Beyond SUS

Many sabha-ologist have asked what comes after SUS. This is an excellent question since it implies a truth that many sabha-ologist have not really contemplated. SUS is just the starting point. (Gasp!) One of the next step in crafting a great talk is to refine what we are going to say and how we are going to say it. This will require deliberate practice which is a fancy way of saying giving lots of talks and getting lots of feedback (a sabha-ologists version of a good time). There are many excellent speakers who after their SUS write down each word they are going to say line by line to hone their presentation. Evan Puschak (the Nerdwriter) has an excellent example of crafting a message (hat tip Jarvikbhai) by deconstructing a Louis C K joke.

You know, more than anything else I think I’m obsessed with articulation, with the magic of putting things just the right way. There are 207 words in this joke and not a single one is wasted. They’re used either in meaning or in rhythm to contribute to the overall effect, an effect that lets us see the world from a different angle, and more importantly, makes us laugh.

It is this idea of articulation that SUS attempts quantify. SUS is just one of many methods to do this. We don't need SUS to make a great talk, but we need something. Using SUS is infinitely better than using nothing at all. After SUS we need to sharpen the saw. One method is to wordsmith in the manner that Louis CK does with his material - looking at every word we are about to say and evaluating if there is a more concise and impactful way of articulating our thoughts. Put another way: is there a better way to say our story to convey our simple message. We may not be able to script every word, but let's start next week by looking at one story.

Make the Kids Write - a new kind of unexpected.

Sahilbhai a first time presenter in Bal 1 and a very ardent Sabha-ologist came up with a unique unexpected (spoiler alert: it was not a video) to engage the Balaks. He wrote the following thoughtful analysis of his talk and how in the future he would improve. A great many good idea here for all of us to implement.

In preparing for my Bal 1 talk centered on the prasang of Shukanand Swami I came up with the following Simple / Unexpected / Story paradigm.

Simple

When we do seva our main goal should be to make Maharaj and Swami happy.I would have the kids repeat this several times to make sure they remembered it. This really worked as some of the kids were said this in their own words while they were eating dinner.

Unexpected

I had the balaks undergo a writing exercise in order to help them understand the difficulty of Shukanand Swami’s seva as Maharaj’s Secretary. Each balak had a blank piece of paper and a pencil. I would say five sentences and have them write it down word for word to the best of their ability. Then I would ask the balaks for feedback on they performed. There was only one balak who was able to get around 90% of what I said which was 40% higher than the second highest. I asked him why he did so well and he told me that he has a teacher who teaches at a fast pace. I related this to Shukanand Swami’s proficiency in his seva because before Shukanand Swami became a sadhu he was a merchant who handled the accounts of land and he was highly educated. Similar to the balak who performed well due to his experience with his teacher in school, Shukanand Swami was highly adept at writing long accounts due to his knowledge of linguistics he was able to handle the rigors of being Maharaj’s Secretary.

After receiving the feedback from the balaks, I immediately told them to flip over their paper and be ready for the second part of the exercise. Similar to the first part, I would say five sentences (different sentences) and have write them down word for word. After completing the exercise, I initiated another feedback interval to ask how they felt now compared to the first part. Many of the balaks improved from their performance on the first part because they kept a positive attitude even though they might have gotten less than 10% accuracy (accuracy is evaluated by how many words a balak was able write down which correlated with what I had spoken in the five sentences) on the first part. The balaks that had done worse than before or did not improve had a negative attitude which affected their performance. Because of the fact they were unable to get a 100% accuracy on the first try, they felt miserable. 

I used this data to inform the balaks on how this exercise resembles seva. When we do seva our main goal should be to make Maharaj and Swami happy. However, sometimes events happen that are out of our control. Those events must be seen as Maharaj’s ichchha (His doing) to test us. If we become depressed and quit we will never achieve the goal we set out which was to earn Maharaj and Swami’s happiness (rajipo). Therefore, if we remain sthitpragya (stable minded) we are able to analyze what happened (antardrishti) to help us persevere through the unsuccessful attempt in order to continue our goal to achieve Maharaj and Swami’s happiness.

Stories

I told the balaks about Shukanand Swami’s seva and the magnitude of difficulty he had to go through. I began with an overview of what it meant being Maharaj’s secretary. As the secretary, Shukanand Swami would create and maintain accounts of Maharaj’s discourses which were later compiled into major religious texts (Vachanamrut). Maharaj always tested his devotees in order for them to become ekantik (perfect devotee). The same was applied to Shukanand Swami by how he was pressured to write 14 page long accounts and end up having to revise them late into the night (this displayed the amount of meticulous perfection Shukanand Swami emphasized in doing seva). When he would submit his seva to Maharaj as a form of bhakti, Maharaj would test him being tearing up the papers and throwing them on the ground. Nityanand Swami asked Shukanand Swami if he experience a feeling of frustration and Shukanand Swami replied by saying “I had written it just to please Maharaj and Maharaj pleased himself by tearing up the pages”. This quote best illustrated how we should perform our seva which is to earn Maharaj and Swami’s happiness and remain stable minded like Shukanand Swami. As a result, Maharaj appreciated Shukanand Swami so much that he would refer to him during discourses on seva.

In order to continue my emphasis on when we do seva our main goal should be to make Maharaj and Swami happy as well as the mahima of Maharaj's ichchha in our seva, I used the London Mandir prasang. It was Yogi Bapa's agna to have a Mandir in every continent. So to fulfill this agna, there was an area of land originally permitted by the urban planners in the city to be used in the construction of the Mandir in London.  Unfortunately, some problems occurred and the land was no longer permitted for construction. The devotees did their best to win a case for permission to construct the Mandir but there was no success in obtaining the land. Due the lost efforts, the devotees lost hope in the cause and quit. However, Pramukh Swami Maharaj had the sthitaprajna to remain focused on fulfilling Yogi Bapa’s agna and inspired the devotees to remain focused on the cause as well. As a result, a new area of land was found to construct the Mandir. Today there is a beautiful Mandir in London which can be seen as a symbol of seva that was done to earn the happiness of Maharaj and Swami. 

What went well:

• The exercise was something challenging and forced the balaks to think better than they would've if I showed them a video.

• I made them say my simple in order for it to stick in their head. I would say “what should we think when we do seva” and then they would reply “to make Maharaj and Swami happy”. I did the same thing with how being stable minded is important.

• When I talked I didn't use any advanced Satsang vocabulary rather I utilized the words happiness, stable minded, and desire. This helped them remain interested because they knew what I was saying.

• I used a lot of gestures (shout out to Aksharbhai) when I spoke to make them interested.
• Because it was my first time, I made them feel comfortable talking to me by joking around before sabha (I did the “lawn mower” backwards and deliberately fell to make them laugh and a bunch of other goofy stuff). I believe this is a great thing to do if someone is presenting for the first time in front of balaks (especially if your height is intimidating to them).



What I could improve:

• Don’t forget to do Jai Naad (shaking my head in disappointment as I type this).

• I should have paced myself because there were other things that I planned to do during my presentation but failed to do so because mentally I was going too fast. As a result, there were some flaws in conveying the exercise's relationship to Shukanand Swami’s seva (I should’ve talked to a balak privately telling them I’ll tear up his paper as part of the exercise).

• I wasn’t able to successfully transition into my story which made some of the balaks bored listening to it. As a result, some of them might forget the name Shukanand Swami. This is a major problem for me which is storytelling. I should’ve told them to imagine the scenario by describing what it was like during Maharaj's time (no microphone, cramped fingers from writing, no pencils so no eraser, revisions that could keep Shukanand Swami awake late into the night without anything but a candle, end up having the papers torn up, going straight into another long discourse while being sleep deprived, and much more to help the balaks see the story more clearly). Shout out to Tusharbhai for the storytelling advice.

• Next time no pencils so they cannot erase (Shukanand Swami did not have an eraser).

• Tell the balaks before the exercise to try their best and not stop to ask questions (which ended up consuming time).

•  Have more than enough materials to prevent wasting time in search of spare pencils, paper, etc. 


One minute SUS Example

If you have a minute (literally) you should watch this talk. We talked about Wadsworth Constant. You can remove a great deal of our matter and still make our point stick. The talk below is a great example. Simple message, unexpected using the rocks, and a great story. Also Rosling's is passionate about the subject - that always helps. Could you do this same thing with your Sunday talk? It would make for a very quick - yet sticky - sabha.

The Clues to a Great Story

Andrew Stanton wrote the first film produced entirely on a computer, Toy Story. But what made that film a classic wasn't the history-making graphic technology -- it's the story, the heart, the characters that children around the world instantly accepted into their own lives. In the video below he shares some of his insights into the art and science of story telling. Many of these are applicable to crafting a sticky sabha presentation.


Note between 1:08 and 1:011 in the video some colorful language is used.

• Story telling is joke telling
• [Story telling] is knowing everything you are saying from beginning to the last is leading to a singular goal.
• [Story telling] is confirming some truth that deepens our understanding of who we are as human beings.
• "Frankly there isn't anyone you couldn't learn to love once you've heard their story."
• Story commandment: Make me care. [this one really resonates with us, this is the goal of sabha]
• Great stories start by making a promise that this talk or story will lead somewhere that is worth your time. [again this is the promise we need to make in sabha, and fulfill it]
• The audience actually wants to work for their meal [they want to be engaged and made to think]. They just don't want to know that they are doing that. [again in any sabha, the audience wants to think, but they do not want to know before hand that they have to think - entertain me.]
• Stories are inevitable if they are good, but they are not predictable.
• Stories infuse wonder.
• Drama is anticipation mingled with uncertainty.

Presenting Vicharan

Several Sabhaologists have inquired about tips for giving a Vicharan presentation in sabha.

"Most times, there is little to no material in the syllabus for this. As a presenter and even as a sabha sanchalak I find myself showing a video from baps.org of Swami's vicharan. Of course there's no story there, no context (except when it's an utsav and there is some topical tableau setup for Swamishri), and no words."

So this week, let's break down Vicharan. The beauty of this method is that no syllabus is required.

Think of the last time you saw some late-breaking news update and that sense of excitement and interest it generates. We want to drum up the same type of sentiment here and may as well be your shakeup start.

Simple

• We have late breaking news about Swamishri. 
• What is Swamishri doing right now?
• What happened last week with Swamishri?
• If you were traveling with Swamishri, what would you be experiencing?

Shakeup
Indeed, it's a tough one as everyone knows what is about to happen, but there are still some things we can do.

• Pictures from website
• Videos from website
• Use a story

For example, two monks were returning to the monastery in the evening. It had rained and there were puddles of water on either sides of the road. At one plac,e a beautiful young woman was standing unable to walk across because of a puddle of water. The elder monk approached her, lifted her into his arms, carrier her to the other side of the road, and continued on his way to the monastery.

Later in the evening, the younger monk inquired, "Sir, as monks, we cannot touch a woman ?"

The elder monk answered "yes, brother".

"But then Sir, how is that you lifted that woman on the roadside?"

The elder monk smiled at him, "I left her on the other side of the road, but you are still carrying her. "

This story is unexpected, now use this to relate to Swamishri. He exemplifies this vairagya. As the pictures are rolling on screen, we can emphasize this. Here is Swamishri in Mumbai Mandir, but he is detached from all the things around him.

Stories
Gather prasangs from the website, including Bliss.We can even relate older prasangs that fit into what is happening now.

Look at this picture

We can clearly see that Bapa has just had his mundan done (shaving of hair and beard).

Now we may not know any prasangs that happened during this mundan, but we do know older prasangs
pertaining to his mundan, like the one featured on today's daily prasang:

"In Sarangpur on July 3rd, 1998, it was the night before mundan (monthly shave). To enable everyone to have darshan of Swamishri's mundan, a barber's chair, which was of adjustable height, had been brought. Swamishri was shown the chair.

Meanwhile, Gnaneshwar Swami asked Swamishri, "When you were young, did the barber come to your house to give you a hair cut?"

"Yes," replied Swamishri, "the barber had been contracted. In return for his services, he would get some grains. He would know when to come, so he came regularly ."

Then, Shvetvaikunth Swami asked, "How did you part your hair - on the side or in the middle?"

"On the side," Swamishri replied!

Everyone smiled with joy on hearing Swamishri's innocent and honest reply."

So while showing these pictures, we can say that in Mumbai, Swamishri just had his mundan done. In 1998, Swamishri had his mundan done in Sarangpur and something interesting happened; he revealed bits of childhood.


Conclusion
Vicharan comes around once a month, so don't let this opportunity go to hone in on a unique style of presenting. It's not rocket science, and approaching it with the science of Sabhaology can help the audience samjan of Swamishri soar to new heights.

Your Own Voice

Telling a great story is one clear way to keep your sabha engaged. There is something that happens when you tell a story live (and without notes) that if done correctly can capture an audience (or put them to sleep if done not so correctly). One of the best ways to tell a better story is to simply listen to as many good stories and story tellers as you can. 


At the (newly redesigned) BAPS website there are many recording of P. Santo telling stories. "Wait this is katha!" you might say. Yes but at the heart of katha is a series of stories. Here are some examples:

• Sant Samagam Samput -1   
• Sant Samagam Samput -2   
• Sant Samagam Samput -5 
• Sant Samagam Samput -6 
• Shikshapatri Part-1   
• Shikshapatri Part-2   
• Shikshapatri Parayan Set 1 - 30   
• Shikshapatri Parayan Set Mp3   
• Shri Harililamrut Gaan   
• Shri Janmangal Namavali   
• Shrimad Bhagwat Parayan- Mp3 
• Shrimad Bhagavatam Set 1 - 27 

One key to telling a great story is to tell your story. Repeating something we heard in katha is great, but when we say it in our own voice, with our own observations - that story then comes to life. Below are a few story telling podcasts that can give examples of exactly that. Many of these are done very well, while others can be hit or miss. However they give a different way of telling a story which we can use when telling our story. So try listening to katha and using some of the techniques you enjoy in the podcasts below and telling the story in your own voice.

• This American Life. Everyday stories told with a definite cadence. These are very sticky stories. Even when you seem to not care about the topic, they find a way to get you interested. Many sticky techniques on display.
• Radiolab. Where life meets science meets audio. While the audio plays a major part in this podcast. Telling science stories from the view of a person who does not understand science works really well for telling prasangs to Bal/Balika/Kishore/Kishori mandal.
• The Moth. True stories told live on stage without notes. We love the Moth. To understand why google Moth Adam Gopnik LOL and have a listen. These stories range all over the place and are not always amazing. But still there is something to learn (and be entertained) in nearly every episode.
• The Story Collider. Similar to The Moth but the stories are about science. This is a recent find and the stories have been consistently good. 
• Freakonomics. The hidden side of everything. This podcast is interesting because the story telling revolves around economics in everyday life. This really helps with making prasangs concrete.
• Intelligence Squared. Debates. These are rebroadcasts of live debates where there are winner and losers. The audience is polled before and after and the side the changes the most votes wins. This really highlights how to give a convincing talk, how to frame your ideas. 
• Planet Money. Similar to Freakonomics, more like reporting than storytelling.
• Snap Judgement. Urban story telling. A great deal of international stories as well. Good place to pick up idea on how music, cadence can add to story telling. 
• 99% Invisible. The story telling of design. We find this podcast is great at taking mundane objects and ideas (things we tend to overlook) and see them in another point of view. Can give good ideas on how to make prasangs and satsang concepts relevant.
• Transom. This is a new one we are listening to. A few of these stories made it to This American Life.
• Third Coast International Audio Festival. Similar to Transom.

Update from fellow Sabha.ologists

• The Monti. Unscripted and Real. Some of these are better than The Moth. 

This list is by no means complete. We would really like to know your recommendations.

Presenter Pointers #3: Punish Thy Prasangs

Every Sunday (or Saturday), Sabhaologists are on the field monitoring, observng, and analyzing presentations. This new series brings to light their observations and points of improvement in a bite-sized blog post.

As we bear witness to the Occupy Wall Street movement taking root across the nation, we can't help if history is repeating itself. After all, France in the late 1700s stood witness to a bloody new beginning in the wake of the French Revolution.

Enter the guillotine: a razor-sharp blade falling down in the blink of an eye to dish off the head of yet another.

Just the sight of one in action would make us cringe - a similar sensation we evoke with prasangs if they come straight from the paper. Think back to the last time you got excited about something be it a gift, a sports victory, or a pleasant surprise.

That's the feeling to imbue in the prasangs we narrate in our presentations. Just reading them off a sheet of paper kills the power vested in them, and with each faltering prasangs, we take one step back from the point we try to present to our audience.

Here's a rule of thumb: how well can we narrate the prasang without the syllabus? Try it out in front of a mirror, and prasang-varnan will reach a whole new level.

Prasangs are thus the life of our presentation. If not, it's to the guillotine and off with our het - to Maharaj and Swami that is. 

Seven Speaking Tips That Beat “Pretend Your Audience Is Naked"

While reading Psychology Today, one of our fellow Sabhaologists passed us this article, and just while we had said before that the three S's resurface again and again in all these articles, we also gain a better understanding of speaking mechanics.

This article notes seven principles that we've explored below.

People love stories. Children plea for them at night, and adults crave them, too. Stories make us wonder; we want to know what happens next, which keeps us engaged, even enthralled. 

Yep: simple/shakeup/stories, and from last week's post, we know this principle all too well.

People don't want to be impressed.  They want to be respected.  Rookie speakers feel tempted to impress an audience, assuming that this will make their ideas sound impressive, too. But if your words or actions suggest "I am better than you," people won't care what you say...

Don't try to impress them. Try to touch them.

Speaking is all about humbling ourselves to the audience.

People care if. If you truly want to help your listeners--by informing or motivating them, or improving their lives--they will care and listen. But they will care only if you do. 

This recalls a favorite tip: "If you really care, notify your face."

When we feel connected with our concepts, our sentiments show through. Thus, we need to take the time to design our stories/shakeup/stories.

Your eyes mean everything. We mistrust people who won't look us in the eyes--even if our eyes are among over 200 sets in a room. We regard peoples' eyes as windows to their souls, and it's from our eyes that people assess us. 

If you look each person in the eye for a few seconds, you make each person feel important--a feeling that every person craves.  It also makes each audience member feel involved; it makes your presentation feel like a conversation rather than a recitation. 

For this reason, minimize visual aids.  They break eye contact and make it appear that you are talking to the screen and not to your listeners.

Wow, minimizing visual aids strikes at the power of Powerpoint, but sometimes, a well delivered presentation doesn't need a Powerpoint. Think supercharged storytelling.

Preparation matters.  But not for the reason you suspect. Preparation does more than make a presentation appear polished--and a too-polished presentation actually can feel inauthentic, even souless. If you've spent hours learning about the people to whom you are speaking, you will communicate the most compelling message you can deliver to a person: You are important to me. 

This principle goes without saying - again be humble.

If it's worth saying, it bears repeating. The old rule--"Tell them what you are going to tell them, then tell them, then tell them what you told them"--reflects the limitations of our memories. Plus researchers have shown repeatedly that people are more apt to believe something they hear more than once--even if they hear it from the same person, and even if they question that person's credibility.

We call this the simple statement, the core of our presentation that we hope to impart to our audience.

People love music. An outstanding speech is musical; it ebbs and flows, hits a variety of notes, and makes beautiful use of pauses and silence. Just as in humor, speaking's key ingredient is timing. 

Allow some gaps between your notes.

Going back to stories, remember to own the story. When we experienced the world for the first time as toddlers, we couldn't stop talking about how green the grass was or how fast the ants moved. Infuse that energy in your presentations to make an impact.  

Storytelling Simplified

Presentations have three elements: the simple statement, the shakeup, and the stories. Once we get in the habit of crafting presentations with these three parts, all we have left to do is polish. Take a look at this video to polish off those prasang-varnan skills. (Yeah, yeah, it's black and white, but like they say, "Old is gold.")

The Common Mistake That Makes Our Prasang Varnan Lifeless

We always love to hear the things our readers have to say, and what better way to show our appreciation by sharing the wealth. A fellow sabha.ologist shared the following wisdom with his yuvak mandal.

Why details often feel like sacrifices

Drilling down on a detail entails sacrifice. It means you won’t get the chance to say everything there is to say about your beloved prasang.

I have seen this many times, that a speaker's prasang is filled with abstractions and generalizations, assuming listeners will mentally fill in the specific from the general.

But the human brain doesn’t work that way.

Imagination trumps logic

Tell me a Zappo’s-style story about an amazing support experience and I’ll conclude that you’ve made a commitment to superior service.

But tell me you have “great customer service,” and I’ll conclude you’re full of it. You expect me to fill in the details about specific ways our service might manifest itself, but I won’t. I don’t have any details to “prove” your point to myself.

The specific can be imagined. It has dramatic power. Generalization just results in easily dismissed, flaccid storytelling, devoid of any emotional power or credibility.

Here’s an example of this same principle at work, as described by Jay Heinrichs (of Figaro Speech fame) in his book, Thank You For Arguing:

"Suppose you wanted me to be angry at my next door neighbor. You could tell me what a jerk he is — that he flirts in front of his wife and watches bad TV. None of this would make me angry at him. You described his personality, not his experience. To make me angry, give me a vivid description of a specific outrage.

You: He called the Boy Scouts a fascist organization.
Me: Well, he’s entitled to his –
You: On Halloween? When my little boy comes to his stoop wearing his older brother’s uniform?
Me: How do you –
You: I was there. When he started to cry, he said, “If you turn out to be gay, you’ll be glad you met me.” Then he looked straight at me and slammed the door.

That would make me angry at the neighbor. You re-created a dramatic scene, making me see it through your eyes. This works much better than name calling."

Tell us a story

See what I’m talking about? You have to be willing to tell one small sliver of your story powerfully, instead of trying to summarize the whole experience in abstract generalizations.

This means you have to do two things:

1. Find the specifics that can represent your larger points
2. Figure out how to breathe life into those specifics through persuasive storytelling

Basically, put my faith in the vivid, dramatic power of specifics.

Have faith in your audience to conclude the general from the specific, rather than the other way around.

Agree or disagree? Feel free to post comments below.

Ramayan for Babies

Simple. To get simple down right takes practice. And as we have said in the past, simple is not so simple. But if you really want to practice simple, go do shishu sabha. Pre-schoolers do not have a long attention span or life experience to relate to. If you want a message to stick you have to get it right the first time, distill it to it's core, and make sure to say it with plain language. Given this how would you explain Diwali to a bunch of pre-schoolers. How about pre-schoolers who are not even Indian? Daunting? Check out the following site as an example. Honestly any feedback you all could give to make this better would be sincerely appreciated. Thanks.

Sound Guy Neck Crane

Unexpected. Can you link this to a topic? It is not so hard. Think about ego, antardrashti, understanding Bapa, prasangs of Bapa and audio problems. This weeks Kishori mandal syllabus has a presentation on the humanitarian spirit - keeping purity in thought and action. The story below can highlight how many times we want to keep this thought and action, but when things go wrong we revert to an alternate behavior. The second presentation is a recap of the summer shibir focused on moksha - how do we relate that. Well Bapa is moksh nu dwar - the doorway to moksha. We attain moksha by being like him. How would he handle the microphone situation and how would we? The mahila goshti syllabus for this month touches on a similar scenario. You have worked really hard to increase Satsang, and Bapa comes to you town - what thoughts go through your mind. Similarly during that assembly if the microphones do not work, what thoughts go through your mind?

The point here is that this story is unexpected, it will get people's attention. We can use that in many ways with many topics. So even if you are presenting next week or four weeks from now, this story can come in handy (as long as your fellow presenters do not use it before you do!)

Microphones are Nastiks (Atheists). I can’t prove this scientifically, but I’m pretty sure it’s true. I think it’s because Maharaj doesn’t need them. When He speaks in the Vachnamrut, His voice is loud and carries naturally, or He uses samadhi and mukto and miracles to amplify His message. So I imagine that microphones feel slighted and decided long ago to wage a very public anti campaign against Maharaj and Swami.

How else can you explain the shenanigans that occur on Sunday afternoon in almost every sabha with the sound system? From microphones that work perfectly during sound check and then refuse to work during sabha to that loud ear-bursting feedback that blossoms during the most inappropriate times, like right before a prarthna, sound systems are always punking the Mandir. And when they do, it’s so easy to pull out a “sound guy neck crane.”

The sound guy neck crane is the first thing we all do when the sound goes bananas in the middle of sabha. It’s a simple move, but I’ll walk you through the steps:

Step 1
Sound messes up.

Step 2
You quickly try to remember where the sound guy is stationed in the sabha.

Step 3
You crane your neck to his position and stare at him with eyes that say, “Do you not hear this? That microphone is on fire! Why do you want sabha to suck? Do you hate Maharaj and Swami? That’s it, isn’t it? You hate Maharaj. You sweaty Nastik.”

Step 4
Sound is restored. You turn back around and silently thank yourself for contributing to the rectification of the problem by pointing it out with your sound guy neck crane.

I’m just as guilty of this as anyone else. The only problem is that at my local Mandir about 5 different sevaks help run the sound on any given Sunday sabha and some sit in the audio room way up high and in the back but a few are on one side of the stage and yet some others are sitting in audience. So my head has to bounce around like I’m watching a tennis match (or desi volleyball) if I want to bust out a sound guy neck crane. “I see you in the audio room. You down at the side of the stage. You up on the corner of the stage, I’m seeing you too, and I’m not happy.” Bounce, bounce, bounce, crane, crane, crane.

That’s part of the reason I’m going to retire my sound guy neck crane. It’s just too much work at my Mandir. It’s also kind of a jerk thing to do. And by “kind of” I mean “really,” and by “jerk” I mean “words I can’t type without crazy *&# symbols.” From now on, when the sound messes up, I’m going to just do a sitting pag e laag the person next to me and whisper politely, “Microphones hate Maharaj.” It will be awkward the first 2, 3, or 400 times, but people usually like sitting paag e laags, and it will put the blame where it belongs: on Maharaj-hatin’ sound equipment.

Resonate!

We have always been great fans of Nancy Duarte and her book, slide:ology, she has come out with a new book entitled, resonate, and well, it really resonates with us. Duarte calls resonate a prequel to her last book slide:ology which tackled the craft of visual presentations. The new book is engaged more with theory. The points she makes about emotion and structure would be obvious to a (decent) Hollywood screenwriter or (serious) second-year M.F.A. student, but they’re not well known to a regional vice president for sales or many sanchalaks who have to present every week.

We are planning some future in depth posts on her findings and really recommend the book or listening to her talk. Here is the (ultra)abridged version.

• Don’t be too cerebral. 
• Tell stories. 
• Figure out what the audience cares about. 
• Create common ground with them. 
• Move back and forth between opposing ideas to create energy. 
• Deliver facts but put them in context and make them shocking if possible. 
• Find inspiration anywhere you can.

She analyzes many great talks to show how they all fall into this pattern. In fact, she propounds that this is the pattern to follow to make something memorable. One talk she analyzes is Ben Zanders TED talk. With an extra 20 minutes to spare, check out the talk and prepare to be engrossed in sheer loveliness.

[Extra credit: Watch it again later to see how it fits many of the Made to Stick paradigms, as well as Duartes's observations above].

An Unusual Gift

Sometimes we struggle with an opener that catches the audience's attention, so we make our way to YouTube to find random videos, sometimes cheesy or lacking in quality. After awhile, the audience adapts to our "creativity," and we are back to our original problem of delivering shock & awe.

However, it falls back on mixing up our strategy. In fact, a prasang can be made unexpected just as easily with the mere tweaking of its delivery. Watch the video below for a quick idea.

What's interesting in this case, here our speaker took something completely dismal, serious, even tragic and spun it off as something as a point of hope, optimism, and fortune - as though one should look forward to it. Could you sense the urgency in trying to find out what it was?

That's the ticket to a great opener or even prasang narration - keep them on the edge of their seats. In this case, we used the Altered Perspective Effect where we took the point to be presented (terrible cancer) to its opposite (unique opportunity).

Other ideas for presenting prasangs powerfully? Share those techniques with us here.

The talk starts in the Mandir parking lot.

The following article - How to capture a crowd - by Mary Civiello appeared in CNN Money section. Her viewpoint is focused on business speaking, but the elements of stickiness are definitely present. We really like the idea of your talk starting from the moment you arrive in the parking lot. This goes lock in step with the idea that we have to live the presentation - at least for that Sunday we present.

1. Can you give your presentation in 20 seconds even though you have 20 minutes to speak? Start your preparation by asking: What is the one thing I want them to remember if they remember nothing else?Studies show that by the end of the day, your audience will have forgotten half of what you said. And by the end of the week, 90% is forgotten. To make sure that the 10% that sticks is the 10% that you really want them to remember, say it early and clearly.

2. Do you look and sound like you do in a conversation? Think about your talk in terms of moods, not just information. Ask, “How should I feel when I deliver those three slides vs. the next three?…Am I giving marching orders, or am I sharing an example?” In delivering different parts of your presentation, you should look and sound different. Have someone videotape you (when you don’t know you’re being taped) to see the gestures and body movement that mark your personal style.

3. Are you mixing it up? Remember to hit the “Refresh” button. A top executive I work with recently stopped cold while rehearsing his speech and sighed, “I’m starting to get bored here myself.” Whether you add a cartoon or image to your PowerPoint, ask real and rhetorical questions–or walk a few steps to the side to tell a story. We live in a BlackBerry world. Adding variety to your visuals will keep you and your audience more engaged.

4. Do you think your presentation begins at 9 a.m., or the moment you drive in the parking lot?Recognize that “communication” begins the moment you arrive. Recall those auto execs arriving in their private planes to ask for taxpayer money. Thanks to social media, your actions (both good and bad) can wind up in print. So be kind to the receptionist, thank the folks backstage, and hold your tongue until you drive off the lot–no matter how clueless that guy in the front row was.

Presentation == Performance

Malcolm Gladwell is a great speaker. He has appeared on the Moth (twice), he has a great TED talk as well as a great Pop!Cast talk. He sound effortless, relaxed and he sucks you into his stories. So how does Gladwell do it? A reader of the blog sent us this excerpt from LifeHacker.

"Afterwards, I broke through the autograph-hunters surrounding him and asked him how he managed to time his talk so beautifully - so that it ended bang on 45 minutes, without ever looking at his watch. He answered - "I know it may not look like this. But it's all scripted. I write down every word and then I learn it off by heart. I do that with all my talks and I've got lots of them."

It sounds like a most elementary sort of advice—just memorize it!—but it contrasts sharply with the "put a few bullet points down on a piece of paper" camp that most people belong to when it comes to getting ready for a presentation."

This bit of advice really takes things full circle. We always dread the presenter to who goes to the podium or the front of the room with the presentation printout (or worse a laptop) cradled in their hands. Why? There is a good possibility that they are going to read right off that paper or screen. So one rule of thumb is to go up to the podium with some note cards (or your phone) with just bullet points. This way you do not forget your points but are forced to speak not talk - forced to tell a story.

Now Gladwell does the exact opposite. He writes down every word of his talk (no bullet points). However you will notice he goes to the podium with out any paper (or laptop or phone). He speaks his story - which he must have practiced many times.

One open question we have at the blog is how often do people practice before they go up to speak in sabha? We wonder what the percentage nationwide would be in all the mandals? Thoughts?

Monti Storytelling

You may have heard of The Moth which features story slams - stories told live with no notes. They have a great archive of podcasts. It is great to listen to these since it distills storytelling to it's core. Now north maybe a direction, but the South is a destination. And in the South, we have our own version of story slams called Monti. The following link has a few stories and a dissection of what makes them so captivating. It is well worth a listen - maybe during your next commute.

To summarize some of the points:

• Storytelling is not trivial, it is an art, but it can be learned.
• The first story is a great example of building up your characters before launching into the anecdote. P. Santo do this many times as well. They will talk about Muktanandan Swami's mahima before launching into a prasang about him. Similarly when we are a presentation full of prasangs, some background work describing (in an unexpected way) the main person in those prasangs will bring the audience in.
• Many people have a habit, sometimes a nervous habit, of asking simple questions during their talk, e.g. Who is the President? They may fall into the trap of asking this question and then seeing what people say - the question does not engage the audience, but you asked it - so now what do you do. The second story shows how to ask such questions and still make things sticky. [For those who are not going to listen to the link, the trick is to answer it yourself in a way that creates emotion.]
• The second talk is all about emotion.
• Humor is used liberally through out.
• What else did we miss?

Best of the Monti via WUNC

Coke, Soda, Pop, or Cold Drink?

Where you grew up really influences what you call a refreshing aerated beverage. The following map was created using crowdsourcing to discover what the majority of people say when offering a drink. There is a site dedicated to this with really interesting information. We find it fascinating (maybe too much so) that sugar water can be so universal, have so many different labels, and cause such passion in so many people.

During the month of January Yuva syllabus is exploring the basics of Akshar. We thought a great unexpected way to start such a talk would be to poll everyone and see how they would label sugar water in a can - Soda? Pop? Coke? Cold Drink? - depending on where your audience grew up any of these may come up as an answer. You can show this infographic to show that the same thing can be called multiple names - but it is essentially one entity. A great way to introduce Akshar - one entity with two different forms - sakar and nirakar. Moreover the sakar form has several different names: Gunatitanand Swami, Bhagatji Maharaj, Shastriji Mahraj, Yogiji Maharaj, and Pramkh Swami Maharaj. In this case it is not where you grew up, but when you grew up that determines what name you associate Akshar with. Try starting sabha with this idea and you will notice at least for the next ten minutes more people paying attention to your next point.

Animal Instincts

The following is a great school day talk (similar to commencement talk). The ties to satsang are pretty evident - controlling vishays. If we do not we are just like any other animal. Interestingly Dr. Sapolsky shows how we are in many ways similar to any other mammal, we just take things to an extreme. You may also notice that he does not really follow the no bullets power point guidelines espoused by many who believe in sticky presentations. I think his power point really detracts from this talk, however he makes up for this with his very strong storytelling. The lesson here is that in the Made To Stick hierarchy being strong in one aspect can overcome being weak in another.

This talk is really interesting, but quite long. It may not be suitable for a sabha talk or even an introduction to a goshti. You can always show a clip or cut and paste an abridged version. We have found showing clips can sometimes be a distraction - you have to get the video setup, pause hit play - all for 30 second clip. Another idea would be to simply restate his stories in your own words. Just by citing his work, you get instant Crediblity, tying it to a real world issue (which he does) gives Concreteness, and you are saying a Story that many people will find Unexpected in the context of sabha - this hits 4 out of the 6 MtS SUCCES metrics. How else do you think can this be used?

Commencement Speeches

We just reviewed (literally) a few of the past posts on commencement talks. Which got us to thinking about really great commencement talks. Here are a few. Read Guy Kawasaki's talk - it does not get any stickier.

• Hindsights - Guy Kawasaki - Palo Alto High School
  
• Hoax Kurt Vonnegut's talk at MIT
• Steve Jobs - Standford
• Ellen DeGeneres - Tulane
• Paul Hawken - University of Portland
• iTunes has a whole mess of these.

We really, really like this form of sticky talks. (We have been to our share of them - good, bad, ugly). Let's us know if you have one that needs to be on this list.