How to Memorize Your Speech

“So tell me – how are you dancing your dance in the dance of life?” I asked my audience this question. Then I paused. The pause allowed the question to sink into the audience member’s minds. However, that wasn’t the primary reason I had paused. The primary reason was…

I had forgotten what to say next!

My mind raced. “Oh my gosh! What do I say? What’s next?!”

Then, like a soft light that slowly became brighter in my mind, the thought of what to say next gently shone itself in my mind. With my mental grasp I caught that soft light before it disappeared, and continued with my speech.

However, the danger had not completely passed. Later in the talk, I forgot the last line of my conclusion. The little “soft light” of thought was nowhere to be found this time. I had to conclude my talk with lame stammering and off the cuff remarks.

I promised myself, I would never put my audience and myself in that position again.

That event brought the following question to mind. How can you remember a talk so that you don’t forget any parts of it while delivering it? This article covers how to do just that.

Chunk That Thing!

To remember a talk, begin by creating it weeks before delivering it. This is vital. By creating the talk with plenty of time before you have to deliver it, you give yourself time to commit it to memory.

Next, break your talk up into chunks, i.e. sections. You may have created an outline of your talk before you wrote it out (you did write your talk out, didn’t you?). If so, you can use that outline to remember the sections of your talk. However, even if you didn’t create an outline of your talk, you can still go through the talk and break it up into its main sections. Those sections are the Opening, the Body, and the Conclusion. The body may contain two or three subsections that correspond to the points you make in that section of your speech.

After identifying the sections of your talk, assign a creative name to each of the sections. A section name should indicate what the section covers. For example, in a talk I gave recently, the opening describes a scene where I was at a dance. I named that section, “Dance”. The next part of the body of the speech centers on my performance at a meeting. In that part, I compare myself to a singing frog. That section is called, “Frog”. Do this type of naming for each section of your talk.

The Brain Remembers Weird Stuff

Next, memorize the names of each section and the order of them in your speech. An optional way to memorize the sections and their order is to create a strange story that involves the sections of your speech.

Why a “strange story”? The reason is that your mind remembers strange things. A “strange” story is one with surprising, odd, or unexpected twists. These oddities help to etch details into your memory.

Here’s an example.

In my speech the first four sections are:

Here’s a strange story using those sections.

One morning I woke up, sat up, and placed my feet on the floor. As soon as my feet felt the fluffiness of the carpet, music with thumping bass started, and I saw in my peripheral vision my friend, Mike, Dancing frantically. Sweat flung from Mike as he danced.

I walked by Mike toward the bathroom. As I neared the bathroom, I was blocked by a human-sized, Singing Frog.

I squeezed by the Frog with some difficulty, got into my bathroom and quickly shut the door. The lights were already on and I was stunned to see my co-workers and manager standing there. They were in the middle of a Meeting and expected me to join in. All eyes were on me!

Embarrassed, because I was still in my jammies, I ran from the meeting into the closet and slammed the door behind me. Yet again, I was shocked, because my closet was packed with people at a networking meeting. They were all standing, holding plates of food, which caused the area to smell strongly like a restaurant. They all started clapping when they saw me. They were expecting me to present my idea for a Business Venture to them.

Ok, enough of that weird story.

Here’s what to note about the story.

It creates a story that I physically (although it’s completely in my mind) follow. That story starts when I sit up in bed and place my feet on the floor. The strange story takes me from my bed, through my bedroom, through the bathroom, and into my closet. You should create a story that takes you along a known path as well. This will help you sequence what you’re trying to remember.
Along the path of my story, I run across bizarre scenes. Each scene is a clue to a section or detail in my talk.
The scenes are described in language that involves your senses. Notice that when the story begins my feet “felt the fluffiness” of the carpet, there was music with “thumping” bass, and there were “multi-colored” lights. Notice also that Mike danced so frantically that “sweat flung” from him. Also, there was that creepy human-sized, singing frog!

All of these details help to etch each scene into your memory. The more vivid the scenes, the better. Also, the more surprising or shocking or emotion evoking the scenes are, the more easily they will be remembered.

If you create a weird story like this, then begin practicing your speech using your story to give yourself clues about what to say next. Practice your speech over and over and over again.

Generally, you don’t have to memorize your speech word-for-word. However, there may be occasional situations where a word-for-word memorization is appropriate. An example might be a speech contest where you have a time limit and you want each word to count. However, outside of those special circumstances, memorizing keywords for sections of your speech, and associating the related stories with those keywords will serve you well.

Use each scene in your weird story to cue you on which portion of your speech you’ll say next. Once you’ve associated the portions of your speech with scenes in your weird story, just talk each portion of your speech out as if you were telling it to a close friend.

Rehearse your speech over and over and over again. Each time you rehearse, attempt to deliver the speech as you would if you were in front of an audience. This is just plain memorization by repetition. It is the most important part of memorizing your speech.

The final step toward memorization is to perform the speech in front of as many trial audiences as you can. This will help you with your ability to recall the speech under the pressure of delivery in front of a live audience.

When practicing in front of an audience, note the feedback from the audience members. Film the speech if you can. Tweak your speech per the feedback you get. Continue to practice and hone the speech. By doing this, the speech will become better and better over time.

After you have practiced the speech enough times, the speech will become internalized. You won’t have to rely on the weird story to jog your memory. You’ll be able to say the speech without thinking much about it. You’ll be able to relive the speech while enjoying and responding to your audience. You’ll have memorized your speech and you’ll feel a wonderful sense of freedom as you give it. Perhaps most importantly, you’ll be free from the worry of forgetting your lines.