Elder Eyring is the Man

Last night we were asked to annotate a speech given by Elder Eyring back in October 1997. It was called "A Child of God." It would probably have been more fittingly titled, "How to Overcome Pride" or "Success through Humility" but who am I to judge? I'm not a General Authority. The talk itself was excellent, and of course, so were my annotations, probably...
So my focus was an idea we discussed in class about "getting on the same page" through rhetoric. Elder Eyring's talk was fascinating by dissecting it looking for ways that he persuaded and simultaneously trying to get his audience on the "same page."

By connecting his themes to his specific audience of college age students, he was able to better persuade them. Most interestingly, Elder Eyring focused on learning and becoming educated while still remaining humble. Often, learning leads to pride, but Elder Eyring's discussion of how education becomes a means through which we can perfect ourselves showed the importance of what his audience was focusing on.

I also was impressed by how little Elder Eyring condemned pride, instead he focused on the rewards for stripping oneself of pride. He spends minimal time on the negative and spends the majority of his talk on the rewards. And as studies often show, positive emotions outweigh negative.

All and all, I would give his talk and 8 out of 10.

(picture from: http://valleyforgewoman.blogspot.com/2010/06/relief-society-lesson-recap-pottstown.html)