If you constantly hear that your reads are too impersonal and you're not connecting with the listener, this month's tip will do wonders for you.
All scripts should be approached as a dialogue. The person to share this information with should be someone you know, not an imaginary person or group of people. Selecting someone you know opens you up emotionally. This adds attitude and opinion to your message. It could be a parent, spouse, sibling, coworker, best friend, boss, lover, child, or even a movie star about whom you've fantasized. Thinking about this person should open up your heart and make you emotionally alive and accessible. If you are really "present" and "in-the-moment" you will be aware of this new emotional life. Breathing pattern, pulse, voice, and body position should alter as you react to that person's image. You become a whole person that someone can relate to, rather than a stick figure delivering words without any feelings.
Choosing a substitution may be difficult at first. The tendency
is to look at the copy and say, "I'm going to talk to a person in a
store who is wearing a blue shirt because that shirt is mentioned in the copy." Or, "I'm going to use a friend's experience because I do not have one of my own that involves a professional pizza chef cutting up meats and veggies." Or better yet, "I'm going to talk to a bunch of guys standing on the corner wearing cowboy boots and ten-gallon hats because that would be different and interesting." All may intellectually be the "right" choice but do not stimulate truthful emotional reactions. Generic stories do not work. You must evoke
genuine feelings.
PERSONALIZE YOUR MESSAGE - Image a person in your life either doing or telling you something at a specific moment or place. See the location in your mind, hear the sounds around
you, and smell the air. That person's words or actions should
elicit a body movement and an emotional response. It may make you roll your eyes, shake your head, smile, jerk your head back, or shift your weight. These little movements help connect you to that person and deliver the words more realistically. If you wait until that natural response is over and compose yourself, it's a wasted exercise. Acting is reacting.
Excerpted from third edition of "There's Money Where Your Mouth Is," by Elaine Clark. To order your copy visit Amazon.com
