The Actual Magic of Signature Speeches
Or how I went from UGH to OMG YES and the secret I have for you
Real talk: for a while I resisted the idea of a “signature speech.” The sort of TED Talk-esque material you could hop on any stage and deliver about the same every time, that connects your best stories to your biggest why.
I resisted it because it felt like marketing? Or it felt canned? Or it felt constricting?
Or it just scared me because I didn’t have one?
Ehem.
And then… I did. Because the calendar date loomed—550 people, all getting a copy of my book, no A/V, big beautiful stage, two weeks from now, go.
And then the building of it was actually nearly effortless. WHAT?! Turns out I had become so clear on my favorite stories and biggest why thanks to book-writing and pod-guesting that my signature speech was like the David inside the marble, whispering to me which chisel moves would reveal it.
Also, because I Permission to Speak’ed myself. By which I mean I applied everything I knew, everything I taught others, to myself because TURNS OUT IT WORKS. Haha. Guess Michelangelo also had to put in the 10,000 hours… stones don’t just whisper to everyone, eh?
AND, just as important as all that: it’s gotten better since then.
Because that’s what happens when you—when any of us—give the same speech over and over (with small tweaks to speak directly to your audience). Your nervous system chills because it knows what to expect, your funnies become funnier because you’ve essentially workshopped them like a standup, your stories become tighter because you’re confident about the LEAST detail needed to elegantly neural entrain your people (hop to min 37 of that video), your emotional hits become something you can anticipate and orchestrate like a world-class conductor, and your bold swings become bolder because you have become bolder.
AKA having a tried-and-true signature speech make us a bolder version of ourselves, like magic.
And it occurred to me this morning as I sat down to write this that signature speeches are the kind of thing business owners are encouraged to have in their back pocket for the purpose of converting listeners into clients blah blah…
But what if ALL of us were encouraged to have a signature speech? Like literally every one of us?
As a practice.
To get at your best stories and your biggest why.
To figure out what, to you, is the boldest swing.
But also to have a repeatable collection of things you like to say, that you’ve gotten so good at that it’s conversational and playful and notes-free, so you KNOW WHAT PUBLIC SPEAKING THAT FEELS GOOD FOR THE SOUL FEELS LIKE.
Back when I was coaching a lot of Hollywood actors with foreign accents on how to sound clearer speaking English, I would never just talk abstractly about sounds.
If they weren’t preparing for a role with a script already available, I would give them a piece of text they could learn, connect to emotionally, embody, and DO for me.
I’m amused at my faves to assign, like a romp through the dudes of the 2010’s… a bit Bradley Cooper has in “Silver Linings Playbook” trying to convince his doctor he doesn’t need meds, and one Jennifer Lawrence says to him, trying to stand up for herself for the first time. That epic response Jeff Daniels has in the pilot of Aaron Sorkin’s “Newsroom.” Sometimes I’d go beat poet and give the ol’ Karouac declaration:
The only people for me are the mad ones.
The ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved.
Desirous of everything at the same time.
The ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing,
But burn burn burn like fabulous yellow roman candles
Exploding like spiders across the stars.
‘Cuz damn saying that out loud you really have to fill it with feeling or what are you doing there? BURN BURN BURN??? Said monotone with no breath support? Bless. And then when you DO, when you crack the code on how to fill the thing, NOW YOU KNOW WHAT IT FEELS LIKE and you trust you can get there with ANYTHING.
Working on something real, out loud, is how we actually get better.
Everything else is theory.
We can be bold in theory but it isn’t bold.
I think of this stunning quote that stared back at me every single day I was writing my book, an answer Stanford linguist and activist Dr. Anne Charity Hudley gave when folks asked her in 2020 how she was so prolific, despite Covid and lung cancer and racism and all the bullshit.
She said:
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc406e917-24ad-4f14-a39e-69d8ce356983_3024x3817.heic)
OK, yes, my handwriting is ridiculous. It says:
Let your writing be a love letter to some people you know; let it scare you with the boldness of its call for change.
Write something that honors the memory of those that have died from this and every virus.
Say it loud.
I know some of you, gentle readers of HOW TO SHOW UP, are already self-proclaimed speakers hopping on real or metaphorical stages all the time. And I know that some of you are much less comfortable identifying as any kind of person-who-gets-seen-at-scale-and-likes-it. All are welcome here. In truth, we are ALL all of the above at different moments, as we navigate our relationship to power and to visibility and to safety. I’m oodles more comfortable on a stage than I was 5 years ago, and AND I still get flustered sometimes, wish to hide, feel as awkward as when I was 12, hold my breath, forget I have anything useful to say.
BUT one thing that always re-aligns me is my signature speech. That it exists. That I know me in my power. That I’m quite proud of that person AND SHE’S ME.
So what would you need to start to craft your own signature speech?
Later this summer, I’ll host a workshop here on building yours and delivering it—Friday, the 16th of August 10a PT—but what can you do in the meanwhile?
Think about your origin story, not where you were born and raised although there’s surely juicy stuff to explore there too, but rather the origin of what you’re up to now. The origin of an idea or a dream or a labor of love (whether it’s come to fruition or not—that you care matters more than that you’ve succeeded by some external metric).
Why? Ask yourself this not while sitting at a computer in worky-mode but maybe when walking in nature. Or taking a shower. Or driving. Or swinging in a hammock. It’s a soft question, not a hard one. It might be an ask-your-friends-or-family question too. The ones who are the best listeners. “What have you noticed makes me tick? What do I get passionate about? Where’s my biggest care?” Another way in is to ask yourself, what breaks my heart the most about the world? That I can actually do something about? (IYKYK, final chapter of my book)
What would scare you with the boldness of your call for change? What would be the biggest swing? Release yourself from the pressure of actually having to say or do it for now; just get curious about what it would even be. My mom asked me once when I was young, if you had a million dollars to invest in a cause, what would it be? This is a similarly invaluable hypothetical: if you could make big bold change, what would it be? There are so many fires, which would you focus on? Which would you extinguish if you could?
And PS. if you KNOW you need help on this and, like I did, feel the fire under you of a looming calendar date, come work with me!! I have 3 spots in July to partner with folks needing to get their speech or pitch or presentation written and ready. If this sounds like relief, read this and follow the link to book a free Speaker Strategy Call and tell me what you’ve got cookin’. We DO NOT have to do this alone.
We shouldn’t do this alone.
This is big, existential, legacy work. But honestly, it’s also joy work.
Especially when we do it with and for each other.
That’s what this Substack is literally for. Hi.
Big love and bold boldness 🤣
Samara
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