How To Tell a Powerful Story in Four Easy Steps: Tom Lockridge (Transcript)

Read the full transcript of Tom Lockridge’s talk titled “How To Tell a Powerful Story in Four Easy Steps” at TEDxMountainAve 2024 conference.

Listen to the audio version here:

TRANSCRIPT:

The Decision That Shaped My Life

When I was 17 years old, I made a decision that would set the path of my life. I was a junior in high school, and I played basketball at this tiny little private school. In the district tournament, we were playing the giant county school from across town. It was truly a David versus Goliath situation.

But my team played great, we pulled the upset, and we went to celebrate after the game. It was a great night for me and all my friends. As we were leaving our celebration, we were all walking to our cars. I got in my car and went to start it up, and then splat, splat, splat, splat. Four eggs hit the windshield of my car. I looked across the parking lot and saw these four country boys standing outside this ’70s van laughing.

I knew they were the ones that did it. All my friends were unaware and were driving away. This was before cell phones, so I had no way to call them. I was on my own.

The Dilemma

This created a real dilemma for a teenage boy. If I just started the car up and drove away, then the story all over town would be, they egged my car, and then I drove away like a coward. But I’d never been in a fight before. And if I went to confront these guys, it was going to be four against one.

Wouldn’t the story be even worse if they egged my car and beat me up? So I didn’t know what to do. I decided to stall for a minute and think about this. I got out of the car and started wiping the egg off.

As I was doing that, I was assessing my opponents. They were all cowboy boots, denim, and John Deere hats. Closer to “Footloose” than to “West Side Story,” I thought. About that time, a motorcycle pulled in next to my car.

An Unexpected Ally

I heard this voice say, “Hey, Tom, somebody egged your car.” I looked over, and it was a guy that I had played minor league baseball with. I hadn’t seen him since I was nine years old. But he’d grown into a mountain of a man.

He was about 6 foot 5, 260 pounds, and he was a biker dude right out of Central Casting. He had long hair, a scraggly beard, and the biker vest. He said, “Who do you think did it?” I said, “I think it’s these guys over here by this van.” He said, “You want me to walk over there with you?” And inside, I was like, “Yes!”

So the two of us walked over there. I’m sure I sounded something like, “Hey, guys, would you all know anything about who might have egged my car?” Well, they took one look at my buddy, and they weren’t talking.

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Then he leaned over my shoulder and said, “The man wants to know who threw the eggs.” Yikes. Now they really weren’t talking. They were just looking straight down at their cowboy boots.

He had a few more choice words for them. We left. I thanked him. He went on his way. And then I got to drive home with my honor intact.

The Epiphany

That night, I was thinking about the events of that evening as I was lying in bed. I thought, “Boy, am I glad he came along when he did.” Because when he was with me, I didn’t feel so scared anymore. In fact, I felt empowered. And I was thankful that he was there.

And then I thought, how great would it be to be the kind of person that makes other people feel that way? I decided that night, I’m going to be like my old teammate. No, not a biker dude. I was going to be a lawyer. And not just any lawyer. I was going to be a prosecutor.

Now, I’m not equating having egg on my car with the trauma that real crime victims go through. All I knew was, I wanted to be the person that walked with people who’ve been through something truly horrific. And in the aftermath of their darkest hour, help them achieve something that feels like justice. That’s what real prosecutors do every day.

Becoming a Prosecutor

At the age of 31, I became the youngest elected Commonwealth attorney in Kentucky. But I didn’t know how much I didn’t know. Not too long after being elected, I was trying a man, a defendant, for sexually abusing his 11-year-old stepdaughter. Let’s give her an alias. We’ll call her Amy.

Amy’s mom married the defendant when Amy was only three years old. So he was the only father figure she’d ever known. And she was just an ordinary fifth grader trying to keep up with her schoolwork. But in the dark of night, he crept into her room and subjected her to sexual abuse. The crimes happened repeatedly over a long period of time. When the defendant began forcing her to do even more, she disclosed the abuse.

Now, like most of these cases, we had no other eyewitnesses to the crime. And we had no physical evidence. But Amy bravely came to court and told 12 strangers all the disturbing details of what the defendant had done to her. And she had to do it in open court, right in front of the defendant, the man she called dad.

A Devastating Verdict

Well, at the end of the case, the jury went out to deliberate. They knocked on the door and they had a verdict. They were filing back in. I remember looking back at Amy and her mom in the audience.

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Then they handed the verdict form to the bailiff. He delivered it to the judge. And then, “We, the jury, find the defendant not guilty.” It felt like a gut punch.

It was my responsibility to talk with Amy about the outcome of the case. So we went into this little witness room. And I told her she did everything right. She made an amazing witness.

That sometimes the jury will vote not guilty even though they believe her. And then her mom wiped away her tears. And the two of them left the courthouse to start the next chapter of their lives without the defendant.

And as I was saying these things to Amy, trying to reassure her, it was like I was trying to convince myself that it wasn’t my fault. But I knew there was something missing from my presentation of the case. And it raised the question, if telling the jury what happened isn’t enough, what do I need to do to keep from disappointing more survivors of violent crime? I was determined to figure this out.

The Power of Storytelling

Well, sometime later, the movie “Amistad” came out. And there’s a great scene in that movie where Anthony Hopkins, who plays an old lawyer, is talking to Morgan Freeman about a case. And he tells him, “In the courtroom, whoever tells the best story wins.” And then he stumps Morgan Freeman when he asks him about the client. “What’s their story?”

Well, this was an aha moment for me. The light bulbs were going off in my head. If telling the jury what happened isn’t enough, I need to take the time, talk to the victim, and find out their story. And tell the whole story.

So, I took a deep dive into story and story structure. And I decided I was going to learn from the greatest storytellers in the world, Hollywood screenwriters. So, I started buying books, I started taking classes, eventually started writing screenplays myself. And so far, three of those have been produced as feature films.

The Key to Effective Storytelling

So, what was my big takeaway from my venture into screenwriting? I learned that the most important rule of storytelling is make me care. As famously stated by Andrew Stanton from Pixar.

Think about all those great emotional Pixar movies. Well, if that’s the most important thing, making the audience care, how do you do that? Well, screenwriters know we have to create empathy for the character. We need the audience to feel the emotion of the events in the story, just like the characters do.

At a minimum, we have to make the characters relatable. And I know from now more than 30 years in the courtroom, that telling people what happened doesn’t move people. But moving people with a good, powerful story delivers results.

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A Four-Step Storytelling Structure

So, I took some screenwriting story structures, combined some things and other tactics, you know, scrunched it all down, broke it down into four easy to use steps.

And this is important for you because this is a structure that you can use for the stories you need to tell in your business and in your world. I already used it in the two stories that I told you earlier in this talk. So, let me break it down for you:

We start with the normal life. Who are these people involved in this story? What’s their life like ordinarily? What are their hopes and dreams? What are their problems and worries?
A triggering event. This is something that disrupts the normal life and causes the characters to have to do something different. It sets the story in motion. It raises dilemmas for them.
The primary narrative of the story. This is where we tell the audience what happened. What choices were made? What decisions were made? What allies did we assemble? It’s the buildup that leads to the showdown.
The new normal. This gives us a glimpse into what life is like for the characters after the events in the story. This allows the audience to understand what was gained or what was lost as a result of the events in the story.

Conclusion

So, the next time you have a story to tell, maybe you’ve got a pitch to make for your nonprofit. Maybe you’re a teacher and you want to set the stage for learning with a good story. Maybe you’re a leader and you want to inspire the troops to take certain actions. This is how to do it. The normal life, triggering events, primary narrative, and then the new normal.

If you do that, the audience will understand the story of the people involved. They’ll feel empathy for your characters. They’ll understand what was gained or lost, and therefore understand how the events of the story impacted the lives of the people involved.

You can do this. I told you two stories today that had a huge impact on my life. And inside each of you is a good, powerful story just waiting to be told. And now you know how to tell it.

Thank you.