I recently got a promo email from Cat Mulvihill, an internet consultant I admire. (Her advice on how to set up a home video studio is priceless.) It was a reminder to register for her Virtual Camera for Beginners Workshop, and she closed it by saying, NO LONGER A BEGINNER? If there is someone in your life who could benefit from this workshop, I would really appreciate it if you would consider sharing the workshop details or forwarding this email.  I want to help as many people as I can, and word of mouth is a powerful way to spread the message. Couldn’t Have Said It Better Mys ..read more

For the past few years, I’ve had the honor of writing speeches with some of America’s greatest (American) football players. And I’ve also had the honor of being featured in a New York Times article about that work. How can that be? (you might ask), when I know almost nothing about football or, in fact, any sport besides lying on the couch reading romance novels? It can be because we are writing acceptance speeches Are All Acceptance Speeches Created Equal? Not quite. A speech that you would give to accept an Academy Award or enshrinement in the Pro Football Hall of Fame is not the same as a sp ..read more

The first time I heard the phrase, “Be brief, be bold, be gone,” I laughed out loud. It was that delicious. And if you’re reading this, I image that you also would prefer to communicate clearly, concisely, and at an effective length. When you’re speaking, using my Instant Speech format takes care of that for you. But what about when you’re writing? How can you curb the number of words you use, with the goal of grabbing and holding your readers’ attention? Brevity Can Power Your Writing, Too That’s the problem that Jim VandeHei, Mike Allen and Roy Schwartz, co-Founders of the news site Axios, t ..read more

And I, uhm, really mean that! Before becoming a public speaking coach and speechwriter, I was a jazz singer. And as a jazz singer, I spent a lot of time—arguably, too much time—developing a smooth-as-silk vocal style. Some singers growl (think Janis Joplin). Others beguile (Dolly Parton) or proclaim (Beyoncé). I wanted to float people away on a magic carpet of rich, smooth sound. So I practiced and worked and worked and practiced, and before I knew it, I had developed a vocal style that was excellent for sophisticated songs, and much less effective for songs about anger or pain. Maybe Smooth I ..read more

The new technology is terrifying…and terrific! Taking ChatGPT Out for a Spin Today, I spent about an hour fooling around with ChatGPT for the first time. (Here’s the excellent YouTube tutorial I started with:) Then I wrote a newsletter about it. The newsletter briefly describes what ChatGPT is, gives a short list of things it does, and ends with the Million Dollar Question, “Did ChatGPT help me write this?”  The Envelope, Please… The answer is Yes. I used ChatGPT to help me write the newsletter in three ways: I asked it for a self-definition (“What is ChatGPT?”) that I edited/expanded ..read more

It’s no fun to give a talk with rusty public speaking skills—and fortunately, you don’t have to. Even if it’s been weeks (or months!) since you last spoke in public, you can scrape off the rust by polishing these three high-level skills: 1. Start with Your Rusty Physical Skills Public speaking starts with a physical activity; namely, pushing words out of your mouth. Of course, we do that all the time. But if you haven’t used your body to make “public speaking sounds” in a while, it’s time to tune up that physical process. How? By speaking out loud to a pretend audience: 1. Choose something to ..read more

For some strange reason, I like to experience popular culture in a quiet, private space.  (Oh wait, I’m an introvert!) This means that I often put off experiencing things—hit TV shows, new musical stars, articles about AI—until long after other people have stopped talking about them. Which brings us to Wordle I don’t know exactly when the Wordle craze began, but for me, it began two weeks ago. (Wordle is a word puzzle that runs in The New York Times; every day, you have six tries to guess a 5-letter word-of-the-day by making other 5-letter words and getting feedback.) To my surprise, sinc ..read more

Is Anxiety a Totally Bad Thing?  I used to tell a one-liner that went like this: Anything worth doing is worth getting anxious about. People thought this was funny and apt, but over time, the idea faded from my mind. Which is too bad, because I could have used that rueful insight during COVID. That’s when my anxiety (which has always been high) pinged right off the charts. And the fact that millions of other people were having the same experience didn’t help. I hated the jumpiness and near panic, and was sure that this was a very bad thing. But is it? In a sense, anxiety—which is baked ..read more

Feedback is a touchy subject for me. Even though I give it all day in my one-on-one speaker coaching sessions, I still find it hard to receive. Sometimes I can plug into my rational mind, hear the critique I’m getting, and make use of it. But often, I have to fight off thoughts that are angry (“Yeah, like you could have done better!”) or groveling (“OK, OK, I’ll fix it but please stop telling me I did wrong”). Why These Childish Reactions? Well, leaving aside my actual childhood (which, for humans, is like leaving aside the fact that we all breathe :-)), the thought process goes something ..read more

We all do—for our health, happiness, and sense of connection Sex is one of our most basic forms of communication. So I was startled to read, in a New York Times op-ed, that more than a quarter of Americans hadn’t had sex even once in the past year, according to the 2021 General Social Survey. No wonder Magdalene J. Taylor’s op ed was titled, “Have More Sex, Please!”  As she points out, “sex reduces pain, relieves stress, improves sleep, lowers blood pressure and strengthens heart health.” So when we miss it, we miss out on a lot more than the o ..read more