Every time I prepare for a keynote presentation (Title: LEFT AND RIGHT, UP AND DOWN: CONNECTING GROUPS AND NETWORKS) I sit with three big buckets to work on:
- What IS the focus (as I have a busy, full brain that can go down ratholes in a nanosecond)
- What is the balance of performance, sharing and engagement?
- Who is inspiring me right now.
I wanted to share some of my answers as a way of thinking and prepping for my keynote next Thursday in Melbourne at ConVerge, and a subsequent massive set of shorter workshops on facilitating online learning in the following weeks. Thinking out loud with you really helps me. Did you know that? Thank you.
In this first post I’m going to start with the inspiration, because that’s where I feel the need this morning. I seriously don’t want to start in old PPT. I have tons of glorious images. I can DRAW glorious images. So what. Who cares. I want to MOVE people when I’m in Australia and I want to be OF VALUE. So there! Let’s talk inspiration…
Jim Groom – Occupy Education
I love Jim and he drives me crazy. In a good way. Clearly he leads with passion. He follows with conviction and he IS a performer. He blends the three buckets into a nice stew. He also alienates me a itty bit, which is good. I can’t step away. The edginess is something I often lack — authentic edginess. Not performance edginess.
I have seriously considered doing this:
Any other inspiring clips to share with me? As I scanned my YouTube favorites, clearly I have not been keeping track of great keynote presentations. I mean, look, THIS inspires me!
I actually get inspired by great standup comedians, like Bill Hicks and George Carlin. My training and, to be honest, personal disposition is towards long-form argument and extensive brooding, so these pithy jabbers inspire me to be fast and surprising.
My subjects are often heavy, so comedians lift me up, too.
Hm, we’d be fun as a pair, Bryan. You brooding, my hyper. I am humorous, but not in a comedian sort of way. I screw that up royally. I just had hot chocolate with Eugene Eric Kim, Drummond Reed, Christy Lee Engle, Jonathan (don’t know last name) and another guy with a really cool name that is eluding my sugar/caffeine hyped mind and they have inspired me. I have three pages of doodles. I must now craft the content post. Style alone — pffft! THANKS!
Are you going to crawl out of a tent in Australia? That is my question 🙂 Sounds like you have good ideas from your coffee group……good luck!
Nancy – we love the way you ‘draw’ people in – so do some large scale ‘drawing’ – something that we can also contribute to online. These collaborative ‘drawings’ could contribute to the many workshops you have coming up.
I know we want to be inspired by you about facilitating online in our various digital habitats.
Being yourself is edginess – you don’t need to do what others do – though inspiration helps. I’m sure you will be fine.
If not I have a very nice tent I can lend you…
Haha, I don’t think I need a tent, but I have drawn inspiration from some of the process work around Occupy. The more I dig, the more interesting it is. But of course, Im still working on the presentation. Carole, there will be some drawing, of all sorts! 😉
Let us know what you decide to do and how it goes!!
Edginess, in my opinion, is something that you kind of either have or don’t have. It’s tough to feign without being obvious. It’s also easy to overdo. You don’t want to alienate your listeners entirely. They shouldn’t be completely uncomfortable or wanting to leave!