How to tell an interesting story.The ability to engage in engaging conversation has always been invaluable, from ancient times to modern times.
Reading and writing
Read the classics
It may seem strange, but reading and writing can teach beautiful and correct oral speech. The classics of world literature will undoubtedly teach you to talk interestingly about even the most trivial things.
Reading special literature will broaden your horizons and vocabulary. Read works on rhetoric, try to memorize unfamiliar words, use new phrases heard somewhere.
Keep a diary
This will also teach you how to tell interesting stories. You most likely won’t make it as a great writer, but keeping a personal journal or blog will help you hone your storytelling skills.
Colorfully describe your emotions, write about the most unusual and interesting things that have happened recently. Diary entries support brain activity, so you will not be threatened with dementia.
Learn the poem and read it aloud
Show interest in poetry, learn by heart. Read the verses with expression. Such training will develop memory, the ability to appreciate beauty and broaden general horizons. Memorize the sayings of famous people, tongue twisters, proverbs, anecdotes. Your friends might like to use them in conversation at the right moment.
Learn to manage the conversation
Use automatic training methods
Stand in front of the mirror and tell stories on topics ranging from gardening to astronomy. The mirror will help correct facial expressions and gestures if necessary. To practice them, study the special literature on sign language.
Use an automatic recorder
Summarize the conversation
You must learn to highlight the main thing. This also applies to written sources and oral discourse. Summarize what the other person said. This technique will turn you into an irreplaceable listener who really knows how to hear another person’s speech.
Trust yourself
The audience won’t find a speech interesting if the speaker doesn’t feel confident. Stuttering, too long pauses, a wandering gaze, a trembling voice indicate fear and nervousness. Eye contact with the audience is especially important, it is a sign of confidence in yourself and in your words.
It is important for a successful manager to learn how to present even the simplest events with a twist. After all, a well-composed story can turn a boring story into an exclusive and interesting story. Having mastered the art of storytelling, you can easily and successfully promote a brand, stand out in a new team, and become an authority.
What will help make the story different and how to keep the intrigue throughout the story?
8 Key Tips for Telling Stories the Right Way:
- An exciting start
- Bright tie
- Growing intrigue
- Climax
- Epilogue and moral
- Elements of the non-verbal story
- An exciting start
We’ve all experienced those moments where we’ve had to do our best to actively listen while someone tells a story that seems to be longer than Moby Dick. And what’s worse than that? Being you the person who rambles endlessly.
Let’s face it: not all of us are born storytellers. But that doesn’t mean we don’t find ourselves in a ton of different situations where we need to be. Whether it’s to explain a moment of overcoming a challenge in a job interview or to share a personal anecdote at a networking event, we all come across those instances where we need to craft a compelling narrative.
So how can you tell a story that is interesting and engaging? The following five tips are a great place to start.
1. Get them hooked from the start
Regardless of whether you’re writing or speaking, an attention-grabbing introduction is the first key to making sure you hook your audience, and this doesn’t mean starting with a cliché “Once upon a time” or “Well, it was a rainy Tuesday…”
So what kind of tactics can you employ for your presentation? The best thing you can do is start your story with something that will surprise or intrigue your audience, be it one person or an entire audience.
The key to a powerful introduction is to get your audience to wonder how it happened, why it happened, and what exactly you did to fix it.
2. Have a clear arc
Have you ever heard someone’s story and it left you thinking, “Umm, and then what…”? That person just delivered a narrative without a clear arc, which means you were left with no resolution or conclusion, and instead felt like you were wasting minutes of your life listening to a completely pointless story.
It goes without saying that you don’t want to be that person who leaves people hanging. So before you launch into a story you think is interesting, take a moment to confirm that your story has a real beginning, a middle, and perhaps most importantly, an end.
I know, it seems very simple. But, it is a crucial step that is often overlooked.
3. “Make” yourself interesting
Most of the time, especially for job interviews or professional talks, we keep our stories in memory. We have canned anecdotes ready to pull from our pockets at any notice.
And, while this is useful for ensuring that you’re always armed and ready with a somewhat interesting narrative, it can have serious consequences on your delivery. Instead of appearing involved and engaged in your own story, you can seem like a robot reciting mechanically.
So, as obvious as it may seem, make an effort to seem genuinely excited about what you’re sharing. Consider that if you don’t seem to be interested in your story, why should anyone else be?
4. Use the present tense
Here’s a little writer’s trick you can use to make your stories that much more engaging: use the present tense.
No, it doesn’t matter if you’re telling a story of something that happened years ago. You can set the scene and then use the actual language to give your story a greater sense of relevance and immediacy, which will keep your audience much more engaged.
5. The shorter, the better
This is going to sound pretty bad, but make an effort to stay with me. As humans, we’re all pretty selfish, which means it can be hard for us to be interested in things that don’t involve us directly or personally.
So unless you’re recounting how you tamed a wild lion or shook hands with the Dalai Lama, most people won’t be as interested in your story as you are, which means brevity is important.
You may think that all those minor details are what really give your narrative extra oomph and context, but it’s usually best to leave them out entirely to keep your story as concise as possible.
Not all of us are natural storytellers. But that doesn’t mean we don’t often find ourselves in situations where we need to share an engaging anecdote.
If you’re tired of watching people’s eyes glaze over as they mentally create their shopping lists during your talk, these five key tips are for you. Do you want more? Join our Storytelling Course and learn all the keys to become an expert speaker and captivate your audience with your stories.
