099: Mastering Public Speaking and Startup Pitches with Will Greenblatt

[00:00:00] and two sentences, how would you say it's a get pass that stage right?

[00:00:03] Because we all have it.

[00:00:04] I think we still have it to this day.

[00:00:06] So what are your tricks for that?

[00:00:09] So if I have to give two sentences, it's good exercise.

[00:00:14] I'll start with two as to see if I can do this.

[00:00:18] First step is realize that you will always have it

[00:00:23] and the second is learn how to manage it, not conquer it.

[00:00:37] Podcasts will welcome to another episode of The Value.

[00:00:41] The language of business for those of you seeking to build

[00:00:44] or invest in companies that are scalable and highly valuable.

[00:00:49] I am your host, Kevin Valley, and today is a really special episode to me

[00:00:55] because this episode speaks to the foundation of what I do as an entrepreneur

[00:01:00] and this is today I'm talking to somebody who I have learned a lot from over the past few years

[00:01:07] in the form of Will Green Black.

[00:01:09] Will is a author, a public speaking and pitch coach who has helped founders raise over $350 million

[00:01:18] in capital.

[00:01:20] Well, are you doing welcome to the show?

[00:01:23] Thanks, man.

[00:01:24] Thank you so much for having me.

[00:01:25] I have to say the feeling is mutual because all this stuff, especially that you used to write

[00:01:30] for a become investible, just about the way of thinking about evaluating companies.

[00:01:35] I didn't have a lot of that knowledge coming into this work and so you were a huge source

[00:01:39] of knowledge and resources for me when I tried to figure out how to tell founders,

[00:01:43] what should my valuation be?

[00:01:44] How do we talk about making this pitch more investible more attractive?

[00:01:49] And so I would often either read your stuff myself or send them your way as a LinkedIn

[00:01:53] follow.

[00:01:54] Yeah, feelings mutual.

[00:01:55] Awesome, man.

[00:01:56] You've spoken for companies such as Google, We Fair, Eric Sandy, and ZICBC.

[00:02:02] Do you ever so popular?

[00:02:04] Text stars mean your text, our speech, course and everything.

[00:02:06] But I know all of this started with you being an actor, right?

[00:02:11] Which I guess is a natural progression but I'm thinking like, alright, so for me, as a child

[00:02:16] grain of no Irish I had that kind of talent, right?

[00:02:19] But as a child grain up, I would always de-dream about that moment.

[00:02:25] It could either be hits any winning shot in a basketball game.

[00:02:28] It could be on the stage but send that move or singing that song and the fans are just

[00:02:33] cheered.

[00:02:34] I thought I just wanted to be a start, but over time when I realized it was for me

[00:02:37] I was chasing that adrenaline, that feeling of success and adoration and all that,

[00:02:44] but of course those things can be fleeting.

[00:02:47] What got you into acting?

[00:02:50] Is it just family legacy like for me with finance or was it something else?

[00:02:55] I think it was two things.

[00:02:57] One was, it was a family legacy so I'm really interested to learn more about your family

[00:03:03] as well like how you're back on a finance.

[00:03:05] So for me was my father, my mother and my older sister were all feeder artists and actors

[00:03:12] in some way.

[00:03:13] My mum was more like a writer, director but my father was writing shows, directing shows,

[00:03:17] and acting and shows he has one of the biggest, most successful Canadian play of all time.

[00:03:23] All two pianos for hands.

[00:03:24] I think it still might be the most successful Canadian production in feeder history.

[00:03:29] I think I'm not sure.

[00:03:31] Okay, still it.

[00:03:32] So piano is for what's my?

[00:03:34] For hands.

[00:03:35] It was a play with him and a collaborator and they did the whole show and they played all these

[00:03:39] different characters and it's all about growing up learning to play the piano.

[00:03:42] There's a huge hit when it launched in Canada and then it went, it's been all over

[00:03:47] the world.

[00:03:48] They have different people doing it in different places.

[00:03:51] It's been really, really, it's been to Europe, it's been to Asia and yeah, it's a huge success

[00:03:57] story, really.

[00:03:58] And that shaped my dad's career but it also had him on the road all the time.

[00:04:04] And as a result, he and my mum divorced when I was 15 because just it was too much them

[00:04:10] to be separated all the time.

[00:04:13] And so it's interesting, you know, talking to him about it now and understanding as I'm

[00:04:16] older like him pursuing his dreams so much.

[00:04:20] He provided a better life for our family before he did the show and after our finances

[00:04:25] change completely.

[00:04:28] But it had a toll on his relationship with his kids and his marriage.

[00:04:32] And so that's something that I think about a lot.

[00:04:35] In any case, at the time, so that was his career.

[00:04:38] My mum was an artistic director and a theater maker.

[00:04:42] She would write and help playwrights write their stories.

[00:04:45] She would curate plays and then my oldest is to start acting when she was 10 and I was

[00:04:50] seven years old.

[00:04:51] So then my sister gets an audition one day for a movie and in the movie there's a part

[00:04:56] for a little boy to play the younger brother.

[00:04:59] And so the agent of our family sent my dad message being like, hey, what you're a son

[00:05:05] want to audition for this like mostly joking even.

[00:05:08] And my dad and my mum were like, oh, we don't want him to do this work.

[00:05:11] It's so hard to make a living.

[00:05:12] It's like such a typical line of work.

[00:05:15] But they asked me and I was like, yeah, what to do?

[00:05:16] You know, it was a tiny kid.

[00:05:17] I had no idea.

[00:05:18] I wanted to be like my older sister.

[00:05:21] And I went to the audition and I got the part.

[00:05:24] I think I ended up doing four callbacks in one of the callbacks.

[00:05:27] They had me doing a handstand against the wall.

[00:05:31] They put me through all these weird things just trying to get the part.

[00:05:34] And I just didn't.

[00:05:35] And I finally got the part.

[00:05:36] And it was a lead and a major American feature film in my first ever audition.

[00:05:41] So it was crazy.

[00:05:42] Like you start this thing when you're a child.

[00:05:44] And it was not like I paid any dues.

[00:05:46] It's not like I did any hard work.

[00:05:48] I just had this career instantly at the age of seven, which is wild.

[00:05:53] And so that I think speaks to the second answer to the question that he was family.

[00:05:58] But it was also had some kind of talent for it.

[00:06:01] And I had some kind of ability to understand what the job was at a very young age.

[00:06:05] I need to learn my lines.

[00:06:07] I need to connect to the kind of emotions that this kid is going through.

[00:06:12] And I need to be likeable both in the audition room and on camera and on set.

[00:06:17] I kind of had that sense early on at the age.

[00:06:19] This job is about being likeable.

[00:06:21] So it could be likeable.

[00:06:22] I'll be successful.

[00:06:24] And yeah, that kicked off a whole child acting career where I worked consistently pretty

[00:06:31] much every year.

[00:06:32] I did a TV show in a movie from the age of seven to the age of 18.

[00:06:36] I think until I started to go to school.

[00:06:39] Yeah.

[00:06:40] So he must have been a pretty brief kid because I mean, me growing up, right?

[00:06:43] And I mean, you asked a little bit about my family.

[00:06:45] So my dad, he passed away in 2011.

[00:06:49] My dad was a very well-known politician in Trinidad.

[00:06:54] His background was in finance and investing on those sort of things.

[00:06:58] He was even a self-trade and he was also a minister in the ministry of finance.

[00:07:02] I've brothers who are good bits older than him at least 15 years older than him.

[00:07:06] And then I have the brothers like five years older than me.

[00:07:08] My older brothers were each in finance as well, but they were so very senior in the

[00:07:14] bags that he would turn.

[00:07:15] They actually lived in Canada before they moved to Trinidad.

[00:07:17] And he didn't attainable around whom I'm really already time right?

[00:07:20] They always talk in about finance.

[00:07:22] They got involved this bond, whatever it is.

[00:07:24] And of course all of that is just going over my head.

[00:07:26] But I'm all in a curious, right?

[00:07:28] I'm just there listening to it for, but I can't contribute to this conversation.

[00:07:32] And I don't want to listen to them.

[00:07:34] So I'm not saying anything.

[00:07:36] I'm just listening, I'm just listening whatever it is.

[00:07:40] I can't get all that.

[00:07:42] Yeah.

[00:07:43] So can you talk about it?

[00:07:44] And I guess that's why no, I really try in everything I do even when I'm dealing with

[00:07:48] plans or what not, I really try to avoid jargon as much as possible.

[00:07:53] When I'm explaining concepts, I'm trying to explain it as non-finance speak as possible.

[00:07:59] Because I really believe that if you're not communicating, it's in a way that other people

[00:08:05] can understand, then it not communicates effectively.

[00:08:08] Yeah, they are preaching to the choir.

[00:08:11] That's the thing is if you're only speaking in a way that people who already speak your

[00:08:15] language do, then you're not converting anyone into this really powerful thing that you

[00:08:20] believe it, right?

[00:08:21] So I have to work against this all the time.

[00:08:23] I often catch myself, I'm speaking at a workshop and I actually have to stop and go

[00:08:28] to these people even think public speaking communication matters.

[00:08:31] They haven't even bought into that idea in the first place and I have to take a step back

[00:08:35] and go, this is why this stuff matters.

[00:08:37] It's about your relationships, it's about how you describe what you do to the world,

[00:08:41] whether people will hire you or not, whether people will pay you whether they'll choose

[00:08:44] you over another competitor.

[00:08:46] All that's up like you got to go back to those basic questions.

[00:08:48] So I love that you said that about avoiding jargon.

[00:08:51] And then the other quote that I love is, I think you can't explain it to an attend your

[00:08:55] old, you don't really understand it.

[00:08:57] I think a lot of people.

[00:08:58] No, but they probably understand it.

[00:09:01] It wasn't explained to me.

[00:09:03] They weren't explaining it to you, but if they did, they probably could have.

[00:09:07] But even people who understand what they do can't explain it to attend your old and it's

[00:09:12] such a good exercise.

[00:09:13] So if anybody ever wants to work on that, that's one of the first things you can do

[00:09:17] is go write this out as though you had to explain it.

[00:09:19] And I always tell them, think about some young person in your family.

[00:09:22] Do you have any nephews, nieces, kids?

[00:09:24] How will do that?

[00:09:26] I tell them to think of like one kid in particular, tell me their name.

[00:09:29] What are they like?

[00:09:30] And then explain it to them.

[00:09:32] And I usually play in the role play.

[00:09:33] I'll play the nephew or niece.

[00:09:36] And if they start to go, yeah, so this is actually a derivative bond.

[00:09:40] I'll just be like, huh, derivative was that.

[00:09:42] And you know, pretend to be the kid who doesn't get it.

[00:09:44] And it's amazing because then it stops you and go, all right, that word doesn't make sense

[00:09:49] to a lot of people.

[00:09:49] I have to explain that and you realize how deep your jargon mind goes, how deep you

[00:09:55] are in the water they swim in.

[00:09:57] You really got to try to rise back up and sort of think, okay, what are we really talking

[00:10:01] about here?

[00:10:02] How do I make it like simple, clear reasons why we do this why it's important in language

[00:10:07] that anyone can understand.

[00:10:09] That's effective communication, you said.

[00:10:10] Thank you.

[00:10:11] And I know that you say that effective communication and speaking skills can also be known

[00:10:17] as stage presence, could be known as your social skills, it could be known as leadership,

[00:10:23] your charisma or historical progress.

[00:10:26] That's a right idea or historical progress.

[00:10:30] But it's true, it's really look back at history and you look at already influenced people

[00:10:34] who have led revolution, so may large impacts.

[00:10:36] It's all about communication skills.

[00:10:39] And when somebody has great communication skills, you look at them as more competent.

[00:10:43] You look at them as more intelligent.

[00:10:46] And in social settings, you look at them as more attractive.

[00:10:50] Bring something out of your instincts or your animal magnetism.

[00:10:57] It's magnetic for your drone and you want to stop and you want to lean in.

[00:11:01] It's really, really interesting.

[00:11:03] So you started acting at the age of seven and you spoke about your bravery there.

[00:11:08] You did that for 16 years.

[00:11:12] What was that like?

[00:11:14] This, a quick essential child's, the school I did the same time.

[00:11:18] Hey, it's woo!

[00:11:19] But it's crowded or anybody wants you on the graph.

[00:11:21] You're trying to get to fifth period.

[00:11:23] How was that?

[00:11:25] Okay, so I'll first of all say it was not quite like that.

[00:11:27] I definitely don't think I don't think the other kids really liked it or even really respected

[00:11:36] it until I got to high school then it started becoming a bit cooler.

[00:11:40] But when I was younger, I think all the other kids could see was that I would get to leave

[00:11:45] school for a couple of weeks at a time and then come back.

[00:11:49] And they would, I think we're just like, how could this, a lot of fucking, it's just

[00:11:52] leaving like come back.

[00:11:53] You know, I want to skip to week to school, you know?

[00:11:55] And of course, when you're a kid, you're making shows for little kids.

[00:12:00] That's usually how it works.

[00:12:01] When you're 15, you're making shows for 12 year olds.

[00:12:04] When your 12 year making shows for eight year olds, when you're eight year, make five

[00:12:07] year olds.

[00:12:08] So when I was eight, the other eight year olds would see me make show for five year olds

[00:12:14] and they're like, this shit is corny.

[00:12:16] He's making little kids stuff, right?

[00:12:18] So the actual shows themselves, they didn't watch them or they would see them and they

[00:12:21] knew I was on TV and they would see it, they'd stop in my sister too.

[00:12:24] And then they would make fun of us because they're like, you're on these cheesy, you know,

[00:12:27] you're on these stupid little kids shows, right?

[00:12:30] So I think it's probably a mixture of jealousy, it's probably a mixture of like, you know,

[00:12:35] just thinking it was corny and it was corny that kind of shows for your own course.

[00:12:38] Like, you know, we're making cheesy kids tell it.

[00:12:41] And so there was no sense of like, oh, wow, you're a child and you have this job and

[00:12:46] you're like, whatever is just like, hey, you're different and you're a loser.

[00:12:49] Really, that's what it was.

[00:12:51] That was the attitude I think for most kids.

[00:12:52] It wasn't fun.

[00:12:53] It wasn't a fun thing.

[00:12:54] I'm not trying to say that I was like a victim of this by any means, but it was just

[00:12:59] interesting looking back on it.

[00:13:00] You might think that the other kids would find this admirable or I think I was cool.

[00:13:05] That was not my experience at all.

[00:13:06] I had experienced me and my sister had was like kids other kids made fun of us kids in the

[00:13:10] neighborhood would make fun of us for P.R.T.B.

[00:13:12] So growing up, it wasn't like I didn't have any friends, but they mentioned me being like

[00:13:17] a brave kid to do this stuff.

[00:13:19] I actually never really felt brave in social situations.

[00:13:21] I always had a lot of social anxiety.

[00:13:23] So it was really hard to make friends.

[00:13:25] The friends I did have, I never felt like I could really relax and be myself forever.

[00:13:30] I also think that acting at the young child made me perform by as an insect.

[00:13:37] I would just always be performing for kids and I feel like people can sense that on

[00:13:40] sub-level, right?

[00:13:41] If somebody's not being themselves, if somebody's performing to get you the like you can

[00:13:44] sense that on sub-level and I don't think kids responded well to it.

[00:13:48] So I had a tough time making friendships.

[00:13:51] I don't remember having a good memories of friendship as a kid.

[00:13:57] When I got to high school, I started being a little more confident, but less worried

[00:14:02] about what people thought of me, although of course, in high school, you still care so much

[00:14:06] about that.

[00:14:07] So I started kind of finding a bit more confidence.

[00:14:12] And yeah, then when it was time to go to school, I was like, okay, I'm going to

[00:14:16] go to this program, which was a one-year program in Halifax, which was like history

[00:14:22] and philosophy, and it's kind of big thing.

[00:14:25] And then I was going to go to theater school.

[00:14:26] I was like, I want one year kind of real school and then I want to go be an actor.

[00:14:30] So I applied to National Theater School of Montreal and I got in and then I went there

[00:14:36] yeah, that was my secondary school.

[00:14:38] Okay, so are you studying Spanish one year in theater school?

[00:14:41] But then, yeah, actually left out because you did an idea of my mental healthening there.

[00:14:46] I actually ended up graduating.

[00:14:47] I did the full three-year program.

[00:14:49] Okay.

[00:14:50] But I did the one year of the other school and then I did this three-year program in Montreal.

[00:14:53] But what happened was.

[00:14:55] So I can't really talk about this without talking about what proceeded it.

[00:14:58] So two years ago, I went to theater school and my brother died.

[00:15:02] That completely, yeah, thank you.

[00:15:04] And I know you've been through some stuff like that yourself.

[00:15:07] And you hit completely as you know, it throws your life off track when you have a sudden

[00:15:12] shock and death in your family or in your, from a loved one.

[00:15:16] And so that's what happened to me.

[00:15:17] I was like, so clear on what I was going to do is going to be an actor and I was going

[00:15:20] to go to theater school and then start my career.

[00:15:23] Something about what happened, not me off my track.

[00:15:28] And when I got to theater school, my mental health was really bad.

[00:15:32] I was still angry, said, go through a bunch of other shit.

[00:15:36] If you don't mind me, I'll just say, how will you end your brother post?

[00:15:41] 17.

[00:15:41] And he was 15.

[00:15:43] Okay.

[00:15:44] Yeah.

[00:15:45] Yeah.

[00:15:46] So one of those things that you never think is going to happen to you, you never think.

[00:15:49] You know, it's part of you can be part of your life.

[00:15:54] I mean, I don't bother you for the rest of your life.

[00:15:55] I don't mean to be on that, but that is something that affects you for the rest of your life.

[00:16:00] So one of my dad's brothers died when he was like,

[00:16:04] the brother that is he was like seven or something like that.

[00:16:07] And he actually gave his name as a middle name to one of my other brothers.

[00:16:10] But he actually saw him get hit by a car and I know I get knocked down, right?

[00:16:15] And just the other day, I was talking to my dad's eldest brother.

[00:16:19] Right?

[00:16:19] I'm talking about an 80, 80, 80, 80, 180, 180, 22 year old gentleman.

[00:16:26] You got emotional about that?

[00:16:27] Just bring that up and you know, and it is like,

[00:16:30] it is that so black, middle-aged Caribbean man, they are very, right?

[00:16:34] For very, very much he is more but it brought him down.

[00:16:38] And yeah, so I'm just saying like, yeah, that stuff is rough.

[00:16:42] Like just, I think, I dream.

[00:16:45] So yeah, I was just going to say like you don't ever get over it.

[00:16:50] So to speak, you just get better at dealing with all the confusion and the loss

[00:16:55] and then time goes by and it just feels a bit more manageable

[00:16:58] and new things come into your life.

[00:17:00] But it never goes away.

[00:17:01] You can just learn how to manage it back.

[00:17:03] But for sure.

[00:17:04] Like when I'm, if you know, if I'm lucky enough to get to 81,

[00:17:07] it'll still make me emotional for sure.

[00:17:09] Yeah.

[00:17:10] And I guess I can mention earlier to you, my dad passed in 2011.

[00:17:16] I think I dream about at least once a month.

[00:17:19] Yeah.

[00:17:19] I know.

[00:17:20] Yeah, I see my dreams I just want some more.

[00:17:22] Yeah, yeah.

[00:17:22] Yeah.

[00:17:23] So these people are just inside of us and like that's 100% true.

[00:17:27] As you said before we started it's like that kind of stuff shapes who you are.

[00:17:31] And in a fucked up way, you have to almost learn how to,

[00:17:35] I don't want to say give thanks for it because that's not how I feel.

[00:17:41] But make peace and tell the story and just come to a thing of like,

[00:17:48] this is what it is and in fact, I would be so different now

[00:17:53] and then that's confusing because you're like, and I like who I am now.

[00:17:57] So it's hard to wrap your mind around that.

[00:17:59] Like, and you can never be grateful for that sort of thing or at least you don't want to be.

[00:18:03] But it is, it's just an un- un- un- un- un- shapeable art of you.

[00:18:10] And it's a- it's the worst thing that happened to you but of course the worst things that happened

[00:18:13] to us are often the ones that shape us and then the only thing you can do is go, okay well,

[00:18:17] then how do I try to make something good about it?

[00:18:20] And so what I do with my work now and we'll get to this later and jump in your hands story a bit.

[00:18:26] Now I kind of go, okay, it's my job part of my job is to talk about this and to say,

[00:18:32] this is what I experienced and this is what it was like for me.

[00:18:34] This is how hard it was and this is how disconnected I felt from my friends and this is

[00:18:39] how much my grief made me, you know, turn to drugs and alcohol and this is how much pain I was in for so long

[00:18:45] and this is why I made shitty choices and I chased relationships that were really toxic because I just needed

[00:18:51] to feel like I had somebody cared about me and all this sort of stuff and just talk about that kind of

[00:18:57] dark stuff but I go whenever I've heard other people talk about this sort of thing,

[00:19:01] it always makes me feel better and less alone. And so I can pass that forward and that's the

[00:19:05] one positive thing I could do or that's one of the positive things I could do is pay that

[00:19:11] open this forward because people who have done that for me, who have spoken about it publicly,

[00:19:16] have no meat you'll so much better so I know, okay, that's something I can do, I can pay that for

[00:19:21] and so that's a big part of why I do what I do now which we can get to in a bit, it's what has

[00:19:26] stopped jumping around but that's fine, that's fine, that's how that's how it goes, man,

[00:19:30] that's not it, yeah, all right so how did you loop a dot grief what did you do to loop a dot

[00:19:37] grief? Yeah so as I said like I did a lot of drugs and I drank a lot and so in the funny thing

[00:19:44] was in the culture that I was in like you know kind of white middle class liberal Canadian kids

[00:19:53] boys especially that was normal it was kind of normal to do that sort of thing and that was just

[00:19:57] partying everybody's like oh which is partying it's normal but I knew that I wasn't partying

[00:20:02] I was self-medicating I was trying to have numpey but because everybody around me,

[00:20:07] not everybody thought a lot of people around me were doing it it just it didn't

[00:20:11] never became sort of something that I felt like I needed to address because it was so normalized

[00:20:16] of course looking back on it now I can see it's like a lot of those people were in pain

[00:20:21] whether the pain was from like a trauma they've been through it just didn't know what they wanted

[00:20:24] to do with their lives or they felt whatever or that you know some was going on you don't

[00:20:29] you don't do drug-thruity weekend if you're happily living your life and and

[00:20:34] feel like you have some purpose and you're doing you're working towards something

[00:20:37] you just why would you do that? And yeah so that's how I cope and I went to theater school

[00:20:44] and because of what I was going through and how my mental health was I realized that this was a

[00:20:50] bad program for me to be an in fact everybody who was in our program kind of suffered

[00:20:54] them at the health suffered because of the way that the teachers taught us and the way that they

[00:20:58] kind of managed the program so basically at theater school there were like we're going to break

[00:21:03] you down psychologically and then build you back up. Have you seen a movie with flash? You see with flash?

[00:21:10] I have but if I'm to grasp what you're saying it's it more like hey you are nothing you

[00:21:15] you know we are going to make you into something. If you came in there and told these years

[00:21:18] I'm experiencing all that it was something like that okay. Very very close and now other kids

[00:21:23] didn't have the same experience but they still they it's like they tried to break us down psychologically

[00:21:29] so that we would like cry on stage that we would talk about our deepest darkest secrets but we were

[00:21:34] like 19 20 year olds you know it's it's we weren't really able to do that and the teachers who were

[00:21:40] doing at no sense of boundaries they had no sense of like helping us afterwards. They literally

[00:21:45] would like ask kids and it's really personal questions and they'd be like okay yeah I just asked

[00:21:50] you about you know somebody in your family died and I'll go on stage and tell us that story

[00:21:53] I think you know but they wouldn't do it with any care they wouldn't do it with any like I

[00:21:57] know this is hard for you none of that it was just like this is when it takes to be an actor like

[00:22:01] get up there also I injured myself and when I was 19 I I suffered from my first disconnation

[00:22:08] at 19 years old in my bag and they made me they kept making me do all these really physical

[00:22:13] class they didn't even believe that my back was hurt they thought I was trying to like get out of

[00:22:17] my class so that kind of toxicity that kind of teaching style just was so hard on me and my

[00:22:23] classmates everybody in my class suffered really during that time so by the time I graduate I was

[00:22:29] like to fuck this I do not want to be an actor I don't anything to do with this and I probably

[00:22:34] would have done that anyways but it was just kind of the accelerator of like no more I just wasn't

[00:22:39] happy and I realized like to be an actor and I think being an entrepreneur you would agree it's the

[00:22:45] same way you have to be so dedicated and love it and put up with all the bullshit right like you

[00:22:51] can't you can't just do it as I like well that's my job and I like to play golf on the weekends

[00:22:56] like it's not it's not like that it's it's a it's a consuming career that really that has a lot of

[00:23:03] downside and so if you don't love it enough to handle the downside you're not going to make it

[00:23:07] and so for me acting was the same way but I didn't have that love and desire to passion for it

[00:23:13] I was just doing it because I've been doing it since I was seven years old so I finally

[00:23:19] quit and I was like I think I have to leave you because you see so I went to Spain yeah

[00:23:25] that's when I went to Spain why Spain I'd always wanted to learn Spanish I like to love the language

[00:23:33] I loved yeah love the way it sounded and I took a Spanish class in like great ten or something

[00:23:38] and I just loved it I was like oh it's so sick and it's kind of easy to learn if you're an English

[00:23:42] speaker you know it's not it's an easier than French which we study in in the class in Canada yeah

[00:23:48] okay for me for me definitely it's easier than French yeah and hi school for me we would have to

[00:23:54] learn both at a mighty same time and French yeah French and Spanish had he same time and I had

[00:24:01] French or I like some right out this Spanish or I like some yeah you're mixing up the words and

[00:24:07] yes yeah yeah that's mean that's mean to do the kids so Spain okay so all right so you got

[00:24:17] the speed was that like well it was amazing I mean I could we could be here for

[00:24:23] how are you talking about that experience but I'll tell you like so I went with my friend of mine

[00:24:28] and another friend of ours joined us like a couple months later and we had had this plan to do

[00:24:33] this the three of us to go on this kind of boy strip in Europe or whatever but I quickly realized

[00:24:40] that when I was there I wanted to be on my own because I felt like I had to like I need a time

[00:24:46] alone to process everything I was going through and so when I was with my friends I was just still

[00:24:51] doing drugs drinking heavily and not healing right I was just staying in the same

[00:24:57] patterns and so finally I was like okay I'm going to move to a small town outside of Madrid

[00:25:03] I was in Madrid for the first six months I think yeah and then I was like I got to move

[00:25:09] and so I got a job and some small town and then I told my friends like sorry guys I got a

[00:25:14] I got to go I got to be on my own they were cool they respected it what I was trying to you know tell

[00:25:18] them but I think they were kind of surprised because and we just wanted those things where I realized like

[00:25:23] you know like but we're supposed to be together and I was kind of like can't I can't do that

[00:25:27] anymore I can't you know I'm not happy I'm not doing well and so then I moved to this small town

[00:25:35] and that was amazing because I started learning the language first box I wasn't hanging out with

[00:25:40] with English speakers from home all day I was actually really speaking Spanish and very few people

[00:25:45] locals spoke English because it was a small town so I really learned Spanish there and I was living

[00:25:52] alone I was hustling to find like when I won teaching clients I was hard to find to get different

[00:25:56] jobs at different schools I started teaching adults business English as well as teaching kids so

[00:26:01] that stage in a lot of ways for the work I do now it's like how to build the coaching

[00:26:06] practice a business around selling your education time for money so that was the first time I did that

[00:26:14] and yeah I found that was good at it after one and I thought my acting skills I think help

[00:26:20] me especially the front of a class help me explain things and it helped me perform it from the

[00:26:24] class to get them to keep their attention into explain the concepts to them yeah and soon I want to

[00:26:30] talk about what you learn from acting and how you translate that into a public speaking and all

[00:26:35] it out but my curiosity wouldn't let me go there yet because I know after this being you went to China

[00:26:40] so is it that you know you know it's always wanted to learn Chinese no because that's a lot

[00:26:45] more difficult to learn than friends way more difficult yeah way more difficult so I never thought

[00:26:51] about going to China what happened was one of my friends who came with me to Spain he had been

[00:26:56] to China with his girlfriend when he was 18 like that was the first thing he did after school

[00:27:01] I actually went to visit him there in 2008 2009 something like that and I love those and made

[00:27:08] so different and so cool like in smoke cigarettes and sigh wow you know yeah just there's a

[00:27:15] really cool thing I don't know if you've been to Asia like an Asia is so much fun

[00:27:19] I'm just in February and it's like they're like different worlds

[00:27:27] totally different but for me it was so exciting and so I did I was really excited to go to China

[00:27:33] but basically my friend who ended up being the CEO of our company he's like let's go

[00:27:39] make a start up there because there's such a need for English the level of English education it's

[00:27:43] not like it is in Europe or in other places in Asia like it's it's not good in China they have

[00:27:48] a really hard time going to English and they lead to come to Canada in a lot of cases to go to

[00:27:52] school they want to come to Canada so we can start a Canadian or come to the in China to teach

[00:27:57] native Canadian English and it was a really good idea we just didn't realize how

[00:28:03] difficult it would be to do the bitlessly because we were a wholly foreign owned enterprise in China

[00:28:09] so that was crazy and it ended up not working out but

[00:28:15] finally enough I agreed to be part of that and that's what got me into entrepreneurship

[00:28:20] but it almost felt like I was in theater school again because I was with my friends but me

[00:28:24] had so much conflict because of working together and we were like paying ourselves like no money

[00:28:30] which is such a stupid thing to do in retrospect like that was so dumb you know all entrepreneurs have

[00:28:36] been there trying to survive on pennies so you can put all the money into the company and it just

[00:28:40] doesn't sustain and we were we were living together and working together we had no

[00:28:46] break from each other it was just that it was a shit show and again I was still doing my friends

[00:28:51] things you know what I mean like that instinct that got me away from my friends and Spain

[00:28:55] was still driving me in China so I was working even though I was a co-founder didn't feel like

[00:28:59] my company felt like my friends kept me yeah so I wasn't doing my thing even though I like the

[00:29:04] work I love you in China I was able to learn a lot of Chinese I had a girlfriend there for a long

[00:29:10] time who really introduced me to so many of her friends and I felt like I really got a good look

[00:29:15] for the time I was there into the culture and stuff and I really enjoyed it's a big part of me now

[00:29:19] still my time there but it wasn't my thing ultimately it wasn't my thing and so I ended up

[00:29:28] going to injure it again might same back injury it flared up in China and I ended up being

[00:29:34] bedridden for like seven months and having to come home to Canada no I've in China lasted about

[00:29:40] about two weeks in bed my girlfriend was coming over before work every morning bringing me food

[00:29:46] leaves I would stay in bed all day as you'd come over after work do all the dishes and like

[00:29:53] get me food to get like it was I was like I you know I couldn't do anything for myself

[00:29:59] and so I ended up coming back to Canada and said goodbye to her and we ended up breaking up because

[00:30:05] it just wasn't wasn't the right relationship anyways but it was tough at the time

[00:30:11] but I came back to my mother's house in Toronto and I was just on her couch and deliver them

[00:30:15] because it couldn't climb stairs so it's just sleeping on a couch taking her cassettes all day

[00:30:21] just addicted to the pain can was because the pain was so bad and I just wasn't healing it was a

[00:30:26] really really rough rough period but the way I got out of that was I started going to therapy

[00:30:33] because the doctor told me if you go to therapy you know your back will start to get better

[00:30:37] like you got to heal your your mind kind of to heal your body and I didn't believe I thought

[00:30:42] that was bullshit at the time and then I started doing it and I was like man this and it literally

[00:30:47] everything started to change for me because I took my mental health seriously for the first time

[00:30:51] in my life and my body started healing my relationships started getting better I became more

[00:31:00] patients calm understanding grateful for life like all these things that I wasn't

[00:31:07] before and I was starting learning those because I had was that this rock bottom of this injury

[00:31:12] I was like if I don't change my whole mindset I'm never going to get better and so that was a

[00:31:19] real turning point in my life and then I started realizing like this way of thinking about

[00:31:25] communicating more honestly finding your purpose being real be or empathetic being more calm

[00:31:33] mindfulness being present all that stuff I was learning and then also having a background and

[00:31:37] acting and teaching I was like I think I can teach this stuff to other people

[00:31:43] and that was the birth of my company out about speaker school that's been my venture for the last

[00:31:49] seven years which was like teaching acting skills as public speaking skills but also

[00:31:56] there's a lot of my own life experience and mindset in the coaching about like okay how do you tell

[00:32:01] your story to you share personal things when we talk about your work or not? How do you communicate

[00:32:07] to the people on your team, the people around you can you do more open-minded more empathetic

[00:32:11] you know all that kind of stuff a lot of the stuff that I've learned so it's kind of like my life,

[00:32:16] my background in acting and my background in teaching and my work with entrepreneurs and I

[00:32:21] re-lust that entrepreneurs are the best people to do this way because they're lifelong self-development

[00:32:25] junkies right? Yes. Every object there you talk to is it is a self-development junkie

[00:32:30] so it's kind of the perfect fit and now that I'm an entrepreneur myself and have been for like the

[00:32:35] last 10 years I'm like okay this is who I want to work with and I still work with some corporate

[00:32:40] people, business leaders but entrepreneurs are my people really that's like the close thing I've

[00:32:44] ever found to be in it is. The answer. I thought that to be a coach at your school you have to

[00:32:49] have some sort of performance background so you're not just going to take any of every public speaking

[00:32:53] coach and ways that. So yeah, enacting or performance background because to me there's

[00:32:58] it's not that people who have self-taught or whatever that they can't be great I have a friend

[00:33:04] Victor Ocaford who does this work for Archford as a Nigeria he's brilliant I love I love the way he does it

[00:33:09] I love his his approach and he actually the way we connected this because he applied for a job at our

[00:33:14] company but I realize like he's like me so he's got to be doing his own thing right? But with my work

[00:33:20] at this school of that's bigger school the thesis says an actor is naturally deeply curious

[00:33:29] about other human beings because you never know what kind of character in the place you're always

[00:33:32] studying people. An actor spends most of their time working on like doing stupid vocal

[00:33:37] one-ups and breathing exercise. You know you're a neat New York red leather yellow leather all that

[00:33:44] shit and actors are actors are constantly trying to imitate people that they hear and take on

[00:33:51] different ways of speaking and different stretch their ability to speak in different ways and they're

[00:33:57] also really really used to getting up on stage and having everybody look at them and taking that

[00:34:04] spot like that big moment you talked about being on stage of another people actors that's what they

[00:34:09] do for a living. That's the way that I approach is like that empathy piece that human curiosity piece

[00:34:15] that ability to take a script and bring it to life and make interesting and make clear and make

[00:34:19] the motivations behind it clear and make a subtext to come to life and then also that dedication to

[00:34:26] understanding how to get yourself ready for public performance all of those skills that actors

[00:34:32] learn in school or on the job that's missing from the business world that was the culture of

[00:34:37] the company I was trying to build was that basis of public performance education. You know we speak

[00:34:44] about public speaking and just those two words alone inside so much fair and I'm excited to

[00:34:50] interview people right and I know you've said that anxiety is a lie and I love that good but I want

[00:34:56] you to expand that out a little bit and you talk about prehistoric times and cavemen and all of that

[00:35:02] let you do digestive. Yeah so the quote anxiety is a liar you know the breakfast club in

[00:35:10] America yeah yeah Charlie and the God I got that from him because his book a shook ones how my

[00:35:16] anxiety plays tricks on me I love that title so much as a huge band of his book with his book

[00:35:21] but then when he released this book I was like oh fuck I love this guy because he was one of the first

[00:35:26] like cool male celebrities who started really talking about anxiety and mental health therapy

[00:35:32] and that kind of made it even for me as like you know a white kid who can't Jewish kid and

[00:35:38] and it just seeing this guy who I really looked up to be be masculine be cool be successful but also

[00:35:45] be very open about mental health therapy and an exite and so that was a big tune for me

[00:35:50] and even before that I had been to the group therapy thing where they used to show us this

[00:35:57] list of anxious thoughts and depressed thoughts and I would read this list of thoughts and I

[00:36:03] would have just had all these thoughts at all this time and they would say how many people have

[00:36:07] this thought how many people have had that thought and they go it's not true this though this is your

[00:36:13] brain trying to tell you try to make sense of the fact that you feel scared but the fear is not

[00:36:22] telling you true things the fear is actually telling you untrue things especially in social situations

[00:36:29] and the reason I like to talk about prehistoric times is the reason I believe social anxiety

[00:36:35] so that done a lot of reading on this obviously I'm not a neuro I'm not a neuroscientist I'm not

[00:36:43] evolutionary biologist but this is like my obsession with reading skills that

[00:36:50] in a tribe and a hundred gather the tribe how humans lived for 200 to 300,000 years most of our

[00:36:56] evolution of our species everything dependent on what your tribe thought of you that your tribes

[00:37:02] opinion of your status whether they would share food with you whether you have the woman that you

[00:37:07] wanted or the man that you wanted your standing in the tribe was everything from a life or death

[00:37:13] perspective if they didn't like you they could kick you out of the cave till you are still your food

[00:37:17] or whatever it was right so when it came time to interact with people and especially standing up

[00:37:22] to speak in front of a group it triggers something like deep in our DNA that says oh buck this is

[00:37:27] really dangerous what you're doing right now this is dangerous if you fuck this up they're going to kill

[00:37:33] you know what I mean and of course but that's not true if I get up on stage at a pitch competition

[00:37:39] or at a keynote or even in the biggest pitch my life and if I mess it up I'm safe nothing's going to

[00:37:46] happen it's just not gonna get too many you're not gonna get the money usually that's not a

[00:37:52] life or death thing right usually we're not pitching so that we can eat tomorrow if we're entrepreneurs

[00:37:57] ideally I think if we get to that stage then you know something's gone horribly wrong

[00:38:03] and it makes feel like it's life or death but it's actually not that is your body's way of

[00:38:07] making sense of the fact that a adrenaline is flooding through your system cortisol

[00:38:10] the only time that used to happen is when you actually were in danger when there was a fucking

[00:38:14] lion about to eat you or when you thought you might get kicked out of your tribe and so

[00:38:20] quote anxiety is a liar is this idea that it's your brain telling you something that isn't true

[00:38:27] to make sense of the fact that you feel like you're in danger and so what our brain tells us

[00:38:32] like going back to that group therapy thing the list of thoughts it was like everybody hates me

[00:38:39] I've had that thought all the time is that true? of course not of course that's our true

[00:38:48] there's a lot of people who like it there's a lot of people who don't like it so what you know

[00:38:53] or the anxious thought I bet this person's mad at me because they didn't wave hide in me at that party

[00:39:00] is that true or did they just not fucking see you there because they were you know doing their own

[00:39:05] thing and saying hi to somebody else and so it was just this way that our anxious thoughts interpret

[00:39:10] reality and twist it into this scary dangerous negative thing that is so important to know

[00:39:16] that like what's in your head what your brain is telling you when you're feeling bad, when you're

[00:39:19] feeling down, you're going to anxious it's not in fact reality it's a distorted perception

[00:39:25] and version of reality so that's where that quote comes from and that's why it's so powerful

[00:39:28] because it also helps you do a stage right because you get up on stage and stage right tells you

[00:39:33] these people hate you or it's going to suck or you're going to make a fool of yourself

[00:39:38] or you're not going to remember your words, you're going to stumble, you're going to spill

[00:39:43] your coffee and then it adds true unless you believe it and then it becomes true you know what

[00:39:49] it means so it's like a self-entiment of the purpose so yeah you got to stop listening to your anxiety

[00:39:54] yeah yeah it's tough it's tough I grew up shy I was always scared of what they're speaking

[00:40:02] I tried toast masters at some point I know your mission is to be to be like a big huge

[00:40:09] mission of toast masters I'll say you're better than that I really dislike to my experience

[00:40:15] that's what matters I mean everybody they've met well but the thing is toast masters for me is

[00:40:21] like hey what you don't know to swim go I'm pushing in that water they had this thing called

[00:40:29] table topics they just give you a random topic it could be anything you don't know and you have to

[00:40:35] speak on it for at least a minute and a half that listens to me the panic that insight that it's

[00:40:45] yeah yeah yeah you know I think I did like one prepared talk there and as I get this in for me

[00:40:52] but what actually helped me deal with stage fright other than subsequently being pushed into

[00:40:57] the deep energy panel another point where I took a talk on becoming investible business ideas

[00:41:03] and fun like oh this is before I create fall daily business this is actually led to me

[00:41:08] creates a new business I had to give that talk interesting yeah and I had to give that talk to

[00:41:13] some youngsters and I set up to give the talk this is the talk I had been preparing for weeks

[00:41:19] a written script which I learned never to do again but I'd written a script and I'd written

[00:41:25] like to be so I stand up I stand up to start I was like who's how does it start again I was like

[00:41:35] oops yeah you know and I was there and what felt like like 10 minutes to me it was probably

[00:41:42] it's over five seconds probably five seconds or she was like an eternity inside yes yes

[00:41:49] and then I sat down I got my notes and I delivered it to all can everybody love that

[00:41:54] everybody's so engaged and really our questions yeah yeah yeah yeah then fast forward a few years

[00:42:00] after that I thought I conquered this thing I already had a podcast I had already MCed some weddings

[00:42:05] and all that stuff I thought I'd conquered this I was running an investment conference for a bunch of

[00:42:12] institutional investors from the region so we had about over 200 people in the room we had

[00:42:16] rented out the hat for this I'm demas of ceremonies everybody's there suited up these are all

[00:42:22] people I want to talk to only people I need to raise funds my clients right don't mess this up

[00:42:29] so what is Kevin do he messes it up I go on stage listen I'm on stage I'm doing my

[00:42:37] a dream of that I had practiced I had practiced I think the video camera took a picture of

[00:42:43] many light hit man I was like oh that's interesting and then I was like oh we were

[00:42:47] and I literally microphone in my hand I said oh shit and I thought well I wanted to

[00:42:54] talk about the stage I wanted to crawl on it to say but I said Kevin that's it you're done

[00:43:01] these people never used to like yeah of course of course at the end they're like yeah at the end

[00:43:07] they're like hey I want to talk to you yeah that's also the other thing is you do learn eventually

[00:43:12] if you get up on stage enough times you learn that the worst it can go is not that bad and that

[00:43:18] most people don't realize how hard you're panicking on the inside usually they don't realize

[00:43:24] unless you're fainting vomiting or you can you know get a word out but other than not usually

[00:43:30] people don't don't realize and if you just keep pushing you'll get through it and then people

[00:43:34] probably forget by the end I guess in two sentences how would you say it's a get past that stage

[00:43:42] right because I mean we all have it I think we still have it to this day you know so what are your

[00:43:48] tricks for that so if I have to give two sentences it's a good exercise I'll start with two as

[00:43:56] to see if I can do this first step is realize that you will always have it and the second is

[00:44:04] learn how to manage it not conquer it so this is actually what my doctor said to me when I was

[00:44:11] getting over my back injury was you're never gonna get better this isn't a disease or a

[00:44:17] sickness that will go away you have something called degenerative disc condition that means your

[00:44:22] spine is like a six-year-old man's spine even though you're only 26 so he's like your job is not to

[00:44:30] heal and then never think about it again as much as that sounds like what you want to do

[00:44:34] what you have to do is learn that for the rest of your life you're going to be managing this

[00:44:37] condition but if you set yourself up properly you can live as though you don't even have it and so

[00:44:45] that's the goal for stage fright is if you haven't you always always will have it it's never going

[00:44:53] to totally go away what you will get really good at is managing it to the point where the feeling is

[00:45:00] are gonna come and you'll be able to breathe them out and you'll be able to get through and you'll

[00:45:04] be able to get up on stage I think my biggest talk so far has been in front of 236 people not even

[00:45:14] that many I mean I've done plays in front of more people but I've never spoken as a keynote

[00:45:19] from a more people than that and for that one I was really nervous but I did it I was actually much better

[00:45:25] than I normally would have been before being a coach and before doing this work because of all

[00:45:30] that I've learned that's the high level thing is except that you're always going to feel nervous

[00:45:34] and that you'll always have stage fright and then learn how to manage it and so the management

[00:45:40] tactics are there's a bunch of the first step is understanding what it is and we've already talked

[00:45:45] about that with the anxiety and the evolutionary origin so just even learning that has helped me so much

[00:45:52] that it's just it's human right you're doing this and everybody feels this way they also have

[00:45:56] done studies where they've measured a bunch of different people from different personality types men,

[00:46:01] women, age and different ages and everybody has elevated cardiovascular reactivity when they speak

[00:46:08] in public so everybody has an elevated heart rate so we all have it a little bit so that's important

[00:46:13] to understand another important thing to understand is nobody can really tell and I know this from

[00:46:20] all the times people have told me they had really bad stage fright and then I saw them speak and they were

[00:46:24] fine and then also understand that yeah it's never going away so once you kind of contextualize

[00:46:30] it with all those things then you start to also understand what it feels like what are the physical

[00:46:36] symptoms sweating you know for white people get really red excessive itching, twitching,

[00:46:45] face and mouth drying dry mouth which sucks mental confusion, mental blanking and it's funny

[00:46:52] because like the bitch the real bitch about all this is that all the symptoms of stage right are

[00:46:58] the things that make us the worst at public speaking like why can't it be like I don't know why

[00:47:05] can't it be like pain in my feet I could deal with pain in my feet on stage but it makes my mouth

[00:47:10] dry and it makes me hard to remember what I'm supposed to say that's like the worst thing for public

[00:47:14] speaking all the symptoms directly work against your ability to tell a good story and speak well

[00:47:22] and clearly on stage so it's just horrible iron right so we kind of contextualize we understand this is

[00:47:29] what's happening to me and it's normal and I am normal I'm not weak I'm not particularly stupid

[00:47:34] or useless this is just a fact of life and I have it too and that's what it is get used to it

[00:47:39] and get over that fact then the next stage is okay what can I do about this well when you actually

[00:47:47] have a talk coming up there's some good things you can do first of all is prepare a million times

[00:47:52] like to do it as much as you can but don't do it in the same way each time you want to

[00:47:56] rehearse in the right way so not just still just say it out a bunch of times or read it a bunch

[00:48:00] times you want to practice it in a different way a different style do it fast do it slow get into

[00:48:05] the language emphasize you know some parts another time say it a different way ask yourself what

[00:48:09] do I really mean by this change it if you have to right really work on it and work it and the more

[00:48:14] you do it out loud and the more you listen to yourself film yourself watch it back change it

[00:48:19] it'll start to feel like you are doing it too much and that's when you just keep pushing through

[00:48:24] because then you'll really really get good at it the other thing you can do is warm up before you

[00:48:31] go on stage I'm a huge proponent of this unique New York Red Let's see how now brown cow all

[00:48:38] that's awesome oh no wrong go breathing exercises grab your arms and stretch it over here

[00:48:44] swing your arms you do shadow boxing jumping jacks yoga pushups

[00:48:48] I thought I was in I thought I was in that's it you wanted if you want to get your body moving

[00:48:54] and you want to start to I read something in a book about how like a lot of the things that

[00:49:01] the reason why exercise makes us feel good when we're feeling anxious is because the anxiety

[00:49:05] is telling us that like maybe we're being hunted by a lion and so you go to the gym you go on a

[00:49:09] treadmill and then your body's like oh we ran away from the lion so we're safe now so and it's

[00:49:14] called something like completing your stress cycle so warming up helps complete your stress cycle

[00:49:20] your anxious about your talk then you go and you do a warm up and then your body goes oh we're

[00:49:24] safe now because we did something about it do you know what I mean and you're not going to feel

[00:49:29] 100% better but you're going to feel way better than you did beforehand and I do this every talk I

[00:49:35] ever give every client ever work with always say always warm up before you pitch or always warm

[00:49:41] up before you speak it's just the best way to feel better and it's also the best way to work

[00:49:45] against the mumbling and the soft voice and the submissive body language gets your body mind

[00:49:52] face voice all focused on what you're trying to do and elevated to that point where you can

[00:49:56] go get that really loud clear strong knockout performance so the warming up really helps so you

[00:50:03] contextualize it you rehearse you warm up and then when you're on stage two things are really

[00:50:10] important one is you just breathe into your belly whenever you feel like you're panicking

[00:50:18] and even if you don't want to make it obvious you just go just through your nose and there's something

[00:50:24] about belly breathing that just harms the nervous system and not again not 100% but enough that you

[00:50:30] can remember what you want to say next and you can get back to what you're thinking about and I can't

[00:50:36] tell you how like how much this is safe and then if I don't think when you're on stage to get

[00:50:41] rid of stage fright is you just think what do I need to do not to look cool to seem cool to get

[00:50:47] through my script but to connect to the audience how do I make sure they hear me how do I make

[00:50:53] sure they care about what I'm saying and that way of thinking about the audience not about yourself

[00:51:00] it takes your mental spotlight off of you and puts it on someone else and then you get less self

[00:51:05] conscious so if you're thinking about oh do they like me do they think I'm cool are they impressed by

[00:51:10] me you flip it onto the audience go what can I do to make you understand what can I do to make

[00:51:16] you engage what can I do for you or you for you how can I make this worth your while how can I

[00:51:21] make this interesting for you and you just put that focus on them and on the words that you're saying

[00:51:26] how do I make these words interesting how do I make this story more you know and then that's

[00:51:31] the kind of focus that you just set your mind to focusing on that oh one last thing I wanted to say

[00:51:37] do last things sorry visualization oh that helped me a lot yes yeah what I do

[00:51:47] I use a blocking technique so I visualize the stage I visualize the crowd I visualize what

[00:51:53] he crowd is going to look like as you know you're signing up there everybody's looking at you

[00:51:58] and then you got a light sun you so I visualize all of that I walk around my apartment and imagine

[00:52:03] myself talking delivering delivering or joke or pause all of these things but what helps me

[00:52:11] and you mentioned it just no is remind of myself it's not about me it's not about me it's about

[00:52:17] either I'm entertaining these people either I'm educating these people either I'm just celebrating

[00:52:22] this occasion or whatever it is it is not about me I am the vehicle yes that's exactly it that's

[00:52:29] exactly it and once you can get over that as an actor when you're an actor if you can realize

[00:52:33] my job is not to impress people with how good it been actor I am as much as you want to do that

[00:52:39] so bad that's not your job if you're thinking about that you're not doing the job the job is to tell

[00:52:44] the story and let the audience into you and your character and your story and like do the work

[00:52:49] beforehand and then be present on stage and so speaking of being present the two most powerful

[00:52:55] things I've ever learned that have helped me with stage fright are mindful this meditation at yoga

[00:53:01] and so obviously yoga has a component of mindfulness meditation to it they go hand in hand

[00:53:07] up and then one last piece cognitive behavioral therapy CBT I learned mindfulness and CBT

[00:53:14] at the same time remember I told you about that group therapy with the list of anxious depressed thoughts

[00:53:19] that was a mindfulness slash CBT group therapy class that shit taught me so much and so

[00:53:26] you do the cognitive behavior therapy exercise which are like identifying the negative thoughts

[00:53:30] examining them counteracting them with other thoughts labeling them as like this is fortune telling

[00:53:36] Mrs. Black or White thinking this is over generalizing and then you meditate and the meditation

[00:53:44] is like the experiential practical thing to the theoretical part of the CBT and you sit there

[00:53:50] and you breathe and you notice your thoughts and you notice your body and you train your mind to be

[00:53:54] able to be conscious of one thing at a time and that is like going to the gym for your ability

[00:54:00] to be focused and present and that's what good public speaking needs if your mind is elsewhere

[00:54:05] you're not going to be truly connected to what you're saying even if you're saying the right words

[00:54:10] it's not going to land for the audience the way it should because you're not there you're not present

[00:54:18] with the audience it's hard to do but mindfulness meditation is huge yeah

[00:54:22] that's my ultimate disjointed guide to stage fright I love it my love it man that was super

[00:54:30] super helpful so I think it's a sweat it's 21 is it's 21 when did you release the book as it's

[00:54:37] 2021 2021 yeah 2021 I think or no 2022 because it was just before my daughter was born okay okay

[00:54:44] yeah thank you okay so you released the book called transform your speaking skills

[00:54:53] that helps people to gain confidence and a captivate audience and advance your career yes

[00:55:00] gain confidence captivate audiences and grow your career right now in that book in that book you have

[00:55:06] a framework and I know this I know I know why you created a framework because you

[00:55:12] you're an artist yeah they same accent yes they same program all right so I love your framework

[00:55:18] you know you have the five acts are not to your acting career awareness articulation action alignment

[00:55:26] and automation can you does arm run through those words for sure so I think of the five acts

[00:55:33] as like a staircase or climbing a mountain you start with one because that gets you to the next

[00:55:38] level and so if you skip one it doesn't always work out the right way so I will sometimes switch around

[00:55:45] these acts but in general I know that when I can take somebody through the five steps in the right order

[00:55:51] that's usually when we get the best results and so when I wrote the book and when I give this stuff

[00:55:56] when I'm speaking on podcasts and such I like to keep that order because I know if somebody's doing

[00:55:59] this themselves that's the the right way to do it awareness is act one everything begins with awareness

[00:56:06] and I say that's true of any discipline right you can't start getting better until you know where

[00:56:12] you're at and you start noticing your behaviors like if you go to a running coach or if you go

[00:56:16] to a golf coach or a hockey coach or a baseball coach or a guitar teacher the first thing they're

[00:56:22] going to do is say show me what you got so far play the guitar for me or I want you to get

[00:56:27] this treadmill run and they kind of analyze where you're at and then start to show you what you're

[00:56:32] wrong or can be improved and nowadays of course we have videos so they'll take video and they'll show

[00:56:37] like that's how most coaching works as you've got to know where you're starting from. You've got

[00:56:42] to start to become aware of your unconscious habits these things that you're doing automatically

[00:56:46] without thinking about it and then just start to notice is this helping you communicate the way you

[00:56:51] want or is this working against you and that's where the speech settings comes from which is a

[00:56:58] framework that I may go into later but basically it's the basic seven speech settings are

[00:57:05] volume pitch, pace, clarity and inflection which is the voice moving up and down and physical

[00:57:10] and facial expressiveness so these seven facets of your communication are the things that you can

[00:57:16] start to become aware of and I just give people to give themselves a number from zero to 10 so for volume

[00:57:22] are you a zero which beats whispering? Or are you a 10 which is your shouting as loud as you can't

[00:57:28] like me? I'm starting to notice like you maybe but I wouldn't say you're at a 10 I would say you're at

[00:57:32] like a nice seven or eight so it's it's loud but it's not obnoxious and that's the thing is there's

[00:57:38] no such thing as right or wrong it's just is this helping you okay I would say your volume tends

[00:57:43] to help you because it makes you fun to listen to but you're not always at a seven or eight that is true

[00:57:50] you go down as well and depending on what you're talking about we all do to some extent

[00:57:55] very few people never change their delivery at all we all change depending on what we're saying

[00:57:59] depending on who we're talking to depending on the moment so I just want people to become aware of

[00:58:03] this stuff at this point and start to make some mindful changes what happens if you speak with

[00:58:09] the fast what happens if you slow down what does that do for you? If you speak really mumble if you

[00:58:14] mumble what happens when you say it with more clarity and you exaggerate the emphasis you know

[00:58:20] how does that transform you and so it's great when I can do this in a group because

[00:58:24] I get the person to speak and I go everybody what would you give them out of like 10 for their volume

[00:58:29] and they say oh the person says I think I was at a seven everybody goes three you know and

[00:58:32] they're like oh shit I didn't realize I was speaking so quietly and I said okay I want you to do

[00:58:36] it at a 10 and I you know I want them to yell and they're like hi everyone and then I go what

[00:58:42] did that feel like and I'm like oh I think I was at a 10 and everybody's up you're at a four you

[00:58:45] know it's like they they don't understand the gap between you know you said it earlier when you

[00:58:51] were blanking on stage it felt like 10 minutes but to the audience it was probably five seconds

[00:58:57] what it looks like on the outside is not what it feels like on the inside so you really

[00:59:00] got to start to become aware of that for public speaking you are not the best gauge

[00:59:04] from the inside you have to rely on video and you have to rely on other people's feedback

[00:59:10] as well as your own internal internal feedback then we get to act too which is our

[00:59:14] articulation so it's like now that we become aware let's look at the actual content what

[00:59:19] story are you telling that you know how to tell a story and so that's why I love working with

[00:59:24] entrepreneurs because the story is why did you start your business and and what does it do

[00:59:30] and who do you work with and who do you help and what's the solution the problem the solution

[00:59:34] the price so I teach a structure that I call the problem solution price structure which is like

[00:59:38] any business story can be boiled down to a three act story there's a problem you have a solution

[00:59:43] and then everybody gets a price and you can think about this for any presentation but in general

[00:59:48] for an elevator pitch for an email for a social media post if you can identify a problem make it

[00:59:55] sufficiently urgent painful costly been by the time you come up with your solution be going oh god

[01:00:02] this this this needs to be solved and then you present your solution and you explain it clearly

[01:00:08] this is what it does this is the benefits this is how it works these are some potential

[01:00:11] objections you might have and then you get to the price which is why bother implementing the solution

[01:00:18] yeah okay it's going to fix the problem we talked about but is there a deeper more

[01:00:23] is there a bigger benefit to this like a bigger society wide industry wide worldwide

[01:00:28] great benefit that we all get if more and more people adopt it the solution and that's what makes

[01:00:33] a really interesting story if there's some kind of bigger vision bigger purpose at the end so

[01:00:37] then that's act two act three is called action and depending who we're working with action will

[01:00:42] mean something different if i'm working with a start a founder who's fundraising actions going to be

[01:00:46] let's look at your pitch let's break it down let's deconstruct it let's make sure the story

[01:00:51] there let's make sure you're telling it well let's make sure we're highlighting the right things

[01:00:55] let's film you giving this pitch to investors let's analyze this footage let's give you more skills

[01:01:00] so that once we have your script let's give you some tools to really bring it to life that's action

[01:01:05] act four after we've done some practical stuff and usually at this point people are like oh my god i'm

[01:01:10] getting such good feedback on my pitches i'm getting such good feedback my presentations you know like

[01:01:14] they're feeling good so I think okay great now tell me about your lifestyle and now that i've kind of

[01:01:21] earned their trust after a few sessions i asked them to talk about their life why did you you know

[01:01:27] what's your childhood like what was your relationship with your parents what was your relationship

[01:01:31] with your siblings some of the stuff we've talked about today and not everybody's comfortable

[01:01:35] to talk about that right away i find more and more i do this work i'm more comfortable bringing

[01:01:40] this stuff up earlier and i also know that if i can share myself first then that will really make

[01:01:45] them feel more comfortable to share but i like to wait in general before i really get into that

[01:01:50] stuff because i need to earn their trust for them to share so then we dig into the deep reasons

[01:01:56] why do you do this work why do care about what you're talking about why are you the way that

[01:02:00] you are why do you have the personality that you do and that shit is all from life right that's

[01:02:04] your life experience make that makes us this way it makes us who we are and so when we get to act

[01:02:10] for alignment we take that deeper dive and then also that's the moment to talk about any fears you

[01:02:15] have any insecurities any self doubts that's getting in the way of being yourself and telling you

[01:02:21] or story so after that the final thing is called automation and automation is how can i get you

[01:02:30] to buy into and to create a work up plan essentially so that you keep improving your skills for

[01:02:36] the rest of your life i love that you say that there will be a personal story kind of really

[01:02:41] be disconnected from your business story or to see the other way around your business story kind

[01:02:45] of really be disconnected from your personal story because you start your business because you want

[01:02:49] to solve something from your personal story so i want to talk about pitching know you said that

[01:02:57] people are a lot less likely to fix a monetary problem than an emotional problem and when i

[01:03:05] thought i was in doing my research and it was like you are so right because especially in

[01:03:11] pitching to investors with they can okay once you get sure that there's a big opportunity and they

[01:03:15] could earn a lot of money boom they're going to invest but first they have to care they have to

[01:03:21] like you right they need to form some sort of emotional connections you they need to feel like

[01:03:27] you and your team are solving a world problem that they did not even know existed before

[01:03:33] and that this problem needs to be solved urgently and that they are blessed to have the funds

[01:03:40] to be able to give it to you to solve that problem so what is the secret source there i know

[01:03:46] that you are a text stars meant so everybody's trying to get it to text us what is the secret source

[01:03:50] what is text us looking for in the phone does that they admit into the program and i'm

[01:03:56] get finding too so there's a few things without being you know in their internal review team

[01:04:03] so i've worked with text art since 2018 and i've done every cohort of the text art

[01:04:07] trauma program which very sadly is probably shutting down so that was a big blow to our city

[01:04:12] and to start up ecosystem here because senile who ran that program gabby and elisha the people

[01:04:19] who were also doing it for the past couple years they were amazing they just provided so much

[01:04:23] support it did so much for the city and it's going to be tough shoes to fill but what i got the

[01:04:29] sense from working with them every year is like they are taking founders who themselves are really

[01:04:35] brilliant and the founder is almost more important than the idea they're also taking founders who are

[01:04:43] very committed to the problem they're solved so the CEO of text art is male gabet she said

[01:04:50] we don't accept anyone who i can tell it's not going to work on this for the next 10 years

[01:04:55] because as a pre-seed investor teller they need to know if they're going to see these

[01:05:00] return they need to wait that well and so they can't take a founder who's just going to jump

[01:05:04] to the next thing as soon as they decide they want to pivot or as soon as they find them more

[01:05:08] cooler you know cannabis opportunity or AI opportunity like they need to be really committed

[01:05:13] to the problem and to the industry and the customer that they're solving so the secret sauce is

[01:05:20] some of the things you mentioned it's kind of especially early stage it changes as you get

[01:05:27] later stage series a series b definitely but like founder market fit is so important when

[01:05:33] those early days we talk a lot about product market fit but founder market fit is so important

[01:05:38] does this founder understand the pains of the customers are talking about and usually it really

[01:05:43] helps if they as you said if they're solving a personal problem that they had that's a really

[01:05:47] compelling pitch um i had this problem i decided to do something about it and if not what is the

[01:05:56] believable reason that they care so much about the people they're helping so i was working with

[01:06:02] a founder of the other day as said you know he wasn't solving problems for people that he didn't

[01:06:07] have the problem that's not why they're solving it but i said why do you care but these people

[01:06:10] and he talked about his parents he said my parents are these kind of people on the level of

[01:06:13] it so i was okay i believe you i believe you care and i could tell by the way he was talking

[01:06:17] about his parents and i could tell by that it was real and so that's a kind of thing that i

[01:06:22] love to look for as a speaking coach but i also know a lot of vcs that i speak to and a lot of

[01:06:26] people that get funded it's like there's something about the team that inspires credibility

[01:06:32] there's there's other things to write there's traction there's product market fit there's indicators

[01:06:39] of that there's defense ability are you able to defend this IP this algorithm that you have

[01:06:44] the proprietary if they're patting you have are you first market but also network do you have

[01:06:49] a network or an ability to create a network so really why i focus on what i do is like okay there's

[01:06:55] a lot of wisdom out there about how to structure your pitch what things to talk about ways to

[01:07:01] emphasize your numbers and your traction but ultimately what you can do better than anybody else

[01:07:09] is be yourself and if you can be yourself loudly and confidently and clearly and compellingly

[01:07:15] then you just stand out from so many founders who go up there and go here is why there's

[01:07:18] so many members this is how big the market is here's how we're going to go to market this is

[01:07:23] the strategy this is what we're going to spend the money on give me money now please vcs get a million

[01:07:29] of those a day and sometimes the idea is so good that it doesn't matter how boring the founder is

[01:07:35] but then i have a client right now who told me that the reason his advisor told them the reason

[01:07:39] he's not fundraising is because he's boring they told him this shit and it's awful and i'm

[01:07:44] like it sucks it shouldn't be that way he should be able to raise money because he's smart and

[01:07:49] hardworking and talented he's got a good idea but unfortunately it's not the way it works so it's

[01:07:54] not that necessarily that you can have a shit idea and you'll raise a bunch of money just because

[01:07:59] your care is magic although that does happen but it means that once you've got your financial

[01:08:05] ducks in a row once you've understood the fundamentals of what makes a compelling investor pitch

[01:08:09] and what and that these he's looking for what kind of scale they need to see what kind of

[01:08:13] marketsize they need what kind of traction they're looking for then work on yourself

[01:08:18] work on the way you talk and work on the emotional stories that you tell and connect your

[01:08:23] personal story to the pitch then it's just an extra huge leg up your competition because most

[01:08:29] of them are not doing this and you want to stand out and you want to be different because they've

[01:08:33] got to make a choice and as much as you think people are making this choice logically they're

[01:08:37] making it emotionally as well it's not more yeah that makes so much sense because

[01:08:44] especially when you're looking at the founders you're looking for people who

[01:08:47] be able to onboard a team again and that goes back to communication because

[01:08:51] it's talking about social skills and leadership and charisma right and your ability to speak clearly

[01:08:58] and communicate effectively and really convey that emotion convey that need it gives the

[01:09:05] investors that feeling of competence are comfort in your competence that is so that's really

[01:09:10] that's really good and thank you for that we're not really sure oh yeah sorry I just wanted to say

[01:09:15] one thing you know Daniel Priestley who runs the thing that we both did he's becoming kind of like a

[01:09:20] a YouTube link in superstar now I don't know if you've been seeing his voice yeah yeah yeah yeah

[01:09:24] yeah yeah yeah yeah and so yeah yeah and so a lot of those things that we learned in that program

[01:09:29] it's funny it's like you are I'm seeing them now on YouTube and LinkedIn all the time but

[01:09:34] one thing I think he said recently on a podcast was everything you want as an entrepreneur

[01:09:40] is just on the other side of a conversation. Amen I love that and I think it's so true it's

[01:09:45] that you can get so much done with a good pitch or with a good conversation or with a warm introduction

[01:09:51] or you know so all this shit his so much of it is about relationship and about the ability to

[01:09:56] tell a good story and the ability to get people on board with you the ability to make friends make

[01:10:00] connections build real meaningful relationships communicate value communicate your purpose with passion

[01:10:10] yes and you can do that man you're well on your way yeah it's a junior with thousand pitches

[01:10:17] and you're always pitching yes hey well I know you have to go I want to thank you so much for

[01:10:25] the story you're with them and your knowledge and those insights tricks there before we wrap up

[01:10:32] is there anything like we have uncovered that you want to make so we get our audience giving you open

[01:10:37] mic, open, form, open platform it's yours yeah I would just say take this as an opportunity to start now

[01:10:48] just like you would start a fitness journey sometimes you just wake up one day and you go

[01:10:52] enough is enough I'm sick of feeling this way I'm sick of feel them tired achy overweight my joints

[01:11:00] hurt I don't I don't have a lot of breath to go upstairs and so you buy parachutes you go for a

[01:11:04] fucking run you go to gym whatever that is right if you're watching this right now and you're not

[01:11:10] where you want to be just think about maybe the way that you speak and the way that you communicate

[01:11:16] could be a huge driver to start to get you there and so take this as a journey to start

[01:11:21] becoming serious about it and working on it and don't think that it's lame or it's corny because

[01:11:25] some people will say it is but they're not you and they're not trying to live the life that you want

[01:11:30] you only you can do that for yourself so I would say that and then there's some great people online

[01:11:35] doing this work who are teaching entrepreneurs to be better speakers ask then is one which is

[01:11:41] really good stuff if you follow Daniel previously you'll learn a lot about pitching my book

[01:11:45] transform your speaking skills obviously I'm biased but I think it's a good place to start

[01:11:50] and I'm launching my YouTube channel called your public speaking coach and maybe I can send it to you

[01:11:55] so if you're still watching and you like this kind of thing please subscribe to the channel

[01:12:00] and I'll put out a lot of stuff on the same topics videos and also insider sneak peaks from my workshops

[01:12:06] oh yeah and follow me on a LinkedIn podcast will there you have it speaking out loud with will

[01:12:14] subscribe to the value at the value dot shows less subscribe check us out on YouTube Spotify

[01:12:20] Apple Podcasts wherever you get your podcast and it that will

[01:12:26] moment thank you so much

[01:12:28] podcast will we are out