Tell Your Own Story

Written by on January 15, 2018 / Communication

If you use publishing or public speaking to sell, you need to tell your own story.  This means do not repeat a story you heard from someone else as if it is your own.  This video provides you with three reasons why.

Here is a transcript of the video:

I’m putting together the content again for The 60 Second Sale. That’s the book that’s coming out in July 2018. So if you’re watching this video and it’s before July 2018, you have to look … Putting together the content for The 60 Second Sale. And I promised I would give you updates as we go. And so today, I’m here in my office. It’s Sunday afternoon. It’s a little past 4 o’clock. We’re in the middle of January. I’m about two weeks away from my deadline. And I’m nowhere near done. But that’s fine. I’ll get there.

I’m working on a part of the book now where we’re talking about stories and how you use stories, whether you’re using them in writing or you’re using the stories in a presentation or a speaking engagement. Telling stories is great. You have to do it. It’s a great way to make your point. It’s a way to engage and entertain. And people will remember what you … They won’t remember what you say or do. But they’ll remember how you make them feel. And stories are a great way to do that. So one day, I am in my house and we have a handyman come over. The handyman liked to drink a little bit. And he goes to give me a bill. And the bill was a little bit more than I thought. So I questioned him on it. And he tells me this story. And this is an old story.

He says, “There’s a guy working at NASA doing a handyman job. And NASA is the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. And NASA is going to launch a rocket. And they go to launch the rocket, and they can’t do it. And something’s wrong. Something’s broken with the rocket. So they call the handyman. He goes over, takes the cover off one of the computers, and notices there’s a loose screw. So he tightens the loose screw, puts the cover on. And the guy who’s in charge of Mission Control says, ‘Oh my goodness. That’s wonderful. It’s a miracle. You’ve fixed our problem. Please give me a bill.’

So the guy gives him a bill, and it’s for $1 million. And the NASA chief, the head of NASA, says, ‘Oh my gosh. There’s no way I can pay this bill. I need itemized information because they’ll never accept this bill from me if it’s not itemized.’ So the gentleman says okay, takes the bill back, and writes down two lines on the bill, hands it to the chief of NASA. And the chief of NASA says, “Are you kidding me? You itemized that bill in that brief a period of time?’

He opens the bill, and it says, ‘Turning one screw, $1. Knowing which screw to turn, $999.’

And that was his $1 million bill.”

The handyman told me this story because the knowledge that he used to fix the thing that was broken, which was a closet door, was the reason why he was able to do it. So the moral of the story is I shouldn’t have questioned the handyman. I should’ve just paid the bill, I guess. Well anyway, I told this story to a group that the handyman told me this. The NASA story has been around for years and years. But I told a group that I was speaking to the story that the handyman used. And my point: Tell your own stories. This handyman was telling me that story as a way to make a point. But that’s an old story that’s been around forever. So tell your own stories.

Two and a half months later, I’m at a different type of meeting. And one of the people who was in the room when I told that story is speaking. And guess what he does? He tells the exact same story, the handyman story, and the handyman NASA story. And he tells it as if it was told to him, as if it happened to him. So that’s a bunch of crap.

The bottom line is you have to tell your own stories. You have to tell your own stories. And that’s the part of the book I’m working on now on a Sunday afternoon in the middle of January.

Tell your own stories!

Until next time, I’m Dave Lorenzo. I hope you make a great living and live a great life.