Special Delivery! Tips for Improving Your Humor
Delivering humorous speeches involves a lot more than simply having good material. Take some time to incorporate these tips into your presentations and watch the fun and laughter factors rise.
In Fun
Sigmund Freud wrote: "The most favorable condition for comic pleasure is a generally happy disposition in which one is in the mood for laughter."
This concept is called "in fun." If you want your audience to laugh, they must be in fun. You, the speaker, must be in fun. The emcee or program coordinator must be in fun. The whole program should be designed in fun. Do anything you can to be sure your audience knows that it's OK to laugh.
Time Of Day
The first speaker of the day for an early morning program should not expect hearty laughter. People are not conditioned to laugh a great deal in the early morning. Many won't even be awake yet. Use more information and less humor. It's important for you to know when not to expect hearty laughter. It would be a waste of time to use your best material at a time when laughter normally wouldn't be expected. The poor response also brings your energy level down. Many consider brunch and lunch to be the best times of day to expect a responsive audience. In the afternoon people are starting to get tired so don't expect laughter to be as intense.
Male/Female Makeup of Audience
All-female audiences tend to laugh more easily and louder than all-male audiences. Audiences that consist of more than 50 percent women are good too. The presence of the females provides a good buffer and makes it OK for the "big-ego" men to laugh.
Size
No, I'm not talking about how much you weigh today. I'm saying that the size of your audience has a direct effect on the types of humor which are most appropriate. Members of small business groups tend to be too self-conscious to laugh much. Use short one-liners. Don't use any long stories or jokes. In larger groups it's OK to stretch to jokes and short stories.
Pre-Program Research
The more you know about your audience, the better able you will be to pick the humor that will get the greatest response. Your research before the program will also allow you to uncover the group's inside humor.
Seating
The best seating arrangement for laughter is semicircular theater style. When audience members are seated close together on a curve, they can look to their left or right and see the faces of each person in the row. This togetherness allows laughter to pass immediately from one person to the other. Contact NSA member and seating expert Paul Radde for advanced seating information.
Choose Funnier Words
Your word choice can be the key to creating a successful witty line or a dud. In particular, words with the "K" sound in them are funny. Cucumber is funnier than mushroom. Cupcake is funnier than pastry. Turkey is a funnier word than loser.
Deliver The Punch
Some humorists will disagree, but I say deliver your punch line to one person and make sure that person is going to laugh. You must punch the line out a little harder and with a slightly different voice than the rest of the joke. Lean into the microphone and say it louder and more clearly than you said the setup lines. If the audience does not hear the punch line, they aren't going to laugh.
Deliver the punch line to a person you know will laugh, so that others will be positively influenced to laugh. How do you know if a person will laugh or not? Pay attention to those who have been laughing, those nodding their heads in agreement with you during the program, and those you identified before the program.
Pause
Pausing just before and just after your punch line gives the audience a chance to "get" the humor and laugh. Absolutely do not continue to talk when laughter is expected. If you do, you will "step on" your laughter and squelch it quickly.
Make It Relevant
If you make all your attempts at humor relevant to your presentation, you get an automatic excuse from your mother if your humor is not all that funny. If your humor is received as funny, so much the better; but if it isn't, at least you made your point. Audiences will be much more tolerant if the humor ties into the subject at hand. Use this formula:
A. Make your point.
B. Illustrate your point with something funny.
C. Restate your point.
Vary The Types
The above formula would get boring and redundant rather quickly if you used the exact same type of humor every time for part B. By varying the type of humor in B, you can go on virtually forever, and no one will recognize that you are using a formula. I have identified more than 34 different types of humor to plug into the formula. You could use one liners, jokes, humorous props, funny stories, magic, cartoons or other funny visuals.
Rule Of Three
One of the most pervasive principles in the construction of humorous situations is the "Rule of Three." You will see it used over and over because it's simple, it's powerful, and it works. (See, I just used it there in a non-funny situation.) Most of the time in humor the Rule of Three is used in the following fashion: The first comment names the topic, the second sets a pattern, and the third unexpectedly switches the pattern, making it funny. Here's an example from a brochure advertising my seminars:
In the "How to Get There" section
From Washington, D.C., take Route 50.
From Baltimore, Md., take Route 95.
From Bangkok, Thailand, board Thai Airways.
Look Funnier
I have been accused of being too "corporate-looking¡¨ to be funny. When I'm being funny, I use facial expressions, odd body angles and bizarre comments and props to make up for my "normal" look. Those of you that have obvious physical characteristics that can be used in teasing yourself have an advantage. People love characters who are not afraid of teasing themselves. You can enhance the funny look with fun patterns and colors on ties and dresses, hats and funny glasses.
Bombproof Your Talks
Are you afraid of bombing when you get up in front of a group? You don't have to be. With proper material selection, a few prepared comments in case of unexpected problems and attention to time, worries about bombing can be virtually eliminated. As in tip above, make sure your material is relevant to your topic, and keep it short. The longer a piece of humor is, the funnier it better be.
A. Saver Lines
Saver Lines are what you say when your supposedly humorous statement does not get a laugh. You shouldn't be ashamed to use saver lines. The top comedians in the world need them and some purposely make mistakes so they can get a laugh from the saver line. Johnny Carson was an expert at this. After a poor response to a joke, he would say a comically insulting line like, "This is the kind of crowd that would watch Bambi through a sniper scope." Don't overdo the saver lines. If you have to use too many, your material must be pretty bad.
B. Pre-Planned Ad-Libs
Another way to keep from bombing is to "expect the unexpected." Canned or pre-planned ad-libs are pre-written responses to unexpected happenings or mistakes that occur during a presentation, i.e., the microphone squeals, the projection bulb burns out, you say the wrong thing, etc. Prepared ad-libs actually do more than just save you. They make you look tremendously polished. Here's the continuum: A bad presenter will stammer around when a problem occurs. A ZZZZZs presenter will say nothing and try to ignore the problem. A great Wake 'em Up presenter will make a witty comment that appears to be spontaneous. The audience believes you are originating humor on the spot. You are just quickly recalling pre-planned responses.
Microphone Squeals
This is the portion of my presentation where I do my elephant impression.
Projector Light Burns Out
This is the first time I have been brighter than my equipment.
Highlighter Runs Out Of Ink I'm out of ink. I'll be back in a wink. (remember . . . "k" words are funny)
Think Diversity
Our audiences are more ethnically diverse than ever before, so it's crucial to watch your political correctness and eliminate sexist language from your presentation. Not only is it easy to offend, which will turn your audience off completely, easily understandable word choice is more critical than ever to ensure that your audience members "get" the humor. When speaking across cultural lines, especially, visual humor such as magic, cartoons and comic strips are the most readily understood.
Even the Gods Laugh: How Humor Becomes Transformational
Most of our lives have become caught up in the dizzying stress, anxiety and self-created drama of the fast paced, twenty-first century. It was slower back in the 14th Century; I miss those days. Just the story of being a member of the human race can make you terminally depressed and confused. It may be inevitable that everyone on Earth is challenged by negativity in life; but it is far from inevitable that we have to keep the soap opera going. Besides breathing, humor and laughter are the simplest and most natural paths to joy and when embraced a powerful transformation takes place. With intention, this change leads to healing and freedom in unexpected ways. Here are some pointers:
Stage One: Questioning Your Beliefs
I define humor as “a break with consensus reality” or, what you think is happening, isn't. Each of us has a belief system that has been imposed on us right from birth and those beliefs either affirm or deny our power. You can bet that consensus reality (parents, TV, radio, news, politicians, etc) is not about to affirm that we are Infinite Love in form. We are constantly reminded that we're victims, helpless worms of the dust and in dire need of Viagra. We're not, not even close!
Stage Two: Healing
Scientists and doctors have documented research that humor and laughter are beneficial for the body. Norman Cousins, while ill with a severe connective tissue disease, was the first to write a bestseller about the healing power of humor. He was able to document how watching Candid Camera and the Marx Brothers allowed him to significantly decrease his physical pain with laughter. It was later discovered that laughter also massages the organs, builds the immune system with beneficial hormones, releases mood-elevating endorphins and lowers blood pressure. What a wonderful and legal way to get high! Just laugh. See the absurdity of what we all take seriously, especially what YOU personally take seriously. Just how important is it? Since we all die, (more or less), put it in perspective. Somebody famous said, "There is not one shred of evidence that life is serious" and I seriously agree with that. What good does it do to feel bad, depressed or guilty? You don't have to, you've been taught to. There is nothing we have to learn. THERE IS A LOT WE HAVE TO UNLEARN.
Stage Three: Uncovering Who You Really Are
This three dimensional world is only part of who we are. At our core we are infinite love. Once we shift out of every day reality to see our own magnificence and experience the joy of living in the present moment that laughter initiates, we can release the beliefs, which keep us from living spontaneously. According to professor of psychiatry William Fry, M.D., at Stanford University Medical School, the average child in kindergarten laughs 300 times a day while adults only laugh approximately 17 times each day. (Are we crabby, or what!) This is why children have more imagination and heal faster than adults. Children live free until taught shame and guilt; reclaiming your childlike energy is the key to transformation.
Let yourself giggle as an expression of your own freedom or better yet, double over with laughter. Ah, but I can hear you saying: what about all the awful stuff that happens? What I'm talking about is a MAJOR SHIFT in your thinking. Imagine for one moment, that millions of people on the planet believed laughter is the best medicine and all at once we started to laugh. Go ahead......start now...giggle, chuckle, gafaw right now. Laughter is contagious and others will catch it and begin laughing too; then another and another. Can you feel what that would be like? Can you feel the potential, the release, the love and joy that would envelope the entire planet? Anything is possible, anything. “Even the gods love jokes,” said Plato. That is because the Cosmic Cookie knows the importance and power of laughter. Nature invented it for a reason. Humor and laughter are sacred, they are the Universal keys to the unexpected joy of release and the inspiration of new perspectives. Once you have unlocked this door your life will never be the sameTwisted Humor; Socks won’t cover this up!
I have had over the years (48 of them) a lot of time to review and participate in many different styles of humor and have studied their various effects on the human psyche. I will convey many of my observations, thoughts and ramblings where humor is involved. Over the next few months I will write on the following topics Cold Humor, Fat Humor, Bad Humor, Tasteless Humor and others.
Twisted Humor: Twisted humor is one of those things that at the end may seam funny to some folks but to the one who bears the brunt of this type of humor is left with his or her life changed forever. You have heard no doubt, of the aftereffects of some of these humorous situations but were not privy to what actually occurred to facilitate the life change. Let me share with you one such story told to me by my friend John, in his words.
I awoke one day several years ago on my birthday. Now birthdays around our house are a big event. The festivities usually start in the morning with the entire family (My wife, 3 Kids and one dog) in bed with the birthday-boy hollering heckles about the aged old man. This ritual usually ended with the kids fixing breakfast and the wife and I enjoying some of the comforts of our physical relationship. But this day was different; I awoke to what appeared to be a normal morning ritual where they were all doing there own thing, getting ready for their respective days. I appeared as though they had forgotten it was my birthday. I began to get terribly depressed but continued on. I quickly prepared for work and left for the office expecting the group I work with to have something big prepared for my birthday as they usually did. I arrived at work and found that my co-workers had also disappointed me, there were no birthday streamers and cake as usual. I slipped further into depression as I thought that turning 50 would have brought out the party poppers and ribbons. It had become a very bad day. Latter in the morning my secretary Denise, who was 35 and built for pleasure, asked me “what has you so down this morning.” I explained that it was my birthday and all of my family and friends had forgotten it, leaving me very depressed. Felling badly about forgetting my birthday she volunteered to take me to lunch. I declined but Denise insisted so we left at one to have lunch. I suggested several restaurants but Denise insisted on taking me to her apartment instead where she indicated she wanted me all to herself. When we arrived at Denise’s apartment, she led me to the wet bar and asked me to make us both a stiff drink. We took our drinks to the living room and visited for a time about the plight of her last failed relationship. She indicated the next time she entered into a relationship it would be with an older gentleman about my age, possibly me. She asked to be excused for a moment while she went to the bedroom to slip into something more comfortable. I was getting excited as I thought she was coming on to me and thinking I might get lucky I waited for her return. My mind began to race excitedly thinking about what might happen next. I began to undress and prepare for her return. I arranged the throw over the love seat and got comfortably naked and waited. After some time she exited her room with loud shouts of happy birthday followed by my wife, mother in law, kids and the guys and gals from my office, all shouting happy birthday and their I sat with nothing on but my socksHumor Makes It Happen
Humor is just as important to professional speaking as taste is to food. Laughter makes you likeable and your audience comfortable. There are plenty of meat-and-potato seminar speakers out there, but the ingredient that endears you to an audience as being authentic and personable is a generous helping of your sense of humor. Likewise, a key ingredient to adult learning is comfort. Comic relief comforts and opens the pathways to accepting new ideas, brings your audience to the present, and evokes thoughts of “I’ve been there… he’s just like me!” Humor is truth after a couple of martinis.
The best kind of humor is always the self-effacing kind. Since most humor is based on someone’s discomfort, it’s always best to make yourself the target. By exposing your vulnerabilities and foibles, people will commiserate, sympathize and identify with your situation and your message. People will root for the underdog. Instead of resisting your words, people will cheer you on. Instead of pounding away at the gray matter between their ears, you will have settled comfortably into their hearts to persuade from within. You will have positioned yourself to achieve our Safe Money Seminar goal of allowing your audience to “laugh and learn.”
But people neither laugh nor learn at the same pace or in the same way. A knee-slapper to one person might be a subtle smirk to another. I recall a speaking engagement I had in Seattle before a group of aspiring speakers in a world semi-final speech contest. Four or five of my best lines had killed in previous speeches, and most of my present audience roared with laughter time after time. But there was one stodgy lady in the second row who refused to crack a smile. I remember thinking to myself, ‘I’m going to make her laugh if it’s the last thing I do!’ I delivered the next punch line squarely at her. Nothing! And so it continued through the end of my speech. Nothing, nothing, nothing. But imagine my surprise when she came up to my table after dinner and said, “Gary, thank you so much for your valuable message. You’re also one of the funniest speakers I’ve ever heard.”
Her words resonate the fact that laughter is experienced and expressed in many different ways, all of them very personal.
“But Gary,” you say, “I’m the most un-funny person on Earth! When I tell a joke, people pound Excedrin.” Well, it’s okay if you’re not funny. You probably don’t “think funny.” But I’ve got an answer for you, too, and thank you for being honest. There is no more humbling experience than the eternal silence following a badly told joke. Save yourself the meltdown.
For now, here’s a quick fix for the un-funny. You can get just as much mileage from a well-told story as you can from humor. Stories, however, must come from your personal experience and must be told “from the heart.” You get bonus points for any funny parts whether deliberate or accidental because, unlike an obvious joke, there is no setup and nobody expects a punch line. With colorful word pictures you might be surprised to look out over the audience and find people transfixed in your every word. Stories do that. The intent of a story is to alter the frame of mind of the listener, to lift your audience out of the current moment and into a new way of experiencing both the message and the messenger.
If you can’t think of any personal stories, hire a writer to write them for you. Seriously! You’ll be surprised at how many starving writers you can Google up with just a few key words. Remember, this is show biz, and the payoff gets you about a dozen pre-sold annuity prospects from each and every Safe Money Seminar. Never lose sight of your career objective. We’re talking a potential here of seven figures annually, and nothing that worthwhile is going to be that easy. Remember, "The worst day in a man's life is when he sits down and begins thinking about how he can get something for nothing." --Thomas Jefferson
Finally, if your stories (or even your jokes for that matter) tend to become a little, shall we say, embellished along the way… not to worry. I remember meeting one of the great raconteurs, Zig Ziglar, at the Broward County Convention Center in Fort Lauderdale, Florida years ago. After his speech, an audience member asked, “Did all your stories happen to you exactly the way you tell them?” Zig’s reply was classic. He said, “It’s a mighty poor speaker who can’t tell a story better than it actually happened.”
