In the past ten years, I’ve spoken at more than 200 events around the world. I lost count a long time ago. Few things are more exciting, fun and powerful than getting on stage in front of any audience to share my thoughts, feelings, experiences, ideas and passions. There’s just something about being given the opportunity to inspire, influence, teach and entertain people, whether the audience is small or large. But there’s something really unique about being invited to participate in a TED Talk. After all, the TED brand has become the most desired stage in the world, having had more luminaries, leaders, big thinkers and success stories on that platform than any other. While I have not yet been given the privilege of speaking from an official TED stage, I was recently invited to be a speaker at TEDxMileHigh, the independent TED event produced and hosted in my home city of Denver, Colorado. The desire to give a TED Talk came upon me last year while attending TED @ IBM in California. My friends Bryan Kramer and Kare Anderson both had the opportunity to present at the event, and I was inspired to pursue preparing and delivering my own TED Talk in the future. It became a bucket list item for me. After a period of vetting by the TEDxMileHigh producers, I was officially invited to give my talk just a month ago. Since the event was planned for June 13th, I had very little time to pull it together. Preparing a TED Talk is unlike most presentations I have delivered. Instead of the usual 45-90 minutes of stage time, the TED format is typically 12-15 minutes. And instead of talking explicitly about business, my proposal for this talk was far more personal and inspirational by design. Suffice to say that I spent more time and mental energy preparing this talk than any I have ever given. After all, I wanted to make my 12-15 minutes count! Working off my initial outline that was approved by the producers, I put together a powerpoint presentation that shared my message which was tentatively titled “Being Human in a Digital World.” I wanted to illustrate the good, the bad and the ugly of social media and technology with a call-to-action for us to choose good. However, once I had put the presentation together I stood back and assessed it. I didn’t like what I saw. I felt like it was vanilla, and not worthy of the TEDx stage. I phoned a friend and shared my struggle with him. I received input, and back to the drawing board I went. By the time I had reworked it, I still wasn’t happy. I then phoned another friend and received more counsel. Again, I fine-tuned and reworked the presentation. My displeasure and frustration increased. I wasn’t getting to the core of the message that I was hoping to uncover. I scrapped the presentation and decided to do something that I NEVER do when preparing for a talk. I scripted it out. 12 pages later, I had something… but I was still frustrated and feeling like I was missing something. Right around that time, another friend reached out to me and asked if he could help me. I spent time discussing the topic with him, rehearsing it and fine-tuning once again. I ended up eliminating almost everything I had started with and finally had a presentation that I was ALMOST happy to deliver. I went to bed thinking about my talk. I woke up thinking about my talk. And in the process, I found my voice… which leads me to Saturday, June 13th at the Ellie Caulkins Opera House in the Denver Center for the Performing Arts. The TEDxMileHigh team was wonderful, paying close attention to every detail, as well as to the needs of the speakers. I was shown to a dressing room which I really didn’t have need of as I was already prepared. But it was kind of cool that they had a room for me with my name on it. As I stood there looking in the mirror I imagined the incredibly talented people that had spent time in the same room, preparing to perform an aria or Shakespearean tragedy. The lobby of the opera house contained a number of exhibits which I wish I had more time to enjoy. But among the exhibits was a bookstore. I was delighted to see three of my books available for sale amongst all the rest. I then met Jeremy Duhon, the curator of TEDxMileHigh. He was enthusiastic and excited about the sold-out show that was soon to take place. A majestic venue with 2200 seats and four tiers of seating, it was a marvel to see! When I stepped out on stage for my rehearsal at 9 am on that morning, I found my place on the 12-foot diameter red carpet and delivered my talk to an empty house. Jason Dilg, the Producer of the program, gave me some great insights, and I fine-tuned the presentation just a bit more. I’m not usually nervous before an audience these days, but the gravity of the talk I was about to deliver certainly brought about anxiety. Fortunately, I had the support of family and friends encouraging me. Due to the nature of my talk, Jason and Jeremy felt that it would make for a good kick-off to the event. So I was invited to go first. Usually I don’t like going first, but I just wanted to get it done and be able to enjoy the rest of the day. Plus, I considered it an honor that I was invited to start the event. A short video welcomed the packed house to the event and the energy was electric! My heart was beating fast and my mouth was dry. But having experienced anxiety before speaking before, I knew this was temporary and that by the time I hit the stage all the fear would fade away […]
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