I just returned from speaking at Toastmaster’s International convention in Washington DC and I had a blast! I gave my keynote presentation “Why Settle for the Balcony? How to get a Front-Row Seat in Life” and something happened that has never happened before. Someone took action. Now, my whole goal is to have people take action on their goals and their dreams…moving their chairs of life closer to the front-row. However, this crowd was different. Most people call me or write me about the steps they have taken AFTER my speech. On this day, someone took action DURING my speech!

If you haven’t seen my keynote, I have seven strategies on getting a front-row seat in life. I start my speech with seven chairs randomly scattered toward the back of the stage. Each chair has a T-Shirt on it with a strategy written in bold letters. As I speak of each strategy, I literally move that chair toward the front of the stage. At the end of the speech, I have created a front-row. My message both in my words and in my visual demonstration, is that if you don’t like your seat in life, move! You can create your own front-row. And, you can take action today to move you toward the front-row of your life, however you define a front-row for yourself. Like I said, most people take action after my speech and I hear their inspiring stories and examples. But, on Saturday, while I was talking about investing in your own personal and professional development to get ahead in life, someone from the audience came up on stage and literally took a seat in one of the chairs! The audience (as well as me) was stunned! I actually thought that it was great because I had just finished talking about taking action on your vision, and this man did take some action, and he wasn’t going to wait until the end of the speech to do it!

He didn’t stay long, but he could have, I didn’t mind. It’s funny too because the chair he sat in was the “Be Gutsy” chair! He certainly displayed being gutsy and it was a really wonderful, unplanned moment of my speech.

I made a call to a man who had purchased a couple of my books. I like to surprise people with a call to thank them for attending my speech and thank them for buying something or referring me for a speaking engagement. Much to my surprise, he told me he had already used what he learned from me. He had taken his son to the emergency room yesterday and felt overwhelmed and lost. Then he remembered something I said and went directly to someone in charge and said “I need to see someone immediately about my son, and if you can’t help me I need to see someone who can.” And, he was immediately helped. I didn’t ask, but I’m sure he acknowledged and appreciated that person for helping him right away.

It always makes me feel good to know something I have said has inspired someone to step out of their comfort zone and take action on getting a front-row seat in life. What action have you taken? What have you done lately to get yourself a well-deserved seat in the front-row? Post a comment here, or write me an e-mail at Marilyn@MarilynSherman.com. Thanks for reading, and as always, I’ll see you in the Front-Row!

Marilyn Sherman

Author, speaker, owner UpFront Presentations www.MarilynSherman.com

702-631-5700