Public Speaking Super Powers is about both the skill of speaking and the courage and heroism it takes to develop this skill.
When you step up to the lectern, podium or platform, you are taking on a heroic role — whether you like it or not. Speakers command at least a modicum of respect and, at times awe. So choosing to develop this skill also means choosing to become a leader and role model. And with that, comes responsibility.
When I first set out to write this book, I looked for quotes about speaking and heroism for inspiration. Below are the ones I liked the best. Some of the following quotes may make it into the final draft of Public Speaking Super Powers. Regardless, they all speak to the essence of the book and inspire me as I continue on this book’s writing journey.
“The most valuable thing anyone will ever give you is their TIME. Not their money. Remember that.”
– Colin Cunningham
“With great power comes great responsibility!”
– The Narrator in The Amazing Spider-Man
“He who controls others may be powerful, but he who has mastered himself is mightier still”
– Lao Tzu
“There are always three speeches, for every one you actually gave. The one you practiced, the one you gave, and the one you wish you gave.”
– Dale Carnegie
“When you doubt your power, you give power to your doubt”
– Honore de Balzac
“It usually takes me more than three weeks to prepare a good impromptu speech.”
– Mark Twain
“All I want is a warm bed and a kind word and unlimited power.”
– Ashleigh Brilliant, Potshots
“Be sincere; be brief; be seated.”
– Franklin D. Roosevelt
“If you had asked me back in grade school what I wanted to be when I grew up, I would have said my first choice was an actor, but if I couldn’t be that, I’d want to be a superhero.”
– Vin Diesel
“A speech is poetry: cadence, rhythm, imagery, sweep! A speech reminds us that words, like children, have the power to make dance the dullest beanbag of a heart.”
– Peggy Noonan
“I think you just have to appreciate who you are and hopefully they can see what a superhero is about.”
– Lucy Liu
“The eloquent man is he who is no beautiful speaker, but who is inwardly and desperately drunk with a certain belief.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Aspire rather to be a hero than merely appear one.”
– Baltasar Gracian
“Ask yourself, ‘If I had only sixty seconds on the stage, what would I absolutely have to say to get my message across.'”
– Jeff Dewar
“A hero is someone who understands the responsibility that comes with his freedom.”
– Bob Dylan
“Public speaking cannot be exchanged for so much time or money. It cannot be bought or sold; it comes, if it comes at all, as the result of a wisely-directed determination.”
– from The Speaker, Vol. II, No. 1, December 1906
“One must think like a hero to behave like a merely decent human being.”
– May Sarton
“Learning to speak well is, like forming character, a matter of self-discipline and self-culture.”
– The Speaker, Vol. II, No. 1, December 1906
“It’s not who I am underneath, it is what I do that defines me.”
– Batman
“Heroes don’t accept the world the way it is. They fight it.”
– Christian Kane as Lindsey McDonald to David Boreanaz as Angel, in the episode “Underneath” of the TV series Angel