The Monday Report

What’s in your presenter bag—and is it helping you shine or secretly sabotaging your talk? 🎤
Join us for this week’s Monday Report as we unpack the must-haves (and the “why did I bring this?” items) that speakers carry with them to the stage. From tech essentials to confidence boosters, we’re diving into the tools, tricks, and little lifesavers that can make or break your presentation.
Whether you’re a seasoned pro or stepping up to the mic for the first time, we’ll share practical tips to help you stay organized, prepared, and ready for anything—because the best presentations don’t just happen, they’re packed with intention.
Tune in, take notes, and maybe even rethink what’s in your bag. Your future self on stage will thank you.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:18

Hey guys, good morning. Welcome to the Monday Report. I am your host, as always, Dan Goyat, along with my good buddy, who you can't see because I'm standing up today. But hey, Frank T-Rex is here in the studio as always. And as always, being brought to you by the North American Hypnotherapy Guild. There's the QR code. Scan it, head on over, join the guild, be part of the conversation, and also being brought to you by HypnoWorld magazine. Scan the QR code, be in the know, subscribe to HypnoWorld magazine, and check out the Monday report right here every Monday at 11 30 a.m. So that being said, I am just going to check to make sure that we're broadcasting all the place. I can already see that we're broadcasting on our main Facebook page. And as I bend down here, because I don't have a standing desk as I'm standing today, uh, we are broadcasting on the website, and we are broadcasting on the YouTube page as well as the traveling hypnotist today. So yeah, we are broadcasting all the places we should be broadcasting at. And just happy to have you. So this morning we are talking about. Oh, I see we got some people joining us. Let's check the live chat here, see what's going on. So, hey, there's Dennis Lawson. So glad to see you today, too, Dennis. Hope that you're having a really good day. So I thought it would be fun to talk about what's in your travel bag. That's our pro that's our thing today. What is in your presenter bag? What is the one thing that you carry or the many things that you carry? So I wanted to talk about that today because conference season is among us and started. Heartland Hypnosis Conference, I think was last weekend or the weekend before, as was the Irish Hypnosis Conference. So we've got some things coming up. We've got uh what else do we have? We have obviously the flagship conference, the world's largest conference. Oh my goodness, Hypnoths Live, excuse me. Wow, can't believe I couldn't almost get that out. But yeah, Hypnothoughts Live. And we have the Canadian Hypnosis Conference that's going to be coming up. We have uh the Mid-America Hypnosis Conference, of course, we have the Michigan Hypnosis Conference as well as the Performing Hypnosis Summit, which will be coming up. And make sure, as I bend down back here again, to scan the QR code for the Performing Hypnosis Summit, and get your speaker proposals in for the Performing Hypnosis Summit. Uh, they are open right now. Grant Saunders, oh wow, Grant Saunders, Sean Kostiak, Brian Bay working incredibly hard um to make that happen. So head on over and hey, you know what? There's the QR code for the Michigan Conference. Get your tickets. You know what I mean? Yeah, right now, early bird price is going on, so that'll be continuing to I think June, June 1st, June 30th, one of the two is sometime in June. So, but since we have so many conferences coming up, and a lot of people are going to be traveling this summer, this year, getting out there, making those connections. Also, very quickly before we get into this, um, I want to talk a minute about the speed with which Spirit Airline closed down. That was one of the major hubs. I think it was the second largest hub in the Detroit Metropolitan Airport. And we have reached out to the Detroit Metropolitan Airport for a comment on the speed with which they closed down and who might be stepping in to that second largest role. A lot of airlines stepped forward to help the passengers that were stranded. So it was just incredibly I know that they were in trouble for a long time, but rarely have I seen a company close that fast. And that's all I'm gonna say on that. Hmm. That's a good cup of ju. Even if I do say so myself. All right, so let's get into it. Uh, I'm gonna bring my other camera up here. Sure, I am. You can do it, Dan. So, yeah, so you guys can see all the cool stuff down here on my desk. So, we're gonna start as I reach around with my travel bag. This is it, right here. Um, this is Swiss gear. It is my presenter backpack, and it is really made out of a really good heavy material. I've had it for several years. I think I paid right around $40 for it. Um, maybe a little bit more when I got it. Does have airflow, and I had one that used to have a USB charger to it, but it doesn't really um have one. And I don't really, I never use that one, anyways. So we're gonna start. Obviously. The important thing about your um presenter bag is it's gonna based on what you put on it, what you take with you, it can help you so much. Uh, I know we all want to show up and we want to make sure that we have good information and we're charismatic and we're doing a great job presenting. Um, but the things that we carry in our bag, our presenter bag can be just as important, if not more, to make sure that we're having a good presentation and the attendees are having a good time at our presentation. So let's start. Oh, obviously, we're gonna start with this uh computer laptop. This is it's an HP, just an inexpensive HP travel computer, 15 inch. I think I paid like $300 for this uh at Walmart. Best Buy, Walmart, one of the two. Um, and it does great. It's not a touch screen, but it does really well for me. So, and I'm gonna be putting stuff in the bag as I go, kind of loading it back up, if you will. So that goes in there. So that's my main thing, computer. Make sure that you have a laptop. I've had that question. Hey, uh, I know I'm coming to your conference or I'm going to this car. Do they provide laptops? Should I bring yes? Always bring your laptop. So that works out really well. Obviously, in the next thing, as you see me reaching down, cord, power cord. Actually, I have um two power cords, right? So I always have two power cords. Make sure that I have a spare. For whatever reason, always have a spare. Another thing I carry with me is this cool item. This is an external battery for my cell phone. If I'm somewhere I can't get the phone charged uh throughout the day, or I'm at a conference and I just can't get back to my uh area to charge my phone. I always have one of these. So that goes in the bag. As I open my little um velcro that you can hear there, and that's kind of an important thing to have. The other thing I carry with me, obviously, I actually have about two of these. You can see me picking it up off the desk, all this cool stuff down here, and you can see my kind of my little map there. Slide clicker presentation tool. This one actually has um USB and C connection. So I don't know if you can see that with my camera, but it does have a C connection, so goes in there. I carry about two or three of these with me, and I will tell you right now, I have been to conferences and I have had people, people, individuals borrow one of my presenter slide projector controllers. So make sure that you have one, or two, or three. I always make sure I have a spare. Spare spare you you're beginning to um sense a pattern here, right? Have a spare. What? Oh my goodness. I've moved to camera position, so that cable's in my way. I apologize as I look down. Now, the other thing, right here, as you can see, HDMI cable. Have one of those. In point of fact, I have two HDMI cables. So I carry an HDMI cable and I carry an HDMI cable. Why? Because at some point one of my friends is gonna come up to me, or somebody at the conference is gonna come up to me and go, Oh, hey, do you have an extra HDMI cable? And I may say yes, and I may loan it to them. And if you do loan someone your extra HDMI cable, uh just knowing your heart, you're never seeing that cable again. You gotta let it go. So that being said, yeah, let it go. And oh, hey, you know what? Something else that's important. Triple A batteries. I always have a plethora. And yes, I know what a plethora means, uh, but I always have triple A batteries with me. So those, you always gotta have those with you in your bag. Also, uh, and if you guys want to comment, please do so. And if you watch this, please put a hashtag replay in there so I know that you watched it. Um adapter HDMI USB C to C adapter, uh, just in case I need one. If I'm hooking up to something, there are a lot of individuals out there that I know, um, and I'm gonna put that right back here where it belongs. Come on, get in there, so this stuff's going back in the bag. You know, they have a MacBook, they're poor, they can't afford a proper PC, and sometimes they're you know, they don't have the connector to to hook up to the projector or the monitor that they're gonna be utilizing to do their presentation on. And okay, so if I have that, I will chase that down. Uh I don't have a spare on that one. I need to get a spare. So um that becomes a thing. So always make sure you have an adapter. Be adaptable, is what I'm saying. Don't you think so, Frank? What else do we got going on? Oh, hey! Low tech let me reach down here so you guys can see me reaching down. Um some of the low tech stuff. Oh, we've boy man, Dennis's thing has been up there a while. Let's take him down. Eraser, dry eraser, dry eraser markers, carry those with me. Uh, I know a lot of conferences usually have those for you, but sometimes during the conference, depending on what day I'm going to be presenting, those markers can be misplaced, they can get lost, they can dry out. I always make sure I have dry eraser markers and an eraser with me. And sometimes I'll even carry a little spray bottle of the cleaning solution so that if I need to, I can get the board nice and clean for my presentation. I'm not really that anal retentive, but sometimes I do um bring one with me. So, okay, what else? Oh, hey, you know what? Oh, I just messed them up, but I do bring earbuds with me. I got these from Delta Airlines. These were free. So these are my official Delta Airline earbuds that I bring with me. Should I need them, so I carry those with me. I know a lot of people have the uh Bluetooth. I don't really listen to anything um like that. I don't, yeah, don't really have it. So the other thing I'll carry with me is two of these two 10-foot H or USB to C cables, along with my power pack speed charger. Have get a speed charger. I highly recommend that you get a speed charger so that you can keep your tablet charged, your phone charged, or whatever it is that you're using. And oh, I just hit my microphone. I always have two of those with me. I only have the one speed charger, though. That's kind of sad. I carry one of those with me. The other thing I carry is this little guy. I've had it forever and ever and ever. This is a four-port USB connector. Uh, just because the port, I only have two ports on my computer, and depending on what I'm doing, sometimes I might need more. So this has worked really well. It's got a good solid connector button on it. Um, but yeah, have one of these. Have a multi port. Not a multi-pass, a multi-port. I also carry not one, but two external flash drives. These are both 64 gigabyte flash drives. I keep my presentations on these, videos, anything that I'm gonna be using at the conference. I also have a two-terabyte external SSD drive that you can get anywhere. I usually carry one of those with me. I don't have it here today. Uh, that's actually off being utilized by Redline Media for another project today, but I do have these. Now, a lot of us keep our presentations on the cloud, which is fine. And that works really, really well. However, if you run into a situation where the cloud isn't available, there's a problem with the internet at the hotel, you can't get connected. Make sure that you have a backup plan for your presentation, a copy with you, so that if you can't get to the cloud, if you can't get to your OneDrive, if you can't get to um wherever it is you are storing your particular presentation, uh, make sure that you have it on an on a flash drive, an SSD drive. Even if it's saved to your computer, make sure that you have that. I don't generally save my presentations to my computer because I want that memory to be free to help the computer run better. Because again, it's not a super expensive computer. It doesn't have a, you know, it works really, really well for me, but because it's not super expensive, it doesn't have a huge amount of memory. So I want to keep that memory free so everything works really well. And I just froze up. So, oh hey, I also carry this bad boy right here. So this is the Zoom H8 field recorder. If I'm gonna be doing something with the podcast, as I often do, we go live from a lot of different um conferences, as we are out there for the Hypno World magazine covering the conferences, or as I say, covering all the hypnotic action. I won't do that again. That was my radio voice. I try not to. Uh, but the nice thing about this is it also doubles not only as a recorder, it does a lot more than that, has podcast settings on it. I can utilize it as an audio interface if I need to. Uh, this comes off and it will actually fit onto the zoom cameras that I have, should I need a larger parabolic microphone? For whatever reason, um, I might need that. Now, that's happened a couple of times just because my USB microphone was on the Fritz. Okay, it got knocked off the table and was broke. But never mind that now. I do carry that with me. So that goes in the bag. And perhaps, oh, I also carry, excuse me, I also carry this. My Bluetooth card reader. Tap, chip, um, so that I've I am selling a subscription to the magazine. Somebody wants to join the uh guild, somebody wants to be part of that. I got it right here. I don't have to manually enter card stuff. I just put it in at Bluetooth to my phone and boom, I'm good to go. So if you are vending at the conference as well as being a presenter, have one of these for whatever you're using. Um, PayPal has them. Uh, I think uh I know Square has one. There are others out there that you can utilize, have a way to be able to take card at the conference that you're going to be vending at. So it just saves a lot of time uh rather than um that goes in the bag, trying to always manually enter the card information. And along with that, it takes a micro cable. I know there are new ones out there that could you could probably I could probably buy new ones and um oh man, I should have been describing some of the stuff because guys are gonna be listening to this. I apologize to that, but um, it's a micro cable for the card reader because it's a little older. It cost me about $50. I could probably buy a new one that takes a C cable, but I don't want to spend the $50 because you know I'd like to say I'm frugal, but let's be honest. I think I could be cheap. Um, and you can kind of see down here that the desk is thinning out, and this is probably one of the more important things I carry right here. This is an adapter, a plug-in adapter for when I'm traveling overseas, so that if I need to plug in my computer, if I need to charge my phone, I can do that. It has settings for Japan, Australia, Europe, UK, and I want to say that's the UK, it comes out right there, plugs in, and then the middle section, go to the middle, is Europe, and it really just folds out. So if you are traveling internationally and you're speaking, you need to have an international charging adapter. Get one of those. I carry that in my bag, so I'm gonna put that in the bag. What else do I carry? I think I'm coming down to the end of it now, but I also carry a couple of these, along with the cable for it. This is the Rode Wireless microphone. One of these clips to me, one of them goes to the camera, and I get better audio from that. I need to charge those, so I'm gonna leave those out of the bag. And I also carry, so if you guys have any questions, and I hope that this is we're having fun with this, um, my SD card reader. So, because I also carry, hey guys, right here. This takes SD cards. This is one of the cameras I carry. The Zoom Q8N4K, parabolic mics, zoom, a lot of great settings on this, really good camera. So takes a 512 SD card, so I carry my SD card um carrier. Also, I use SD cards for other things. And I think that's oh, and you know what? A couple of pens. Always have a notebook and a pen. Um, what else do I carry? What or should be carried in your travel bag? Sometimes a lot of the stuff that you might think about will be in, will be in my carry-on bag. Um, long days, I usually have some Tylenol with me, uh, have some protein bars with me, I have some snacks. I I have uh water, even though most conferences you can get something to drink, but I'll take a bottle of water with me. I might even take some coffee with me. Um, I'm I'm a bit of a coffee snob. So so hey there, Amanda. How are you this morning? She says, what if she says, good afternoon? Good afternoon, Amanda. So um happy to see the uh amazing Amanda Dodd. She and I actually did a joint presentation at Heartland uh last year, the year before, but it was really, really fun. And it was just a great way to collaborate. So, but that is what we have in your travel bag. So make sure that when you're traveling, when you're gonna be presenting, that you've got that packed, that everything you need is in there, so that your stress is reduced, those technical issues that might come up aren't gonna be an issue. You've got backups for your backups. And I will say this if I'm traveling a long, long ways, uh, if I'm going to Ireland, if I'm going to the UK hypnosis conference, maybe I'm gonna present uh at that. From time to time, I'll take an extra laptop. I have one here. Um excuse me, clear my throat there. I'll take an extra laptop with me. So yeah. Because your presenter bag can make all the difference to whether or not you have a great presentation or a not so great presentation. But I think that's gonna do it for today, guys. As always, I hope everybody is happy, healthy, staying safe. And hey, yeah, I'll see you out there. Peace out.