Structure of Humor, & Humorous 1-liner Jokes - NLP Article
Most jokes of the well-known "One-Liner" form come from taking a well-known, oft-heard cliche, and considering what ambiguities can be found within the sounds of the words, or what other meanings can be made from the words themselves.
And then once ambiguities are found, or other meanings are found, you then build up the joke around the punchline, in reverse, setting up the ambiguity. So I challenge you to do the same. It doesn't have to be "great," it only matters that you play with the exercise. Ambiguities breed mental flexibility and acuity, which helps in everything else we do.
For example, let's take:
"killing two birds with one stone"
"One stone" could also be heard as "one's tone."
And since I'm a bear for tonality... and irresistible voices... what if you make the ambiguity about bad tonality killing birds.
Maybe you caught another one in that last phrase, too... :)
OK, so let's see... if a guy with bad tonality speaks to birds in a pet shop and they die, that covers the "alternative" meaning of the phrase. How do I set it up so that the primary meaning is also covered?
(1st cut) How about:
A man whose voice annoyed all his friends was told to buy a pet bird that could imitate him, and give him some real-time vocal feedback. But he also was told that birds are sensitive to sound, so he went into a pet shop to find out if his voice could be improved by talking to birds, and to determine how sensitive birds might be to his grating voice. The pet store owner directed the man over to the bird cages, and upon listening to the man, two parrots went berserk, then promptly keeled over & died. "Wow," thought the owner... "that's really killing two birds with one's tone."
Now it's your turn. Come up with a better one for "killing two birds with one stone" (I'm sure they're out there)... or for another cliche!
Oh, also, watch out for those bad-tonality killing-birds.
In Roswell, GA, a few years back, I visited a pet store to pick up some dog food, for my neighbor. And there's a bird that they display in a cage outside this door of the store. It's parked when you enter, and it's trained to say "goodbye" and "come back soon" and "have a nice day" when you walk out this door. Makes for a great laugh. And it had pretty good tonality, too, for a bird.
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- Alex AkselrodBought Audio : Finding Your Irresistible Voice
As a certified hypnotherapist, I can tell you that I will use these techniques in all of my future hypnosis work, both with clients & on tape, as well as any inductions I record for free distribution. Jonathan demonstrated these techniques as he taught them, & each time, I had a high level of response to them. He is a very dynamic speaker, & forced me to really pay attention & understand the communication at all levels.
2001 - Jenny WallerLife Coach, Coaching with Jen,Attended Course : Speaking Ingeniously
"Jonathan Altfeld is a highly skilled communicator and trainer whom it is an absolute pleasure to watch at work. He cultivates a learning environment which nurtures and develops the skills and abilities of everyone within the group, and created epic transformations."
http://www.coachingwithjen.com/2006 - Maureen StevensonCafe Manager, Nottingham, UKAttended Course : Belief Craft MP3 Set
"As a person who has never attended any NLP or KE Sessions before, I have found the whole experience useful to me and feel that I am going away with a wealth of knowledge I believe will guide me through many areas of my life. I am excited about attending more trainings in the future."
2005 - Quinton ZondervanCEO, Excelimmune, Inc., Woburn, MAHired Coaching :
I hired Jonathan for weekly 1-on-1 executive coaching, as well as invited him to spend two days with my team of scientists and managers, for a customized presentation followed up with individual employee coaching sessions.
Jonathan was tremendously helpful in coaching me through some very difficult situations. We focussed primarily on "emotional state management" which he quickly diagnosed was where I needed the most help. Maintaining the proper emotional equilibrium while going through stressful situations to a large extend comes natural to me. Nonetheless, there was a lot of room for improvement, and Jonathan definitely helped me reach a higher level of performance. Working with Jonathan was an absolute delight because he would quickly assess the situation I would describe to him and give me clear, specific pointers on how to adjust my perceptions and options to create a more positive emotional state regarding the situation. From there we would seamlessly transition to specific training exercises to prepare for future situations. I use many of these techniques now without thinking about them; they've become part of my repertoire and toolset.
Not only was Jonathan able to help me improve my performance, he worked with my entire team to help them improve their internal communication. By appropriately confronting them with the need to take responsibility for the outcome of their individual attempts at communication, he was able to help many of them move towards a greater awareness of their own specific communication needs and approaches and to make adjustments to improve the outcome. One team member told me what an amazing resource he was. I was very pleased with the changes in the team's approach to communicating with each other. While communication is still of course not yet perfect among them, it has improved considerably, and this allowed the team to achieve an amazing result. We set goals for the end of the year that we thought were aggressive. In fact we ended up beating the date by 2 months. No doubt we got lucky of course in terms of not encountering major technical obstacles we could not easily overcome. Nonetheless I credit a significant part of our success to Jonathan's work in enabling better team communication. Just the knowledge that in fact there were specific, attainable ways to make communication better encouraged the team and gave them the confidence to work through tense or difficult situations more smoothly than before.
Jonathan is indeed a tremendous resource for those who want to improve their communications (in the broadest sense of that word). Ultimately all human achievement is based on our proficiency to interact with others in a way that makes it more likely we will achieve a mutually beneficial, mutually desired outcome. Jonathan is able to work with any team or individual motivated enough to seek help in doing better, and helping them improve. What I appreciate the most about Jonathan is that he does not try to create an unnatural dependence. On the contrary, he happily shares his techniques and uses exercises and training to help you internalize them. Like any good coach, he helps you get better and acquire new skills that you can use on your own to achieve amazing results.
http://www.excelimmune.com/2011 - Steven KenyonTrainer, Network Consultant, Manteca, CABought Audio : Finding Your Irresistible Voice
I'm a technical trainer who frequently teaches MCSE bootcamps. What that means is I take a group of 10 to 20 people and cram 6 months of learning into 1 or 2 weeks. This is an exercise for me as an instructor since it is 12 hour days, but with only 14 days to pass 7 tests, it's grueling for my students. Before I listened to your CD's, there were times when it seemed like no matter how much the students wanted to learn, they could only absorb so much in a day. About 8 hours into the second day most of my students would start to gaze over completely and frequent breaks were needed. Too frequent in my opinion (sometimes it's hard to get them to come back in and get going). With the proper use of your Dual Tone Voice & Modulation techniques, I found that my students could be completely captivated, even late into the last day! This program should be mandatory listening for teachers and trainers in any industry. Thank you for such an awesome program!
2003 - Claudio SennhauserDemo Coach and Author of "Giving Memorable Product Demos", ThailandBought Audio : Finding Your Irresistible Voice
Your 'Finding Your Irresistible Voice' 2-CD set [...] really gives me the tools & knowledge to IMPROVE my voice... no matter what level. Just learning about how to develop a dual-tone voice is worth the money for the whole set! I especially like your dynamic presentation of the material - your good mood really comes through.... A definite must in the library of any NLP student!
http://sennhauser.com/2002 - Howard SweeneyDenver, COAttended Course : “Irresistible Voice”seminar
Jonathan Altfeld's Irresistible Voice Workshop is one of the most impactful trainings that I have ever experienced. In just the first few minutes of the workshop, Jonathan was able to provide both me and all of my fellow participants with instant, dramatic, and positive results in finding our true voices and having us start using them fully as quality instruments of clarity and communication. Jonathan utilized his significant training skills and unique technology to guide me to a much more pleasing and expressive voice in only three fun-filled days. Now, after the "feel good" of most training and workshops has long passed, I find that (thanks to Jonathan) I am continuing to improve my new-found voice skills on a daily basis. Jonathan provided me with a solid foundation to automatically make effortless and continuous improvements in my voice. Other folks are now complementing me on my voice - that's certainly a new experience for me! Jonathan didn't stop with simply having me sound much better. He amped it up with fun exercises where I learned exactly how to use my new-found richer sounding voice and use my words to communicate much more effectively and produce positive results in others. With short, fun, and creative exercises, Jonathan taught me life-changing speaking skills that will only get better and better, auto-magically. Jonathan's personalized one-on-one coaching helped me achieve results that I truly did not think would be possible in just 3 days. I cannot begin to express my profound thanks to Jonathan for the life-changing skills he instilled in me in just a few short days. If you are interested in a much better sounding voice that will have positive and life-changing impact, sign up now and make sure you are one of the fortunate folks to attend Jonathan's Irresistible Voice Workshop.
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After attending an NLP seminar with Jonathan Altfeld, I can only use one word to describe it: amazing! Throughout the weekend, I went through a metamorphosis, leaving the cocoon of my former limited self and now knowing that I can accomplish anything I desire. My only limit now is time. I was amazed to have seen some of my limiting beliefs just fade away and snap like delicate threads. Not only did these changes take place during the seminar, but I now have the tools necessary to make other changes to any aspect of my life. I now understand that the only thing holding me back was myself! Seeing Jonathan using the skills he was teaching in real life was also a major plus. He uses everything that he is teaching all of the time. He doesn't give stop until he knows that everyone has learned what they need to know. In the past few days, since the seminar, I have developed more rapport with my family and co-workers. In the past, I would have been in a situation where meeting new people would have scared me immensely, and now, I can't wait to meet new people. My only regret is that I didn't do this sooner. If you are not living life to the fullest, then you owe it to yourself to go to one of his seminars.
1997 - Cesar GutierrezNew York, NYBought Audio : Finding Your Irresistible Voice
Hope you and yours are doing well. I just wanted to share this recent compliment I received about my voice from a young lady I just met. "I also think you have a very nice voice. I would like to hear it some more." This of course led to us exchanging numbers and a potential relationship. So, with that said, when is "Irresistible Voice 2" coming out!? Thanks again for making a product that exceeds expectations.
2006