How to tell better stories | Matthew Dicks (Storyworthy)
Matthew Dix, author of Storyworthy and a 59-time Moth Story Slam winner, shares tactical advice on how to tell better stories in life and work. He emphasizes centering stories around a five-second moment of transformation, building engagement through stakes and humor, and developing a personal story bank.
Deep Dive Analysis
19 Topic Outline
Introduction to Storytelling in Business
The Five-Second Moment of Transformation or Realization
Starting Stories at the End
The Universal Appeal of Change in Storytelling
The 'Dinner Test' for Authentic Storytelling
Why Stories Must Be Personal and Vulnerable
Avoiding Common Storytelling Pitfalls (e.g., Vacation Stories)
Building Stakes and Surprise into Stories
Benefits of Storytelling in Business Contexts
Applying Personal Stories to Business Challenges
Using a Personal Interest Inventory for Relatability
Four Ways to Keep an Audience Engaged
Strategies for Incorporating Humor in Business Stories
The 'Speaking with Adjacency' Method for Business Storytelling
The 'Homework for Life' Practice for Story Generation
Practical Steps for Starting 'Homework for Life'
Overcoming Nervousness in Public Speaking
The Transformative Power of Saying Yes
Lightning Round Insights
6 Key Concepts
Five-Second Moment
A singular moment of transformation (changing who you are) or realization (changing what you think) that forms the core of every good story. The story's purpose is to bring this moment to clarity for the audience.
Dinner Test
A guideline for storytelling suggesting that a formal story should be a slightly elevated version of what you'd tell someone at dinner, avoiding artificial performance elements like unattributed dialogue or starting with sounds.
Stakes
Elements in a story that make the audience worry, wonder, or hope for the storyteller, company, or product. They are crucial for maintaining audience engagement and should build continually throughout the narrative.
Personal Interest Inventory
A strategic list of personal details, experiences, or characteristics that an individual can subtly weave into their communication to create deeper, more intense connections with an audience, making them more relatable than a 'corporate monolith'.
Speaking with Adjacency
A storytelling technique where instead of matching content directly to content, you match a story's theme, meaning, or message to the topic you want to convey. This creates a powerful 'snap' of realization for the audience when they connect the seemingly unrelated story to the main point.
Homework for Life
A daily practice of reflecting on your day to find one moment worth remembering or telling as a story and writing it down. This practice develops a 'storytelling lens,' helps recover lost time, reveals life patterns, and generates an endless supply of story material.
12 Questions Answered
It's a singular moment of transformation or realization that is at the heart of every good story, and the narrative's purpose is to bring this moment to the greatest clarity for the audience.
For true stories, start at the end, as knowing the ultimate moment of change or realization informs everything and allows the story to be framed around two opposing moments in time.
A story centered on change has universal appeal, allowing the audience to connect emotionally with the narrative even if the specific content is unrelated to their own experiences.
The 'dinner test' means a story should be told in a natural, slightly elevated way, similar to how you'd speak at a dinner party, avoiding artificial performance elements like unattributed dialogue or sound effects.
Telling your own story allows for vulnerability and genuine self-revelation, which is crucial for connecting with an audience, whereas telling someone else's story often feels like fiction and lacks personal stakes.
Incorporate personal stories, use humor, build stakes, and create moments of surprise and suspense, as people remember imagery and human connection more than facts, statistics, or pie charts.
Use techniques like planting an 'elephant' (an immediate big worry), using a 'backpack' (sharing your plan), dropping 'breadcrumbs' (hints), employing an 'hourglass' (slowing time during a crucial moment), and using a 'crystal ball' (predicting a future, even a false one).
Two simple strategies are using nostalgia (e.g., contrasting past and present work methods) and the 'one of these things is not like the other' technique (presenting two expected items followed by one unexpected, funny item).
It's a technique where you don't match content to content, but rather match a story's theme, meaning, or message to the business topic you want to convey, creating a powerful and memorable connection for the audience.
'Homework for Life' is a daily practice of identifying and recording one memorable moment from your day. It helps you develop a storytelling lens, recover lost time, observe patterns in your life, and build an endless supply of personal stories.
Understand that most nervousness occurs before speaking, not during. Prepare by recording and passively listening to your talk until it seeps into your memory, and actively practice transitions between sections.
Saying 'yes' prevents you from presumptuously judging opportunities before experiencing them, can lead to extraordinary and unexpected chains of events, and allows you to discover what truly is or isn't for you.
34 Actionable Insights
1. Speak in Story to Be Remembered
Tell stories in business and life, as minds are designed to remember imagery and narratives, not just facts or statistics. This ensures you are memorable and avoid being forgotten in a world of forgettable communication.
2. Center Stories on a 5-Second Moment
Identify a single, brief moment of change (transformation or realization) as the core of your story. This moment provides clarity and allows the audience to experience the change with the storyteller, making the story resonate.
3. Start Storytelling at the End
Before telling a true story, identify its ‘five-second moment’ of change, as knowing the end helps shape the entire narrative. This ensures you have something important to say and helps structure the story effectively, with a clear beginning and end in opposition.
4. Ensure Universal Appeal Through Change
Focus your stories on moments of change or transformation. Change has universal appeal, allowing a broader audience to connect emotionally with your story, even if the specific content isn’t directly relevant to them.
5. Tell Your Own Stories
Center your stories on your own experiences, even if they involve others, by focusing on how their experiences impacted you. This allows you to express vulnerability and share your heart and mind, which helps the audience connect with you more deeply.
6. Apply the “Dinner Test”
When telling a story, ensure it sounds natural and conversational, like something you’d share at a dinner party (slightly elevated). This helps avoid unnatural performance art elements and makes your communication more authentic and engaging.
7. Start as Close to End
Begin your story at the latest possible point, focusing directly on the moment leading up to the core change or realization. This keeps the story concise and impactful, avoiding unnecessary context and immediately drawing the audience into the most relevant part.
8. Start Every Story with Location, Action
Begin your stories by immediately establishing a specific location and describing an action taking place there. Location activates the audience’s imagination, and immediate action signals that a story is beginning, capturing attention and creating space for you to speak.
9. Continuously Build Story Stakes
Introduce elements that make the audience wonder, worry, or hope for the storyteller throughout the narrative, rather than front-loading all the stakes. This keeps the audience engaged and listening, constantly anticipating what will happen next.
10. Use “Elephant” to Hook Audience
Start your story with an immediate, compelling event or situation that clearly establishes something is at stake. This immediately grabs the audience’s attention and makes them wonder what will happen next, even if it’s not the central plot.
11. Use “Backpack” to Share Hopes
Clearly state your character’s (or company’s) plan or goal early in the story. This allows the audience to invest in your aspirations and feel the stakes when the plan encounters difficulties.
12. Use “Breadcrumbs” to Hint
Strategically drop subtle hints or details that suggest future developments without revealing the full picture. This creates anticipation and keeps the audience wondering how these hints will eventually connect to the story’s resolution.
13. Use “Hourglass” to Slow Down
When approaching a pivotal moment of discovery or climax, deliberately slow down the narrative and add rich details. This builds tension and keeps the audience on the edge of their seat, prolonging their anticipation for the outcome.
14. Use “Crystal Ball” for Stakes
Describe a potential (even if not actual) future outcome, especially a negative one, to heighten the audience’s concern. This creates a sense of worry and increases the perceived stakes for the storyteller or situation.
15. Aim for Surprising, Inevitable Endings
Structure your story so that the conclusion, while surprising, feels perfectly logical and unavoidable in retrospect due to earlier, subtly placed information. This delivers the most satisfying and impactful experience for the audience.
16. Use Surprise, Suspense, Humor
Actively incorporate elements of surprise, suspense, and humor into your business communications and stories. These elements are crucial for holding an audience’s attention, making your message more engaging and memorable.
17. Dare to Be Funny
Be willing to take calculated risks by incorporating humor into your presentations, even if it feels uncomfortable or different from others. Humor is a powerful differentiator that can make you stand out and connect with an audience more effectively.
18. Use Nostalgia for Humor
Leverage nostalgia by referencing past technologies, trends, or societal norms when introducing new products or concepts. This can generate humor, make your message relatable, and subtly demonstrate your deep understanding and expertise.
19. “One of These Things” Humor
Create humor by presenting a series of three items, where two are expected or similar, and the third is unexpectedly different. This simple comedic structure can effectively generate laughs and highlight contrasts in a memorable way.
20. Become a “Brick Builder”
Proactively collect and refine a bank of personal stories that can be adapted and deployed for various business contexts. This approach makes you a better, more self-sufficient storyteller, rather than just seeking stories to solve immediate problems.
21. Personalize Business Narratives
Find strategic ways to insert personal anecdotes or elements of your own life into business presentations and narratives. This humanizes your message, makes you more relatable, and fosters deeper connections with your audience, making your communication more memorable.
22. Develop a “Personal Interest Inventory”
Identify aspects of your personal life (e.g., married, hobbies, unique experiences) that could create connection points with others. Knowing these ‘inventory items’ allows you to strategically weave them into conversations or presentations, making you more memorable and relatable.
23. Answer Questions with Personal Touches
When asked a question, try to incorporate a relevant personal detail or aspect of your ‘personal interest inventory’ into your answer. This helps reveal your personality and creates connection opportunities without making the conversation solely about yourself.
24. Match Story Themes, Not Content
When using a story to illustrate a business point, focus on finding a story that aligns with the theme, meaning, or message you want to convey, rather than direct content. This ‘speaking with adjacency’ creates a powerful ‘snap’ moment of realization for the audience.
25. Avoid Most Vacation Stories
Refrain from recounting entire vacations unless a specific, transformative ‘five-second moment’ occurred during them. Most vacation stories lack a central point of change and are often perceived as self-indulgent, failing to engage the audience.
26. Implement “Homework for Life” Daily
Every day, record at least one moment that touched your heart or mind, using a simple spreadsheet (date + brief description). This habit trains your brain to recognize potential stories, builds an endless bank of material, recovers lost time, and reveals life patterns.
27. Record Moments Throughout Day
Don’t wait until the end of the day; capture potential ‘Homework for Life’ moments as they happen using your phone or laptop. This prevents forgetting valuable details or observations that occur throughout the day, ensuring a richer collection of moments.
28. Practice by Listening to Yourself
Record yourself telling your story or giving your talk and listen to it repeatedly, even while doing other tasks. This helps the material sink into your memory, making it easier to recall and deliver naturally, reducing reliance on memorization.
29. Focus on Memorizing Transitions
When practicing, pay special attention to the transitions between different sections or scenes of your story/talk. Mastering transitions helps maintain flow and confidence, as forgetting these points is a common source of nervousness.
30. Avoid Word-for-Word Memorization
Instead of memorizing your talk verbatim, aim to remember key points, themes, and transitions. Memorization can lead to increased anxiety and a stilted delivery; understanding the flow allows for more natural and adaptable speaking.
31. Say “Yes” to Opportunities
Embrace opportunities, even if they seem daunting or undesirable, with the understanding that you can always opt out later. Saying ‘yes’ opens doors to unexpected, extraordinary experiences and growth, challenging preconceived notions and leading to new paths.
32. Confront Things That Scare You
Actively pursue opportunities or challenges that induce fear or discomfort. These experiences often lead to the most significant personal growth and valuable outcomes.
33. Cultivate a Positive Mental Attitude
Consciously choose to frame your experiences and approach life with a positive mental attitude. This mindset is presented as a key to success and significantly influences how you perceive and navigate life’s challenges.
34. Practice Active Listening, Encourage Stories
Actively listen to others and create opportunities for them to share their own stories, especially when they hint at wanting to share. This fosters connection, enriches conversations, and creates a more storytelling-friendly environment.
8 Key Quotes
The risk you take if you're not telling stories is that you will be forgotten. 100% you will be forgotten.
Matthew Dicks
Essentially, a story is about these two moments in time, a beginning and an end, and they are operating in opposition to each other.
Matthew Dicks
The shortest version of every story is the best version of every story. Starting as close to the end of a story is always the best place to begin.
Matthew Dicks
I assume all the time, 100% of the time, that no one wants to hear anything I have to say. And so I am relentless in my attempt to get the audience to be constantly wondering what the next sentence is.
Matthew Dicks
People don't want to hear spokespeople present information. They want to hear human beings connect with you and then offer you something that perhaps will have value.
Matthew Dicks
Every day that you don't do homework for life is a day that is going to be lost to you forever.
Matthew Dicks
A positive mental attitude will be your key to success.
Matthew Dicks (quoting his 4th grade teacher)
The cave you fear contains the treasure you seek.
Matthew Dicks (quoting someone else)
3 Protocols
Homework for Life
Matthew Dicks- Every day before bed, look back on the day and find one moment that would have been worth telling as a story.
- Write down this moment in a two-column spreadsheet (date and a brief description, fitting within the length of a computer screen).
- Optionally, track moments throughout the day (e.g., at lunchtime, after work, in the evening) to capture them before they are forgotten.
- Mark recovered memories from the past as 'MEMORY' to distinguish them from daily entries.
Preparing for a Talk or Presentation
Matthew Dicks- Practice your talk or pitch.
- Record your talk and listen to it passively (e.g., while grocery shopping or doing chores) to allow the content to 'seep into your soul'.
- Actively listen to your recording, playing a game where you identify the next transition or topic you need to cover.
- If you struggle with a transition, create a mnemonic or specific memorization cue for that point.
- Avoid memorizing the entire talk word-for-word; instead, remember the sequence of scenes or sections.
Starting a Story Effectively
Matthew Dicks- Begin with a clear location to activate the audience's imagination (e.g., 'I'm standing in the kitchen...').
- Immediately follow with action, indicating that something is happening right away (e.g., '...and I'm doing a thing').