This post will be God-sent for those of who you are cracking your brain to think of a speech to deliver at your Toastmasters meeting, a business gathering or an after-dinner event.

What you are seeing below is an abstract of Darren La Croix’s winning speech “Ouch”.

Have you watch it? If no, go watch it esp. if you are looking to be humored after a long day at work.

Here’s a trivia for how this winning speech came about. A couple of months before the contest, Darren went to his speech coach, Mark Brown (1995 Champ) for some assistance. He was not sure of what to speak on. And his coach gave him one assignment. Take it down as well!

“If you have only one day left to live, what is one lesson that you have personally learnt in your life, which you want to pass on to your children?”

For those of you who do not have children, replace that with your loved ones or even the world if you like.

Darren had two days to list them all down. You see, if you were to think on the spot, you may come up with the obvious few. However this may not be the most heart-felt or authentic ones. Remember the importance of speaking from the heart? The intention is to find a topic that you can relate to with every fibre of your soul; that has the most significance to your life, that when shared, will create the greatest impact to your listeners.

As he glanced through all the possible topics, one stood out.

“I became a comedian because I was willing to fail…”

And Darren ran along with that topic.

The next assignment was to find stories that relate to his message. Again, if you were to just take whatever comes to your mind first, you will put yourself in the league of the ordinary. Stories on Thomas Edison or Abraham Lincoln were way too common and predictable. Instead, Darren chose a character that was listed at the bottom of page four - Dr Robert Gardner, the man who invented the first rocket.

The lesson is simple. By giving yourself the time and space to reflect, you go deep. And as you realize, that’s where all the golden nuggets of wisdom are kept.

So… if you have only one day left to live, what is one lesson that you have personally learnt in your life, which you want to pass on to your children?

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