Reflections for video #1

- Interview reflection

1. What is the essential story behind the piece you created?

I was on a search for a personal development physical technique that workshop participants could safely use to feel the rush of accomplishment. I felt that the techniques that most motivational gurus were using were dangerous and appealed mostly to the male energy within a person. I wanted something more feminine that would still kept the participant actively engaged and that was difficult enough to do that the participant would feel a great sense of accomplishment in its completion.

2. What was your purpose in creating this piece of new media narrative? Do you feel you were successful in communicating your purpose?

The purpose of this new media narrative was personal as well as a motivation for other coaches. I was proud of myself for having accomplished the fork and spoon bending and wanted an opportunity to show off my prowess. I also wanted to encourage other female personal development coaches to continue to search for the perfect fit within their presentations and not be swayed by what was popular at the moment.  I feel that I successfully communicated that I was proud of my accomplishment, but not so sure that one video by itself can increase people’s confidence enough for them to go against the popular convention of using crazy stunts to hype up their events.

3. Who was your audience? Do you feel you were successful in reaching your audience?

My audience was friends, family and colleagues. My friends and family thought the video was cute. My colleagues doubted that I actually bent the spoons. They wanted a repeat performance, which I was glad to do, but did not capture on video. I think that the length of time it took for the first bending to be successful makes for a boring video and you don’t really know when the spoon will buckle, so it is difficult to have patience to show the process. Also, there are many videos on you tube debunking the spoon bending as a hoax since most people who video themselves are illusionists. My audience has been hand selected, so there aren’t a lot of trackable views for the video. I haven’t made the video public because I am featured in the video and don’t have on any make-up and my hair isn’t perfect, so I am a bit self-conscious about showing it.

4. Why did you use your particular approach to media production and media selection? Were you successful?

I chose to use photos of popular gurus and their techniques so my audience could relate the familiar. Some of the people have gone through these same experiences and/or have sat in the audience listening to those gurus. I have had conversations with many people who have said they were afraid to try the crazy stunt and wondered if they missed out on any life breakthroughs. I think that trying to video myself bending a spoon in real time would not translate the same drama as a board being broken or walking on fire, so it is a bit of a challenge. I am hoping that actually seeing the before and after pictures of the fork and the spoon will motivate people to want to check it out further.

5. What did you learn during the process of crafting your media piece that you can use in creating future new media narrative?

I learned that I need to feel confident about the photos of myself that I put inside of the videos because it takes so much time to create them, it isn’t worth it to then sit on the finished product and not circulate it because of something I could’ve taken care of in pre-production. I also realize that there are more applications of the finished video than I may have thought of when I originally was creating the video. Again, the amount of effort required to create the product deserves to be honored by carefully choosing what will work the first time through. There isn’t always a budget (time or money) to do a second pass at a project.

Reflections for video #2

Interview reflection

1. What is the essential story behind the piece you created?

The story behind the piece is a mixture of my story and the story of past clients who used the experience of divorce to become stronger and help other women. The fictional character, Shari woke up one morning to the pain of finding out that her marriage was over. She kept focusing on what went wrong and couldn’t find any answers. Then she began to focus on healing herself, and that turned out to be an achievable goal. In the process she found her inner strength and a story to inspire other women to honor themselves and not be defined by a man. She learned that she could trust again, not just other people, but herself.

2. What was your purpose in creating this piece of new media narrative? Do you feel you were successful in communicating your purpose?

This piece was created as an example for my audience, motivational speakers, to see what the story portion of the speech might look like. I wrote a book about life lessons that we endure and encourage speakers to use it to anchor their speech. The purpose of the video was to use Shari’s choice of life lesson – Trust – to tell her story as part of a motivational speech. The balance of the speech will be in another video. I feel I successfully communicated my purpose because the piece is one in a series and enables the potential speakers to visualize their own PowerPoint presentation based on the story map I created.

3. Who was your audience? Do you feel you were successful in reaching your audience?

My audience was single moms who successfully overcame the challenges of being a single parent, dealing with depression, frustration, domestic abuse and temptation to pack it all in and who were willing to share their story to motivate single moms in domestic abuse shelters. I feel I was successful in reaching my audience because I anticipated needing to coach each speaker one-on-one and to have to edit their speeches, but I didn’t do any of that. The women created powerful speeches based on my instructional videos and completing their worksheets. This was a vast improvement over the previous instructional video and worksheets I had used which left many questions in the minds of the would-be speakers.

This technique made it easy for non-writers, to write and discover they have the ability to write their story and to share it with oral narration.

The video and PowerPoint of one of the speakers is below. I have received permission from her to use it in this course to show how I’ve applied the learning tools in this course. The instructional video is found here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WrX1ip_3uK4

4. Why did you use your particular approach to media production and media selection? Were you successful?

I used some clip art supplemented with stock photos to make the story appear more real. The clip art and the cheesy sound effects were to make this heavy topic a little bit lighter. The music at the beginning and then end add some polish to the media piece. I wanted to make sure there was some relatable visuals such as the photo of the “Friends” cast. I used a lot of dissolves since the character experienced a dissolution of her marriage and had to dissolve past beliefs. One of the techniques I will try next time is slide transitions to emphasize the turn in the story. I may also use some audio to tie together some emotion with the visual and the narrative inflection.

5. What did you learn during the process of crafting your media piece that you can use in creating future new media narrative?

I learned the timing it takes to complete the media narrative. I was scheduling 1 hour per minute of final video. However, it is taking more like 3 hours per minute of video.

Arranging the story map table is key to organizing my time. I identified the pictures I would use, located them and then pasted them into the table. When I worked on the PowerPoint presentation, sometimes it was easier just to cut and paste the images directly from the table. Also, I could see where there were gaps in the slides and where I could move pictures around or repeat pictures. Sometimes I would start to get too wordy, and it was good to refer back to the table for guidance.

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Speaker’s PowerPoint is located on Google docs at: https://docs.google.com/present/edit?id=0AZi5CdZ1o8j9ZGZ3d2Rrcm1fMTQ0Zzdmdng5Y2I&hl=en&authkey=CPifncMN

Video of speaker’s presentation:

Part 1 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nhUUm95l9HU

Part 2 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0u8mN2ma1M

Support request video commercial

I have been applying the information I learned in this course to the work I do in my non-profit organization. I will present in my paper some of the results. Below is my first 1 minute video to promote our upcoming fundraiser.

I created a free account at animoto.com and chose the animoto original template. I used one of their videos for the opening flower sequence, uploaded my pictures, used their text editor for the captions and used their music. I made several videos because I had too many pictures for the template to use and each video seemed to arrange the images differently and apply various effects. I then uploaded the videos to Camtasia and cut and pasted the ones I liked and added additional call outs to impose the url of our organization wherever there was dead space. I separated the audio and video so I could loop the audio track. The 30 second animoto video got extended into a 1 minute commercial.

Any feedback is welcome.

New Media Narrative Project #2

Learning To Trust Video:

Learning to Trust

This is the script and the story map for my video - Learning to Trust. The video is the story of a fictitious speaker sharing how she learned to trust after divorce. I will use this video in my training materials as an example of writing a story that will be delivered inside of a motivational speech.

I run a non-profit organization and I train successful single moms (current and former) to tell their story to empower others. I created a story-writing outline to teach my speakers how to create their story within their speech and built a multi-media training program around it, based on information I learned in this course. Earlier this month, my speakers utilized my training videos. They downloaded the information and wrote their speeches. They each delivered their speech in front of 30 participants who are single moms living in a domestic abuse shelter. I was thrilled that i didn't have to do much individual coaching. They were able to follow the training instructions and get such great results!

I will post some of the video footage of the workshops and post one of the completed worksheets of a speaker who did quite well.  The feedback from the participants and the staff was phenomonal.  Thank you Jason, Thank you Fielding!  I am living my dream!
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Script:

At one time in my life, I would never have believed I’d be able to identify with the idea of trust being liberating. It seemed that trust continued to keep me going down the path of confinement and imprisonment... You see, 3 years ago, I was happily married, or so it seemed.

One day, I woke up and the sky was blue, the birds were singing and everything seemed like my normal paradise. But things were NOT the same.

This was the day that my husband decided he was leaving. Leaving me. Leaving us. Leaving the past we had created. Leaving the dreams we had planned to create.

He no longer loved me. He was unhappy. He wanted out.

The sky was still blue. The birds were still singing. Didn’t they know that paradise had just shattered? I felt alone, confused, angry and betrayed.

Because of that moment, my life changed forever. I stopped trusting what people said. I started to doubt myself. I couldn’t stop playing the movie, in-my-head, of our 20 years together, wondering what went wrong. I became obsessed. All I could think about was, “Why me?”

Because of this obsession, I started attending personal development workshops and reading personal development books, to get other people’s take on my situation. They had no answers for me.

So I continued to spiral into deeper confusion until I hit rock bottom. I wasn’t doing drugs, or anything that would appear to be self-destructive, but I was not honoring myself. I was not celebrating who I really was, without being attached to “my man”. I got sick of looking at the pitiful person in the mirror.

Because I realized that I needed to pull myself up, out of the quagmire of disgusting pity, but because it was too heavy to do alone, I reached out. I went through more personal development programs, but this time to work on myself, not on my situation.

When I started to focus on my own growth, my life started to expand. I attracted more people who cared about the things I cared about and who shared my values. I asked myself, “is it worth it to think small and live small by staying in anger and distrust?” The results of my action made me sure that the answer was “no”. “Was it worth it to take a chance on myself, and grow in my relationships?” “Did I deserve to trust myself and others?”  The answer, to these questions, was “yes”. So I committed to forgive myself for trusting the wrong people in the past, and to trust I’d make better decisions in the future.

I hope that you too, will take the journey down the road of self-trust. As you can see by my story, I learned that when you trust yourself, you expand your life. I hope my speech has motivated you to ask YOURSELF if you deserve to have an expanded life. Ask yourself the questions that I shared.

“I would like us to empower one another at this time. Please stand and repeat after me…”

Trust:  I know that each person I connect with intends the highest good for all. We are all in this together.

Story board:

Content:	Media
It seemed that trust continued to keep me going down the path of confinement and imprisonment... You see, 3 years ago, I was happily married, or so it seemed.	Photos of Shari behind bars Image of happily married couple, then it breaks in two and dissolves
One day, I woke up and the sky was blue, the birds were singing and everything seemed like my normal paradise.	Picture of bird singing, picture of palm trees
I felt alone, confused, angry and betrayed.	Picture of Shari looking angry with rain cloud over her head
I became obsessed.	"Why Me?"  graphic
I started attending personal development workshops and reading personal development books, to get other people’s take on my situation.	Picture of self-help books, Picture of Shari looking confused
I hit rock bottom.	Picture of someone lying destitute in an alley. Animate it so it spirals into the frame.
I went through more personal development programs, but this time to work on myself, not on my situation.	Music that sounds ethereal.
I attracted more people who cared about the things I cared about and who shared my values.	Have a list of Shari’s values float into the screen.
the answer was “no”.	Animate  “No”
“Was it worth it to take a chance on myself, and grow in my relationships?” “Did I deserve to trust myself and others?”	Have the questions come in from different directions
The answer, to these questions, was “yes”	Animate “yes” so it grows and is multiple colors Add triumphant music
So I committed to forgive myself for trusting the wrong people in the past, and to trust I’d make better decisions in the future.	Alternate the words, forgive and Trust so it looks like a flashing light.
I learned that when you trust yourself, you expand your life.	“Trust can be so liberating.” Dr. Neen (put the life lesson on slide and have it expand)
I hope my speech has motivated you to ask YOURSELF if you deserve to have an expanded life.	Picture of Shari with prison bars dissolving. Put a flower or something pretty under her chin.
“I would like us to empower one another at this time. Please stand and repeat after me…”	Trust:  I know that each person I connect with intends the highest good for all. We are all in this together.

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Story Map
I created my own Story Map process. I created an instructional video for completion of this worksheet. This is what the successful single mom speakers used to create their speeches delivered at the shelter earlier this month.

Dr. Neen’s 7-Part Story Worksheet

Backstory:

Goal:

Conflict:

Aha Moment:

Action:

Result:

Life Lesson:

Dr. Neen’s 7-Part Story Worksheet - Shari's Example

Backstory:

“At one time in my life, I would never have believed I’d be able to identify with the idea of trust being liberating. It seemed it continued to keep me going down the path of confinement and imprisonment...

You see, 3 years ago, I was happily married, or so it seemed…(her story goes into detail here)

Goal:

·        I want them to take the journey down the road of self-trust.

·        I want them to ask themselves if they deserve to have an expanded life.

·        I want them to believe “YOU have the power to turn fear into trust.”

Conflict:

·        I started to doubt myself

·        I became obsessed with reviewing what went wrong in my relationship

·        I kept pitying myself

·        I kept searching for other people’s opinion of my situation

·        I was not honoring my definition of self

Aha Moment:

·        I looked in the mirror and was sick of the pity party

·        I realized I had to trust myself again

·        I realized I needed support to keep focused on my goal of remembering who I was

Action:

·        Attended personal development programs to work on myself, not on my situation

·        Maintained consistent commitment

·        Created a support system

Result:

·        When I started to focus on my own growth, my life started to expand

·        I attracted more people who cared about the things I cared about and who shared my values. 

·        I learned that when you trust yourself, you expand your life.

So as you can see by my story, I learned that when you trust yourself, you expand your life. I hope my speech has motivated you to ask YOURSELF if you deserve to have an expanded life. Ask yourself the questions that I shared.

Life Lesson:

Shari went through a very bad divorce. She has had to re-learn how to trust people. She resonates with the life lesson Trust.

The statement from the w.o.w. on trust is impactful to her. It is “Trust can be so liberating.”

The Mind Bending Experience

This was an amazing experience for me and is re-shaping how I teach personal development. Enjoy!

mind bending experience story core, story map

Story core:

Problem (tension) –I couldn’t bend the spoon

Transformation – I had to try a different approach than I used for bending the fork

Solution (resolution) – I visualized the end result and then let go of trying. The tip of the spoon folded over

Story Map:

The Platform	Once upon a time Every day	I was frustrated looking for a safe, feminine expression of personal transformation that involved a physical technique. I noticed that personal development gurus were making waves by using dangerous physical techniques to help people with their transformation. Robert Allen helped people break boards that had their challenges written on them.  Tony Robbins had people walking on hot coals. T. Harv Ecker had people breaking arrows by pushing on them with the hollow of their necks. Because of the physicality of those activities, people had to sign hold harmless waivers. I didn’t want my participants to take such a physical risk. I also didn’t want to get sued. So, I started searching for a more feminine expression of personal transformation that involved a physical technique. I started to focus on receiving the answer to this dilemma. Nothing was coming to mind. So I stopped thinking about it.
The catalyst	But one day	Then, one day, a friend of mine told me she would be conducting a spoon bending party.
The consequences	Because of that	I had heard about people bending spoons with their minds and was curious. So I decided to check it out.
		As beginners we had to work our way up to bending with our minds. As a group, we created an energy vortex. We all believed we could focus our energy into heat. We believed that we could transfer that heat to a fork and make it hot enough to be reshaped with our hands.
	Because of that	I successfully bent a fork and twisted it! I repeated it again 4 more times, even without the group energy.
	Because of that	Then, I tried to bend the tip of a spoon. I couldn’t combine the heat of my hand and the force of my hand to bend the spoon the way I bent the fork. I started to get frustrated…
The climax	Until finally	Finally, after an hour of trying the same approach and getting nowhere, I changed my attitude and my approach. I stopped trying to physically bend the spoon with my hand. It was time to start using some of my mind power in a different way. Instead of relying on brute force, I decided to visualize the end result I wanted -  the spoon tip bending over. I focused on that picture in my mind for about 15 minutes, and then started thinking about something else. Suddenly, the tip of the spoon bent gave way under my thumb and bent over like a limp leaf! I yelled out loud, I was so happy!
The resolution	Ever since then And the moral of the story is	Experiencing proof that we can focus our energy for real-time results is powerful! I found a tool that I can use to show people that they can manifest what they visualize.  By focusing on the result I wanted and then letting go, I not only bent a spoon, but I found the physical technique I was searching for!