This week I prepared
and delivered a seven-minute speech at Rising Tide Toastmasters club. The
speech was a simple Christmas story.
Speeches
like this aren’t a strength of mine. I
use stories regularly in speeches, but rarely would the purpose of one of my speeches
be only to entertain. However, over the past week this one fell into place quickly
and easily. I will share the process as
I think you might find it helpful. I
will likely re-use the speech in Christmases to come.
Three
Components
I had recently completed a thorough cleaning
of my living room, and in doing so, I picked up and moved an old guitar that was just
sitting around collecting dust. I decluttered books, DVDs, and the guitar, and
took them to the Salvation Army thrift shop as a donation. That’s the entire story, but of course each component
needs some relevant detail and color. Here’s how that was added. Three components
for about two minutes each result in around six minutes of material in my
experience and practice. I delivered this planned six minutes of material in a
total of seven minutes. Here are the components.
First, I described
the thorough cleaning. I still have too
many books. I was surprised how many
DVDs I still have when I have no longer have a DVD player, or a television. I
own a few guitars and the one I spoke about was unused for many years. My Rising
Tide Toastmasters club had recently discussed clutter so this provided a nice
refer back to that shared experience. At
every meeting we practice off-the-cuff questions and response on a variety of
topics, and a few weeks ago it was on clutter. I noticed people have some
strong opinions on acquisition, storage, and disposal. So, the first speech
component about my decluttering was easy to construct and set the stage for the
speech.
For the
second component, I described how I had originally acquired the guitar, and why
it was not used recently. The guitar is a Les Paul junior and when I bought it,
it was in poor shape, but I wanted it anyway, because it looked cool. I made efforts to improve it, but it was
never in great condition. I did and do love it, but in recent years I bought
another junior that is in much better shape.
For the
third component, I described the disposal, and the decision on how to proceed
with disposal. I had considered selling or
gifting the guitar directly to see if I could get it to a kid at Christmas who
would treasure having a cool looking guitar, that is playable, but not in greet
shape. But listing and finding a buyer, let alone a buyer I would find suitable
for my beloved possession, would take time. So, I decided to donate it and let
the thrift shop manage all aspects of that.
I do hope it makes some kids Christmas.
Dialogue
Adds Color
The
interaction at the thrift shop added more color. The conversation was brief;
“I have a
donation’”
“Great.
Thanks. A guitar! How much should we
charge for this?”
“Not much! Ten
dollars. Maybe as much as $50.”
“Is that
all!!!”
“Yes. It’s playable, but it’s not in great shape.
Hopefully it makes some kids Christmas. It would make a great first guitar for
someone.”
And those
were the three components.
Speeches
and Purpose
It’s fine
for a speech to only offer a story, to simply entertain. Christmas time leads
itself to that. But it’s much better if
you can inspire people to think differently or act differently.
So, I closed
by stating my purpose was to get the audience thinking about how we all have
possessions, how the value to us often diminishes over time, and that they
might be holding something that might make nice donation, and make someone’s
Christmas. Not a world changing message, but perhaps it can help someone’s
holiday.
I feel good believing
that the guitar will get into the hands of a deserving kid, maybe a future rock
star.
My purpose
in writing this is to show how we can be opportunistic in reflecting on
everyday small events, and assemble components for a worthwhile speech.
