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CHAPTER 7 MOOD Make them feel it

‘What your heart thinks is great, is great. The soul's emphasis is always right.‘ Ralph Waldo Emerson

When you put your idea on the table does it excite people, scare them, inspire them or perhaps confuse them? Is their gut instinctively crying out, ‘This feels right, let's do it!’ Or is it screaming, ‘Oh God, no … Taxi!'

You've surely been in situations where you're presenting an idea and your audience:

• aren't listening or, if they are, they're disengaged (is that the sound of crickets chirping?)
• don't care in the same way you do — or worse, couldn't care less
• struggle to remember what you've just presented to them
• are distracted by other priorities or messages on their smart phone
• look at you like you just ran over their cat.

These are all symptoms of one key problem: your audience is just not feeling it.

Capture a feeling

A dark-haired man with chiselled looks drives along a rugged coastline in a convertible, the top down and his companion's long golden locks blowing in the breeze. The sky turns from blazing red to burnt orange to ochre as the sun dips into the sparkling blue ocean. He turns to the girl and smiles, a deep loving smile. His eyes sparkle with the reflection of the sunset. She tilts her head back, laughs and throws her arms into the air in exhilaration as they accelerate into the distance …

Clichéd? You bet. Yet this is ...