What We Can Learn From Brené Brown About Exceptional Speaking

It’s a lesson we can embrace well before we find ourselves on a stage

I don’t remember how I stumbled across Brené Brown’s breakout Ted Talk on shame, but I do remember finishing off the last third of a box of Kleenex that was on my desk while listening to it.

What was going on? What nerve inside of me had been touched? And how had she moved so effortlessly past my defenses? 

It was 2010, and I was in a raw place since the economic collapse that started in 2009.

My gigs as an entertainer had evaporated and our bank account had been steadily draining to the bottom. Each and every day I stared at it with dread, like watching a desert rain barrel reveal its rusty bottom in the midst of a relentless drought.

I had made my living as a comedian for decades and was in the process of reinventing myself as a motivational speaker in an attempt to book some of the corporate events that were slowly coming back to the meeting industry.

But I was scared. Speaking itself is a frightening prospect, because it forces the communicator to grapple with the one essential question that Brené Brown stumbled upon in her research. 

“Do I want to risk being truly seen?”

Brown’s years of research included hundreds of long interviews, focus groups, shared journal pages, submitted anecdotes, and Facebook comments. Vulnerability, it turns out, was the key factor that predicted an individual’s sense of connection. Those who risked it, thrived—those who ran from it, suffered. But Brené Brown wasn’t just reporting on these findings, she was actually demonstrating her own vulnerability in the telling of her research story.

There are two types of tears. The tears you shed when you feel hopeless, helpless, and lost—and the tears that come when you realize you’ve found a way forward. 

Brené Brown’s example helped me realize that my fear wasn’t a warning sign—it was a lighthouse guiding me home—evidence that my vulnerability was still intact, and that sharing it could open the door for others to find a way forward with the struggles of their own lives. This is the kind of speaker I also wanted to be.

So I watched Brené Brown’s TED Talk again and again to study why it was so effective. And I noticed that her exceptional speaking was based on her capacity to listen, not only to her research subjects, but also to herself. She acknowledged her own limits, preconceptions, and hold-outs that were revealed to her in the research process that “fundamentally expanded my perception and . . . changed the way that I live, love, work, and parent.” 

"The Power of Vulnerability" is one of the five most viewed TED Talks of all time with more than 63 million views. Brené Brown has since become an internationally bestselling author and just the sort of person who might come to mind if you were asked to name a great speaker. And yet she was demonstrating a depth of courage that went much deeper than spouting theories and proving one’s expertise.

Vulnerability isn’t just the willingness to speak the truth. It’s the capacity to hear it. Not only did she hear the truth, she did the hard work of implementing it in her own life. She set out to change the world and ultimately had to allow the world to change her. 

The courage to set aside our agenda, the need for validation, approval, or to prove that our worldview is legitimate or “right” is the predecessor to discovering worthwhile things to share. It’s an uncommon receptivity that fuels our capacity for exceptional speech.

Brené Brown’s success as a presenter didn’t come from the desire to convince others she had something valuable to say, but from the conviction to share something valuable she had heard.

Compelling speakers are courageous listeners

The co-existence of courageous listening and inspired speaking demonstrated by Brené Brown is not an anomaly. Captivating speakers throughout history have possessed a similar depth of curiosity, open-mindedness, and capacity for self-reflection.

Mister Rogers Neighborhood is one of the longest-running television shows in history, having aired more than 870 episodes. Its primary content featured one man, Fred Rogers, talking to children. His manner of speaking transformed the media industry’s understanding about what was possible with television, and modeled emotional intelligence for children before the term had ever been coined.

By tuning in to the deeper needs of children, Rogers was able to validate the feelings of millions of children in his 40 years on-air. He challenged the prevailing beliefs and attitudes of his time by listening to American culture and arming families and children to understand difficult topics like racism, divorce, death, and aggression through the lens of compassion, kindness, and social emotional learning.

But Fred Rogers carried his capacity for conversational speaking everywhere. In 1969 the funding for his own show was in danger of being slashed, and he appeared before a Senate subcommittee to advocate for the programming needs of his viewers. In six minutes, facing what appeared to be a bored and icy Senator, Rogers visibly melted the heart of a government bureaucrat by talking about feelings, puppet shows, and concluding with a nursery rhyme he’d authored. Concluding his brief testimony, Fred Rogers’ extraordinary capacity for listening to the needs of children, advocating for it, and addressing the concerns of the Senate committee prompted the same Senator to declare, “Looks like you just earned yourself the $20 million."

“Listening is where love begins: listening to ourselves and then to our neighbors.” —Fred Rogers

To cite another example of a history-making listener, few people know that Dr. Martin Luther King’s famous “I have a dream” speech wasn’t planned.

King was speaking to 250,000 people at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom rally. He spontaneously launched into the delivery of his now historic address because he questioned the appropriateness of a pre-scripted ending, and paused. As he listened for a proper direction, he was prompted by a supporter to share his vision, and “I have a dream” came forth.

King’s vision was formed through countless conversations, debates, and dialogues with mentors, advisors, critics, and rivals.

The depth of his listening—to others, to himself, and to his faith—fired a force of oratory brilliance that changed America.

Where is deep listening active in your life? 

In what domains are you willing to leave your beliefs, knowledge, and expertise outside the door and enter with pure curiosity, receptivity, and delight—or with a passion to advance a cause or the way humans understand their world?

What stories do you have to tell that arise from your unique observation of life?

Whether you are tuned to birdsong, conversations on social justice, the themes of world religion, or the economic patterns of digital currency—your fellow humans need you to share the unique ways you’ve been listening to the world. 

Just recently, a community member who was participating in one of our storytelling sessions stumbled on a memory of her father furiously berating her mother for making a mistake on a tax form. As she described her mother’s hot and fearful tears, and the bellowing rant of her father condemning her mother’s use of Wite-Out, the rest of us bonded in sympathy around the decision she’d made as a young woman to stay small in her home, and play it safe later in life. That upbringing necessitated a long journey of recovering her own agency and courage. As a result, her listening is fine-tuned to every cowed human who has lost their voice in an atmosphere of fear, and she is uniquely armed to help restore it. 

No one has been studying life exactly like you. When you comment on what has been illuminated by the spotlight of your attention, you enrich our lives with your insights and the depth of your view. 

What if the most useful form of speech arises from those who are willing to follow the unique patterns of their own attention and comment honestly and skillfully on what they see? This type of speaking carries the mood of a conversation—the gentleness and integrity of a listener. It has enabled leaders like John F. Kennedy, change-makers like Cicero, and orators like Socrates to make a historic impact on audiences throughout time.

When it comes to influential speaking, nothing has changed. Excelling as a business professional, consultant, founder, leader, manager—or featured speaker—depends on your own unique form of listening, and your capacity to offer useful comments on the challenges and potential of your audience, your culture, your customers, colleagues, or team.

So how do we practice this kind of conversational speaking without having a line-up of live audiences at our disposal?

Our daily lives are full of opportunities to listen deeply and share our unique perspectives. But mostly, we haven’t trained ourselves to notice them. The open events I host here at Pivot to the Podium are designed to help us re-educate ourselves about the potential that lies in our speaking.

In this week’s MasterClass, I’m going to share a simple way you can get unlimited opportunities to practice your active listening skills with an audience, engage in worthy conversations, refine your thinking, and speak to the highest possibility in others.

This Week’s Events

** Schedule change — For regular participants, please note that this week’s masterclass is on Wednesday rather than Thursday this week.

MASTERCLASS

A Simple Way to Practice Active Listening and Responsive Speaking

Wednesday, Nov 8th, 9 am - 10 am PST - Pivot to the Podium MasterClass

PODIUM DAY

Sat. Nov 11th, 9 am - 10 am PST - Podium Day

Open storytelling practice session. Bring a story from your week or from any part of your life that you’d like to practice or develop for future sharing.

Thank you, as always for reading Pivot to the Podium, and especially for the authentic words you speak into the world.

I welcome your comments, suggestions, insights, and participation.

Regards,