How to never be boring in a conversation
Using these four tips will improve your storytelling
Ever wonder why some people can captivate an audience with their stories? It is not just the words they use. It is also how they tell the story. Using the following techniques will improve your conversations and storytelling, making you the next, life of the party.
Use a story gap
The story gap is a concept that Robert McKee brought to life. It is that moment in time when the world presents the character with a surprise to his ordinary life. Using a story gap gives the listener a reason to care.
Start your story with a hint of what is to come. No, do not give up the punch line or the surprise ending at the beginning. Just tease them in the first one or two sentences.
One way is to start by raising a question in the mind of the listener. A good start — Let me tell you how we won the state football championship when we down by six points and only had 30 seconds on the clock.
With this opening, the listener is already thinking, “Yeah, how did you do it?”
Using high positive or negative connotation words that create an emotional stake is very effective.
In advertising, you would call this the hook.
Now that you have their attention, you need to deliver. What good does a great story gap do if you continue with a boring story and put your audience to sleep?
Use a story gap to bring your listeners into the story by giving them a reason to care.
Inhabit the character and actions you are talking about
You do not need to be an Oscar Award-winning actor to accomplish the following.
If the person you are talking about is known to the group, adapting known gestures and mannerisms of this person will help in the storytelling.
These actions do not need to be perfect. They just need to close enough to be recognizable to the group. You know, how Barbara always flicks her hair with her left hand when talking about something.
Many people telling a story remain flat in their gestures and facial expressions. This puts a huge burden on the words you use in your story. They need to be fascinating. It is a bit like making stone soup. Without meat, vegetables, and spices, you are stuck with warm water.
Using gestures, facial expressions, and if you can pull it off, accents, you are adding spices to your story.
If your character is running, climbing, or swimming, pantomiming these actions add to your story.
Inhabiting your character and his actions help the story along when it might be dragging. It also does not matter if some of your jokes fall flat.
Your storytelling is not dependent only upon your words. Using gestures, accents, and facial expressions, you add spice to your story. If everything else fails, at least you are fun to watch.
Use Dynamics
Dynamics is simply shifting the volume of your voice or the size of your gestures. Think about a roller coaster. The ride would be boring if it only when up or down. Every good roller coaster, like every good story, has ups, downs, and twists.
A shift from a loud voice to a quieter voice makes your listener lean in to hear your words. Changing from large gestures to smaller gestures causes the same effect because your listener does not want to miss the smaller details of your gestures.
Making these shifts reinvest the listener in your story. If you stay on the same baseline all the time, you become monotonous.
When you start your story, come in a little higher than the situation requires. This separates you from other storytellers. Of course, you need to back down a level as soon as the story calls for it.
Think of it as a Rowing Team. At the start of the race, the first ten stokes are at a much faster tempo to get the boat moving, but then the team settles into a slower tempo to continue the race. Unlike rowing, when you do come down, you still need to be dynamic in your storytelling.
Start your story one level higher than needed, and settle down when the story calls for it. Also, remember to mix it up just like a roller coaster with ups, downs, and twists. A monotone delivery will kill your story, no matter how interesting the words may be.
Include everybody
People pay attention when they are being spoken to. They feel this conversation is for them. Simply acknowledging someone makes them feel the story is for them.
Even in larger groups, when you go out of your way to include people in the conversation, it makes it more interesting for everyone.
Asking a question or pointing out how this story relates to someone in the group can have this effect. Even if the point does not directly affect this person, the act of acknowledging a relationship with someone automatically increases their attention to the story.
This technique works in larger groups. Sure, If you are telling a story to 100 people, it is impossible to give everybody a personal reason to listen to your story. This is where eye contact comes into play.
Looking at someone, or when addressing a large audience, in their general direction, shows you are addressing that part of the audience.
Remember the three-second rule. Looking for more than three seconds is borderline staring. Give each person or section of your audience about three seconds of eye contact before moving on to the next person.
Include your audience in your story through acknowledgment. This can be direct through a verbal acknowledgment or just making eye contact. Remember the three-second rule for eye contact. No staring.
The story still counts
I have given you four powerful ways to make your story more interesting, regardless of the content.
- Using a story gap
- Inhabiting the character and actions in your story
- Using dynamics — thing of a roller coaster
- Include everybody
The content of your story still matters. Even if you use these four techniques, you can only do so much with a boring story.
Stone soup is still stone soup.
