Listen: On Shaping Your Talk with Visuals

Such a delight to speak with Sally Zimney, fellow professional speaker and fellow Minnesotan, on her podcast This Moved Me (now named Be Moved). 

This podcast is for people building talks that actually mean something. She's a coach and a speaker herself — so this was a conversation between two people who care deeply about the same things.

The Uncle Carl story came up, and it's become one of my best entry points into visual thinking for people who think it's not for them:

My uncle was dreading a visit with his sister. Getting more and more exercised thinking about it. I said: get a piece of paper and a pen. He looked at me sideways. I tore the paper into a square, folded it into a bingo card of 25 squares, gave him a free star in the center, and said: give me 24 things your sister's gonna do to piss you off.

By the end, his energy had completely shifted. All that stuff rolling around in his head was now tangible on those little squares. I told him: fold it up, put it in your wallet. When she starts doing these things, mark them off. When you get five in a row, call me and say bingo.

He was like: why am I getting a piece of paper and a pen, what could this possibly do for me? And then by the end: all right. I get it.

A few choice quotes:
"A shape for people to think into — so as you're giving them more text and more words as you're speaking, they have that scaffolding to hang it on."

"Drawing is both a noun and a verb. When people get intimidated by drawing, they think of it as a noun — it's an object, it's something they're doing wrong. Messy drawings can create clarity."

"Let the content tell you what the structure naturally is, instead of trying to make your content fit a specific shape."

On the two kinds of strong speakers I've seen standing at the front of the room: those with a very clear linear path, taking people on a journey — and those who give you the whole map at once, so you can see everything simultaneously. On the road, or on the map.