Denziens of the San Francisco tech scene are greeting the sun at a series of Daybreaker Digital Dextox dance parties in Mission District lofts. MORE

11) Get completely unplugged and off the grid — no iPhones or BlackBerrys, etc. — Kaizen (??) means "improvement" — "kai" (?) means change/make better, and "zen" (?) means good — but as the term is used as a business process it more closely resembles in English “continuous improvement.” MORE

Photo by Mark Heaps. We recently worked with Michael Pollan to design a presentation for the Annual Pop!Tech Tech Conference, ( [link] ) and I have officially been transformed from appreciative fan to groupie. He’s wicked smart, and a great communicator; and until his recent appearance at Pop!Tech, MORE

Do TV executives realize that there is a a growing number of choice demographics who have not only unplugged but are no longer even boxed in?  Tonight I ran into yet another professional who no longer has a TV set in the house.  MORE

Second, if you get unstable behaviour while presenting, unplug the receiver from the computer. I had a good conversation with a client this week about a struggle they had during a presentation. Things were going along well until an unknown problem caused every attempt to advance to the next slide to cause the pen pointer to come up on the screen. They eventually made it go away but were unsure what they did to stop the problem. MORE

This and all my blogs are on hiatus this week while I unplug. Normal service will resume next week! Creative Commons licensed photo by Craig Sunter ). weekly speaker toolkit MORE

For those of us who speak and write, a bountiful source of stories and information is passing us by if we don't stop, unplug, and start listening. Technology, no matter how wonderful its claims, can turn you into its slave if you're not careful. I just came back from a business trip, and hadn't flown in about two years. My observations in several airports and on several airplanes gave me real cause for concern. Conversation between strangers just doesn't seem to be happening so much. MORE

I'm convinced that had to do with the fact that I was unplugged, he had a natural cuiriosity about meeting new people, and he gladly engaged in a real conversation as a break from his graduate studies homework. Tags: iPhone unplugged conversation On a rare snowy day in Dallas I found myself having breakfast at the Dallas Fort Worth airport, in a distant corner of the terminal next to a small Starbucks. I spotted a young man working on his laptop with an iPhone plugged into it. MORE

Confessions of a Public Speaker, by Scott Burken. When I received a copy, my initial reaction was that it was yet another publich speaking guide. Paging the book, I quickly realized that I was wrong. MORE

If you suspect that a piece of hardware is causing the issue, unplug it and try the presentation again. I got a panicked call recently from a past workshop participant. She supports presenters who were out on the road doing a major presentation in venues across the country. Whenever they started the presentation, its gives them the Blue Screen of Death (BSoD as it’s known). It is likely that the PowerPoint file got corrupted. How could it have happened and what can you do about it? MORE

Unplug. I'll be leading the "Good on Your Feet" workshop on dynamic speaking skills next week--you have signed up, haven't you?--and and I've been thinking about how to give the participants a great experience and valuable learning opportunities. MORE

Active verbs make a call to action: Read the verbs in the excerpt above: Put, close, unplug, stop, assemble, carry, converge, occupy, sacrifice, make. MORE

Today is inauguration day in the U.S., when a new president takes office. Tomorrow, women from all over the world will march in Washington, D.C.--where where I live--and in 30 more cities in the U.S. MORE

All too often, when people are trying to do the right thing by creating a strong visual to represent an idea, they fall back on the literal meaning of the word. This often makes it very difficult to find the right image to convey the idea and will often result in a visual that seems forced. MORE

  The electronic village now is debating if there should be monitoring of compliance of the Unplugged Order. The land of LinkedIn began to be filled with friendly helpful groups. Members had much to share.  And there was great joy throughout.  "We are learning so much." MORE

 There, where there was WiFi, I blogged about how we who had been unplugged by nature found refuge in a book store. Before the current digital technology, many had to depend on companies like Starbucks and Sephora to create "experiences" for us. MORE

You can take a tech break, e.g. unplug, and your stress level doesn't increase. You understand that unplugging helps those other parts of your brain, that aren't tech wired, to flourish. Here are a few signs that you master technology and use it to improve your speaking. You own only the tech tools you get the most value from. You define what value actually means to you. MORE

8:33 What happened when Ryan unplugged for 9 days? The roller coaster of speaking; one day you’re up, the next day, you’re down. The prodigious speaker and author, Ryan Estis, weighs in on how he has dealt with the ups and downs of his own speaking career. MORE

Active verbs make a call to action: Read the verbs in the excerpt above: Put, close, unplug, stop, assemble, carry, converge, occupy, sacrifice, make. (Editor's note: Organizers of the 2017 Women's March on Washington have been signalling their intent to organize a women's strike on March 8. MORE

Another lesson I learned is that I can unplug from that awful entity reality [which even T.S. Have you've known an influential writer who hasn't battled Demon Alcohol [DA]?    Unlikely.    The two seem to go together like W.B. Yates's concept of the interrelation between the dancer and the dance. That battle seemed to have been lost by F. MORE

Is silence, or being 'unplugged,' now unnatural to you? The Great Idea, that will make a speech memorable, or maybe even change a life, often comes when we least expect it, when we are otherwise unplugged, or listening to another person speak. Friend or Foe? iPhones , Blackberrys , GPS, Instant Message, Texting --are these your new Masters, and are you their Slave? Have you replaced the old fashioned verbal conversation with text, even when the person you communicate is steps away? MORE

I was unplugged last week, so this week catches you up with posts from just before the hiatus: Besting stress: Stress is essentially a series of changes in your body--so listening to your body can help you reduce stress and build resilience , key skills for public speakers. MORE

Cure: Effected by releasing the TV’s magnetic pull; typically by interrupting the TV signal by turning it off or unplugging it. Here are the results of this month’s joke contest– Disease Definitions. New Joke Contests are announced on the first of the month (alternating months). New Cartoon Caption Contests are announced on the first of the month (alternating months). The next caption contest is September 1, 2011. ** FIRST PLACE **. MORE

This version she presents, which is supposed to attract attention, is Hillary Unplugged. Drudge Report had developed a popular niche deriding Hillary Clinton. A major piece of that were the unflattering Hillary photos. Those ranged from wicked witch Hillary to manic Hillary. MORE

Unplugging and listening to my own thoughts is one of the best ways to approach speaking with a fresh viewpoint. What inspires you? For the long weekend, I spent time in the place that inspires me the most--the nearby Berkshire hills. The book shown at left will give you an idea of why I find the Berkshires so inspiring. inspiring MORE