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Art Fettig’s Monday Morning Memo
October 12, 2009
In This Issue
o Aspiring Speakers
o Say Something Good
o Visit Our Website
o Points To Ponder
o A Little Humor
o Quote of the Week
o To Subscribe
Aspiring Speakers
I can remember the day I heard my first professional speaker giving a talk for our railroad group in Battle Creek, Michigan. His name was Herb True Ph.D. and that same day he put me on his team as a humor writer. That meeting changed my life. Many hundreds of times when I was out on the road giving speeches I was approached by members of the audience and they too had a burning passion to become a professional speaker. What is the secret? Pretty simple, really. Just have a fantastic message that will somehow benefit the members of the audience. Oh yes, if you want to be paid a high fee then you had better be the best speaker in the field on that topic and have a brilliant marketing approach.
Speaking is similar to becoming a successful artist, author, actor, musician, photographer, comedian or even news broadcaster. Many believe they are called but very, very, very few are chosen.
I have always felt that I was blessed…First to meet Herb True that day and then to have the drive to wade through all of those years of rejection as a part-time author and humorist.
Could I make a success of it starting out today? I seriously doubt it. Not with my high-school formal education. Not with the competition that is out there today.
When they started The National Speakers Assn. there were only around three hundred people they could round up who considered themselves “Professional Speakers.” I’ve heard that today there are over a hundred thousand. I believe it.
Of course there are a lot more slots for professional speakers to fill but still the competition is awesome.
So what is my advice to aspiring speakers? Don’t try it unless you absolutely have to. If you figure that you won’t be able to take another breath unless you are out there striving as a speaker go for it…but…don’t quit your day job.
Say Something Good
Mayberry. It is two weeks ago today that I rode in that parade at Mount Airy dressed up in a seersucker “Matlock” jacket and looking so much like Andy that no matter what I said about not being Andy Griffith about 30% of those I visited with refused to accept my denial. Now we are reviewing some video that was shot of the parade and of my stand-up presentations and I can live it all over again at the click of my mouse.
What thrilled me the most were the crowds. This was some kind of very special demonstration and it wasn’t in anger, it was not a protest, it was a celebration of the past and I believe that for many it was a sign of hope for the future of America. Being there surrounded by people with a common bond, that of being fans of Mayberry, made me feel that there really were a lot of God loving, caring, dedicated American people of all creeds and all ages who are not the sort of folks represented in our news broadcasts, our TV shows and our movies today. We still have a lot of good people in this nation. May God bless all America and all our people and keep our troops from harm.
Points To Ponder
You may delay, but time will not. Benjamin Franklin
A Little Humor
The economy is so bad that I got a pre-declined credit card in the mail.
Quote of the Week
He who knows no hardships will know no hardihood. He who faces no calamity will need no courage. Mysterious though it is, the characteristics in human nature which we love best grow in a soil with a strong mixture of troubles. Harry Emerson Fosdick
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