Give a speech on how to find one's "ness". As in your "Herbiejuan-ness". That which makes you you. That special thing that gives you your connection to the Mother Ship so that when the time is right, when the Mothership calls, you'll be able to allow your Herbiejuan-ness to take you to heights you never thought were achieveable... :blink:
Umm....Sorry bout that. You'll have to watch the movie "You, Me, and Dupree" with Owen Wilson and Matt Dillon....
How about something to do with guns - you could go off on rights, safety, how to's, etc. (I know nothing about guns, but I do know something about you... so that's just a suggestion...)
Maybe there's something else that tickles your fancy....
Talk about what you know or what you love - I've actually gotten awards in public speaking. I love it. I was always careful to pick a safe subject whenever I could - something I knew something about. If I didn't know the subject (like, once I had to speak on the history of aviation - yikes) I worked like hell to learn my subject.
Ok...so far it involves speaking to a poly sci class, two geoscience classes, a history class and an urban planning and develppmment class on urban agriculture and sustainability. Previous to this (in 97) I was asked to speak to their art class regarding art.
I initend to include nude beekeeping as part of my talk and I am hoping I can make apoint towards the legalization of marujuana (just to prove myself difficult)
The classes probably could give a rats butt about any of us, but you already know of what to speak. It's an area for which you are well learned and versed and skilled.
Get up there and tell your story. Make good eye contact, avoid the uh's um's and yaknow's. Don't bother trying to impress. Consider your audience, be clear, don't wander around the topic. Be prepared for questions.
You'll do a good job and come back and tell us how well it went.
Umm...Sorry bout that Herbiejuan, it was a poor attempt at humor. There is a funny scene in the movie where a guy gives an impromptu speech. Sorry I don't have much to offer. And so, good luck on the speech.
Its probably too late to offer advice, which is good, because I have none to offer. :) I just wanted to say I wish I were one of the students so I could hear your speech. It sounds interesting!
Good luck! And I'll second Shell, please come back and tell us how it went and what you said.
I guess it depends on when these speeches are to be given, Herb.
If somewhere in the far off future, get thee to a Toastmaster's meeting and join up.
If it's in the immediate future, get a copy of Public Speaking For Dummies by Malcolm Kushner.
The only other suggestion is to ask the person who asked you to give the speech if they had anything in mind for the speech. Other than that, attempt to tailor your speech to your audience.
Your recent dream come true and how you had to work with all kinds of folks, politicians, farmers, educators, etc. to see it come to fruition. The lessons you learned in the process and how absolutely 'pinch me; I must be dreaming' awesome it is. And then, how they, too, can make that ripple in the ocean doing what they love to do.
Ah, too little, too late, I suppose. But I've always thought that the biggest key to public speaking is to stop listening to yourself, and think instead about what you need to say. Remind yourself that what you are talking about is important, then say it as if you are talking to your best friend.
Just be sure your best friend is in the back of the room, so everyone else can hear you....
Johnny I owe you an apology, I shouldn't have been so quick to snap like that...sorry
It is funny, thanks for trying to help
What has to be said has alot of me in it but what I say will not have me in it, it will be the *us* that made all this possible in the first place, which is why I liked Coolwaters post on selling an idea or in my case, the pwoer of an idea (or several). At least this is my thinking.
I set an impossible deadline for the rough draft and then frittered the day away watching ballgames, I got the date put off till next week and I'll be talking throughout the semester. I'm really trying to make the focus of this on something other than me, which can be challenging, it's we and us not me and them, I like that idea alot.
Thanks
Oh and to handle the marijuana issue, I'm going to ask my listeners what is America's largest cash crop and where does all that money go?
Aww shucks, no problem Herbijuan. I see that you were being pretty serious, and maybe the time of the "humor' was bad too.
And so, I think Cool Chef's "rule of thumb" is a good one. And, if I had to choose a topic, and the choices were wide open, I think I would make sure to choose a subject that I am passionate about. One that I am very familiar with and one that has an known audience. For example:
I lived in a small harbor town in Alaska (Haines) where we had a thriving cruise ship business. We only had one cruise ship a day, five days a week. That's only five ships total a week. Each ship arrived at 5:00 p.m. and departed at 11:00. That meant tourists off the street by 10:00 p.m as the ship got ready to sail. The shops prospered, nature tours prospered, the liquor stores prospered and the bars prospered. My friend's tattoo parlour did very well. People took out business loans to open gift shops and they began to prosper too. And, the money trickled throughout town, and we enjoyed three years of prosperity, with a very low level of impact as far as having lots of people in town was concerned, for, at the end of each day, they were all gone. And, it was not the "Disneyland overkill" of Skagway, Alaska (only twenty miles away as the crow flies), that receives five huge cruise ships a day. Yes, that small town of 800 receives over 11,000 tourists and crew members a day, and it is a way crowded hustle bustle town in the summer. And, of course, Skagway is awash in money. Very prosperous town. But Haines was far and away from that kind of crowd, and we "Hainiaks" were not about to become another Skagway. Five ships a week was more than enough...
And so, here was our little town of 1200 (with much more city infrastructure than Skaqway because Haines used to be a logging town of 5,000 back in the early seventies), trying to get it's feet on the ground by trying to join the tourist business since we really had not much of an economy-for our old economy was killed off-and lo and behold, disaster struck! One day when one of the Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines (RLCC) monster cruise ships docked, and as the smiling passengers began to walk off the dock, a crowd of around thirty hippies met the passengers with signs and posters and began to shout the hapless tourists down. Yeah, here was gray haired "Hal and Marge" from Effingham, Illinois, or Keokuk, Iowa, looking at the wondrous Alaskan scenery, and all of the sudden, there is an angry hippy in their faces screaming; "We don't come into your bedroom and s hi t in it! Why do you come and s hi t in ours!! Take your toxic waisting cruise ship and go back to the States!" Yes, there had been an isolated incident when a cruise ship had dumped some of it's sewage in our waters some eighty miles south of Haines, but they got busted for it, paid millions in fines (at least 1 million to Haines), and the situation was "made right". But, after this "protest" at the cruise ship dock, RLCC, told the city of Haines; "Well, we hope you enjoy your two brand new baseball diamonds with the digital score boards, the new and huge jungle jim for the little guys and gals, and the baseball uniforms for the Little League guys that we gave you, but, we have to go. You need us more than we need you. Our passengers have been insulted for the last time, and so, we have to go". And they left. And the business rolled up. My house depreciated greatly. My property taxes went up to pay the bill on the new cruise ship dock which was to be paid for with docking fees, now hardly used. The "anti- economy crowd" (small minority) laughed and cheered their "victory" which included hurting many many familes-including my own-and the town's emerging economy up and died. Many moved away. "Grizzly Gregs Pizza" went bankrupt, Barb's Bakery died, my friend Fred's very high quality Native Alaskan Art store (ivory carvings, etc) went bankrupt, and on and on down the line. All of these people (including me) moved away to larger cities in Alaska where they could make a living taking care of their families. Unfortunately, we have taken jobs that are not in the realm of our "onetime dream businesses", and are living in the bigger less attractive cities like Juneau, Fairbanks, and Anchorage.
And so, I could make a very good speech about this occurrence in a very unique Alaskan town. I first tell them how one selfish group, with beliefs of their own but contrary to many, did a drastic thing but with great boldness, and managed to disrupt and bankrupt the economy of one whole town. And this would be the "Tell Them What You Are Going To Tell Them" part.
Then I would tell them, just as I just now told you, then I would re-iterate the salient points and end it with my opinion of such peoples' efforts, which would be the "Tell 'Em What You Just Told 'Em" part.
Hey Herbijuan, I know that you don't want your speech "to be about you", and I admire that. But the most comfortable way that I know to give a speech is to have an Incident that you can relay, for their really is "power in the incident". And, if that incident includes one of your experiences, there will be that much more power in that incident, because it is way easy to become passionate about ones' own experiences. And so, food for thought!
I feel for you Jonny we had the same thing happen here. Your event didn't happen around the time of the Valdez oil spill did it?
We had a decent clothing manufacturing business here, 12 plants altogether, making high quality suits shirts and trousers. Locals who worked there bought n paid for homes, raised kids, put some through college and retired. Then corperate profit margins began dominating the clothing purchasing business and all the accounts moved overseas.
One shop is still open making military uniforms.
The town went into a steady decline until it realised three simple truths 1) there are a million little towns out there just like ours 2) they are all competing for the same limited resources to kick starting their economy and 3) the only sure way for the town to pull itself out of its rut was for it to believe in and invest in itself. We did and things are getting better.
It's funny how the interests of a few can affect many isn't it.
We have the option of joining the Metro Atlanta ratrace, this side of the county (so far) is opting out.
Oh my. Metro Atlanta. That's a huge one, isn't it? I know I'll not do that. For me, the "huge city of Juneau" at 29,000 people is way too much. And so, was that thing that Ross Perot predicted part of the reason for the clothing manufacturing jobs moving overseas? I have heard that a serious amount of manufacturing jobs have moved South Of The Border...
Well, Godspeed Herbiejuan. I hope your little town makes it. The town of Haines is slowly recovering in the form of "Heli-Skiing", which is helicopter skiing in some of the most awesome extreme skiing in the world.
Thank you for your suggestions, the speech went well, I gave it in front of the dean of the dept and two profs. It went well enough for them to let me go ahead n schedule this for presenting to the different classes wanting me to speak.
I basicly told the story of the sustainable ag and development movement here, how it got started how its progressed and where it is going, it's an interesting story.
Oh more good news!
My first day of class was today, I'm taking 15 hrs, I just learned that all my courses have been switched to self study which means I'll spend about 20 hrs on campus this semester sweet eh? :)
I did. I was finishing up my point on declining farm revenue and asked them if they could think of any crop that was generating it's growers a genuine year to year profit. I didn't let them answer but went on to ask why that was. This made a good sedgeway into why specialized crops tailored to a specific market and grown by a limited number of skilled farmers can also make a profit, only in a more legitimate business.
What stressed me so much was I had this tangled mess of ideas I wanted to get across and the more I tried to untangle it the worse it got. I wanted to weave a tapestry and all I could see was this mass of yarn daring me to try. Today I think I knitted a pot holder.
Due to my stupidity I'm dealing with politicians, appointed officials, special interest groups, college students, professors, federal, state and local agencies, non profits and a few groups I helped birth.
There are only a few folks taking the lead in the areas I am dealing with, not all of them play nice and I am EXPECTED by many to voice an opinion.
I found this is a dangerous position to be in so I quit talking and began listening and designing the SGS program (the first of its kind in the southeast inspite of what GO may say).
So I stress over needless details sometimes, silly me.
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J0nny Ling0
Give a speech on how to find one's "ness". As in your "Herbiejuan-ness". That which makes you you. That special thing that gives you your connection to the Mother Ship so that when the time is right, when the Mothership calls, you'll be able to allow your Herbiejuan-ness to take you to heights you never thought were achieveable... :blink:
Umm....Sorry bout that. You'll have to watch the movie "You, Me, and Dupree" with Owen Wilson and Matt Dillon....
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herbiejuan
No I am trying my best to avoid that john boy
I intend to focus this on what has been done and to build on reality
Unlike others who prefer to disrepect I've been busy being respected
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Ham
Well.. what are the classes? I don't quite know what you are referring to with UWG..
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dmiller
Could nude bee-keeping factor in?
If you were to (somehow) correlate it with the topic at hand?? :)
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ChasUFarley
You're into guns, right?
How about something to do with guns - you could go off on rights, safety, how to's, etc. (I know nothing about guns, but I do know something about you... so that's just a suggestion...)
Maybe there's something else that tickles your fancy....
Talk about what you know or what you love - I've actually gotten awards in public speaking. I love it. I was always careful to pick a safe subject whenever I could - something I knew something about. If I didn't know the subject (like, once I had to speak on the history of aviation - yikes) I worked like hell to learn my subject.
Speak with conviction - whatever you do.
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herbiejuan
Ok...so far it involves speaking to a poly sci class, two geoscience classes, a history class and an urban planning and develppmment class on urban agriculture and sustainability. Previous to this (in 97) I was asked to speak to their art class regarding art.
I initend to include nude beekeeping as part of my talk and I am hoping I can make apoint towards the legalization of marujuana (just to prove myself difficult)
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herbiejuan
So there are my main points I have as speech to make tommorrow in front of a crowd of smart folks
1) What are my MAIN points
2) WHAT are my facts
3) HOW do I go about presenting this to my audience in order to sell it to them?
I'm not planning to make a prestnation tommorrow on these disjointed subjects altho I may have in a previous life..
I'll be talking about sustainable agriculture and communities
Livable cities
Livable communities
The sense of community the sense of belonging and responsibility
In other words Jonnie I will be speaking of you Chas Ham Shell Verbal Paw...
U
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Shellon
The classes probably could give a rats butt about any of us, but you already know of what to speak. It's an area for which you are well learned and versed and skilled.
Get up there and tell your story. Make good eye contact, avoid the uh's um's and yaknow's. Don't bother trying to impress. Consider your audience, be clear, don't wander around the topic. Be prepared for questions.
You'll do a good job and come back and tell us how well it went.
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J0nny Ling0
Umm...Sorry bout that Herbiejuan, it was a poor attempt at humor. There is a funny scene in the movie where a guy gives an impromptu speech. Sorry I don't have much to offer. And so, good luck on the speech.
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VeganXTC
Its probably too late to offer advice, which is good, because I have none to offer. :) I just wanted to say I wish I were one of the students so I could hear your speech. It sounds interesting!
Good luck! And I'll second Shell, please come back and tell us how it went and what you said.
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Sushi
I guess it depends on when these speeches are to be given, Herb.
If somewhere in the far off future, get thee to a Toastmaster's meeting and join up.
If it's in the immediate future, get a copy of Public Speaking For Dummies by Malcolm Kushner.
The only other suggestion is to ask the person who asked you to give the speech if they had anything in mind for the speech. Other than that, attempt to tailor your speech to your audience.
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Belle
Your recent dream come true and how you had to work with all kinds of folks, politicians, farmers, educators, etc. to see it come to fruition. The lessons you learned in the process and how absolutely 'pinch me; I must be dreaming' awesome it is.
And then, how they, too, can make that ripple in the ocean doing what they love to do.
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coolchef
about one of the only few good words of adivice i ever heard from the big brow was
tell them what you're going to tell them
tell them
tell them you told them
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Belle
How'd it go, HerbieJuan??
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shazdancer
Ah, too little, too late, I suppose. But I've always thought that the biggest key to public speaking is to stop listening to yourself, and think instead about what you need to say. Remind yourself that what you are talking about is important, then say it as if you are talking to your best friend.
Just be sure your best friend is in the back of the room, so everyone else can hear you....
Shaz
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herbiejuan
Johnny I owe you an apology, I shouldn't have been so quick to snap like that...sorry
It is funny, thanks for trying to help
What has to be said has alot of me in it but what I say will not have me in it, it will be the *us* that made all this possible in the first place, which is why I liked Coolwaters post on selling an idea or in my case, the pwoer of an idea (or several). At least this is my thinking.
I set an impossible deadline for the rough draft and then frittered the day away watching ballgames, I got the date put off till next week and I'll be talking throughout the semester. I'm really trying to make the focus of this on something other than me, which can be challenging, it's we and us not me and them, I like that idea alot.
Thanks
Oh and to handle the marijuana issue, I'm going to ask my listeners what is America's largest cash crop and where does all that money go?
me
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J0nny Ling0
Aww shucks, no problem Herbijuan. I see that you were being pretty serious, and maybe the time of the "humor' was bad too.
And so, I think Cool Chef's "rule of thumb" is a good one. And, if I had to choose a topic, and the choices were wide open, I think I would make sure to choose a subject that I am passionate about. One that I am very familiar with and one that has an known audience. For example:
I lived in a small harbor town in Alaska (Haines) where we had a thriving cruise ship business. We only had one cruise ship a day, five days a week. That's only five ships total a week. Each ship arrived at 5:00 p.m. and departed at 11:00. That meant tourists off the street by 10:00 p.m as the ship got ready to sail. The shops prospered, nature tours prospered, the liquor stores prospered and the bars prospered. My friend's tattoo parlour did very well. People took out business loans to open gift shops and they began to prosper too. And, the money trickled throughout town, and we enjoyed three years of prosperity, with a very low level of impact as far as having lots of people in town was concerned, for, at the end of each day, they were all gone. And, it was not the "Disneyland overkill" of Skagway, Alaska (only twenty miles away as the crow flies), that receives five huge cruise ships a day. Yes, that small town of 800 receives over 11,000 tourists and crew members a day, and it is a way crowded hustle bustle town in the summer. And, of course, Skagway is awash in money. Very prosperous town. But Haines was far and away from that kind of crowd, and we "Hainiaks" were not about to become another Skagway. Five ships a week was more than enough...
And so, here was our little town of 1200 (with much more city infrastructure than Skaqway because Haines used to be a logging town of 5,000 back in the early seventies), trying to get it's feet on the ground by trying to join the tourist business since we really had not much of an economy-for our old economy was killed off-and lo and behold, disaster struck! One day when one of the Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines (RLCC) monster cruise ships docked, and as the smiling passengers began to walk off the dock, a crowd of around thirty hippies met the passengers with signs and posters and began to shout the hapless tourists down. Yeah, here was gray haired "Hal and Marge" from Effingham, Illinois, or Keokuk, Iowa, looking at the wondrous Alaskan scenery, and all of the sudden, there is an angry hippy in their faces screaming; "We don't come into your bedroom and s hi t in it! Why do you come and s hi t in ours!! Take your toxic waisting cruise ship and go back to the States!" Yes, there had been an isolated incident when a cruise ship had dumped some of it's sewage in our waters some eighty miles south of Haines, but they got busted for it, paid millions in fines (at least 1 million to Haines), and the situation was "made right". But, after this "protest" at the cruise ship dock, RLCC, told the city of Haines; "Well, we hope you enjoy your two brand new baseball diamonds with the digital score boards, the new and huge jungle jim for the little guys and gals, and the baseball uniforms for the Little League guys that we gave you, but, we have to go. You need us more than we need you. Our passengers have been insulted for the last time, and so, we have to go". And they left. And the business rolled up. My house depreciated greatly. My property taxes went up to pay the bill on the new cruise ship dock which was to be paid for with docking fees, now hardly used. The "anti- economy crowd" (small minority) laughed and cheered their "victory" which included hurting many many familes-including my own-and the town's emerging economy up and died. Many moved away. "Grizzly Gregs Pizza" went bankrupt, Barb's Bakery died, my friend Fred's very high quality Native Alaskan Art store (ivory carvings, etc) went bankrupt, and on and on down the line. All of these people (including me) moved away to larger cities in Alaska where they could make a living taking care of their families. Unfortunately, we have taken jobs that are not in the realm of our "onetime dream businesses", and are living in the bigger less attractive cities like Juneau, Fairbanks, and Anchorage.
And so, I could make a very good speech about this occurrence in a very unique Alaskan town. I first tell them how one selfish group, with beliefs of their own but contrary to many, did a drastic thing but with great boldness, and managed to disrupt and bankrupt the economy of one whole town. And this would be the "Tell Them What You Are Going To Tell Them" part.
Then I would tell them, just as I just now told you, then I would re-iterate the salient points and end it with my opinion of such peoples' efforts, which would be the "Tell 'Em What You Just Told 'Em" part.
Hey Herbijuan, I know that you don't want your speech "to be about you", and I admire that. But the most comfortable way that I know to give a speech is to have an Incident that you can relay, for their really is "power in the incident". And, if that incident includes one of your experiences, there will be that much more power in that incident, because it is way easy to become passionate about ones' own experiences. And so, food for thought!
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herbiejuan
I feel for you Jonny we had the same thing happen here. Your event didn't happen around the time of the Valdez oil spill did it?
We had a decent clothing manufacturing business here, 12 plants altogether, making high quality suits shirts and trousers. Locals who worked there bought n paid for homes, raised kids, put some through college and retired. Then corperate profit margins began dominating the clothing purchasing business and all the accounts moved overseas.
One shop is still open making military uniforms.
The town went into a steady decline until it realised three simple truths 1) there are a million little towns out there just like ours 2) they are all competing for the same limited resources to kick starting their economy and 3) the only sure way for the town to pull itself out of its rut was for it to believe in and invest in itself. We did and things are getting better.
It's funny how the interests of a few can affect many isn't it.
We have the option of joining the Metro Atlanta ratrace, this side of the county (so far) is opting out.
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J0nny Ling0
Oh my. Metro Atlanta. That's a huge one, isn't it? I know I'll not do that. For me, the "huge city of Juneau" at 29,000 people is way too much. And so, was that thing that Ross Perot predicted part of the reason for the clothing manufacturing jobs moving overseas? I have heard that a serious amount of manufacturing jobs have moved South Of The Border...
Well, Godspeed Herbiejuan. I hope your little town makes it. The town of Haines is slowly recovering in the form of "Heli-Skiing", which is helicopter skiing in some of the most awesome extreme skiing in the world.
http://www.feedthehabit.com/articles/red_b...snowthrill.html
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herbiejuan
Thank you for your suggestions, the speech went well, I gave it in front of the dean of the dept and two profs. It went well enough for them to let me go ahead n schedule this for presenting to the different classes wanting me to speak.
I basicly told the story of the sustainable ag and development movement here, how it got started how its progressed and where it is going, it's an interesting story.
Oh more good news!
My first day of class was today, I'm taking 15 hrs, I just learned that all my courses have been switched to self study which means I'll spend about 20 hrs on campus this semester sweet eh? :)
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Dot Matrix
Cool
Did you bring up maryjane?
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herbiejuan
I did. I was finishing up my point on declining farm revenue and asked them if they could think of any crop that was generating it's growers a genuine year to year profit. I didn't let them answer but went on to ask why that was. This made a good sedgeway into why specialized crops tailored to a specific market and grown by a limited number of skilled farmers can also make a profit, only in a more legitimate business.
What stressed me so much was I had this tangled mess of ideas I wanted to get across and the more I tried to untangle it the worse it got. I wanted to weave a tapestry and all I could see was this mass of yarn daring me to try. Today I think I knitted a pot holder.
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krys
You'll be fine!
If you think it's tangled, keep it as simple as possible until you feel more comfortable.
I've found that making a "map" on paper of the ideas I want to convey, and then list the steps to get to the end of the idea often helps.
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herbiejuan
I'm beginning to have fun with this.
Due to my stupidity I'm dealing with politicians, appointed officials, special interest groups, college students, professors, federal, state and local agencies, non profits and a few groups I helped birth.
There are only a few folks taking the lead in the areas I am dealing with, not all of them play nice and I am EXPECTED by many to voice an opinion.
I found this is a dangerous position to be in so I quit talking and began listening and designing the SGS program (the first of its kind in the southeast inspite of what GO may say).
So I stress over needless details sometimes, silly me.
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