The KellyGram

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PAINT WORD PICTURES IN YOUR STORIES!

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The art of storytelling includes the ability to paint word pictures that help make your stories come alive. I once heard Patricia Fripp, past president of the National Speakers Association, offer this advice: "Make every word a picture word," she said.

To illustrate her point, she recited the answer she got from a scientist, when she’d asked him to define his profession: "It’s like doing a jigsaw puzzle in a snowstorm at night, with some pieces missing, and with no idea what the finished picture looks like."

Now, she could have checked her dictionary and found scientist defined as: "an expert in science, especially one of the physical or natural sciences." Oh, really? Instead, by using picture words, her scientist friend painted a perfect word picture of his profession.

I was reminded of that advice while reading an article in the September 14, 2009 issue of FORTUNE. Headlined "iPhone Overload," the article, by Jon Forst, reported on a large gathering held earlier this year in Austin, Texas. It seems so many of the attendees were using their iPhones simultaneously that voice and data services all but came to a halt, which sent AT&T scrambling to bring in additional equipment to handle the overload.

Forst described smartphones as "double-edged swords for phone operators." While they generate substantial revenues for these companies, they can also clog networks when they’re being used simultaneously by large numbers of people in one location.

Here’s the word picture Forst painted: "Now the wireless providers hawking those Internet-enabled mobile devices are experiencing the digital equivalent of being proprietors of an all-you-can-eat buffet: It seems like the perfect business until the sumo wrestlers show up."

Another word picture that has remained in my memory bank for several years now was painted by a reporter named Dahlia Lithwick, who was covering the Senate Judiciary Committee hearings on the nomination of John Roberts to the Supreme Court.

While most of the mainstream media covered the hearings in painstaking and often tedious detail, Lithwick wrote: "Roberts is a man long accustomed to answering really hard questions from extremely smart people, suddenly faced with the almost-harder task of answering obvious questions from less-smart people. He finds himself standing in a batting cage with the pitching machine set way too slow."

A jigsaw puzzle in a snowstorm at night; sumo wrestlers at an all-you-can eat buffet; a batting cage with the pitching machine set way too slow: taken out of context, they make no sense, but what great word pictures they paint in our minds when compared with the events being described.

The late rabbi, M. Robert Syme, described words as: "vehicles that can transport us from the drab sands to the dazzling stars." And the famous Welsh poet, Dylan Thomas, wrote at length of his love affair with words, and of "the shape and shade and size and noise of the words as they hummed, strummed, jigged and galloped along."

In your storytelling, go after those picture words, that hum, strum, jig and gallop along, to create word pictures in the minds of your readers and hearers.

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OUR NEW BOOK — FEATURING STORIES OF SUCCESS

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Success! The late Og Mandino called it "a magical word [which] conjures up different but always enticing visions in the minds of all of us."

A magical word indeed, but what exactly is it? A one-time thing, like hitting a home run, scoring a touchdown, or winning a game? Is it a destination? Or a journey? Is there a fixed, clearly marked place called "Success"? Or does it vary from individual to individual?

Does success mean achievement, or fame, or power, or wealth? Who decides when one has become "successful"? Can it be self-conferred? Is it, like beauty, in the eye of the beholder? Can we objectively define it? Or is it a relative thing? Can two people have nearly identical track records and yet one be seen as successful and the other to have failed?

Is success a specific target to aim at, like making a million dollars or becoming the CEO of a large corporation? Can it be clearly seen by everyone?

In my new book: The Best of Success: A Treasury of Inspiration, we explore many of the components of a successful life. Beautifully illustrated in full color and written in conjunction with Mac Anderson, founder and CEO of Simple Truths, LLC, the book is scheduled for release early in December, and will be available on the Simple Truths web site, www.simpletruths.com.

Each of the book’s 25 chapters focuses on one component of success. It begins with a story illustrating that component, followed by about 20 quotations which support it. The stories are of the famous and the obscure, of men and women of various ethnic backgrounds and nationalities, each of whom traveled a different path on the journey to success.

There’s no secret about most of the qualities which contributed to their success in varying degrees: integrity, curiosity, opportunity, generosity, innovation, perseverance — even failure. All are important, but perhaps the most important quality of all is based on a story told more than a half-century ago by a father to his young daughter, who passed it along to me. It’s called simply "Lagniappe."

We’ll share more about The Best of Success in our December issue. It might prove to be the perfect Christmas gift for that family member, friend, colleague or client who already has "just about everything."

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SMILE AWHILE

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Just recently, thanks to Audri and Jim Lanford, I learned the story of Emilio Onra, and of his remarkable feat one long-ago November. The Lanfords distribute an email message every day, containing an inspirational quotation, accompanied by a brief story of a rare and little-known event or activity which took place on that date in history.

The message is titled "Your Inspirational Quote," and free subscriptions are available by contacting yourinspiration@famous-quotes-quotations.com.

Meanwhile, let’s get back to Emilio Onra, whose story you’ve probably never heard.

Once upon a time (on November 21, 1871 to be precise), in the city of London, Onra became the first person ever to be shot out of a cannon. For some undisclosed reason, he accomplished this history-making feat while disguised as a woman. Other details, including how far he was propelled and whether or not he survived, are sketchy at best.

The Lanfords didn’t say any more about it, and I couldn’t find any details on the Interent. One is tempted to speculate that Mr. Onra had gathered the courage to attempt his unprecedented act by first making the rounds of the London pubs, and had managed to — uhh — get loaded.

There hasn’t been much in the news lately about folks being shot from cannons. Perhaps there’s some truth to the rumor that it has become very difficult to find anyone (are you ready?) of Onra’s caliber.

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ODDS AND ENDS

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FUN WITH WORDS

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Here’s the answer to this month's puzzle:

Each of the words listed includes one letter which is not pronounced.

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THE LAST WORD

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"Stories are the creative conversion of life itself into a more powerful, clearer, more meaningful experience. They are the currency of human contact."

(Robert McKee)

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© 2009 by Bob Kelly. All rights reserved.