Corporate HallucinationsBusting the bottleneckers

In the sober light of day on Sunday, I have to say the speech went pretty well. However, it was a little unnerving, because not everybody in the audience was into it.

See, I’m used to speaking to communicators, and they are almost always into what I’m saying. But in this audience of 160 non-communicators, not everyone was into it. In fact, there were exactly 37 people who had absolutely no interest in what I was saying.

How do I know? Because I’m tremendously insecure, and I crave audience reaction like a crack addict craves the pipe … and I know those 37 people just weren’t paying attention. How could I tell? Because when you’re a speaker, you know that certain lines are going to get a laugh. You know this because they have gotten a laugh the last 247 times you have said them, in a row. Without fail. Because they’re funny.

So every time I would hit one of those lines, I would check the people I didn’t think were paying attention … and sure enough, each time I got nothing. Not a smile, not a chuckle, not a lifting of a lip. So I know they weren’t paying attention.