Episode 31

How Can Storytelling Help Presenting and Speaking Skills?

In this week's episode of Ongoing Mastery: Presenting & Speaking, Kellie tells Kirsten about going to The Moth’s monthly StorySLAM event as part of her ongoing mastery journey. Kirsten puts herself in the shoes of a novice who might want to get started, and Kellie surprises her friend a few times.

Key take-aways:

  • The atmosphere is very welcoming and friendly; there’s no pressure to get on stage
  • The audience’s response is an essential component of storytelling
  • Resources like podcasts and audiobooks can help with timing and voice control

Rourke Training’s webpage: https://www.rourketraining.com/

Ongoing Masgtery: Presenting & Speaking page: https://ongoing-mastery.captivate.fm/

RSS feed: https://feeds.captivate.fm/ongoing-mastery/

Read a transcript of this episode: https://share.descript.com/view/Ildae4DaobT

For the video version of this episode: https://youtu.be/3sciug83Cnc

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kirstenrourke/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kirstenmalenarourke

Twitter: https://twitter.com/kirstenrourke?lang=en

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rourketraining/

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Transcript
Kirsten:

Hello everyone.

Kirsten:

Welcome to Ongoing Mastery: Presenting & Speaking the

Kirsten:

podcast, and today the interview.

Kirsten:

But unlike previous ones, we're not interviewing a guest.

Kirsten:

I'm interviewing Kellie.

Kirsten:

So Kellie, tell me a story.

Kirsten:

What did you

Kellie:

do?

Kellie:

Well, I went to the Moth StorySLAM a couple weeks ago.

Kellie:

It was a terrific evening.

Kellie:

It was so fun, so exciting.

Kellie:

I left bubbling and just bouncing even after a long day, teaching on

Kellie:

my feet, all of that, even though I went after work, it was still great.

Kirsten:

All right.

Kirsten:

So for people not in the area, what

Kellie:

is the Moth?

Kellie:

So the Moth is, I'm not sure exactly who produces it, but it

Kellie:

airs on National Public Radio.

Kellie:

It is a live storytelling program, and they've got

Kellie:

different ways that they do that.

Kellie:

But StorySLAM is one of their main things.

Kellie:

StorySLAM is twice a month.

Kellie:

Cities all around the country, it is a national program and so every two weeks

Kellie:

there's a cycle of an announced topic.

Kellie:

And so cities all across the country hear stories, the same topic, and I'm

Kellie:

sure they get sort of collected up and turned into the national Moth,

Kellie:

but the local stories slam you come in if you have prepared a five minute.

Kellie:

On the topic of the evening, you put your name in a bag.

Kellie:

There are 10 storytelling slots and the evening's host pulls, literally

Kellie:

pulls names out of the bag randomly.

Kellie:

Our evening had 21 people, so only half of them got to tell stories.

Kellie:

You tell your story, there are themes of judges out in the audience, the producer

Kellie:

of the show, I don't know how exactly, but makes teams of judges ahead of.

Kellie:

Okay, so while the teams are deciding their scores, the host has

Kellie:

a separate bag of other mini prompts.

Kellie:

Mm-hmm.

Kellie:

. So the theme that went was juggle.

Kellie:

And the mini prompt was, tell us about a time you did a balancing act.

Kellie:

So people in the audience fill out these little mini prompts, and while

Kellie:

the judges are compiling their score, the host pulls out of the bag and

Kellie:

reads, you know, 2, 3, 4 sentence.

Kellie:

Mini story reads a couple of those while the judges are compiling their scores to

Kellie:

fill the time, give the host something to react, to, riff on, and so on.

Kellie:

Okay,

Kirsten:

so somebody who, somebody who, the idea of going up on stage and telling

Kirsten:

a story, they're like, I'd rather die.

Kirsten:

Who would still have a good time going?

Kirsten:

Because they could see it.

Kirsten:

Yeah, they could enjoy it and they could fill out the mini prompt

Kirsten:

and have the person up on stage.

Kirsten:

Go, Kirsten, from Auburn.

Kirsten:

Her answer is, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Kirsten:

That

Kellie:

sort of thing.

Kellie:

Exactly, exactly.

Kellie:

Okay.

Kellie:

Maybe sort of dip your toe in the water.

Kellie:

If you have, say a favorite story that you tell with friends, maybe you put the three

Kellie:

sentence version of that on the prompt and see what kind of reaction it gets.

Kellie:

Maybe a little bit of audience testing, building up some courage before

Kellie:

deciding you've got a five minute story and put your name in the big.

Kirsten:

Nice.

Kirsten:

Nice.

Kirsten:

And as an instructional designer, I really like the cleverness of

Kirsten:

keeping the audience engaged by having something that they've participated in.

Kirsten:

So that's, I like that.

Kirsten:

Yeah.

Kirsten:

That's really good production design.

Kirsten:

Yeah.

Kirsten:

So did you prep a story or did you go to watch.

Kellie:

I went to watch you and I of course had been to the Grand Slam, which

Kellie:

was sort of the finals of the season.

Kellie:

This is one of the lead up pieces, but I'd never been to one.

Kellie:

I had no idea how many people would be attending if there's any kind of

Kellie:

go, go, go up there, kind of pressure.

Kellie:

No, there is not.

Kellie:

But I definitely was not planning to put myself in the spotlight

Kellie:

until I had at least some little understanding of how the evening works.

Kirsten:

So the people who tend to do it for your first time going, did they

Kirsten:

seem like they were generally people who were storytellers, or did it seem like

Kirsten:

a mix of people who were storytellers and people who were like, oh, I'll give

Kirsten:

it a shot, but oh my God, I wanna die.

Kellie:

I think it was a mix.

Kellie:

Okay.

Kellie:

The stories were all really good.

Kellie:

They get judged on a scale of one to 10, and I don't know if there's some

Kellie:

kind of guidance that the teams get for how they're assessing this, but

Kellie:

all of the stories were at least, I think maybe 7.8 was the lowest score.

Kellie:

So three teams of judges, 10 stories, 30 scores, maybe 7.8 was the lowest.

Kellie:

Once.

Kellie:

Okay, so, so there were well told stories,

Kirsten:

so, so if somebody is interested in expanding their ongoing mastery of

Kirsten:

their presenting and speaking skills, but they don't consider themselves a

Kirsten:

storyteller, this is still the kind of thing that they might find satisfaction

Kirsten:

in doing and they might find valuable.

Kellie:

Oh, for sure, for sure.

Kellie:

Okay.

Kellie:

At least one of the people up on stage.

Kellie:

Actually, I think there were two of them, happened to be lawyers.

Kellie:

Right?

Kellie:

They're not storytellers by profession.

Kellie:

They have entirely other jobs, but this is a creative thing that they do.

Kellie:

Okay.

Kellie:

No one who came to the stage that I can remember.

Kellie:

Explicitly identified themselves as a storyteller or other

Kellie:

kind of performing art person.

Kellie:

So I think it's primarily skilled amateurs.

Kellie:

I don't think many people come up for the very first time ever.

Kellie:

Never having been the center of a circle of friends telling

Kellie:

a story at a bar . Right.

Kellie:

Okay.

Kellie:

I don't think you can go directly from wallflower to the stage.

Kellie:

But if you're the kind of person who likes to tell stories with your friends,

Kellie:

this might be the next thing you might think about doing to tell those stories

Kellie:

in front of people you don't know.

Kirsten:

And if you are an introvert who wants to be someone who is

Kirsten:

more tell stories and people listen to you, you could go and

Kirsten:

watch some and get a sense of it.

Kirsten:

Absolutely

Kellie:

Fantastic.

Kellie:

Yeah.

Kellie:

So you get a sense of what.

Kellie:

Yeah.

Kellie:

Uh, sorry.

Kellie:

Uh, yes.

Kellie:

That's what makes for like a good story , like what the arc is of a good

Kellie:

story, how long five minute is how much information you can get into five minutes.

Kellie:

And they really are pretty strict.

Kellie:

They have a chime that indicate you're hitting about to hit the mark,

Kellie:

and then a different one that is really, you have to wrap it up now.

Kellie:

But most of the time you don't even get that far.

Kellie:

So it is not a long involved, super complicated Okay.

Kellie:

Process.

Kellie:

So if you're someone who's interested in adding storytelling and being

Kellie:

less introverted, I think it's a great experience to go see how other

Kellie:

people do it and sort of demystify some of the sense of it's such a big

Kellie:

production, it's so evolved, it's so in.

Kellie:

It doesn't have to be.

Kellie:

It really doesn't.

Kirsten:

So as somebody who teaches for a living, and especially as somebody

Kirsten:

who teaches analysis in literature and reading and being able to pull through

Kirsten:

lines out of content, when you were watching this, did you get a sense of.

Kirsten:

Did you get a sense of how people originate?

Kirsten:

Like how they created their stories?

Kirsten:

Do you think that these were stories that were ones they've been telling for

Kirsten:

to their friends for a hundred years?

Kirsten:

Or did some of them seem like ones that they were like, okay, I

Kirsten:

really wanna learn this skill and I'm gonna put something together.

Kirsten:

Did it feel like hanging around in a kitchen?

Kirsten:

Did it feel more.

Kirsten:

Going to a bar and trying to pick somebody up on speed dating.

Kirsten:

Like what

Kellie:

was the energy like?

Kellie:

? The energy was more kitchen than bar speed dating.

Kellie:

Okay.

Kellie:

It was comfortable.

Kellie:

It was relaxed.

Kellie:

It was a way that, I don't know about you, but any party I end up

Kellie:

at, most people end up in the kitchen even if the food is somewhere else.

Kellie:

right.

Kellie:

You have to make a sort of concerted effort to get people out of the

Kellie:

kitchen to other parts of the.

Kellie:

So it had that kind of comfortable, we're just hanging out here

Kellie:

entertaining each other vibe to it.

Kellie:

It did sound like at least a couple of the stories are familiar favorites to

Kellie:

the storyteller with enough adjustment to fit the theme of the night.

Kellie:

Okay, so cool.

Kellie:

I didn't get a huge sense.

Kellie:

Maybe one or two stories felt like.

Kellie:

The theme of juggle, oh, I could talk about this.

Kellie:

Let me figure out how to tell it.

Kellie:

For this particular story slam event.

Kellie:

Mm-hmm.

Kellie:

, and I hope I get picked.

Kellie:

Okay.

Kellie:

Right.

Kellie:

A couple of them felt crafted to the theme.

Kellie:

Not originally made up out of nothing, but not a favorite story to tell.

Kellie:

And you know, put together for the theme, but several others, definitely

Kellie:

you could kind of feel that there were a flexible enough story that the theme

Kellie:

of love or the theme of unexpected consequences or the theme of juggle

Kellie:

might all fit that same one story.

Kellie:

So

Kirsten:

the reason why I ask is because I'm trying to put myself in

Kirsten:

the shoes of any of our listeners that find the idea of this to be

Kirsten:

really daunting or really scary.

Kirsten:

Oh, but I wouldn't even know where to begin, so that's why I'm trying to

Kirsten:

pull out kind of what the experience is because yeah, it sounds like this

Kirsten:

would be a really, especially if it's all over, it's in all the cities, all

Kirsten:

the major cities would be a really great experience for somebody who wants to

Kirsten:

expand their presenting and speaking skills to go into a storytelling event.

Kirsten:

Sorry, rough throat today.

Kirsten:

And.

Kirsten:

Give it a shot and not necessarily be in that because like if it was a poetry

Kirsten:

slam, I would think that would be for me a little bit more of, I'm not up for that.

Kirsten:

But an open storytelling might be a little less intimidating.

Kellie:

I would agree with that.

Kellie:

Poetry Slams for me have a much bigger performance, quality, vocal

Kellie:

inflection, movement quality to it that the StorySLAM has less of.

Kellie:

It's definitely a performance.

Kellie:

They don't just stand there woodenly at the microphone, but it is less.

Kellie:

Amped up.

Kellie:

Hmm.

Kellie:

I would say it's definitely more casual, more comfortable.

Kellie:

As you and I know from a hobby that we participate in, I actually was thinking

Kellie:

if I were to go up and tell a story, I might have to start it with no shit.

Kellie:

There I was , right?

Kellie:

And sort of , right?

Kellie:

Like the familiar beat of, Hey, I gotta tell you this.

Kellie:

And and for the people and not quite so much of Yeah.

Kirsten:

Sorry.

Kirsten:

And not quite so much of.

Kellie:

Yeah.

Kellie:

And not quite so much of I Chanel perform.

Kellie:

Right.

Kirsten:

So for people again, wow.

Kirsten:

All of a sudden frog in my throat.

Kirsten:

Well done.

Kirsten:

For the people listening, so Kellie and I knew each other.

Kirsten:

Met through an organization called the SCA, which is Society

Kirsten:

for Creative Anachronism, or creatively living in the past.

Kirsten:

And she's an active member, and I was an active member for a really long time.

Kirsten:

And the traditional war story of the SCA is always a different story,

Kirsten:

but it always starts with no shit.

Kirsten:

There we were or no shit.

Kirsten:

There I was.

Kirsten:

And it's always this, you know, big drink in your hand sitting around

Kirsten:

a campfire kind of experience.

Kirsten:

So I love the idea of bringing that energy to the stage and

Kirsten:

you know, the possibility of it.

Kirsten:

Because people who pretend it's the middles on weekends have a

Kirsten:

bit of a theatrical streak even when they think they don't.

Kirsten:

Kellie, I'm looking at you

Kirsten:

. Kellie: Yes.

Kirsten:

Yes you are.

Kirsten:

. Kirsten: I love how you're like,

Kirsten:

I'm like, you're a skating.

Kirsten:

Sorry, busted.

Kirsten:

Plus, you're a literature professor busted twice.

Kirsten:

So this sounds like this was a really good evening and honestly I expected

Kirsten:

you to come back and be happy with it.

Kirsten:

But you told me prior to this call that you are thinking of actually

Kirsten:

doing one, which is a surprise to me.

Kellie:

Yeah.

Kellie:

I don't know exactly if it might be the next one, but also a surprise to myself.

Kellie:

Mm-hmm.

Kellie:

I could see myself giving it a try.

Kellie:

Nice.

Kellie:

Like the people who told the stories were all ages, all demographics of all kinds,

Kellie:

be someone who explicitly identified her religious cultural background.

Kellie:

We had people who identified particular illnesses that ended

Kellie:

up being part of the story.

Kellie:

Right.

Kellie:

It has not.

Kellie:

The bright, pretty shiny things who get up and get to be the center of attention.

Kellie:

It was really, it was really a Arian in that way, and I really

Kellie:

enjoyed that energy about it.

Kellie:

Awesome.

Kellie:

. Kirsten: And what I love about

Kellie:

it for people who wanna be able to branch out because storytelling

Kellie:

is something that, it's tricky.

Kellie:

I mean, there's, there's different ways of doing it.

Kellie:

Like I've, like many, many people have written some truly mediocre

Kellie:

fan fiction and I've had friends read it and they were really kind.

Kellie:

, but I wouldn't necessarily go and perform that on stage . So

Kellie:

in this case it would be right.

Kellie:

More of a performance idea rather than, you know, like my favorite

Kellie:

TV show character suddenly is able to fly or something like that.

Kellie:

So yeah.

Kellie:

In, in the case of, for you as an instructor and you as someone who guides

Kellie:

people through the journey of discovery as a literature professor, do you think.

Kellie:

If someone is looking to add storytelling in as a skillset that watching stories

Kellie:

and listening to audiobooks and doing stuff like this is a good kind

Kellie:

of branching into the open world.

Kellie:

And is there anything specific that you would suggest that they try as

Kellie:

like a, a challenge for themselves?

Kellie:

Like some homework

Kellie:

to.

Kellie:

Okay.

Kellie:

I think first question first, yes.

Kellie:

I think if you're looking to add storytelling to your skillset,

Kellie:

I would say as often as possible being part of a live audience.

Kellie:

And if you can't do that, listening to something recorded with a live

Kellie:

audience, cause that audience interaction matters so much.

Kellie:

The energy of the space really contributes to the experience in

Kellie:

an intangible way that a book just audio recorded in a studio is.

Kellie:

If you don't have access to that, see if you can listen to podcasts or audiobooks

Kellie:

that are recorded, theatrically.

Kellie:

Mm-hmm.

Kellie:

, for example, we, my family and I are listening to a podcast, uh, no Excuse

Kellie:

of an audiobook of a series, and it's based on a video game character.

Kellie:

The whole book series is this character trying to get through the levels of the.

Kellie:

Earth's benefited by aliens, the whole thing.

Kellie:

But there are sound effects, there are different voices,

Kellie:

there's all kinds of things.

Kellie:

It's definitely not just one voice talking to a microphone, right?

Kellie:

So the more that you can listen to stories told with theatricality

Kellie:

to understand pacing, to hear the timing beats to hear how.

Kellie:

Builds a Spence, if you've got an audience, can hear what kinds of things

Kellie:

are funny, maybe what kinds of things really bring down a room, how to make

Kellie:

a funny cancer joke, for example, which you might not think is possible.

Kellie:

And yet there were some funny cancer jokes told at the night I was there.

Kellie:

Oh, so okay.

Kellie:

All of those sorts of, yeah, I wouldn't

Kirsten:

have called that.

Kirsten:

Yeah, I, I'm literally making a face right now.

Kirsten:

Tell funny cancer jokes, funny cancer jokes, , okay.

Kirsten:

Uh, that, that what I definitely wouldn't have called.

Kirsten:

And I will say that I'm gonna side myself specific homework from the, this episode,

Kirsten:

which is you handled it graciously.

Kirsten:

Thank you.

Kirsten:

Which is, I shouldn't ask compound questions.

Kirsten:

I asked you three questions in one and you rolled with it.

Kirsten:

You're like, I'll start with the first one.

Kirsten:

And I'm like, oh, damn.

Kirsten:

Shouldn't have done that . So homework to me one at a time.

Kellie:

Well, and I would say homework is looking for those kinds

Kellie:

of resources and having a sense of.

Kellie:

What it is you're trying to learn and how listening to an audiobook or

Kellie:

a podcast might target those things.

Kellie:

So look for things that are record in front of a studio audience.

Kellie:

I'm a huge fan of NPR's Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me.

Kellie:

Mm.

Kellie:

And yeah, this is a side note, but I think it's related.

Kellie:

During the pandemic when they could not record in front of a studio audience,

Kellie:

the first few pandemic episodes had no laughter, and they were excruciating.

Kellie:

And so the production team ended.

Kellie:

Adding in laughter from previously recorded shows because the

Kellie:

show just did not work without some kind of audience response.

Kellie:

Yeah, and so, Homework would be actively look for those kinds of resources.

Kellie:

And the one other thing I would say about the Moth for clarity is

Kellie:

that these are stories about the teller's own life that are true as

Kellie:

the teller understands them to be.

Kellie:

So, partly why impossible to make a funny cancer joke is that the

Kellie:

teller is making it about themselves.

Kellie:

Or about their own direct experience.

Kellie:

These are not stories that you have made up, say, like fan fiction mm-hmm.

Kellie:

with a set of material that you're not personally involved in the experience.

Kellie:

Yes.

Kirsten:

Because, uh, like my mother survived cancer.

Kirsten:

Your husband and you have survived cancer.

Kirsten:

I have not had that experience.

Kirsten:

Right.

Kirsten:

I would not tell that joke.

Kirsten:

. That is not mine to tell.

Kirsten:

Yeah.

Kirsten:

However, I could totally see my mother doing it.

Kirsten:

100.

Kellie:

I could.

Kellie:

Yeah.

Kellie:

And your mother would be so dry.

Kellie:

People wouldn't quite be sure if it was a joke.

Kellie:

Yeah.

Kirsten:

They would actually be afraid until we cracked up and then

Kirsten:

they'd be like, it's okay to laugh.

Kirsten:

Is it really okay?

Kirsten:

Yeah.

Kirsten:

So.

Kirsten:

Perfect.

Kirsten:

All right, so thank you for your feedback and your thought and the homework.

Kirsten:

I, we were actually gonna go further than this and talk about Kristin Spencer.

Kirsten:

Who came back on and talked about a previous podcast, but we didn't have time.

Kirsten:

So for those of you listening, check out our other episodes because we

Kirsten:

have Laura who, Laura Packer, who.

Kirsten:

Is a fantastic storyteller.

Kirsten:

And then we had Kristin Spencer, who is a storytelling friend of ours, who

Kirsten:

came back on and gave her feedback on Laura and actually brought one

Kirsten:

of Laura's books and read me quotes from Laura's book, which was awesome.

Kirsten:

Yes.

Kirsten:

So we're about storytelling as a concept, as a way of trying to bring

Kirsten:

that as an ongoing mastery practice.

Kirsten:

So give your feedback, make comments, send us notes, tell us what you

Kirsten:

think, and if you show up at a.

Kirsten:

and you're in Massachusetts.

Kirsten:

Look for us in the audience and come say hi and we'll see you next time.

Kellie:

And Yep.

Kellie:

Don't we have a LinkedIn group?

Kirsten:

Kirsten?

Kirsten:

We do have a LinkedIn group.

We have the Ongoing Mastery:

Presenting & Speaking LinkedIn group in which

We have the Ongoing Mastery:

we are putting in things like this.

We have the Ongoing Mastery:

And we should actually throw up another poll pretty soon for, yeah,

We have the Ongoing Mastery:

what kind of, you know, what kind of event people might wanna see if

We have the Ongoing Mastery:

we do an online like storytelling retrospective or workshop or something.

We have the Ongoing Mastery:

So, great.

We have the Ongoing Mastery:

Put something.

We have the Ongoing Mastery:

So go check it out and we will see you next time.

We have the Ongoing Mastery:

Thanks for coming.

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