Going naked (image credit).
The theme for The Project 16 this year was Creativity in Business and Beyond. Hosted at Auckland University of Technology, the speaker lineup was superb along with the topics tackled, plus insights shared.
After weeks of reflection on the topic I settled on the idea that creativity is an act of vulnerability. With this in mind, it was my intention to illustrate and demonstrate this rather than just talk about it. I decided to ‘go naked’ and present with no notes, slides or cheeky little stuff written on my arms / hands.
Listen to my ten minutes talk:
The silence after I am introduced by my brilliant pal Michelle Dickinson aka nanogirl is intentional—keep listening.
I had several stories to tell to demonstrate my point although the final three were chosen minutes before I went on to ensure they complimented and did not duplicate existing points made by the previous speakers. It was everything you’re taught not to do as a speaker and as you’ve heard, a mistake was made, and the final story was plucked from the recesses of the brain.
Lessons have been learned and there’s a hunger to explore more opportunities to experience this method and a desire to be able to use it more confidently. HUGE thanks to The Project 16 for allowing me to share and participate plus respect to my fellow speakers as gained so much from their talks as well.
“DK is an early adopter of new trends, technologies and techniques as well as a social risk-taker. As a presenter at this years AUT Project 2016, DK gave a very insightful talk about vulnerability, purposely w/o any audio-visual media support. DK’s presentation underscored how difficult it is to put oneself out there clearly, and with purpose, in order to achieve one’s objectives while simultaneously generating proactive outcomes. DK’s talk was most inspirational and I’d recommend him as a speaker at other conferences or events where an outlier perspective would help an audience better understand traditional ideas by stepping out of their usual day-to-day point of view.”
Hal Josephson, Program Chair for Project16
Special thanks to Hal for the invite to speak plus appreciation to BizDojo for the permission / allowance.
Really interesting topic. Ive been taking on something i read in Kristin Linklater( master voice teacher) book …that is discovering that in vulnerability is your strength ( particularly relating to performing) . Its very challenging. Would be interesting to talk about.
Thanks for your comment Ruth – believe me, was very challenging :-)
There’s the obvious Brene Brown stuff on vulnerability as well and was hoping I was offering a slightly different take on it all – keen to chat when I next see you though and learn more from you.
Really like the concept and the approach you took. Vulnerability is a bit of a theme around me personally at the moment and i know it is certainly of interest to others. There was a presentation last week in Wellington at the School of Philosophy based on Brené Browns book – Daring Greatly (the talk was fairly poor and got more out of the Ted talk which I had previously viewed).
There is a real power within allowing ourselves to be vulnerable specifically in relation to the creative process and even more specific to getting in to flow states, whereby we manifest and express ourselves authentically from the deepest part of our being.
I genuinely believe and feel if the above was the case and more people allowed themselves to be vulnerable daily and in turn tuned in to their authentic selves they would find that they would potentially be moving in to a line of service that is very different than the one they are in now…all part of the journey.
Just my personal perspective and in reality a projection of my own reflections of myself. Thanks for sharing DK
Always great to your thoughts Neil – thanks for taking the time to craft / share – read with nodding head and further appreciation of the value you add in the world. Thank you my friend!