5 Minute Speech Coach: Recent Episodes
H Kapp-Klote
An audio tool to help anyone (especially organizers and activists) to get better at public speaking with consistent practice.
The good news is that even if you’ve never spoken in public before, you have so much real expertise you can draw upon: your entire life experience. The bad news is that in our world, we don’t put much of a premium on the struggle, focus, and discomfort that comes with reflecting and internalizing lessons learned from our life experiences.
More strategies, toolkits, and ideas for how to use the audio course to practice in a way that works for you no matter what kind of public speaking you’re doing or how much time you can set aside to use these tools.
How to Use This Course: Each lesson is 3-5 minutes, and the first 4 are listed in order. You can use these lessons whenever you have a few minutes to spare your day to day.
In each track I will introduce a concept, tell a story to illustrate it, and then share a guided exercise. The rest of the time is yours to practice the concept using that guided exercise -- I’ll come back in at the end to make sure you know the 5 minutes are up, and to help you transition back into the rest of your day.
The amount of time you take in between lessons is up to you. I’ll have resources, worksheets, and other reading for each lesson in the show notes.
Hi, welcome to 5 Minute Speech Coach, an audio course to help anyone get better at public speaking.
Before we go any further, let’s take 3 deep breaths together. Try to breathe from your stomach as much as you can.
Ready? Okay. [3 deep breathes] Today’s lesson is about the A in the GAPE system: Anchor. Or, that is, setting an anchor.
Last week, you spent some time thinking about your Goal -- or, why are you even having this conversation? What do you want to get out of it, your destination for this conversation.
Your anchor is like the compass in this conversation, something that will always point you towards your destination or your goall, even if you get overwhelmed, off track, or confused (which are all feelings I feel regularly when doing any kind of public speaking).
Armies call the anchor “the commander’s intent,” PR people call it your “core message” and Adrienne Maree Brown talks about it as the “one conversation that can ONLY happen in this room”. Whatever you call it, think of your Anchor as the single piece of information you need in order to get yourself back on track: it’s something simple, easy to remember, and that you can return to without a lot of
[Here’s a story about anchors] -- how diff from goal?It’s just a matter of sitting with that deep truth, listening to it, and thinking about how best to get it across.
There are also some great tools and reading in the show notes for thinking more about Anchors, and building in the time and space that is needed to make them happen.
If you chose a topic that’s important to you, and set a goal for this conversation, it’s likely that you already know what your compass for this conversation, and that’s why it’s so important to you.
So, here’s your exercise. The next few 1-2 minutes of this audio are silent, and if you can, try to spend those minutes breathing and thinking about your anchor. Try to take your time and try not to judge or criticize yourself as you work through this
Okay. Here’s my question: What is the one thing, if you could say nothing else, that you want to get across to the other person in this conversation? How do you want that information to make them to feel?
The answer is your anchor.
As you can tell from my story, your anchor isn’t just one thing, and you;ll probably improve on it over and over again as you think about it. What matters most is not that it’s the same words, or that you memorize it. In fact, if you’re trying to memorize it, that probably means your anchor is a little too complicated or will be hard to return to when you’re off track,overwhelmed, or dealing with a fight or flight or emotional response.
When we start to practice, like we’ll do in the next session, we’ll practice saying your anchor out loud as much as we will practice dredging it up in times of crisis, using it as a guiding force even when you’re feeling lost.
Nice job! If you listened to this audio, you’re making a lot of space to do something uncomfortable. That’s really hard, but it will make such a difference in your public speaking.
Have a wonderful day, and talk to you in our next, most practical session: practice.
This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app
Welcome to 5 Minute Speech Coach. 5 Minute Speech Coach is an audio course to help anyone get better at public speaking through consistent practice. Before we go any further, let’s take 3 deep breaths together. If you can, try to breathe in four counts - breathe in for four counts, hold it for four counts, breathe out for four counts, and hold again for four counts. This is called Box Breathing, and it’s a helpful tool we’ll come back to later. Ready? [pause] Okay, let’s get started. Today’s lesson is an introduction to the public speaking system we’ll use during this course. You can use it for anything, from a training, a media interview, or even a tough conversation with a friend. It’s called GAPE -- or, Goals, Anchor, Practice, Evaluation. You can use GAPE to prepare for situation that calls for you to present your ideas effectively, whether you have 5 days or 5 minutes. G stands for Goals. A stands for Anchor. P stands for Practice. E stands for Evaluation. I’m going to say it again, and explain a little more about what each step means. G stands for Goals -- Your goals. What is the point of this conversation for you? Why does it matter? What are you trying to accomplish? A stands for Anchor. Your anchor is the grounding deep truth that you will come back to over and over again to guide your responses in this conversation. P stands for Practice. Practice is how you’re going to make sure you get more comfortable with using your anchor -- no matter what’s going on in the conversation. E stands for Evaluation. Your evaluation is how you’ll know if you achieved your goals or not, and what to do next. Okay that’s GAPE! A quick note: for the rest of the course, I will refer to whatever you’re preparing for as a conversation, regardless of what it is. I use the word “conversation” in this training, and not say, presentation or interview, because at the end of the day, that’s what you’re preparing for, even if you’re going to be the only person talking. You’re trying to connect with whoever you’re addressing. Usually I will end each episode with an exercise for you to do. Today, instead, I recommend you take this time to decide what you’re going to use the GAPE system to prepare for. Is it a job interview? A press conference? A tough conversation with a friend? If you’re having a hard time thinking of something, check out some of the ideas in the show notes or available on the website. It should be a specific, real life scenario you’re dealing with -- a lot of these exercises are centered around the specific feelings and emotions that come up for you in the moment of public speaking. The other thing I recommend is that whatever you pick is important to you - that doesn’t necessarily mean you’re addressing a lot of people. In fact, I think this system is best when you use it the first time for more intimate conversations where you think you might have a hard time getting your ideas across. That’s it for today -- next time we will go over the first step in the GAPE system, Goals.
Transcript: Hi, welcome to 5 Minute Speech Coach.
5MSC is an audio course to help anyone get better at public speaking through consistent practice.
My name is H, and I’m your facilitator.
Before we go any further, let’s take 3 deep breaths together. It’s gonna help us both get more comfortable.
Ready? [3 deep breathes]
Okay. Let’s get started.
It takes a lot of time and energy to sound like yourself.
The best speakers in the world are deeply authentic and engaging.
That’s because they sound like themselves -- the things they say and the way they say it are unique to them, things that no one else in the world can capture quite like they can.
“sounding like yourself” requires deep reflection, self awareness, and even a little mind and body coordination. The good news is -- you already have so much expertise you can draw upon for this course, even if you’ve never spoken in public before: it’s your entire life.
The bad news is, using that life experience requires reflection, discomfort, and practicing a lot of skills that at first glance, don’t necessarily seem related to public speaking.
5 Minute Speech Coach is designed to help you get comfortable with that practice, and practice in general -- one of the hardest parts of public speaking.
Each lesson is 3-5 minutes so that you can work on these whenever you have a few minutes to spare. In each lesson, I will introduce a concept, tell a story to illustrate it, and then share a guided exercise for you to work through on your own. The rest of the time is yours to practice -- I’ll come back in at the end to tell you when our 5 minutes are up.
Today, that’s it. In the next episode we’ll get going with an approach to guide your public speaking practice, from evaluating your practice to finding time to make that practice happen. Talk to you soon.
This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app
E Evaluation Hi, welcome to 5 Minute Speech Coach, an audio course to help anyone get better at public speaking through consistent practice.
Before we go any further, let’s take 3 deep breaths together. Try to breathe from your stomach as much as you can.
Ready? Okay. [3 deep breathes]
Today is our last lesson and the last piece of the GAPE system: evaluation, or how you know you met your goals or not.
A quick note for this lesson: if you want, you can absolutely listen to it right before you actually have the conversation itself, or wait until after you have the conversation. Either way, part of this lesson is about setting up some time for a final recap after the conversation -- there’s guidance on this in the show notes.
So we’re at the last step, evaluation: often we finish up a tough or scary conversation and have no idea what happened, or we assume the worst. Mostly, no matter how it went, we’re usually on to the next thing, or our perception of how the conversation went is totally colored by one emotion, maybe even an emotion that wasn’t even how you felt for most of the interview.
Story:
We’re not doing any line by line breakdowns of your conversation today -- that’s not realistic or useful for our five minutes.
Instead, I want you to pick a single detail of your part of the conversation that you’re proud of, that you want to remember. Maybe it’s If you’re still feeling your hormones and fight or flight system going, take 2-3 deep breathes again. Ready? Go for it.
Then, I want to know: did you use your anchor?
Reflect on that. When did you use it? If you didn’t use it, why?
I want to be really clear that you’re not a failure if you didn’t use your anchor.
Part of getting better is getting comfortable with paying attention to what happens in the moment. And honestly, that’s really freaking hard!
For your exercise today, take a second to think about how you’ll evaluate if you hit your goal or not -- get corny and really think about when you’ll do it (right after? A few days later? Will you make a calendar event for it or add it to your to do list?) and where (in a notebook? In a google doc that you’ll check?).
Then, if you have a few more minutes, use your evaluation tool to see if you met your goal.
This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app
Practice Welcome to 5 Minute Speech Coach, an audio course to help anyone get better at public speaking through consistent practice.
Before we go any further, let’s take 3 deep breaths together. Try to breath from your stomach as much as you can.
Ready? Okay. [3 deep breathes]
This episode is about the 3rd part of GAPE: practice. Gape is (goals, anchor, practice, evaluation) and p, practice.
5 Minute Speech Coach is an audio course to help anyone get better at public speaking through consistent practice. I highly recommend checking out the show notes for today, because the resources on Practice will be way more how we set up consistent habits, and know what to work on when.
Here’s a story about Practice. everyone and their mother can tell you that an important part of building a new skill is PRACTICE, but that doesn’t mean we ever freaking do it. The second piece is that more time practicing isn’t always helpful -- in fact, it can actually be the opposite, ingraining bad practice in your emotional reactions, approach to work, and even in your speaking patterns.
Now we come to the exercise for today’s lesson -- thinking about your practice. One of the most important concepts in the GAPE system is learning how to access your anchor: not memorize it, but to come back to it and find it whenever you need it, even if your mind or body are not at ease. So for the next few minutes I want to take some time to breathe, get centered, and practice answering questions or responding to something based on your anchor. You might need to pause here for a minute and think about different questions or moments that might come up in your conversation that you want to prepare for, and that’s fine. You might even want to come up with questions you have to answer in other parts of your life where your anchor might be relevant (like I did for my second job interview). Some potential scenarios are listed in the show notes if it helps. But work on breathing, pausing, and responding to that scenario with your anchor in mind.
[Practice track]
Great work today. Thanks for taking the time to focus on building this skill ,and check out today’s show notes’: there are lots of resources on building a habit out of practice, ways to make sure you stay consistent in your GAPE practice, and some notes on how to approach reflection. Talk to you soon for our fourth and final step in GAPE -- evaluation.