"You came alone. And you rocked the stage."
It was a bit weird how frequently people used 'rocked' after my first humorous speech performance at Toastmasters International Area C3 contest for Humorous Speech.
My younger brother knows the absolute mayhem in which the aforementioned speech was drafted. And most ridiculously, a few minutes before delivery I changed the whole beginning! And when I was sequenced 4th among four people, I was almost sure of boring them to death.
My younger brother knows the absolute mayhem in which the aforementioned speech was drafted. And most ridiculously, a few minutes before delivery I changed the whole beginning! And when I was sequenced 4th among four people, I was almost sure of boring them to death.
So what worked?
I did some preliminary analysis that day in my washroom, and this is something that came out of it -
1. More than mere words
A good speech isn't a collection of sentences but a performance. And when the performance is supposed to be 'Humorous' trust me it's going to stretch your limits of craziness when you're out there on the stage. So what are you waiting for? Go, stretch.
1. More than mere words
A good speech isn't a collection of sentences but a performance. And when the performance is supposed to be 'Humorous' trust me it's going to stretch your limits of craziness when you're out there on the stage. So what are you waiting for? Go, stretch.
2. Hitting the nail on it's head
A humorous speech is all about humor. You can have 100 other parameters like 'purpose', 'value', 'effectiveness' graded on paper but you got to make people laugh if you want that trophy. And you got to make them laugh CRAZY.
3. Stretching beyond the ordinary
This is your chance to put your societal limits to a test. You ain't that crazy in front of your team in office but this performance is like a shot out of a Bollywood movie. For those five to seven minutes you shred yourself to adopt a new avatar and this avatar has no bounds! It's limitless!
This is your chance to put your societal limits to a test. You ain't that crazy in front of your team in office but this performance is like a shot out of a Bollywood movie. For those five to seven minutes you shred yourself to adopt a new avatar and this avatar has no bounds! It's limitless!
4. Performance absolution
An analytical brain wants to think about competitors. It wants to be assured that you're better than them in x out of y parameters. But Sire, while this strategy can work, it can disastrously pull you down as well. Watching a great performance might suck the energy, enthusiasm and that fight out of you. So perform in absolution. If you still cannot survive without the reference of competition, just assume you're speaking against the world champion and see the magic (or disaster) unravel!
An analytical brain wants to think about competitors. It wants to be assured that you're better than them in x out of y parameters. But Sire, while this strategy can work, it can disastrously pull you down as well. Watching a great performance might suck the energy, enthusiasm and that fight out of you. So perform in absolution. If you still cannot survive without the reference of competition, just assume you're speaking against the world champion and see the magic (or disaster) unravel!
5. Structure the skeleton and focus on inflection points
The irony about a humorous speech is if you rehearse it a lot, it starts to sound like "What the bloody hell am I speaking". You start to feel that there's going to be absolute silence in the audience and this is because you'd have heard yourself hit those punches a billion times. Moreover what's worse if that out there on the stage, you MIGHT actually sound like a robot! So the best way is to only concretize important points of inflection in your memory and then plug in more granular points which you'll remember thanks to the segregation. Out there on the stage, use the moment to spin spontaneous magic.
The irony about a humorous speech is if you rehearse it a lot, it starts to sound like "What the bloody hell am I speaking". You start to feel that there's going to be absolute silence in the audience and this is because you'd have heard yourself hit those punches a billion times. Moreover what's worse if that out there on the stage, you MIGHT actually sound like a robot! So the best way is to only concretize important points of inflection in your memory and then plug in more granular points which you'll remember thanks to the segregation. Out there on the stage, use the moment to spin spontaneous magic.
Okay. Enough gyan.
But hang on. What about Speech Evaluation? Thankfully there's just one pointer here -
"Be different."
Professionalism is awesome. But it brings along a disease of monotony. When you bring a new framework to the performance on the table, it's like hot spicy seduction served on a plate for judges. And trust me they cannot avoid grading you well even if your core performance was slightly above average.
So innovation, creativity and you are to join hands and conquer the Evaluation together.
Disclaimer: This blog post is a note of personal observations and does not in any manner intend to declare me a God level speaker. I'm just a fraction who's tried to optimize!
Cheers!
P.S. I'll keep these quickies really short -
1. Explore the Stage!
Find 5 mins, go there, stand, sit and roam. Make yourself one with it before you step in for your delivery.
2. Use your voice, chuck the mike!
Unless you have a collar-mike, your hand's gonna be busy, and that can screw your intensity. Even with a collar mike you'll be hearing the echo of your own voice. And at times that's just weird. So either listen to yourself over it first, or chuck it altogether and go solo.
