4 TED Talks that will take you on an emotional rollercoaster.
And they’re more than worth your time.
Y’all know how much I love TED Talks. If I ever had three wishes, one would be to force all of those privileged enough to have access to the Internet to watch a selection of the top talks.
That might sound like a wasted wish, but trust me when I say it wouldn’t be. There’s a reason the TED slogan is Ideas Worth Spreading. TED Talks move people to action. They inspire and motivate and energise. If more people sat down and listened to what TED speakers had to say, the world would be a better place.
Today though, I wanted to share with you all some TED Talks that have taken me on an emotional rollercoaster from start to finish. Like most TED Talks, they’ll leave a lasting impact on your life. These ones just emotionally moreso.
Shonda Rhimes’ year of saying yes to everything.
15 minutes. What could be wrong with giving myself my full attention for 15 minutes? Turns out, nothing. The very act of not working has made it possible for the hum to return. As if the hum’s engine could only refuel when I was away. Work doesn’t work without play.
I first heard this talk in podcast form while shaving, and for a good five minutes I stopped what I was doing and just listened. I’ve never heard anyone speak with such fluency and flow like Rhimes does in My Year of Saying Yes to Everything, and it’s a super interesting take on how one of the busiest women in the world balances work and play.
Frank Warren’s half a million secrets.
Secrets can take many forms. They can be shocking or silly or soulful, they can connect us with our deepest humanity, or with people we’ll never meet again.
I caught this talk at a TED discussion group last week, and it’s an impactful one. You know a speaker is great when they can take their audience from laughter to silence in a matter of seconds. Frank Warren doesn’t just do this once during his 10 minutes on stage, which is what makes Half a Million Secrets such an impressive — and rollercoaster — talk.
BJ Miller asks: what really matters at the end of life?
You can always find a shock of beauty or meaning in what life you have left. If we love such moments ferociously, then maybe we can learn to live well not in spite of death, but because of it. Let death be what takes us, not lack of imagination.
BJ Miller is an emotional rollercoaster just to look at. A guy who lost three limbs after making contact with an 11,000 volt power line, Miller’s clear-eyed view on life and death is utterly enthralling. His talk is sad but insightful, and will likely make you approach life just a little bit differently once the 18 minutes are up.
Jill Bolte Taylor’s stroke of insight.
I believe that the more time we spend choosing to run the deep inner-peace circuitry of our right hemispheres, the more peace we will project in to the world, and the more peaceful our planet will be.
I’ve saved the best until last here. Taylor’s unique style and energy makes this my favourite TED Talk of all time — I even wrote a Chapter using content from it. It’s an incredible story, and one that will take your emotions from one end of the spectrum to the other a ridiculous number of times within 20 minutes.
