Lisa Nichols
Appearances
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Hi, guys. It's Tony Robbins. You're listening to Habits & Hustle. Crush it.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
But no one's moving my soul. Stir my soul. Expand my diaphragm. Take my breath away. Make me want to stand on my tippy toes when you finish speaking. I wanted to give that. And so to answer your question, I went away and I began to look at what I was doing every single time. Nothing was planned, but what was I doing? And then quite honestly, I looked at Nelson Mandela.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And then I looked over at Dr. Martin Luther King. And then I looked at Mahatma Gandhi. And then I looked at Mother Teresa. I looked at people who were movement makers. I don't want to make a moment. And I don't want to have a nice speech. I want to ignite a movement if I can in this lifetime. So I looked at people who were movement makers. What charged them? And then I began to write it down.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And I put it in a framework. And for the last five years... Only five years of my 28 years of teaching, that's what I've been teaching. How to be unforgettable.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Yeah. So number one, seek first to inspire, not to impress. That's amazing. It's true. It's your come from space. So I'm not going to give you a technique to do. I'm going to give you an essence to be. And if you're willing to be that, now you're ready for the technique. Okay.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
So I started in transformational training. So that's my foundation is transformational training. So whenever our students step on our campus, they think they're going through speaking only, but you're going through self-discovery. That if you discover more of you, then you'll give me more of you. You can only give me what you have and you know you have. So number one, your to-do list is long.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
People like you, your to-do list is long. But your to-done list, T-A-D-U-N, to-done list, is a lot longer. What in your to-done list can you give yourself credit for? Just sit and nap for a moment. Things that people will never see that you did. The way you love the perceivingly unlovable. The way you forgive the perceivingly unforgivable. The way you get up in the dark of the night.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Who you have to be in the dark of the night to show up as who you are in the middle of the day. I said that once to Angela Bassett at an event. I hugged her and I said, thank you, sis, for who you have to be in the dark of the night to show up the way you do in the middle of the day. And she pushed me away. She goes, girl, don't you make me cry here. Because we all know what that feels like.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And so first is, can you acknowledge you? Three sentences will help you. Number one, get in the mirror, look at yourself in the eyes, and say, I'm proud that you... And find seven different answers. Even if you say, I'm proud that you got up today and brushed your teeth. I'm proud that you walked away from an unhealthy friendship. I'm proud that you put the bread down and picked up some broccoli.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Baby steps, but celebrate you. Second sentence... Now I'm answering your question. How do you get to that person? There's a way to get to them. Second question, cut the shackles. Second sentence, I'm sorry. Cut the shackles to shame, blame, guilt, regret, and anger as it is attached to you. By completing this sentence, look at yourself. Say your name. I said my name, Lisa. I forgive you for.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Eye to eye with self. And when I first said it, the first thing I said, now this was 2000, 1997, the first time I did this. I said, Lisa, I forgive you for being so lonely that you lowered your bar. Real talk. Lisa, I forgive you for being so afraid of being alone again that you let him stay. Lisa, I forgive you for finding solace in food. Lisa, I forgive you for forgetting your value. Real talk.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Now, the first time I did it, you couldn't understand what I was saying. It sounded more like... Unrecognizable. I was just talking to me anyway. Right. Third and final sentence. We're so comfortable making commitments to other people and keeping those commitments to them before we keep our commitments to ourselves. So the last sentence is, I commit to you that...
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And thank you for your persistency.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Before I made a commitment to anybody else, before you make a commitment to anybody else, in the bathroom mirror, right before you brush your teeth, go through all three of these. The last one is I commit to you that. And my first commitments were, Lisa, I commit to you that today I think more happy thoughts about you, more nice thoughts about you than negative.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And Lisa, I commit to you that today you'll only say yes when you want to say yes. And you'll say no when you need to say no. So to answer your question, there are ways to the journey back to you. I did those three sentences every day for six months. Now I recommend my students do them every day for 30 days at least. And if you want to go further, go further.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
But that helps you get connected with who you're going to give to the world. Because you have to be deeper in you, scuba dive, so you can give me more of you. So I can see more of me when I see you.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
100%.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
So if we do these three things, that will begin to dissipate. Right. So every time you say, I'm proud that you, you're looking at your to-done list. You're collecting evidence. Right. So if you do this... There's a reason why it's I'm proud of you, I forgive you for, I commit to you that. It's a reason why it's those three sentences. Right. Because they help you build more certainty in self.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
They help you go, oh, I actually am okay. Oh, I am not my past. My past makes me who I am. It's not who I am today. It's not my future. And so I say jump into that. Even if I say seven different endings twice, Every day for all three sentences. But on day one, you may have two. Right. You may have two. On day one, you may just stare at yourself.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
When's the last time you gave yourself the gift of just looking into your eyes in the mirror? Like I did all of my messages in the mirror in the bathroom first. I saw myself. I spoke to me first. Do you know that when I'm on YouTube sometimes, and sometimes it's very strange because I pop up on YouTube in my own feed. And you're looking at yourself.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Do you know I listen, but I don't listen as I'm... the deliverer of the message, I listen as the woman that the message popped up in front of. And I'm sitting there sobbing, completely disconnected from the fact that it's me talking. Because right now I'm going, God, what in this message did you bring to me that I need right now.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
But I love listening that it...
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
The conviction.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Opened the car door, did everything.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And now you choose how you'll be treated. But I wanted to show you how you get to be treated.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
No, no. It was so great to hear you reflect on it. I haven't done it in years. It's so old. But this is how long I've been trying to get you on the show. Oh, my gosh. I'm so glad. Thank you for your persistency. So yeah, so how does that happen? And then I look up and I end up in an abusive relationship.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Amazing family.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Yeah, the first thing I forgave myself for in the mirror was, I forgive you for being so lonely that you lowered your bar. And I didn't see it coming. I wasn't in an abusive relationship that was... at all had any indication that abuse was coming. It just hit one time and that was enough for me, but it hit one time and came out of left field.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
But I'm sure somewhere underneath three layers, there was a sign. It just wasn't the natural signs that we know as signs, raising your voice or being a little overbearing, none of that. At the time, my abusive former fiance was chivalrous and gentlemanly, and all the way up to the abuse, people were asking, does he have a brother? Like all the way. No one said, get away from that guy.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
No one said that. And so I didn't see any signs because I didn't know that it came in a package of perfection looking like marketing perfection. And then- After dinner one night and after having an amazing evening, after intimacy, I went to sleep and I woke up with his hands wrapped around my throat with no argument, with no discord, with no indication of what was going to happen.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
From that moment forth, I was with him three months later. For three months after that, because I was navigating my way out of the relationship without being in a body bag. I knew if I gave him a reason, I knew in the pit of my belly that I would leave that house in a body bag. And so I negotiated myself out of that relationship very creatively.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And it was the fight for my life, which showed me how I could fight, number one. And it showed me how... I needed to be aware of my blind spots. And it also was the catalyst of me being diagnosed as clinically depressed. And that was the catalyst of me getting in the mirror. I had lost Lisa. I lost Lisa in being his fiance.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I lost Lisa in having to embrace and swallow that I was now an abused woman with all of my history, with my amazing Superman dad and my Wonder Woman mom. how did I get here? So I love that you asked that question because I asked myself that question only 9,000 times. And the only way I could navigate my way back to Lisa was to get in the mirror.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And to complete these three sentences seven different ways every single day for six months straight, to go somewhere in this debris of pain, in this debris of guilt, hurt, and shame, anger, and resentment, she still exists. And I put on my hat, turned on my door, the Explorer light, and I went after me.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And for the next, now it's been 28 years, I always give that same exercise to people as either your starting point or to ramp you up. I give the same exercise. It's the starting point, mirror work. Because if you can start in the mirror, we can go anywhere.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Yeah. I love that question. I really like you.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I like where you play. I like where you live. Thank you. Yeah, I do. Thank you. I love gentlemen in the world. I do. I like. I always pray when I'm going into an interview that they'll ask me the real questions. Like, don't. Don't try to make it stay neat. Yeah. Because people are looking for real over neat. I agree. Yeah. Hope is priceless and no hope is costly.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Everyone's snorkeling and you want to scuba dive.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And your question was, how do I help people to...
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Yeah. I appreciate that question because I think you're reflecting on what my whole life has been. Right. Thank you. I just did a one-woman show on Broadway. Yeah, it's crazy. You did? I did. I know. It's the best-kept secret. When? In December of 2024. It was a sold-out show. 690 seats, not one seat open in the house. It was on Broadway. By the way, I never...
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
ever even have on any vision board that I'd be doing a one-woman show on Broadway.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And I only say this to share that during that show, I told the stories. You would enjoy it. I may tell you about when I'm doing it again. Because it was storytelling. All I did was just theatrically told one story after another on the journey of Lisa. And I was able to full-on live in the theatrical world.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
For the first time. I've never done that before. So freaking cool. I bet it was excellent. So freaking cool. Like, I was a little girl. But I say that to say, when I look at that, I look back at, it was just a journey of constantly keeping hope, giving hope, keeping hope, giving hope. So the reason why you make me think about that, because I was like, what was...
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
All I've stood for is don't give up hope. And if you do, that's okay. Let's pick it back up again. So we don't have to write a 30-chapter book. What I would tell someone who's in that hopeless place to pick up hope again is let's just write the next line. Let's not pick up the shovel. Let's pick up a teaspoon. And we can pick up a teaspoon. Let's not take a deep breath.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Let's just go for now, finding what you can do next. And let's hold on to the, at the end of your life, when you look back, what do you want your dash to have said? And have we said it all yet? And if we haven't, then it ain't over. It might be hard. It might be messy, but it ain't over. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
No. I needed to discover Lisa first. First of all, I just have to start and pay homage to you.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Thank you for showing up, searching for authenticity. Thank you for being hungry for something deeper than surface. Because it allows us unicorns to find each other and go... okay, oxygen, you know, water, realness. So thank you because it gets lonely in the universe and amongst, you know, I always say, listen, I woke up a unicorn.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Thank you.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I just take my horn off and act like a horse so y'all don't feel so uncomfortable in my presence. And so when you get around another unicorn, you're like, oh, okay, hold on. Let me screw my horn back on so we can just sit and have a real conversation. So no, I wasn't always that. What you resonate with is the awareness of the work I had to do.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Thank you.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
to get to my level of certainty, because you know you've been on that journey yourself. And so it's the, we have a soul connection of similarity that we haven't talked about yet. It's a natural draw. It's the pheromones of authenticity. It's just that thing thing, right? And so I can't say I've always been this way because I was busy trying to at one point get my own oxygen.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
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Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I love serving people like you, which is why I'm probably the best kept secret because I don't go up and announce.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I was busy at one point trying to affirm that I was worthy of having a message like the one you saw, even in my mocha skin with my full lips and my round hips and my kinky hair in a world that didn't say I was beautiful. I had to discover and accept me and then give myself permission to have a voice of value. That was a journey.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I don't go and announce because all of, well, in addition to the yous in the world, all of the fake folk will run, consume me, throw lots of money at me. And I go, I really don't want to work with folk like you. I love helping great people uncover or build their superpowers. So I always say the techniques I give you, they're a superpower.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
What you have to commit to me is you'll use your powers for good. Because here's what I can tell you. You learn these techniques and you don't even know why you're becoming, like you can stand still and people begin to come to you. You don't have to pursue as much.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Yeah, so that first one is called audience connection formula. Okay. Me, we. You, just fill in the blanks. There was a time when I, we have a tendency to, have you ever? That's it. I love that. Okay. Now you're climbing with them. Okay. And then let's see another technique. I'll give you this one. Okay. So we are a world of rhythm. We love rhythm. We love music.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
When I was in Taipei, no one spoke English. But when they put on Beyonce, you should have put a ring on it. 3,300 people were singing. Should have put a ring on it, right? Same thing when I was in Xinjiang. Same thing when I was in Swahili. Music is a unifier, right? So if we use that as a premise, I want to introduce you to iteration and cadence flow, another technique that I use.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And that's using words that start with the same letter, are in with the same ending, T-I-O-N-I-N-G starts with an S or starts with a P or ends with the same word, up. And then you create a rhythm that the audience begins to lean into. You feel a little poetry. You feel a little like John Legend. They don't quite know what's going on. So it sounds like this. It's time for us to speak up, stand up.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
You might want to show up. He might want to get prayed up. It's time for us to rise up so that we as a community can hold up. All I did was use up. I'll use another one for you. We all deserve inspiration. We need education. We got to go get our motivation. We got to tap into our determination. You might feel some frustration, but don't worry about it because that has its own elimination.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
But you got to be willing. You see? Of course I see. That's amazing. But it's easy for you. Right. No. But my middle, my fourth quarter, can be your first quarter. I see it all the time with my students. If I gave you a list of words, I've seen it happen. I know this sounds crazy. I've had students never do this before. I give them the list.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
See, what makes it seem magic now is that you don't see a list in front of me. I have it in my head. But if I gave you a list and I just set it in front of you, I said, okay, Jennifer, here are seven words. Just start talking. You would be blown away by what you do. S's, up, I-O-N, T-I-N-G. And then what you begin to do is as you're writing your own speech, you go, I want to play with T's.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I want to play with mother. And you start playing with it. All of a sudden you realize, now most people are playing here. If this was the piano and they're speaking, they're only using the center 10 keys. That's why they're boring. That's why you said what you said. But when you realize the same words, you go all the way out. There's 66 ways you can play in the lexicon.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
All I've done is I've mastered all the different ways you use words. So that's cadence and iteration. That's just using the same ending or the same beginning. And you would be blown away if you just write the list of words and then you start playing with the list of words and you record yourself. So that when you say something you like, looking at the words, you transcribe it.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I wasn't overnight, which is why my conviction is unshakable because I fought for this clarity. This clarity ain't for sale. It ain't for bargain. It ain't for marketing. I'm not doing it for likes, which is what makes people like it. Seem like she not asking permission to be her. And we all want that.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And then you say something again with what you've transcribed and add another word to it. You'll build... A message, just a moment in your message, a moment. This is not your whole message. This is just a moment in the middle of a speech. Imagine the only person that does that was Dr. Maya Angelou. She'd be in the middle of a speech and just drop some poetry and then go back to the speech.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And you're like this. She just do. I saw her do it in 2000. I said, okay, when I grow up, I'm going to do that one day. And so when I was on Broadway in December, in the middle of my Broadway show, I dropped spoken word and then went back to the show and didn't highlight it. I'm about to do spoken word. Just drop into it.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Imagine if you were speaking for nine minutes and two minutes in the middle, you did iteration or cadence flow and then kept going. Now you're a standout. You keep doing one more thing after another, stand out. One last technique, verbal highlight. You've seen me do this a lot. You know what's happening.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
But a verbal highlight, most people, especially when they call it motivation, oh, Lord, they think that you got to be loud. You got to scream. Motivation is not screaming. That's just screaming. It drives me crazy. So you don't have to be loud, and you don't have to be fast only. Verbal highlights is making a distinction with your words. I want you to follow my words with me, okay? Will you?
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I'm going to give you words to say, but I want you to follow the tonation. Remember I said 66 keys on a piano? Part of those keys are not just what you say, it's how you say it, right? So when you felt that, ah, for me, normally you also experience verbal highlights. Repeat after me along with my pacing and my tone, okay?
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I'm committed. I'm committed. To be the best version of myself.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Because it makes me who I am today.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Even those who are trying to market the next gimmick, they wish they can get up one morning and just discover themselves. I do believe that. And so my job, in whatever way I can, in my most humble way, is to give examples of what I've discovered as possible and then to still learn too.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
No, because you're going to place it to the appropriate words that it fits for you.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I just have you repeating after me right now, so you're just choosing words that I chose for you. But when you are saying, if I can ask you, what's one moment in your life, give me a little bit of a moment in your life when it felt, I don't know if I'm going to bounce back from this one. It tested your faith.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
a moment of that yeah a real moment actually right now in my life okay let's unpack it so without even knowing the details i'd love to work with you because then we go and make sure that you feel safe about that thing yeah because until you feel safe about that thing it's not available to the world right exactly i was going to say that's why i don't want to say it out loud it's not available to the world i remember when i first got frauded i got frauded in my company
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And one of my employees said, I don't feel like you're being genuine. I said, why? She goes, because we're dealing with this fraud and you're not telling anyone. I said, oh, sweetheart, please. I don't tell anybody about a battle that I'm still fighting. Yeah. Soon as I get through this one, whether I win or lose, then it's available. But right now. This is mine.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I'm quite comfortable with the stories that are still mine. And I'm quite comfortable with the ones that never belong to the public. But the ones that I give you, I'm going to give you as much of me so that you can find you. So this other technique is called scooping.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I'm not going to tell you how to do it now because it's kind of advanced, but I'm going to tell you the theory because you can appreciate it because it's what you experienced with me. Everything I'm telling you, you experienced this with me already. It's why I'm here. It's why you worked so long to have me here. You didn't even know what was happening.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Scooping is I tell my story in its own authenticity, but I widen my story up in the examples enough so that you can see a part of you in my story. Oh, my God. That's exactly why people like you. And now that is, I will tell you, that's LeBron James level. That's not a first level. No one that I've taught how to speak at the first level can do that.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
But if you get the first level, if you get the audience connection formula, you get the cadence iteration, you get the pregnant pause. I just taught you verbal highlights. Verbal highlights is range. We just work on range for a while. I listen to your story and I go, tell me that again in what I call the bottom of your belly. Top is, hey, we all get to be happy.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Bottom of your belly is, because abundance is your birthright. That's non-negotiable. You see the power?
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Abundance is my damn birthright. Right? Like you feel it.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Yeah. Did you see me on the stage at Agape? I'm in the black dress. And I'm like, my English teacher told me.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And I said, but other people's perception of you.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
So you don't look for a story. You look for an incident. And isn't it the same? No, it's not. People think a story, stories have more range. They have their totality. If I ask you, Jennifer, find an incident, an incident that made you go, oh, that hurt, or wonder, or did I make the right decision? We go back. We sit here long enough.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Humble.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And I got to say, I have an amazing mom and an incredible dad. And so on the outside, you look at me and, you know, we kind of like the black Brady Bunch. Yeah. You know, like there wasn't a lot of chaos in our house. We had the dog and we had the white picket fence and we had the great family. But I lived in South Central LA and I had three fights a week to get home from school.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
The technique I call scoop them. That's when you said scoop. I can see myself in your story.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
It's so important. And the more intentionality you do it with while keeping the integrity of your story. That's hard. The mistake that people make because they don't know the technique is that they get out of the story and start teaching. You can't teach and be in the story at the same time. You're either in the story or you're teaching.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Most people don't know how to make them sit next to each other. Another technique that I teach is the bridge. They don't know the bridge that connects the story to the content and then the content to the story again. After this interview, I think you're going to watch me differently like my students. Do I tell my students after we do this?
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I say, go back and watch me now because now you're behind the black curtain. And now you're going to go, ooh, she just scooped me. Ooh, she just audience connection for me. Ooh, she just verbal highlight. Now that's great. Your brain is looking at the techniques. Because if you can nail the techniques individually, then we can technique stack better. And that's what makes you unforgettable.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I do one-on-ones.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I do one-on-ones all the time. But most of the time when I do a one-on-one, they're playing at a higher level.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Well, I've always been teaching, but I've been teaching transformation.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
So I made a lot of money teaching transformation.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And at a very early age, I lived in fight or flight. When I left my house, it was chaotic. And in my home, it was safe, but I had to leave my house every day. And so I grew up in this energy of worry and anxiety. And then when I had my son years later, my son's father went to prison when he was five, eight months old, and that took me in a spiral.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
No.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
The industry pulled me into it. Right, because you're so good. My friends were like, we don't want... We want you to teach us how to do what you do. Like, they forced me to do it.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
What's funny is, so I just did a podcast with Scott Miller, who... I know Scott, he interviewed me too.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
So I did, when I did his interview, at the end of the interview, he goes, number one, where have you been all my life? And number two, why don't more people know about you? That's what I said to you. Literally. So Scott was just at my house this past Saturday, and we did the framework for my next book that the working title is Becoming Unforgettable. And it's how to speak to make an influence.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And the entire ecosystem of this training will be born out of that even more so because it's taken me a while. It's hard when you've been on Oprah, Larry King, and Dr. Phil, and Steve Harvey for personal development.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Yeah, to get from under personal development. People are like, no, no, no, you're the transformation lady. So that screams really big. My first book was Chicken Soup. My second book was The Secret. I totally know. And so people, they want me for that. So it was the industry leaders, you know, Vishen Lakhiani, CEO of MyValley. I know him.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
He always says, she's the only person that I flew 33 hours with. And coach in a middle seat because it was the last seat on the plane to go to her speaker training because I needed to know when she finally decided to teach it.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And so, yeah, I've been quietly kind of teaching it. And now I'm just coming out going, you can get my personal development. First of all, I have to build a library of all my personal development trainings so people can get access to it without having me.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
It takes a lot to get out of a big box.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Actually, it's through engagements like this because I have a whole body of work around speaker development. So I'm ready for this interview. I'm ready to go. By the way, these are my legacy years, Jennifer. These are my legacy years. Like I'm 10 more years. I just want to sit beside my super delicious husband as much as possible. These are my real talk. I know, right? Girl talk.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
So these are my legacy years. And so I'm more passionate about, I don't want this to sit down with me. Especially when you can turn around and do it the way you just did. If you can do one technique that I taught you, you can do all 16. Some are easier to grasp than others. Some come before others. And so I'll just spend the next 10 years going, can I help make you more impactful?
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Can I help make you more unforgettable? Can I help with that? And I don't think we'll have a hard time because what you said is so true. People who need to lead need to speak. People who are assigned to leading want to feel more confident. You want to accept. I won't drop any names by anybody, but what you said earlier resonated so much with me because I've heard it before.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I decline speaking engagements. Not because I don't want to go, but because I don't feel confident about how I'll show up when I go. So I just, I'm too busy for them.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
It's bigger than dying by fire.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Yeah, I was teaching the extension of if you took chicken soup or you took The Secret and you made it a training, if you took limiting beliefs, how to overcome them, how to set goals, how to set all those things, Stephen Covey's training. You take that. Yeah. billion dollar industry, right?
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And I wish it didn't, but I had spent all of my high school years and my late middle school years avoiding relationships. because I didn't want to get tethered to the neighborhood.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
So there was no lack of opportunity, but what people kept watching in the opportunity was how do you do that? How'd you say that? And I'm like, don't worry about how I said that. Just go do this so you can get this breakthrough. And people began to look at what I was doing and how I was saying it more than the transformation from the, and it wasn't the people in the seats.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
It was my colleagues that were on the roster with me. So when I'm on the roster and I'm sitting in the back in Toronto, Canada, and there's 11,400 people in the audience. And it's me, Jack Canfield, Bob Proctor, T.R. Veckert, and John Assaraf. I know exactly who it was. I call them my brothers from another mother. And I was often the only woman.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And we're sitting in the back and all of them are busy typing their PowerPoints. And I'm sitting there talking to someone and we're laughing and talking. And all of a sudden I look around and I see everyone has a PowerPoint. They're all head down in it. And I'm the first speaker. And I'm kicking and laughing and, oh, I like those shoes. And I go, oh, crap. I should be doing a PowerPoint.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
For a moment, I forgot. I'm going to be honest. For a moment, I'm looking at the good old boys. They're all wildly successful. And I'm going, you peon, you should be doing what they're doing so you can have what they have. So I go next to Jack, who Jack has always been my binky.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And he's always been my binky. And I'm like, Jack, I really should have a PowerPoint, shouldn't I? And I freak out and drive my assistant crazy. I'm like... Write something down. Give me something on paper. She's like, what? I'm like, the conversion rate from the Canadian dollar to the U.S.? I don't know. Write something down. And she writes down the conversion rate. I'm just freaking out.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I completely lose my core of confidence. And I go out on stage and I just start talking and I do my thing. And at the end of my speech, I get a roaring five minute standing ovation, like roaring. And as I'm walking off stage, Jack's walking up because he comes after me and he goes, don't you ever. Like he was like pissed. Don't you ever talk about needing a PowerPoint again.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Yeah. Real talk.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And at the end of the night, we all have dinner together, and Bob Proctor comes over to me, and he says, I've never seen you speak, young lady, because I'm just trying to get into the club. I said, yeah, I've seen you speak. You're amazing. He goes, no, no, no. I'm good. You're amazing. I took four pages of notes. He goes, but you have a being. There's a being in your belly. A being.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
He goes, and you offer your being to the audience. Bottle that up. That's what you're going to get paid for. It went on about the night. When I tell you every speaker I've ever admired... Because I'm young in the game. Like, not so much now, but back then. You go back to 2006, I was the youngest person by 10, 15 years. They had all been established.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I don't know. What's funny is people often ask that. And what I said to him when we were dating is, there's a calling on my life. I'm not clear what it is, but I can feel it. So I know we both are born and raised in LA, but I keep my nose clean here. And if you are to go to jail for anything, you're on your own. I don't do jail. I'm not a jailhouse girlfriend.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I'm literally putting my credit card on hotels saying, run it for one night. at a time, like real talk. I'm there for five nights, but I'm like, don't run all five nights. It was very bootstrapped. Everywhere I went though, the speakers would look back and go, wow, do you know the torment that came with? I will go back to my room and I cry and go, what is it?
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Because I don't know how to bottle it up and sell it. I don't know how to offer it. What are they seeing? First, I didn't know what they were seeing. And then I didn't know how to contain it. Then I didn't know how to articulate it. Then I didn't know how to shape it. Then I didn't know how to serve it to you the way I just said, do this technique. I didn't even know.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
So it was in my unconscious competence. And so I'm excited about the last five years because I feel like if I don't ever get like if I don't have to build a multibillion dollar industry from it, at least it doesn't die in my belly.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Number one, my friends forced me. Like, I got, you know, I got strong friends. JJ, Virgin, Vision, Jack. They were like, look, go lock yourself in the office. And in my prayer time, I got to tell you, I said, God, what's next? And what I heard the Spirit say was quit being lazy. You should see. Do you see my calendar? And that word, like, it shook me. It was disruptive.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And lazy was just because it's difficult don't mean you shouldn't be doing it. Make your gift someone else's skill set, period. And so then I went, I started searching. I started, how do you do it? And I started coming up with crazy names and putting Post-it papers all around my office. I don't think I showered for like five days. And I'm like, ugh. My son was little. He's like, mom, come out.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I'm like, no, eat a sandwich. It was crazy. And then I tried it out. And my first version was wildly effective. I couldn't believe it. I was like, oh, it was so... I don't want to sound like I'm bragging. No, you're not. But it was so in my cells. It was so in my cells that when I gave it to you and you try it, I go, yeah, yeah, that's what my art looks like outside of me.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
But there's another version to that. Once you get that, tell me, because I got like three more versions beyond that. Like it was so much.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Yeah, so I love this because, you know, I'm a businesswoman. You know that, right?
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I'm a businesswoman. Like, our business, like, is like...
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
foreplay to me i love business so me too well you keep on mentioning jj version and she's all business too so yeah that's my girl like we talk business together her cynthia garcia we all we sit down and we talk rois revenue streams we talk you know uh are you going to that thing in my side note mexico is that i am they want me to teach there oh you are gonna teach yeah okay so are you going to teach there
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
They're 70%. They 70% got me. Oh, okay. Both of them took me out to dinner the other night.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Cynthia Garcia. She's co-founder of the Unicorns.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
She's delicious. When you meet her, you'll fall in love.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I know JJ, but I don't know. This one is... It's a well of dynamic women with all different gifts and talents. And it's walking with like-minded unicorns who are all very different from the rest of the world, who doesn't get a chance to play in their greatness, as well as have challenges.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Because the world doesn't, like, we're not allowed to complain out loud because our problems are what people are pursuing. And I'm mindful of that and sensitive to that. But in that environment, we get to be all things. And it really is a sense of sisterhood. I'm not real big on, like, girl bands and girl groups. I'm kind of an alpha woman. So it took a while for them to get me there.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Are you a member of the thing? Is that what you're doing? I think I am. I'm not sure. I don't know what member means, but I've gone three times.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
So trust me when I say I'm going to keep my promise. You go in, you're on your own. So I am honest with you when I tell you, I don't know. Because when it happened, I needed to live my life and continue going in the direction that I knew my life was supposed to go in. So my son is 30 and my son's father is still in prison.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Yeah, JJ and I were friends before then. So she's the person. That's how she got me. So speaking is a revenue stream. I'm now doing more speaking than I was before. I used to do a lot of speaking, 38 keynotes a year, you know, all around the world. And then I dialed back considerably so I can build my training programs.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And so I can have something for people who couldn't make a keynote.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I'm real big on making things available for everyone. So the first level here, you need $500, two payments of whatever. The ultimate level, you want to get in the room with me, it's going to be an investment. $15,000, we'll spend five days together. Those are groups. I also have a mastermind. They meet in my house. Those are the gladiators, only 15. Meet in my house four times a year for two days.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
We're going to take your business and we're going to rocket your business or your brand or your message. So I spent the second day of our mastermind literally helping everyone. I love what you said earlier. I broke down a speech. I said, you want an unforgettable speech? It needs to have these components to it. And we put each component in their speech.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Everyone was working on their own and they were shocked to see the limited amount of content. compared to what they thought. Still good amount of content, but in a 30-minute speech, let me show you how much needs to be an opening, needs to be a bridge. I need your story. I need a bridge. I need your content. I need some inspiration. Give me another small story. Now give me a charge. Now close me.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
So I just put together the construct, and they're like, I said, now let's fill in each one for you. I'm never going to touch your content. You're the genius of that. Let me touch everything else with you. Because if you want someone inspired, they'll never be inspired by your intellect. They'll be impressed and informed. They'll be inspired by the way you scoop them.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
They'll be inspired by your story. They'll be inspired by your charge. What's a charge? A charge comes at the very end. Never do a charge before the very end. Charge is the very end. I challenge you. That's a bold statement. I challenge you. To love like you've never been hurt. Forgive like you've never been betrayed. Leap like you've never fallen. So a charge has some elements in it.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
It always has to make humanity better. That's some movement stuff. We don't see anyone doing that. Who does that? Everyone ends with how I can help you and remember this. Don't tell me to remember this. Please don't end like, oh, like boring. Charge me. Charge me to be the better, best version of myself in a way that feels inviting, that leaves me like this. I just did it when I was in Dubai.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
They had to call a break after my keynote. It was not a break planned. Really? They're like, okay, we're going to take a break so everyone can catch their breath. Okay, I'm done. And then I stood outside and took pictures for two and a half hours. Two and a half hours while all the other speakers left and went to dinner. I even told the people in line, I got to go do four interviews.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And my son's father, I have to say, is a brilliant man because he's authored 26 now, 26 books from prison. 26. His first seven books were authored before I authored my first book. So it is not for lack of awareness and brilliance. It's environment. Environment and influence. And, you know, the three strikes law didn't start out fair, but it made it easy to put people away.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
If you're here when I get back, I'll keep taking pictures with you. I went. I spent 40 minutes doing interviews. I came back. They were all still there. And I took pictures with them. And vision goes, what would make someone stand in line? It was the tippy toe. It was the breath. It was the scooping. For a picture, that's all I got was a picture. But that's the combination. So I do that as well.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Because you can do all of it here, too. This is not relocated to stage. No, no, no, I know. This is book. This is podcast. This is every time you open your mouth, you get to use these techniques.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
The best people on the planet. Canadians are great. Let me just say, let me just say. My very first tour, my very first time out of the country on tour, I went to Winnipeg. Winnipeg is where I'm from. Like, I was born— My very first. When I tell you the way those people loved me, the way— Did you just say Winnipeg? I said Winnipeg. Winnipeg, Manitoba. Listen.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I went to Winnipeg with a really big coat on with some flip-flop shoes in December because I'm a Californian, and they did not tell me, please buy some boots.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And they loved on me. Well, I love you. It was the first time I saw—first time I was out of the country— And it was 2009. I'll never forget. And I was scared. Jennifer, I was scared. I was like, why is the world responding to me like this? What's happening? I didn't know what was happening around me. I'd just been in the secret. And Winnipeg loved me.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
We were meant to be together.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
My first stop in Canada was Winnipeg.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I loved it. They loved on me. Winnipeg will always be a part of my life story. Always. You see what I'm saying?
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I've been around the world a few times, and Winnipeg is one of the places that I talk about. I don't talk about everywhere. Because of the way they loved me, the time of my life it was. I didn't know if they were ready for a mocha woman with an afro with full lips and round hips. I wasn't sure. I wasn't sure how they would accept me. I was nervous. And then they went, we love you.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And I was like, thank you. They were my evidence that the world was ready for me. Winnipeg.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
No. So, number one, I don't invite any of my students to do what I do. No, I know, I know. Because I'm fourth quarter. Michael Jordan. But I can teach them how to do the version. So what I do is I ask the same three questions. This I will invite you. Please do this. I ask the same three questions to every host that hires me to come everywhere. And I coach my students to do the same.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I ask the question, what do you want the audience to feel as a result of my keynote? What action do you want the audience to take as a result of my keynote? And what would you like them thinking at the end of my keynote? What do you want them to think about? Same three questions every single time. And then I make the rest up to get there. But let me tell you what I start with.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
The one thing I walk in knowing is what story am I going to tell? I match the story to their answer. Oh, now number one, another thing I help my students do is I help you create your stories. and then create your story library. You only need about four, but I help you curate each one so you have something to choose from.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
So I say all that to say I have this pile of reasons for me to feel shame, blame, regret, anger, fear. fear. And then on top of that, I ended up having to get on government's assistance to take care of my son. And so now I have, back in the day, back in the day when you had food stamp booklets, I got my food stamp booklets.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Tunk-A-Toy. So Tunk-A-Toy, the last time I did that, it was with Eli Lilly, which is pharmaceutical, and the HR department invited me in. It's a hard time for our team, and everyone's feeling overwhelmed. This was in 2007. We're there again, and people are tired. They're exhausted. And we want you to just keep them going. So I said, oh, Tonka Toy. Tonka Toy is about Jelani.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Now, mind you, it has nothing to do with work. It's about Jelani and his Tonka truck and how he kept picking this truck up and dropping it, and it kept going slow. Picking it up and dropping it. Picking it up and dropping it. This truck, no matter what Jelani did to it, it just kept going slow.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And at the end of telling that, toward the end, I go, when Jelani would pick the truck up and drop it, I was surprised it would keep going. But when Mattel built that truck, Mattel said when they had the truck on the assembly line, this truck right here is going to meet Jelani Malik Nichols. And this truck needs to be extra strong. And this truck needs to be extra tough.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And this truck needs extra endurance. I believe in whatever your faith is. Just as Mattel knew what that tonka truck was going to go through when God had you on the assembly line, when God was building you and shaping you, God knew what you were going to go through. They said, this woman, she's going to be picked up and dropped a few times. This man, he might lose his job.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
This woman, she might be lied to. This man, he might get exhausted. That everything you need, you were built with.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I got my WIC card, W-I-C, Women, Infant, and Children, free cheese, free pasta, free butter. I will forever be grateful for those programs, but I always had shame Because I needed them. And so when you look at Lisa, who she is today, this was a radical decision, girl, to go, hold on. My past does not equal my future. And this chapter is not the end of my story.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And no one else holds the pen to write my story but me. And though chapter four is funky and messy, baby, chapter 24 is still coming. And that's what you felt when you saw me. And that's what I try to give every time I open my mouth because someone's in their chapter four or their 14 or their 20, wherever you are in your chapter, let's make the next one dope.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Thank you. Thank you.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
delicious, even more so than the last one, even if it were messy. Because at the end of our life, Jennifer, I believe we want to sit back and read our story. We want to share our story with someone else. And when they're reading, because this is what it feels like for me, someone's reading the story when I only had $11.42 in the bank.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And when you said the beginning, I took you to when I was diagnosed as clinically depressed.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And I went straight to the mirror. That's number one. So in the webinar that we were just teaching, people were going, you're giving us so much and we haven't registered. I said, if you don't register, that's on you. But at least you walk away. At least do. And I'm a coach coach. So I go, if you're not going to act on what I gave you for free, there's no sense in registering.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
There's no sense in following me because you like the sexy conversation more than the application. And application is not always sexy. Application births outcomes. But it's like an athlete. I'm an athlete. I ran track. I swam competition. I was a synchronized swimmer. You know, the swim meet or the track meet, that's only one small part of the entire week.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And everyone wants to fast forward, Google download. Right. Excellence. I want to Google download mastery. I don't know how to tell you how to get to the top without the stairs.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Someone's reading that story of when I was at the ATM at 7-Eleven in Inglewood. Right. Someone's reading that story of when I didn't have money to buy pampers for Jelani, so I had to wrap my son in a towel, various towels, for two days. That's messy. You got one job as a parent. Protect your baby. When someone reads that story, Jennifer, I want to be able to sit back and go, keep reading.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
But I'll climb beside you. I'll climb beside you, but you got to build your glutes and your hams and your quads and your calves.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Well, it was a number of ways. It wasn't pretty. And that's the Broadway show that I talk about. It was the first time I revealed. I had six blood transfusions in three years. Yeah. We're going to get distracted with that. Like, that's a whole.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Like, will you invite me back? You'll come back.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
So when we come back, I'll talk about my health transformation. But before I talk about my health transformation, I'd love for us to create a safe space for me to reveal my health hell. Because while I was making bestseller after bestseller after bestseller, I was going through a private health hell.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Another conversation, whole another day. We're going to have to drink some of the stuff. We're going to have to light the candle and zen out the room.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I know you weren't. No one.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I will. I live around the corner, of course. And you have to know the only reason why I can talk to you about this is... is because I decided to come out about it on Broadway. It's why I cried almost every day leading up to Broadway. I was what we call terror-cited, part terrified, part excited. But I knew my next iteration of Lisa required me to share with you what you would never know.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
That was just not 90 days ago from the recording of this.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
From the recording of this, from sitting in front of you not 90 days ago.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
It's so big.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
But just for the record, I'm in discussion. to do it again in another country, which I'm sure you have a passport.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And a lot of my friends are going to, when I tell them, they're going to be like, we'll meet.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I know.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
It's the kind of girls I run with. Absolutely.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
She's so cute. Like, can I tell you what you are? You're like new girlfriend drunk.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
You're like new girlfriend. And I only know it because when I feel it and I see it, you're a new girlfriend, Drunk. We'll spend time together.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I love you. I so love the fact that there are other humans, sorry for your experience, and I'm glad that there are other humans that understand the pain. If this is painful, I'm at events. Yeah. I'm at events, and this is my experience. And then they want to go to dinner with all of us. I said, there is no way I am going to extend this experience beyond these moments.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
You're welcome. And there's one more gift that I brought for you. Oh, green leather pants? Yeah, yeah. You can have these. Listen, and I do pass on my fabulosity to my friends.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I'll be done with it and then I'm not attached to it. So I brought a link to a quiz that, that people can see how do I rate when it comes to speaking? And most importantly, what should I do when I'm there? What should be the two things I focus on to move the dial and to move the needle? I realized that I come and I do this and people are like, okay, what do I do? Where am I?
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And I spent six hours on an international flight curating what should you be looking for to really see am I at the beginning levels? And by the way, there are people who have been doing it for 15 years who rate at the beginning level. And then am I right in the middle? And am I a little more advanced? And then what should I focus on? That's the most important part.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
What should I focus on if this is where I am? You don't want to eat the whole elephant.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
What should be my next bite? So if it feels right to your community, it just allows you to kind of see where you are and how to get to the next step. Because I'm a breadcrumber. Can you give me breadcrumbs? Can you show me how to step forward? Can you give me some clarity?
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I will. I will. Take the quiz. See where you are. Don't judge yourself too much. You have the link. I think it's motivatingthemasses.com for the last quiz.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Don't worry about it. But find out where you are and give yourself grace. Be gracious wherever you are. Be gracious. I so enjoy you. You are a breath of fresh air. You are. Seriously. Thank you for your commitment to have this conversation with me.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I get it, sis. There's no way I would keep you hostage and not showing you that middle point. And for years, I didn't know how to articulate it, just so you know. So I'm grateful that we're here now because for years, people have been telling me, And when I say people, like people whose books we read as young adults.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
You know, the first time I was told by someone I admired that I had a gift, it was Jack Canfield. Oh, okay. Right, so just go straight to the top, right? How did he know? How did he meet you? So I was at a conference that I borrowed money to go to. I sold everything I could. If it wasn't nailed down, I sold it to be able to afford this entrepreneur's conference.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And I could barely, I couldn't spell entrepreneur, right? But I'm like, I think that's me. How many years ago are we talking? We're talking 28. Okay. You know, you measure things by the age of my child. He was two. Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it was 28 years ago. I'm late 20s, early 30s, and I'm just, I'm late 20s. And I know I have something in me.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I could feel it, and I would do things in L.A., like when the 1992 civil unrest occurred, when L.A. was burning down, and I was an activist. I would get in the streets. I was ignorance on fire. I didn't know what I was fighting for, but we're going to fight the system, right?
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And I remember being in a march and I was fighting for them not to provide loans to the liquor store owners to rebuild liquor stores in the community. That instead, build grocery stores. That was my first thing. Like, don't build another liquor store on another corner. Build a grocery store. So that was my first thing. And I'm, no more liquor stores, no more liquor stores.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And the organizer of this march down Western Boulevard noticed me and then gives me the bullhorn. No more liquor stores. I'm like, okay, I got this. Then the organizer's boss puts me up on the truck. And now I'm on the truck. By the time we get to the rally, the councilman knows that I'm leading. I don't know how I'm leading this march. I started seeing this happening over and over again.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Sometimes your gifts will reveal themselves to others before you're clear on them.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
Because I still had all my self-doubt. I still am dealing with the fact that at 25, I discovered that I'm functionally dyslexic. So my 12 years in school was hell. I bet. So I wasn't building on this great self-esteem experience. My math teacher at Dorsey High School gave me a D to pass me in math because he said I was nice. I took the D. Thank you very much. That's how much I struggle.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
So here I am academically struggling my entire life, not knowing that I'm flipping all my words. So I'm not building this on, I see a gift in me. My first year, well, let me not mislead you, my first and my last year in college, I got a fail in English. And my English teacher said in front of the entire classroom, Lisa, you have to be the weakest writer I've ever met in my entire life.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And at 19, to me, she was really old. She was like 42. Wow. Right. She was a fossil. That same year, and I'm only telling this so you can understand what I had to climb over. My speech teacher that same year said, Ms. Nichols, quote unquote, I recommend you never speak in public, that you get a desk job, and gave me a D. Wow. So I didn't see, because I kept saying, I can't be this good.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
And so as I began to open up, I went to this conference, and I'm at this conference, and I'm sharing a poem with someone. And the CEO of the conference is standing with an earshot and looks at me, a woman. She says, would you like to share that poem on stage? And I said, yes. And I shared the poem on stage. Now, mind you, there are 800 people in the audience. 760 at least are older white men.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
My scary person for me. Older white men represented the educational system that wasn't kind to me and the justice system that wasn't kind to me or anyone I knew. So I'm in front of my scary, hairy person. And I do the poem. And I see people doing this, and I see a lot of this. And I wonder, what's falling from the sky? Like, what is happening? Only to find out later, those were tears.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
First sign of the superpower. Then Jack Canfield comes to this event, and he sees it. And he begins to tell me, you got a gift. And I would not accept it. I can't tell you how long it took me to accept the fact that this was worthy of focusing on so that I can help you. My gift can be your skill set. It took me years.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I was at dinner once with Jack and he said, I wish I could know that I can inspire people the way you do. I said, oh, Jack. He goes, no, no, no, Lisa. I'd give my pinky finger to know I can do what you do versus wondering if I'm doing it. And I went, really? He goes, I would. And so I went in a cave and I said, God, show me what I'm doing because I don't want to die with this in my belly.
Habits and Hustle
Episode 427: Lisa Nichols: The Art and Science of Impactful Communication + Audience Connection Techniques
I don't want to be the only one to move and inspire people to be unforgettable. I'm not, I'm sure I'm not the only one, but I don't want to be an anomaly. There's no, to me, there's no grandioso in being an anomaly. I think that what I do, as many of us as possible should be doing it. Because quite frankly, I'm bored with everyone intellectually trying to tell me what they know.