I competed at a Moth StorySLAM in Boston earlier this week.

Finished in second place. Lost by a tenth of a point to the storyteller who went last.

So annoying.

Sadly, I remember the second-place finishes far better than any of my 58 victories.

I'm kind of a jerk in that regard.

But here was a general thought about the stories I heard last night:

Many lacked momentum.

Whether you are telling a story, delivering a keynote, building a marketing deck, teaching a lesson, offering a sermon, toasting newlyweds, or sharing an anecdote over dinner, momentum is essential.

Audiences want a sense that things are moving, changing, and evolving at all times. Hanging onto any one moment for too long can kill a storyteller’s momentum and make their content feel heavy, slow, and possibly, terrifyingly endless.

You want your words to feel like a boulder tumbling down a mountain, relentlessly rushing and spinning and bouncing forward toward a satisfying conclusion.

Not an elephant leisurely plodding over to the waterhole for an afternoon drink.

The former can excite an audience. The latter, at best, annoys them. At worst, they simply stop listening.

Momentum can be achieved in many ways:

The proper crafting of a story and each of its individual scenes so that they all start as close to their end as possible.

• Avoiding superfluous description and detail.
• The elimination of any asides or tangents.
• Word choice.
• Sentence length.
• Enunciation choices.
• The ruthless elimination of anything that is self-serving or even incredibly interesting but ultimately not needed for the story to succeed.
• Proper pacing and pausing.
• Volume modulation.
• Physicality.

But before you attempt to deploy any of these strategies, it begins with an awareness of momentum:

The simple but essential acknowledgment of its importance to your success as a communicator.

Momentum starts with the thought that your story needs to feel dynamic and alive. Your decisions about what and when and how to say things must be made with the importance of momentum in mind.

My keynote needs to evolve as I speak. My lesson needs to appeal to a variety of modalities. My anecdote needs to do its job and be done. My sermon must rouse the congregation’s spirits. My slides need to be designed in such a way as to make the audience want to see the next one. My audience must be hanging on my every word.

Make momentum something you consider as you craft and tell your story. Ask yourself if your story or keynote or wedding toast feels energetic and alive or deliberate and self-indulgent.

Does your story sound like a tumbling boulder or a ponderous elephant?
Just recognizing the importance of momentum and keeping it top-of-mind when making your crafting decision will make you better than most of the storytellers and speakers I hear in the world today.

The strategies will help. I’ve taught them to many clients to great effect.

But as G.I. Joe said in a famous PSA from my childhood: 

“Now you know, and knowing is half the battle.”