a keynote message for young college students who were also in sales and there was just a lot of distractions i'm gonna blame it on the distractions like bourbon street and you know add and these kids i was the last person to speak so they were ready to get you know go and have fun so i'm gonna blame it on that.

But i also that does seem like a less than ideal scenario and format for a serious interview because i well remember when i was young on bourbon street and listening to people pontificate on anything serious was not the top priority.

And you know as far as your audience goes like if you i have found that the introduction is the biggest one of the most important things the district manager he didn't introduce me properly he's just like hey this is justin letford he's awesome let's hear him talk instead of what i'm used to this guy has succeeded da da da da da he's doing great and here's why you should look you know the introduction whenever you're meeting somebody or introducing somebody make that person feel special and what happens is they become more receptive to you and open to listening.

This is slightly different but related how do you introduce yourself let's say you're at speakers convention or some conference and all of a sudden there's thirty people in the room and they say okay let's all go up let's all stand up and introduce ourselves for twenty thirty seconds how do you introduce yourself in that situation because i know a lot of people who are articulate and accomplished suddenly turn into just the most boring name rank and serial number people when that happens.

First of all i would stand in a power pose and i would smile and i'd say how's everybody doing and i'd get some interaction with the stage or with the group whoever i'm talking to and then if there was no interaction i'd say i'm sorry i can't see very well and i put my hand on my ear and i'd say how is everybody doing and the next thing you know everybody's like we're doing great so i'd get some interaction and then i'd say guys my name is justin ledford i'm not a guru i'm just a young man who has a passion and a dream to help people become a better version of themselves i've had a lot of success before the age of thirty and i have a message it's inside my book visions to the top i teach people how to use visualization how to use meditation and ultimately live a dream fulfilled life you know that's basically what i would do i'd say whether whether you're super successful in life or maybe you haven't made it to the success that you want it's like a buffet platter it has nuggets of wisdom inside of it that can teach anybody at any walk of life and that's something you're interested in you should come check we should have a conversation and i'd end it with a smile and just waving my hands people can sense if you're stuck up and stubborn and you know i like to have fun with life i wear flip flops you know i'm just a laid back kind of dude i'm wearing.

Crocs right now myself we are two peas in a pod it sounds like.

That'S awesome.

I want to hear from you i don't certainly don't want to end on a negative note but i do want to know what you think is some of the worst communication advice out there because anybody can call themselves a communications expert or a communications guru to use a word that i think you're not a huge fan of but i want to know what some of the best communication advice you think there is that isn't it either isn't followed or people just don't stop to think about but i also want to know what bad advice is out there that you think people should really shun absolutely.

That is a great question and i will say as far as like the best advice goes you know there's a quote that i've i live by let's see if i can find it it's from jim rome and he said i'm having a hard time finding but he basically said your level of income is in direct proportion to the amount of time you spend growing yourself and as far as communication goes know who your audience is that's one of the best pieces of advice know who they are know what their struggles are know what their strengths are know what they're trying to accomplish know where they're having difficulties and if you can know that come from a place of value how can i offer value to this audience whenever i got that in my head by offering value to people that helped me in my communication tremendously so that's one of my best pieces of communication that people rarely follow know your audience and offer value to them now did you ask me about the worst communication advice yes i'd say worst communication advice it's a great question going up and not being confident not looking people in the eye not connecting with your audience not interacting with them these are things i've mentioned before but i've seen it before when they're up on stage and they're just kind of going through the motions you know conceited like that's not good you want to connect with your audience and get them interacted that would be.

My tip and are there ways of interaction that just don't work i will be honest with you i personally just really don't like it when a speaker gets up and says how's everyone doing today or who here wants to make more money to me it always feels very contrived and like they're manipulating me it's like okay i have to raise my hand say something how do you make the judgment between the right amount of engagement versus something that can maybe half the audience likes but the other half thinks it's cheesy and manipulative that's.

A great question you really got to feel your audience out and you're right tj there's people who don't like don't like that stuff so there's ways around it what you do is you change their physiology and what i do is when i notice that kind of weirdness in the audience i'll get them to i say everybody stand up please grab all your belongings i need everybody everybody take a deep breath in and a lot of times it's just they need to breathe and then okay next i want you to turn to your neighbor on your right and give them a little massage now turn to your left and give them a little massage and that changes their physiology it changes their mental state and then if i see it again in the presentation i will literally i'll guide the audience if it's a one on one we'll go walk somewhere else and change the atmosphere if it's a group presentation i'll change it up and we'll go i'll get them to move into a different location whenever it's like a hundred or two hundred or plus people i'll have everybody switch seats that changes the physiology of people and it kind of throws them off a little bit and then they're back in peak state.

And final question justin what is it you want my audience to do well i should say the audience it sounds pretentious to say my audience what am i rush limbaugh i've been doing this for fifty years no what do you want the listeners of this show to do well you know.

Obviously i appreciate you asking i would love your audience to pick up a copy of my book i'm actually for your audience i'm giving away the first two chapters for free just so they can get a feel for it i want them to read that at visionstothetop dot com again it's visionstothetop dot com and if you like it be a supporter join our facebook community there's people all around the world i never would have expected this russia china japan all over europe emailing me every day telling me how this tactic or this technique has really helped them in business or in their health so i want your audience to become the best version of themselves and how does that happen it happens by personal growth whenever people are personally growing that's when better betterness begins it allows them to focus on contribution and living a better life you know as well as i know tj whenever you learn something new you want to share it with somebody right of course so i want your audience to be the best communicators possible learn how to visualize and definitely pick up a copy of my book visionstothetop com and they.

Can find you on facebook just by typing in justin ledford that is correct.

They can search for justin ledford visions.

Of the top and that's led f.

O r d that's correct and also my website justinledford dot net justinledford not.

Dot com but dot net three w's justinledford and we'll post a link to that in the show notes as well justin thanks for being our guest today again the name of the book visions to the a millionaire's secret formula to productivity visualization and meditation available now on amazon thank you tj thank you speaking with tj walker has been brought to you by media training worldwide for all of your media training and public speaking training needs whether it's one on one training workshops group workshops individual workshops online on demand courses in person or skype training all available to you from mediatrainingworldwide dot com.

Speaking with tj walker is the number one rated daily streaming tv and radio show devoted to all aspects of speech speaking and communication if you received value from this show then please subscribe to it at mediatrainingworldwide dot com please review the show leave comments and share it with your friends and colleagues today.