TED Talks

So today I slept until noon and watched TED talks online and movies on tv. I watched movies late last night, too, which is why I slept in so late. But that's not important, except to say that I need to nip that habit in the bud. It is so easy to waste time. That's why I'm trying to take another sabbatical from Facebook. I'm okay without it but I continue to find other ways to waste time.

TED talks are really thought provoking and inspiring, most of the time. Not all of the speakers are brilliant but it's a much better use of my time that Facebook. I love that Facebook allows me to keep up with friends who I may never see again, but it is so easy to waste entire days sitting in front of the computer.

The first TED talk that caught my eye was Charles Limb: Your Brain on Improv. I have seen several presentations of studies on the brain in love, playing music, and other things, using MRIs. It was very interesting to see what areas of the brain are involved during the creative processes of improvisation and freestyle rap.

The second one that really blew my mind was Ken Robinson: Schools Kill Creativity. (also, Changing Education Paradigms) I have been thinking a lot about if the education system is failing because it's just an outdated conception of what education should be and how it should work. Robinson explains the history of the education system and how it is set up with a hierarchy with the arts on the bottom. The system is set up to pump out professors, and rates success in one, narrow, academic way. As a result many brilliant students feel they are unsuccessful and their potential is squelched.

The third talk was by Amy Smith. It was about producing safer burning charcoal bricks out of common materials in Haiti and India. What struck me was her statistics near the end. Women and children around the world spend 40 billion hours a year fetching water. I don't know how big the audience was. 300 in the room would be farmers. 100 would have AIDs. More than half in the room would earn only $1 a day.

I also really liked coach John Wooden's definition of success: Peace of mind attained only through self-satisfaction and knowing you made the effort to do the best of what you're capable.

It's so incredible to hear people's incredible stories, efforts, and revelations. It gave me a lot to meditate on. Hopefully I can think of something worth remembering.