TED Talks: The Official TED Guide to Public Speaking - by Chris Anderson

From recommendations of font sizes to larger philosophical applications to life, this book is a great resource for any public speaker (of course), educator, or anyone brave enough to try and impact the world through Ideas.

Thank you to my wife for finding it in a Hong Kong bookstore. 

Here are some highlights:

 

The Why of Public Speaking:

“Your number-one goal as a speaker is to take something that matters deeply to you and to rebuild it inside the minds of others.” – pg 12

“An idea is anything that can change how people see the world.” Pg 13

“An important idea, wrapped up in a fresh story, can make a great talk.” Pg 15

When giving a presentation, “give, don’t take.” It’s not about you, the admirations you want to receive, or to boost your name and product, it’s about sharing a gift that you have that will benefit others, not self. Pg 24

“ The intense appeal of the standing ovation can lead aspiring speakers to do bad things.” pg 27

“Here’s the thing about inspiration: it has to be earned. Someone is inspiring not because they look at you with big eyes and ask you to find it in your heart to believe in their dream. It’s because they actually have a dream that’s worth getting excited about. And those dreams don’t come lightly. They come from blood, sweet, and tears. Pg 28

“If you have dreams of being a rock-star public speaker, pumping up an audience as you stride the stage and proclaim your brilliance, I beg you to reconsider. Don’t dream of that. Dream of something much bigger than you are.” Pg 29

“What are humans for? Humans are for being more human than we’ve ever been. More human in how we work. More human in what we learn. And more human in how we share that knowledge with each other.” Pg 234

“The secret to happiness is: find something more important than you are, and dedicate your life to it.” – Dan Dennett

“We don’t seek the painful experiences that hew our identities, but we seek our identities in the wake of painful experiences. We cannot bear a pointless torment, but we can endure great pain if we believe that it’s purposeful. Ease makes less of an impression on us than struggle. We could have been ourselves without our delights, but not without the misfortunes that drive our search for meaning.” – Andrew Solomon

 

The How of Public Speaking:

 "Throughline is the connecting point that runs through your entire presentation, connecting every piece, and perhaps encapsulated in fifteen words or less."

“The throughline traces the path that the journey takes. It ensures that there are no impossible leaps, and that by the end of the talk, the speaker and audience have arrived together at a satisfying destination” pg 33

“Great writing is all about the power of the deleted word” pg 36

- Don’t be trapped by your ego – kill your darlings.

“An issue-based talk leads with morality. An idea-based talk leads with curiosity.” Pg 41

“If you want to reach people who radically disagree with you, your only chance is to put yourself in their shoes as best you can. Don’t use language that may trigger tribal responses. Start with a visual of the world as seen through their eyes. And use every one of the tools described here to build a connection based on your shared humanity.” Pg 62

“There’s always somebody who wants to confiscate our shared humanity, and there are always stories that restore it. If we live out loud, we can trounce the hatred and expand everyone’s lives – Andrew Solomon pg 69

If the whole power of a talk is in the connection between the speaker and audience, slides may actually get in the way of that. Pg 113

With a talk and slides, you have two streams of cognitive output running in parallel. The speaker needs to blend both streams into a master mix. In these circumstances, the audience member’s brain needs to decide whether to focus on your words, your slides, or both and it’s mostly involuntary. You must choose where you want their attention. Pg 116

            Questions: Are the visuals key to explaining what I want to say, or a distraction?

“Give your audience enough time to absorb each step. Don’t feed too much of the slide at a time or people will get overwhelmed.” Pg 122

- Rarely show clips longer than 30 seconds

- Must explain something that can’t be explained by still images; and have great production value

Transitions: Should never call attention to itself

- Cut: shifting to a new idea

- Dissolve: two slides are related in some way

“Every word you speak that someone has already seen on a slide is a word that carries zero punch. It’s not new news.” Pg 142

- Tease the arrival of a slide before revealing it.

“Every piece of content in our modern era is part of an attention war. It’s fighting against thousands of other claims on people’s time and energy . . . all these are lethal enemies. You never want to provide people with an excuse to zone out.” Pg 157

“If the ending isn’t memorable, the talk itself may not be.” Pg 168

The How: Authenticity

“When speaking live, we are vulnerable. When we are live and passionate, the audience can sense the conviction, and they get to be a part of the excitement of seeing a big idea identified, battled with, and finally shaken into shape.  The fact that they can sense that the presenter truly mean what they’re saying in the moment helps give permission to embrace the meaning, the idea.” Pg 134

“If the audience can tell you’re reciting. They may see your eyes roll around between paragraphs as you bring the next sentence to mind. More likely they will notice that your tone is slightly flat and robotic, because you are focused on brining the right sentences out instead of brining real meaning to those sentences.”  Pg 136

- As related to life: scripted apologies or affirmations have a similar effect.

Ask, “Is this essential to advancing my message, and is this interesting, really interesting? Do I love saying this line? If anything lands in the maybe pile . . . it’s out” pg 145

A Checklist:

-       Is this a topic I’m passionate about?

-       Does it inspire curiosity?

-       Will it make a difference to the audience?

-       Is my talk a gift or an ask?

-       Is the information fresh? Or is it already out there?

-       Do I have the credibility to make this talk?

-       What are fifteen words that encapsulate my talk?

-       Do those fifteen words really matter?

 

 Future TED Talks:

            Sherwin Nuland         

            Bryan Stevenson

            Rob Reid

            Hans Rosling

            David Deutsch

            Nancy Kanwisher

            Steven Johnson

            David Christian

            Dan Pallotta

            Reuben Margolin

            Thomas Heatherwick

            Hans Rosling

            James Nachtwey

            J.J. Abrams

            Brene Brown

            Julian Treasure

            Billy Collins

            June Cohen

The War of the Worlds, by H.G. Wells

A study, a glimpse, into the heart of man. The white man has many large footprints around the world where God, the pursuit of exploration, and the hope to "civilize" granted permission to pillage, destroy, and rape a people and land. The natives might have called them Martians. But they didn't. But reading a story that places the white man on the other side of colonization certainly has a different feel to it than our high school history books.

The War of the Worlds was a decent and easy read which also made it tolerable. If it had gone on too much longer it may have been shelved before completed, but as it is, just shy of 200 pages, it was worth the read. 

And it offered a few choice nuggets. In Chapter 13, one of the minor characters (the curate) finds himself in complete mental anguish and begins a brief discussion of the purpose of life, conflict, and role of man.  

"What does it mean?" he said. "What do these things mean?
I stared at him and made no answer.
He extended a thin white hand and spoke in almost a complaining tone.
"Why are these things permitted? What sins have we done? The morning service was over, I was walking through the roads to clear my brain for the afternoon, and then - fire, earthquake, death! As if it were Sodom and Gomorrah! All our work undone, all the work - What are these Martians?"
"What are we?" I answered, clearing my throat. He gripped his knees and turn to look at me again. For half a minute, perhaps, he stared silently. "I was walking through the roads to clear my brain," he said. "And suddenly - fire, earthquake, death!"
He relapsed into silence, with his chin now sunken almost to his knees.
Presently he began waving his hand. "All the work - all the Sunday school -- What have we done - what has Weybridge done? Everything gone - everything destroyed. The church! We rebuilt it only three years ago. Gone! Swept out of existence! Why?"
. . .
"Be a man!" said I. "You are scared out of your wits! What good is religion if it collapses under calamity? Think of what earthquakes and floods, wars and volcanoes, have done before to men! Did you think God exempted Weybridge? He is not an insurance agent."

H.G. Wells then provides a possible answer to the question of what is the purpose of conflict? What is It all about?

Answer: to endure, and to not lose hope.

By the toll of a billion deaths man has bought his birthright of the earth, and it is his against all comers; it would still be his were the Martians ten times as mighty as they are. For neither do men live nor die in vain.

And then he concludes with:

And there, amazed and afraid, even as I stood amazed and afraid, were my cousin and my wife - my wife white and tearless. She gave a faint cry. "I came," she said. "I knew - knew --"
She put her hand to her throat - swayed. I made a step forward, and caught her in my arms."

Beautiful.

A Loving Life, by Paul E. Miller

I've been accused of hating Christian books, movies, and music. It's an accurate accusation. And this book by Paul E. Miller is a great example of why. 

I'm trying to find the silver-lining in life, people, and thoughts because I don't want to be a bitter old man who complains about everyone and everything. So I tried with this book, and sure enough, there are some.  Things like:

Suffering is the crucible for love. We don't learn how to love anywhere else. Don't misunderstand; suffering doesn't create love, but it is a hot-house where love can emerge . . . the death of self offers ideal growing conditions for love. 

and

One of the oddest things about deep suffering is that the sun comes up in the morning. Life limps along.

and this

One of the hardest parts of a hesed love is that you can love others, but there may be no one to love you. The very act of loving can make you lonely.

But then he uses phrases like, "Your life energy needs to come from God" and I begin to lose interest. But that isn't enough to toss the book because I'm sure I too use similar language at times and really, so what if he says a phrase differently than I'd like.  

This book is damaging and frustrating not because of a few shallow phrases, but because of it's arrogance. All throughout, Miller uses his family and himself as the standard for esed love. The story of Naomi and Ruth are his structure and outline, but he is the center of book: his advice, his love, and his actions - the saving of a remote African village was perhaps the most disturbing. "I can endure in love for these people . . . I recruited teams, raised funds, and planned strategy . . . I loved them from above" - like Boaz!  He literally spends two pages talking about how he saved this village and then relates himself to the savior of the Naomi story!  

Who is this book about again?

Equally disturbing, but in contrast to the saved-by-a-white-foreigner story is the arrogance with which he looks down on Paula - the woman with five children from five different husbands who can't work, needs money, wisdom on how to live life, and is completely without anything redeemable - even morals. And that is exactly how Paul E. Miller sees her: a project that needs him. The way he describes her is ruthless and pious. No grace. No kindness. He actually says, "Frankly, I was disgusted with her choices" and concludes her story with a callous, "A few years later she got cancer and passed away."

His reflection on the woman and her life is "I assumed her appreciation of our care meant repentance. It didn't. I helped her situation but not her soul. But my biggest regret was that I didn't stay in touch with her sons." 

This is why "Christian" literature bothers me. It often takes a story, pads layers upon layers of possible intent, then spends the majority of the time talking about self, then sells it as a brilliant and new way of living.

The simple gospel truth of "remember the poor" doesn't need explanation. 

(As a side note, the continual assumption that the reader is of such low understanding and cognitive ability frightens me. Here's an example: "The Hebrew for "she sat beside the reapers" suggests that Ruth sat down at the side of or next to the reapers." And there's about half a dozen such examples in this book.)

The best part of this book is when he writes:

Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love (Eph. 4:2)
Bear with one another and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you (Col. 3:13)
In repentance and rest is your salvation (Isaiah 30:15)
When you give a dinner or banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, let they also invite you in return and you be repaid. But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind, and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the just (Luke 14:12-14)

I think Paul E. Miller means well, that he has done some pretty great things, and that I am probably being unfair at the least and hypocritical at best. I'm aware that, as I write my critique, I am exuding the same critical nature he showed Paula. So I don't want to write him off as worthless or someone in need of something I can provide. What have I done or written?  Am I able to cast the first stone?

Certainly not. 

I would just rather not read this type of literature.

 

The Magician's Elephant, by Kate DiCamillo

"At the end of the century before last, in the market square of the city of Baltese, there stood a boy with a hat on his head and a coin in his hand. The boy's name was Peter Augustus Duchene, and the coin that he held did not belong to him but was instead the property of his guardian, and old soldier named Vilna Lutz, who had sent the boy to the market for fish and bread."

"That day in the market square, in the midst of the entirely remarkable and absolutely ordinary stall of the fishmongers and cloth merchants and bakers and silver-smiths, there had appeared, without warning or fanfare, the red tent of a fortune-teller. Attached to the fortune-teller's tent was a piece of paper, and penned upon the paper in a cramped but unapologetic had were these words:"

The most profound and difficult questions that could possibly be posed by the human mind or heart will be answered within for the price of one florist.

"Peter read the small sign once, and then again. The audacity of the words, their dizzying promise made it difficult suddenly for him to breathe. He looked down at his coin, the single florist, in his hand . . ."

 (an excerpt from chapter 1)

Uncommon Grounds: The History of Coffee and How it Transformed the World

By Mark Pendergrast

Favorite Quotes:

- "The aroma is familiar and obvious enough - that fragrance that often promises more than the taste delivers. Body refers to the feel or "weight" of the coffee in the mouth, how it rolls around the tongue and fills the throat on the way down. Acidity refers to a sparkle, a brightness, a tang that adds zest to the cup. Finally, flavor is the evanescent, subtle taste that explodes in the mouth, then lingers as a gustatory memory." - pg xvi

- "So important did the brew become in Turkey that a lack of sufficient coffee provided grounds for a woman to seek a divorce." - pg 7

- "They came to be known as penny universities, because for that price one could purchase a cup of coffee and sit for hours listening to extraordinary conversations -or, asa 1657 newspaper advertisement put it, "PUBLICK INTERCOURSE." . . . "The coffeehouses provided England's first egalitarian meeting place, where a man was expected to chat with his stablemates whether he knew them or not." - pg 12

- "Wherever it has been introduced it has spelled revolution. It has been the world's most radical drink in that its function has always been to make people think. And when the people begin to think, they become dangerous to tyrants." pg 17

- "It wasn't enough simply to employ people. 'You love them, you love their families, you are part of them.'" - pg 126

- "Our judgement concerning the worth of things, big or little, depend on the feelings the things arouse in us." - pg 128

- "I believe the only way to conquer is to walk where the battle rages most fiercely, and fight, fight, fight until you win." (Alice Foote MacDougall) - pg 131

- "There have been many other extraordinary outcomes from the cooperation of roasters and growers. Paul Katzeff sells Delicious Peace, coffee grown on a Ugandan cooperative consisting of Christians, Muslims, and Jews. Community Coffee of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, convicted the feuding Colombian towns of Toledo and Labateca to work together to produce a great blend high in the Andes." - pg 358