How to be funny (even if you're boring)

I’m running out of the house to catch my taxi when I notice it: 

The front of my trousers is all creased. 

Well, not the whole front: just the area right below the belt. 

That will not be a good look when I’m teaching the MBA class this morning. 

I don’t have any other clean work trousers to put on, so I grab the iron and plug it in, but when I look at the clock I realise I’m screwed:  

There’s no way I can set up the ironing board, take off my trousers and iron them properly - if I’m not in that taxi in a few minutes I’ll be late, and that will be even worse…

I look at the iron getting hot in my hand.

I look at my creased trousers. 

I look at the clock. 

“I wonder if I could just iron them… like this?”

Before I can give it much thought, I spray some water on the front of my trousers, and I start ironing. 

As I feel the heat through the material, I wonder, 

“Maybe having a hot iron right on top of my privates is not such a good idea… This could be pretty terrible… But I’m still doing it… Yep, the iron is still right there… Why am I still doing it?!?”

I finish the job. 

By some miracle I don’t hurt myself. 

Maybe I just wasn’t that worried…

I have enough kids as it is 😅

Why are things funny?

I’ve shared that story loads of times and most people think it’s funny. But why? 

I’m not “being funny”. I’m just telling you something that actually happened. 

Apart from that very last line (which I don’t normally use when I tell it in person), there’s nothing I’m doing to make it funny. 

So why does it work? 

In his TEDx talk, “What makes things funny,” Peter McGraw explains the “benign violation theory”: we want to hear about things that feel wrong, that go against the way the world should work or people should behave (“violations”) but we don’t want them to cause any actual harm (“benign”). 

That’s why someone falling down a hole can be funny, but not if they break a leg. 

An idiot ironing his trousers while wearing them is funny, but not if I’d actually hurt myself. 

This is how anyone can be funny

I love telling stories of when I do something stupid, but somehow that still ends up ok: 

• Wearing a ridiculous T-shirt with a picture of my girlfriend and a romantic poem printed on it… in front of her friends (but she didn’t dump me) 

• Telling my long-term girlfriend to “wear something nice” because “I had a surprise for her” and having no idea she’d think I was going to propose (but she still married me)

• Forgetting my laptop at the airport security (but I recovered it)

• Accidentally drinking 15g of salt (but that only making me a little thirsty)

Ok, as I go through that list, I realise I do more stupid stuff than the average person 😅

But even if you don’t, do you ever say weird or stupid things? 

And even if you never say them, do you think them? Sometimes the funniest stuff is what’s going on in our heads, even if it’s something we’d never actually act on or say–that is exactly why it’s funny, because it’s so out of character or absurd.

You can also get a lot of mileage sharing weird or stupid things other people have said or done, which is what I often do with my children.

A note of caution here: you can get away with sharing about your kids, and maybe your partner, but I’d be wary of doing that with anyone else. It can easily seem as if you’re making fun of them. 

Poking fun at yourself can make you more vulnerable and approachable, but when it’s about someone else you can easily come across as a jerk–and that’s definitely not worth some laughs! 

We all say, do and think stuff that’s weird, absurd, or even stupid. It happens all the time (to some of us a little more often 😂). 

Telling those stories is how you become funny - even if you’re not 🤘

-Francisco 

Whenever you're ready, there are 3 ways I can help you:

1. Getting clarity through your story to stand out from all the other coaches, speakers and entrepreneurs out there 

2. If you dream of speaking on the Red Dot, take this Scorecard and instantly discover how likely your idea is to be accepted by a TED-style organizing committee

3. If you (or your team) got any storytelling challenges, I’m sure there’s something we can do together ;-)

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