Do you want to make a deeper and more lasting impression on your audience? To deepen that connection, you must go deeper within yourself.
Doesn’t that just make sense? Everyone has a story; in fact, many stories. Do you ever feel jealous of other presenters who have great stories and wish stories like that would happen to us? They have, and we usually bury them in our memory because they’re painful.
I just spent the weekend leading a Champ Camp with Judy Carter about ‘Finding Your Message.’ We sat on the side of the room and talked as the students were involved in an exercise. I don’t even remember how it came up, but I was telling her how, when I was growing up, I had to wear ugly black different size shoes and how I now have a passion for ‘cool’ shoes. She asked if I’d ever told that story. Nope. I’d written an article about it, but had never told it from the stage. She reminded me that it’s a great story, from ugly-to-cool. We need to tell the stories of our transformations.
Many speakers want to become professionals long before they know their own unique message. We must first figure out ‘our story’ before we can share our message — kinda like saying we can’t market until we know who we’re marketing to… who needs to hear our message.
So, how do you find your story? Early in my career, I was listening a speech by Bobbi Gee. She directly asked, “Why should anyone listen to you? What have you done? What have you overcome?” Wow! I had no idea. That was why I was sitting in her presentation. After months of pondering that thought, I realized that my story was that I had become a comedian even though I wasn’t funny. That led me to seeing some of my value, long before I won the World Championship. In fact, if I trace the origins of my winning speech, it was really that question from the mid-1990’s.
What can you do to find your story? As you may know, I’m in the midst of writing my own screenplay. My exhaustive studying of master screenwriters has taken me through a journey of discovery. I’ve found countless correlations between the process of screenwriting and the process of storytelling for speakers. This idea was spawned by Syd Field’s The Screenwriter’s Workbook. In this book, Syd mentions that he has seen many screenplays that were OK, but just not compelling enough. What does Syd recommend to his students? For each of the main characters, he suggests writing a biography of their life. What was it like for them growing up? What did their parents do for a living? He says that if you go deeper in to the lives of your characters, you can ad more detail and ‘back story’ to the screenplay. Investing a little time in writing the biography will make the story writing easier and the added detail will make the story more compelling and real.
Here’s your assignment, if you’re willing to accept it:
Write a 2-to-3 page biography about yourself. Take a few days to think about it and reflect. You never have to show anyone. The self-discovery could lead you to the best story you ever told, one with more of a lasting impact. What memories — good and bad — do you have about growing up?
Here is what I wrote (rambling, typos and all!):
My name is Darren LaCroix. I was born in Worcester, Mass in 1966. I was born with a deformity called a clubfoot. My mom felt like it was her fault and over compensated to help her deal with the unnecessary guilt. In those days doctors didn’t want to operate on infants. Most doctors told her that they would have to wait until my early teens before they could do anything. My mom persisted she found Dr. Karen. He operated on me when I was a year and a half old. I remember he was a pretty cool guy too. He found a way to take ligaments from one side of foot and add them to the other to help twist my foot straight.
I had a few operations and several casts. Mom felt bad. I didn’t really know any different. Mom said when I was little, if I wanted something across the room, I just went and got it, dragging my little cast behind me. That’s kind of how life is I guess.
For a while I had to wear those leg braces. Not very cool. Wearing a cast much of my infancy, my left foot didn’t grow as fast, so one foot was smaller than the other. We had to go to a special store, Stride Rite, to buy shoes. They were the only place that would sell us two different sized shoes. When all the other kids were wearing the cool sneakers I was wearing ugly black ones. Mom was very loving, but she did not have a great sense of fashion. She found me this red corduroy cape and a matching Sherlock Holmes hat. I got teased at school, “Darren, Darren the Red Baron.” Ouch.
My sister, Donna was the oldest. She was the smart one. My brother David was the funny one. He was a super jock and quite clever too. He was six years older than me. I think I was a surprise. They broke my parents in for me. They would get so frustrated because my mom didn’t make me eat anything I didn’t want to. They were forced to eat Lima beans. They were creative in finding ways hide the evidence. They would either hide them in their milk or feed them our dog Sandy, under the table.
Mom and dad were great. They were like June and Ward Clever, but their roles were reversed. Mom ruled the roost and dad was a quiet guy who loved to fish. I have no idea how we survived on such little income. Dad worked at the electric company, mom made wedding cakes out of our home to earn extra cash to provide for us. She was also an artist. She did oil paintings of nature scenes and covered bridges. Mom would always watch the news and make me afraid of the big cities. That was where all the crime was.
Dad has the biggest heart and could fix anything. When it came to woodworking was his gift. Sometimes we called him Geppetto as he even made Christmas gifts for my nephews. Dad’s parents were adopted and 100% French. Mom’s parents were 100% Polish. My great grandparents came to America from Poland.
Every Sunday we would go to church, then my grandparents would stop by with fresh bagels from Water Street in Worcester. Mmmmmm. Nothing like a fresh bagel and cream cheese and grandma’s fresh picked strawberries.
Growing up I remember a book I found in the library. It was my first exposure to motivation. I read the biography of O.J. Simpson. Then he was famous as a running back for the Buffalo Bills. I was inspired to hear how he had rickets growing up. He had to wear the same braces I did. This moved me.
I was naive enough to believe my dreams could come true. I grew up in a family where they believed success was for other people. Not us. If we could just go to college and get a good job, have a family and retire from that job, that’s the most you could hope for.
My brother was a super jock and still has track records at our hometown high school. I liked sports, though I was never very good at it. I used to pitch side arm. In high school the good hitters had trouble with it, the bad hitters cleaned my clock!
My sister was a scholar. The first grandchild from our family to graduate college and graduated Suma Cum Laude. I was an average student. I had challenges reading so I was in remedial reading classes to. I got hooked up to a reading machine to help me focus one word at a time. That was before they knew what dyslexia was – or ‘saw.’
People liked me, but I always wanted more. Always loved the movies because I saw life as challenging. That people needed an escape. I thought it would be cool to make movies to help people have that escape. Even wrote a little movie for me and my cousins based on a Styx album. You might not even be old enough to know what an album is. Its an MP3 made out of a big black plastic pancake.
I thought we had it tough, not having much money. Not having cool stuff, but my parents loved us and did they best they could. Everyone see’s their situation as the worst. We look at people who have it better than us and get a little jealous. I grew up in a plastic bubble. I had no idea how lucky we really were. Then again, do most people?
I loved seeing people laugh. There was nothing that made me happier than seeing people happy. I wasn’t very funny though. My brother and cousins, they were funny. I enjoyed that was the ultimate for me.
Never won anything in my life. I just wasn’t lucky or really good at anything.
In high school I played baseball and football. I was a relief pitcher in baseball and second-string quarterback. I could throw better than the first string QB in practice, but had no business being first. I was too afraid.
My biggest accomplishment in my life to that point was the summer before senior year. I was tired of watching the varsity sports from the sidelines. This was going to be my year. I was mad as heck and I wasn’t going to take it anymore. I started lifting weights and running four miles a day. My brother forced me to lift. He literally stood over me on the bench press with his fist in the ready to punch me if I gave up too soon. I hated it at the moment, but appreciated it later on. I ended up getting the nickname “Chester” that year. I had great pectoral muscles.
I remember watching an NFL Film highlight when running back Walter Payton broke a rushing record. It was played to the Bond theme song, “Nobody does it better.” I sat in awe and wondered what it would be like to be the best at something.
My high school aptitude test said I should consider being a TV Camera man. My reaction was funny and sad now. I thought, “How cool… .to be working with TV stars! That would be awesome.” The problem with that was, I barely could dream being behind a camera, and it did not even come close to my consciousness that I could be in front of the camera.
I went on to Bryant College, a small business school in Rhode Island. I studied marketing and finance. I didn’t like finance, but took it just to shut my brother up. In fact I took extra classes over the summer just to qualify for a double major. When in college I started a summer business with my friend Jim. It was a driveway sealing business. The idea came to us when we were sealing his father’s restaurant parking lot overnight, so he didn’t have to close down his parking lot. We still blame it on the fumes. Jim was the one who got me into motivational tapes and the guy who game me the Brian Tracy program that is now infamous. Over my bed, in my childhood bedroom where my dream started hang a Successories poster of a skier going off a cliff with the saying, “If it’s to be, it’s up to me.” I needed that message.
After college I wanted to go to Hollywood and become an actor. I took a trip out there with my friend Don. We ended up in the audience and got on camera when Harry Loraine memorized all of the audience’s names. It felt like fate we were destined to be there. Never had the guts to make the move though. I did end up doing lots of local commercials in Boston. My acting teacher, Bob North taught me that the day you are ready to give up, is the day you would have landed the role. He proved to be right. The day I was going to quit was the day I landed a national Konica Copier spot. I wore the ugliest tie ever in that spot. Still have it hanging in my office to remind me of that lesson. I went on to get my S.A.G. card, and though I’m still a card-carrying member, I haven’t used it since those days.
When I was getting started it was tough to get camera time. I remember being at the town hall and seeing a poster for a public access TV course. It was free. I could afford that. I got together with some of my funny friends and started a public access TV program. We did skit comedy. It was fun and invaluable experience. Camera time, camera time, camera time.
I am a hopeless romantic. When I started pursing my comedy dream, I fell in love with a much older woman named Jane. Her support was crucial at the beginning. She would drive with me into Boston to open mic night every Sunday. I got the guys who worked for me at the Subway shop and I coached in football to come with me late one night and accompany me on the guitar when I sang Extreme’s song, “More than words” outside her window. I then asked her to marry me. She couldn’t do it. She was much smarter than I was. She knew my family would have a hard time accepting her and her daughter because she was much older. I was crushed. The only way I could deal with it was to dive deeper into comedy. I felt no pain when I was on stage making people laugh. Even if the laughs were few and far between.
I keep adding to it. More ideas come each day.
If you want a deeper impact, you need to go deeper. You never have to show it to anyone. The exercise will still be valuable. Most of the time we’re too close to see our own value. Help from friends can be powerful.
If you’re willing to show someone else, consider this:
After you write your biography, I suggest asking trusted friends to take a look and tell you what’s interesting. What are the “commonalities” that people who look at it mention? If you’re a speaker or a Toastmaster, ask your friends or colleagues if they’d give you a few minutes of feedback. What you hear might just change the course of your speaking.
I’d like your help: If you’re willing to give me feedback on mine, please do and post on my blog. What seems interesting to you? What intrigues you? What might you want to know more about? Is trying to discover what makes me an interesting backstory?
Please share your comments below!
Darren, I delighted in reading this because it felt like you were just sitting across the table talking to me. I think that is one of the qualities of connecting with people from the stage or in a group is just talking to them like old buddies, simple and straight-forward. Each one of those bits of your story could then be easily embellished with even more colorful language as a storyteller might use or become dialog in a solo performance.
I also loved that there is not one single ounce of regret in your story, only accolades for your childhood, your family and your parents, even though we get the message that you wanted to become more than they wanted you to be perhaps, from their beliefs. The fact that you just wanted to see people happy says a lot.
I’d love to know more about your first love, Jane, and how she influenced and supported you, and then more about how comedy and performance really helps us overcome so many things and gives us so much understanding about people and life. At least that is my own experience with performance, teaching and speaking.
I’m really glad to finally know where LaCroix came from. I talk about you a lot because I really admire everything you do and I am also French so I automatically pronounce your name in French which has people asking me to repeat it. Then I have to think about how to say it in English.
I love reading your posts and blogs. Keep it coming!
Darren,
Thank you so much for sharing your story with us. I LOVED reading it! Here’s what I connect to: challenges, and how different people deal with them. What was most moving were your chapters of your childhood, because we can all relate to having our own obstacles as kids. The photo of you with the cast on your foot really made a connection.
It got a little slower around college and afterward. Don’t just tell us that your were inspired, show us what difference the poster made to you, how did it change the way you thought? Same thing with movies and other experiences during and after college. Give us examples of the ways the inspirational people or moments in your life affected you, and the emotional ride, because of those challenges.
I’m actually doing this same exercise right now, writing the introduction to my upcoming book, Look Good Now, Ladies. I wrote out my stories, but didn’t feel like they went anywhere. So I worked with a writing coach. She’s terrific; she identified what was missing in my stories which was the emotional conflict. Each episode has to have some sort of challenge so the audience is always riding an emotional wave and wanting to know what’s coming next.
Great work, Darren. Your readers really feel a connection to you through these stories. I know I did. Looking forward to more!
Marian Rothschild
Personal Image Consultant
Look Good Now
We all learned a lot, this weekend, in the Message of You day, and the two following one’s. I was so impressed with each opening up, and even Judy Carter telling at the end: I got nearer the participants as ever, as all opened and went deep: I realised, she said to us, I will have also to reveal more.
So I see felt you. Both of you wonderful teachers! Together made a wonderful team to lead us through the three days of workshop in Vegas.
Reading the bio of your beginning. First, it does bring me nearer you. Till now, seen only the winner, sure of himself, even with the small video of first gig. Now a more human side of Darren emerges. Going deep brings you closer to us.
One small observation: “My biggest accomplishment in my life to that point was the summer before senior year.” You write. I read three times, did not find where did the accomplishment is described.
Another suggestion. Give a name to your older woman friend. Does not have to be the real one, it would bring her closer to us.
And thanks, for the great three days! I already asked in my French blog ‘il y a de la vie après 70 ans’ how they see me. One of the points of Judy’s workshop. And got my first answer from someone who has been reading me for five years, day after day. Her message – of me – was not far from the one I used last day of your and Judy’s Bootcamp. “You always make the best from what comes, bad or good.”
I will do the assignment as you suggested, even if 2/3 pages are not enough for all ups and downs, finishing well sometimes at the end. But already, got some new material and ways of thinking. For all 20 or 22 of us it was a very positive strong experience.
You are one of life’s great givers Darren, although I’m 22years older than yourself I enjoyed reading it all, it gave me a number of pointers that will help me write my own story.
Being a master procrastinator you remind that that if it is to be it’s up to me and I think it was William James who agreed but added; “What I need most in my life is someone to make me do what I can.”
Probably why so many of the really successful people state that a coach has been so important to their success..
After 2 years on my shelf I’ve just dusted off Rick and your Laugh & Get Rich book, now half way through it and committed to finish it within the next two days..
Thanks again for all you do, you are a true master speaker and trainer. Neville
Aloha e Darren:
Your story about wearing the braces is very much a part of my life but it was my little brother, Brad, who had been misdiagnosed initially with Cerebral Palsy at age 5 then after attending a school for CP one of the therapists saw the way he got back up after falling which he did all the time due to his heels being lifted off the ground as the achilles tendon shrank. They rediagnosed him with Muscular Dystrophy – the type he had only boys get between the ages of 3-10 and progressed most quickly. There were only 5 people who had survived to adulthood – we were told he would only live until age 15. He was actually 19 when suddenly the ravages of the disease took him suddenly – which was a blessing but a total surprise. I always think the glass is 3/4 full so was sure he was going to be the 6th survivor. Always being there for others is what I’m best at including when our friend was stuck by a drunk driver and in a coma -after she came out of the coma some days later she said she couldn’t really remember what I had been saying to her but she heard my voice and felt reassured. I actually was telling her that we had brought her twin daughters, who were turning 13 that week, and their dog to live with us until she was back home. Mahalo nui for all your encouragement – I am still trying to find my story and appreciate your help – D
Darren,
I join with the others in thanking you for sharing yourself so openly with us.
I see Little Darren dragging his cast behind him in order to grab what he wanted from the other side of the room as a metaphor for your whole life. Read through your story again. Everything is about rising above the odds and succeeding when no one thought you could.
One of our pastors will be teaching a class on storytelling this Fall. I may get to help. He sees story as a way of sharing our own journeys to peace with God as well as an opportunity to encourage others who are going through difficult situations. I will be forwarding him your email so he can see how it works.
Darren,
Thank you for your story. Because of your ‘deformities’ – club foot and dyslexia – being teased and having a creative mother, you seem to have always been on a path to prove yourself to the world. Your comedy was a way of escape like the movies, lifting weights, “if it’s to be, it’s up to me” (love that one too!), commercials, public access tv, your first love…
That may sound a little denigrating your motives but there are a bunch of us out here who need that role model! Hopefully it’s never too late…”if it’s to be, it’s up to me”!
You’ve inspired me to write my biography because I dream of being a professional speaker – I just haven’t been able to figure out what experiences I have had in my plain life that could inspire and help others as you have.
Keep writing and keep being a role model!
M
So THAT’S why you liked my shoes!
I really enjoyed getting to know you on a deeper level Darren. Although I’ve had “More than Words” stuck in my head all bloomin’ day now.
Can’t wait to see where you go next. 🙂
Hi Darren,
Thank you so much for sharing your story with thousand of people. It is amazing and I admire you for showing your soul and being so transparent. I know it is difficult to open yourself to everybody.
Definitely, people connect and trust you when you show by example, what you have accomplished and what was your beginning.
The daughter of my best friend has problem on her feet, it is a little bit smaller and she has problems to grow. She is really concerned about what life her daughter can have and I can understand your mother because my friend all time wants to give the best she can to her daughter. She is at kinder garden and kids make fun of her because she is shorter. It is really hard for my friend because she would like to protect her little kid from other kids but she cannot. Perhaps if she reads your story and she knows how a child lives that situation and that is not a problem to succeed, she may have more hope. I will submit your story to her because it will be an inspiration.
I have followed your advise about telling stories and connecting with people. I am preparing my keynote about marketing and I tell story and make a point. I have watched several Speakers and analyze those who are more effective and they tell stories, that make it more human.
Thank you for sharing your story. By telling it, you inspire people 😀
Have a wondeful day,
Andrea Clemente
From Mexico 😀