#8 Refining my pitch
I am looking forward to when drugs don’t overtake someone and ruin their lives. I am targeting everyone that knows, has or has heard of drug problems. This topic what be about a 7 on the scale because I am passionate about it but I also want to learn new things and think about different possibilities.
Picture of ecstasy
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Sidney,
I think that you do have a topic that connects to everyone. As you consider refining your pitch, I wonder if you might ask a few questions, play a short clip, or provide a few statistics about drug use. I do think that if you asked questions about addiction that you would engage the entire audience. Thinking about addiction as a ‘brain reward’ that motivates to the point of an irresistible need could create a common experience for the audience. If you pose questions, or a scenario, at the beginning of your talk asking people to bring themselves to a place where they are experiencing happiness and then asked them to consider their “high” as something that they cannot let go of that this might set the scene for your talk. I know Halloween will have passed, but I am trying to think of a stimulus that would get people into a mindset where they were ‘giddy with happiness,’ and candy is what popped into my head.
You might be able to play a funny YouTube clip, play a song, or tell a joke. After creating an experience for everyone and asking them to reflect about how they felt, you might go into your pitch about the harsh realities of addiction related to drugs and continuing to engage the audience. As I am making all of these suggestions, PLEASE know that I am not making light of addiction and drug use. I think that it would be important to express the siveraity of drug addiction to the audience, if you did take any of my suggestions. Drug addiction is not funny, but you are trying to relate to topic to extreme feelings of happiness and engage an audience. Emotion-happy, sad, scared, etc. is one way to ‘hoook’ your audience during your talk.
Good luck over the weekend! Sorry I will not be able to make it to the overnight, I will be in Atlanta, GA at a conference. Let me know if I can help in any way leading up to this weekend.
Casey