2024 Annual Review | Reviving To Valuing – Hello, I'm DK

Varied lessons in principled living.

2024 broke my heart…

…broke my spirit…

…broke me open…

…what a gift!

VALUES

It was a year of living my personal and professional standards.

This meant orienting away from people and a path which had already eroded much of my time, had taken me away from cherished communities, emptied my energy / bank account / sense of belonging and left me adrift.

These decisions deeply hurt although were right and made easier by those who ask for mundane, those who say things then do or don’t do the opposite, those who prefer to stay small and who have yet to develop the courage to develop a sense of responsibility for situations they have created!

It truly was not a good year for others bringing positiveness to my life, however, it was one in which I discovered my own worth… then I added tax!

TED(x) TALK

My TEDx talk is on ted.com—BOOM⁠—what a smile-inducing-discovery and had me adding ‘as featured on ted.com’ to all references on my site!

The talk is flirting with the one-million-views mark so currently working out what to do to recognise this. Sign up in the sidebar to get that notification as will announce it on my blog.

The accompanying Speaking With Purpose book continues to sell in its tens… many purchasers have gotten in touch afterwards saying nice things and / or asking follow-up questions.

I’m currently story-boarding a ten-part videos series on my three pillar approach and it being applied in different ways, so again stay tuned to that in the first half of the new year via this blog.

FEATURES

Was quadruply-thrilled to be invited to participate / featured in the following podcasts:

The Subtle Art of Public Speaking | Stage, Page & Screen Podcast

Digby Scott, Dig Deeper Podcast | Translation, Narration, Curation and Host Leadership

Is Creativity Just A Catchphrase? | Finding Creativity Podcast

Deconstructing My TEDx Talk | A Critique Via The GhostRanch Podcast

BLOGGED

Posts this year:

To ensure you don’t miss a thing subscribe and can get an email every time I post a blog:

RETURN(S)

…back to Cymru Wales for two extended periods.

…back to the hunger building to be creative (with others).

…back in England for a quarter-of-the-year-side-quest.

…back to North America for some dancing plus HATCH.

…back in Aotearoa New Zealand rediscovering whanau.

…back to freelancing and meeting folks to explore collabs.

…back for new future possibilities with blank pieces of paper (see 2025 below)!

ONLINE COURSE REDO DECISION

Decided not to develop this out further after asking and gaining feedback from the community. After chalking up a healthy five-figure return which sustained me through the lean-years of post-Covid-times, will now be folding the lessons and insights into the following:

NEW SERVICE

planes trains and automobiles gif - john candy with a casio

Launched publicly after a successful pilot with a multi-national (who promptly ordered a second cohort plus now in talks for future ones in 2025), the Amplifying Narrative Impact service is a tailored leadership learning experience, aimed at greatly improving storytelling techniques and oratory skills, as well as enhancing the capability to deliver exceptional showcase presentations across diverse fields.

Here are some quotes from those who have participated:

“I appreciated the three pronged approach that DK showed us, backed by the wealth of experience he brings to the training. Public speaking is such an art and with practice and the right training, can be a powerful tool for delivering story and message.”

“This course provided me with the mindset, toolsets and experience/feedback to confidently approach speaking in a modern context. The quotes inspired me, the challenges felt relevant and the peer support (in addition to expert feedback) helped me develop quickly.”

“Overall, the entire course was wonderful. Really appreciate the guidance provided by DK. It was also a great opportunity to network and build connections with colleagues across the globe, with such diverse backgrounds and areas of work expertise.”

“Thank you for an amazing few weeks. I learned so much, i was pushed out of my comfort zone, and I’m looking forward to applying these techniques to my work.”

“DK and the overall training have been extremely professional, appropriately safe and fun. I enjoyed it plenty and learned a lot! Judging this as a highly impactful and worthwhile investment into the success of our people and with it our company at scale. I was and am grateful for the chance to participate in this first cohort.”

“I really enjoyed this program and am so glad we piloted it with the group we had. There was community within the cohort and I look forward to working alongside a powerful group of speakers. Thank you DK for sharing your brilliance. Your coaching and guidance was supportive and affirming, and you created a space that encouraged respect for the craft. Appreciate you!”

If you care about having your leaders internally gain crucial oratory / communication skills then this is something to check out and then get in touch to explore booking.

SPEAKER COACHING

Always a joy to sit and collaborate with others on their voice and story, plus how they will share that with the world.

As I continue to hone my speaker coaching skills I’m finding a lot more fluidity in approaches I’m taking, informed by the accrued years of practice, an intuition stemming from the thousands of individuals I can now say I’ve interacted with. And even so, I continue to learn constantly and constantly reevaluate the limits of my own understanding in this discipline.

Along with the 1-2-1’s (which now includes an Olympian in my alumni of clients), I continue to offer speaker coaching through my established half/full day ‘purposeful storytelling’ masterclass sessions (foundation and advanced options available), again, get in touch for more info.

CREATIVE PRODUCING

john travolta confused gif - pulp fiction

Apart from some pro-bono and friend-consulting in this space have done very little this year. Although triple-keen to explore briefs from those looking to gather humans in one room for ‘delicious learning experiences’⁠—check out my pedigree and lets talk.

STORIES

Have an outline of a historical fiction story and another sci-fi trilogy I’d like to work on in the first half of 2025. Have decided against the other book idea at the moment (detailed in last years update and which aligns to a launch of a new business venture which I’m still researching and curating ideas around).

SOCIAL MEDIA

Since I stopped tweetmailing the platform continues to descend further into the pile of fiery turds described.

I did sign up for Mastodon and Bluesky although not interested in diverting my time from other things to cultivate a following on there or diluting my curative / creative efforts.

Tumblr has become my go-back-to curation platform and have enjoyed the interesting things it thinks I should be interested in, but again, spend no time on there shaping the feeds and not using it beyond feeding my monthly digital breadcrumbs posts.

As where I get my information and stimulation from, am going back to the more ‘traditional’ blogs and online communities like Reddit plus personal newsletters (especially ones with RSS feeds I can pull into my reader).

For that reason LinkedIn holds less and less interest as it continue to go the way of all algorithmic platforms (I’d honestly pay the premium option if it trusted us to be adults and I could just get the updates of those in my network).

So for now the focus will be blogging and creating here (again, sign-up in the sidebar please).

2025

the simpsons - i will not fight the future gif

I’m hungry to find the edges of things, to build, rebuild, to collaborate, to Shake The Dust, plus orient towards those who are principle-led and celebrate / nurture creative actioneers.

For this reason I’m taking the opportunity to return to Aotearoa New Zealand (for at least six months) and in terms of future travels, unless something radical and wonderful occurs, will be staying put for a while as really need to ‘land’ somewhere to counter the adrift-ness being felt deeply.

So what about you? Where do you find yourself at the beginning of the new calendar year? How can I serve / add value in your adventures in 2025? And if nothing else, please feel me sending you light:

WATCH my TEDx talk, the public speaking lesson you never had, BUY the companion Speaking With Purpose book, PLUS check out the newly launch 'Mundane Series'.

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