The Power of Metaphor

Metaphor is a powerful rhetorical device that can bring life to your speech and your ideas.

When we use metaphor, the mind of the audience makes associations between what we are saying and the target of the metaphor. As a result the feelings we have about the one are transferred to the other.

A positive metaphor – like the one I just used ‘bring life to your speech’ borrows the ideas, associations and feelings we have about a thing – in this case ‘life’ and applies them to the speech.  We care for things that are alive, we love things that are alive, we nurture things that are alive, and we value things that are alive.  So by using the metaphor we begin to associate  that value or even love for the speech itself.

Business leaders talk of the DNA of their company – implying it is a living thing that will grow and develop and evolve.

Metaphor can also be used in a negative way.  Hitler described the Jews as snakes, in Rwanda the Tutsi were described as cockroaches. Snakes and cockroaches are both things that we would not want in our house, would not want around our children, vermin we are happy to see destroyed.  If those ideas are repeated enough they start to sway peoples subconscious thoughts.

Metaphor is a powerful tool, and with great power comes great responsibility!

“The greatest thing by far is to be a master or metaphor. It is the one thing that cannot be learned from others; it is also a sign of genius, since a good metaphor implies and eye for resemblance” said Aristotle.

A well chosen metaphor helps your audience understand and grasp hold of profound and complicated ideas in a few words, like this one from Gino the Kindness Coach:  Your unforgiveness is like holding a burning coal in your hands – it causes you pain, it demands your constant attention but it does not affect the person who upset you in any way… the only person it hurts is you.  

The apparent simplicity on the surface of a metaphor is a signpost to the deeper truth in what you are saying.

The use of Metaphor is one of the Modules covered by my new course: How to be a Motivational Speaker.  Learn more about How to be a Motivational Speaker.

Read the whole Rhetoric blog series.