Remember your passion. Watch the Apple App Store for a new iPad app for becoming a professional motivational Speaker.

can have a speaking career…then I can do that too”. Well don’t underestimate the time and energy it takes to prepare a keynote speech. Learn from Winston Churchill. One day, while Prime Minister Churchill was splashing in his bathtub, his valet
overheard him loudly talking. Believing he needed assistance, the valet entered and
inquired, “Did you call, Sir?” “No,” Churchill replied. “I was just giving a speech to The House of Commons.”
At the small risk of leaving myself open to a charge of splitting hairs rather than implanting new growths, I’ve decided to separate practice out from underneath the umbrella of preparation. Practicing, or rehearsing, stands alone in effectively extinguishing fear. That said, let’s explore the value of vigorous rehearsal. You’d never have caught Sir Winston standing before Parliament and winging it. In fact, according to James vanFleet, in his book, Hidden Power, Churchill never made a speech of major importance without first rehearsing it in front of a mirror. Imagine the man voted the greatest speaker of the twentieth century, standing up there after the Battle of Britain, holding a page of hastily written notes in his hand, totally unrehearsed, coming up with: Never, in the course of human suffering, have so many owed so
much to so few. Wouldn’t have happened. Maybe instead… Well done, lads. We all owe you a bloody lot, we do. Would you want some of the other professionals you deal with to wing it? Would
you want your surgeon telling you, “You know, I’ve never done one of these before, but
there has to be a first; so I’m excited about opening you up, and we’ll just take it from here. We can share this experience together.” How about the contractor building your
house or the person piloting the next plane you’re scheduled to fly? You wouldn’t want
them winging it. It’s the same with movie directors, actors or iPhone developers you have to rehearse your outcomes. Can you imagine a top selling best app for iPad being designed without planning and preparation?

* …reading
* …note-taking
* …outlining
* …writing
* …editing
* …memorizing
* …developing supplementary materials
* …finding appropriate props

…and as many essential etceteras as you can shake a stick at! Don’t make the mistake of so many who start in this industry and then bomb when they have to stand and deliver. It takes preparation…lots of preparation to become a motivational speaker. Start now in outlining the chapters of your book and your motivational speech because to become a motivational speaker the hardest part is always…just starting.

as a motivational speaker. Remember the
the first minute is so important. To win in public speaking you have to capture critical attention immediately.
Notice that they employ humor in the following examples.. You’ve heard the old maxim, “always open with a joke.” I would suggest, whenever possible, to use humor because there’s nothing like laughter to loosen up people. Moreover, all three of these examples demonstrate a keen awareness of the audience. They are direct and purposeful, humorous and captivating. In short, they showcase the art of fire building.

Example #1-A friend of mine once was motivational speaking to a group of 250 professionals who were in an adversarial relationship with her company. In her opening, rather than not mentioning this conflict, she instead chose to go before them wearing a
bulletproof vest. She told the group that her name was Jane, and then she gave the name of her company. She continued, “ I understand that there’s a lot of hard feelings in this room towards my department. For that reason, I’ve worn a bullet-proof vest today.”
Everyone started laughing and clapping, so she took off the vest and said, “Good. I see that I won’t be needing this today. Thank you so much.” Excellent introduction. Very creative, and it broke the ice.

Example #2 A CEO was speaking his top executives about budget problems and depleted resources. He’d hung a piñata in the middle of the room and he started out whacking that piñata blindfolded, and hit it until it finally burst open. “You
know,” he began, “I want to start this meeting by telling you that this is exactly how I’ve felt for the past few months. Just like this piñata. I feel like I’ve been battered. People keep asking me for more and more, but the resources are depleted.” As he picked up the scattered candy and began passing it out to the group, he said, “Today, let’s discuss some alternative ways to meet your needs.”
Presentations (magazine)

Example #3-I saw another speaker get up in front of a group of salespeople and began his motivational speaking in a foreign language (I think it was French). He went on for a couple of minutes until he saw everyone looking around in puzzlement. Then he paused and said, “Oh, I’m sorry. I was speaking the wrong language there for a moment…One of the reasons that we’re not gaining market share is we’re speaking the wrong language to our customers. Today we’ll learn how to speak the right language.”

All of these examples are very captivating, as it caught everyone’s attention right from the start!
Remember only get one chance to make a good impression and only one chance to capture critical attention…in the 1st minute
of your public speaking keynote speech. Our motivational speaker training course will further your motivational speaking opportunities.

Motivational Speaker Training

I want to introduce you to a motivational speaker who, in his time, set a standard for presentations unapproached by his peers. Several years ago, while living in South London, I discovered the fascinating story of Charles Spurgeon, and, from the heart of his story, both the theme and title for this book.

I feel connected to this reverend for the following reasons:

• Our fathers were both Baptist preachers.

• On a personal note, we’ve both been described as portly, and have relished a fine cigar.

The dynamic Charles Spurgeon was a minister in the Elephant and Castle district of South London in the latter nineteenth century. While researching this “man of the cloth,” I learned some disturbing statistics describing church attendance. During his lifetime, attendance was at an historical low in churches of all faiths throughout England. The average attendance ranged from between five and seven people per service, per church! The notable exception was the Metropolitan Tabernacle, the largest independent congregation in the world, where Spurgeon had a regular attendance of five to seven thousand every Sunday morning!

What really compelled me to study this man’s speaking skills was not just this astounding attendance. It was the appeal he made to his congregation on Sunday mornings at the end of his sermons. He would ask those in attendance to not return that evening so that others would have an opportunity to get in, who that morning had been turned away!

I’d never heard of a minister having to make that kind of announcement. What made Charles Spurgeon so popular? What about him appealed so powerfully to others? In my research, I uncovered an interview with Spurgeon that provided, with the brilliance of a few searing words, the answers I sought. When asked why so many people were coming to his church when other churches were nearly empty, Spurgeon’s response was:

I conducted a motivational speaker training for a Fortune 400 insurance company. I was in a meeting with one of the company executives who asked if I would be willing to help one of the managers (let’s call him John) with a presentation he was to do in seven days for senior executives. I said of course I’d be happy to do that, as long as John was willing. This executive went on to explain to me that this would be a very important presentation and that John was an excellent manager who probably deserved to be a director. It turned out that the only thing keeping John from being promoted was his lack of presentation skills. I was then told that if John did an exceptional job speaking, he would receive that promotion to director. And I was left with these final words: “Oh yeah, and you can’t tell him about this.”

So, the next day, I met with John. He already had the content that he was speaking on written because it was one he’d spoken on several times. To be honest, he didn’t seem that excited about it. I said to John, “Why don’t we really go after it this time and make this presentation better than it’s ever been?” “I know, John, but for this Monday night, why don’t we go for it? Let’s put in some good humor, create a very captivating introduction, and initiate a call to action?”

“I don’t know. I hadn’t thought about doing that much.”

“John, we have six more days. We can practice it, we can rework it, we can really spice it up and make sure it’s fantastic!  What do you think?” That’s when he blurted, “Here’s what I think- I think you are more excited about my motivational speaking than I am!”

“John, we have six more days. We can practice it, we can rework it, we can really spice it up and make sure it’s fantastic! What do you think?” We laughed about it a bit. Of course, I couldn’t tell him what was riding on it, but he did practice, and he did rehearse, and he did a truly wonderful job on the presentation. As a result, he was promoted to director and is probably now on his way to vice-president. I often wonder if there are not hundreds, even thousands, of stories like John’s. Are you ready to get motivational speaker training in 2009? Let’s go.

Become a Motivational Speaker

Many people wonder how Tiger Woods got to be the best golfer in the world at such a young age.  Perhaps his secret lies partially in a decision he made very early in his career to study and learn from the best in his sport.  He chose to learn from both those playing against him and those who played before him. Tiger already knew at a tender age what, frankly, many people never learn:

Every man I meet is my superior in some way; in that I learn from him.

Tiger’s strategy was to pick fifty golfers, fifty of the greatest, study them and try to extract the very best parts of each of their games, and incorporate them into his own. His goal was to create one super player…and for all intents and purposes, he’s done just that!

In my motivational speaking career, I have tried to do the same.  This process began about thirty years ago.  I began seriously listening to other motivational speakers by whom I was captivated.  I studied what I thought each did exceptionally well, picked out parts of their “games,” and incorporated them into my own professional speaking skills.  I strongly urge everyone who is trying to take their speaking career to the next level to do the same. Let me give you five examples of my “case studies” and what, in my opinion, each did best:

1) Maya Angelou

Maya Angelou is a Grammy Award-winning poet, writer, and motivational speaker who is also currently a professor at my alma mater, Wake Forest.  (I’m throwing in this plug for my Demon Deacons.  Fight on!)  Very few speakers have Maya Angelou’s flair and creativity in speaking.  The way that she captures an audience, even in her introductions, is just fabulous.  And her mastery of pauses…powerful! Study her techniques and your captivating powers will indeed “Rise”!

2) Charles Spurgeon

Charles Spurgeon, whom I discussed in the introduction, is my mentor not only in the field of passion, but also of humor.  Spurgeon often used levity in his sermons, which was very controversial in his time—and to a lesser extent, remains so in churches today— because the idea of using the pulpit to make people laugh was considered rather sacrilegious.  When Charles was once asked why he used humor, his response was, “I wait until I open a man’s mouth wide with laughter, then I pour a dose of truth down it.”  This lesson is the basis of all the humor I use in my speeches.

3)  Martin Luther King, Jr.

Martin Luther King, Jr.…As I write his name down and gaze at it, I ask myself, “Is any explanation necessary?”  He is my hands-down favorite speaker of all time.  His soul, his spirit, his song, his use of parallel phraseology was spectacular!  (Unlike any before or since his time)  At the end of the nineties, Martin Luther King, Jr. was voted as one of the best two speakers of the twentieth century, second only to…

4)  Winston Churchill

An interesting dilemma for me is that Churchill is generally not my cup of tea.  And yet, how can I leave him off of my list of fifty to be studied, when he was voted the most powerful orator of the twentieth century?  Here’s a man whose voice was not only as necessary as troops and armaments were to the British war effort, but also a man who won a Nobel Prize for Literature and his oratory.  So much a “man of the hour” was Churchill, that he was the first non-U.S. citizen who was granted honorary citizenship in the United States.  In fact, in his honor we have the battleship USS Churchill.  I also had to include Churchill on the list of fifty because he’s my “poster-boy” for speech preparation.  When once asked why his speeches were so popular and powerful, his response set a new standard for masterful preparedness: “As a rule of thumb, I try to spendone hour of work and preparation for every one minute of a speech that I give.”These are but five of the speakers from whom I’ve learned.  Tiger Woods knows the importance of learning all he can from both those before him and those around him to make himself better.  What prevents us from doing that in our speaking careers? Many times it comes downto just one word….Ego. Take your Speaking Career to the next level in 2009. Stay tuned for my Motivational Speakers Training Course, training you to become a motivational speaker. The doors will open in a few short weeks.

showcase. Having a powerful keynote is what we offer with our motivational speaker

training course.