A short YouTube live-stream Q&A (TJ Walker) addressing a former student’s question about handling emotion when telling personal stories in speeches. Walker advises that relevant emotion and storytelling are powerful memory aids, recommends keeping emotion appropriate and relatable, suggests video-recording to calibrate self-perception, and encourages speakers to preserve emotion rather than trying to remove it.
Chapters
How much emotion is too much emotion in a speech or presentation? This question comes From Richard says TJ I took your class back in December 2012. I have a question that I've researched online but have been unsuccessful in finding an answer. When speaking to groups, I like using stories that spark and bring out emotions in people. Some of those are personal in nature. The question is, how do you keep from getting emotional when telling the story? I'm conscious of it and have worked at it, but it slips up on me sometimes. Smiley face. I'm not a blubbering idiot, but I'll get that lump in my throat that causes my voice to crack. I want to make the story impactful and remain in control. Any tips? Well, Richard, good to hear from you. If you're telling stories to make your point, number one, that's fantastic. That is the absolute most important thing you can do as a communicator. If you want people to remember ideas, you have to tell stories. Here's the thing about emotion that draws people in. It's more interesting as long as it seems relevant to the story and to the audience. If you get up to give a speech on the latest accounting software and all of a sudden you just say, well, you know, my spouse started yelling at me and my spouse doesn't respect me and you start crying, that's just going to be embarrassing. People are like, why is this person talking about that? It has nothing to do with the topic. Now I'm confident that's not what you're doing. If you're being emotional and the emotion is appropriate and people in the audience can relate to it and say, wow, I'd feel the same way. I think you're on the right track because now you're communicating at the intellectual level and sort of the gut emotional level that is extremely powerful. You say your voice cracked good. I've never once heard people leave a convention talking about a speaker and say, I hate the way that speaker had so many interesting, relevant stories that will help me in my business. But this speaker's voice cracked. Never heard that. What I have heard is, wow, I hated the way that speaker just bored us to death and read. Or that speaker just said the same old stuff that was in the handout that I hear all the time. So if your voice is cracking, guess what? That's a good thing. There are a lot of old time motivational speakers who have made tens of millions of dollars off of giving the same speech where their voice cracks at the same time each time at the same place. I'm not suggesting you try to do it like that or that it's easy to be those sorts of motivational speakers anymore. But emotion works for you. It makes you human, it draws you in. You just have to make sure that, as you mentioned, you're not blubbering, that it is appropriate in small doses. And the more important issue is can people relate to it and is the story 100% relevant to a message the audience finds interesting and useful? If that's the case, I beg you, don't try to strip the emotion out. People think, oh, it's not professional to have emotion. Guess what? The most highly paid professional speakers in the world have more emotion, not less emotion than everyone else. So keep it up. Now, one thing you can do, video record. You may feel like you're blubbering and almost losing it, but watching it on video, you may think, well, you just seem like you're conversational a little down. So oftentimes our perception of ourself is very different. Experiencing it versus seeing it as others do. So make sure you're video recording it it and make sure whatever you do, keep up with the stories, keep up with the emotion. Richard, good to hear from you. I'm T.J. walker. I help people speak more effectively. If you would like to become a better speaker, I've got several solutions for you. I have online courses which you can start learning right now, today. I've got in person public workshops every month which you can sign up for right now and start learning. And I have private one on one and group trainings that take place all over the world. So give me a call call or check out the website.
