How to lead an extraordinary life: Pallas Hupe Cotter at TEDxHomeBushRdWomen

I have to tell you that I feel like I am a pretty lucky person because I have had the opportunity to live in some of the coolest places in the world including the coolest little Capitol here in Wellington New Zealand and I was blessed to be born to parents who were brave enough to drag me to some of these places sometimes despite my own strong objections if you can imagine a 13 year old being told that she had to uproot and move halfway around the world and I'm willing to bet that many of you in this room were probably raised hearing a philosophy similar to this what I learned from my parents that anybody can lead an extraordinary life as long as you dare to try and you don't let anybody stop you not even an indignant teenager now if you were raised with this philosophy or if your spoon-feeding similar mantras to your children then I have a question for you today and I want you to be really honest when you consider the answer right here right now today do you believe that you are leading an extraordinary life and if your answer is no do you still believe that you can now I know that we all have moments and those moments are for example when you're looking at your friend's facebook feed and your life seems well a little less exciting or when you're sitting on the couch perhaps and you're watching an Olympic athlete push her body beyond it seems the laws of gravity and suddenly that afternoon run you were planning seems just a little bit pointless or dare I say it after you've seen someone take a TEDTalk stage a brilliant mind an innovator inventor 30 years old or 13 and they've already changed the world and you look in the mirror and you ask yourself how do I add value we all have moments but it's when those moments start to become what we believe when they really start to sink in that it can stop you in your tracks and keep you from leading an extraordinary life when I was first entertaining the idea of public speaking I went to a veteran speaker for a little advice and she told me flat-out no one's going to want to hear what you have to say my story is simply this I have lived a lot of different places and I did work in television news for twenty years at one point reporting on the streets of Detroit while raising a young family and I even hosted a children's television show in Saudi Arabia which is by the way where my parents moved when I was 13 and so I thought maybe I have a little something to share about embracing change and blooming where you're planted but the speaker summed up my life thusly big deal so you've moved a lot and you worked a little in TV nobody knows your name you don't have any great story of overcoming any struggle no one's going to care now that could have stopped me in my tracks but I knew what she was trying to say because I had worked in News and hero stories cell and I'm no hero I'm no brilliant mind innovator scientist Olympic athlete or even someone who's climbed a mountain of any significance even though here in New Zealand that seems to be a rite of passage so give me time nothing about my story is guaranteed to grab attention words grab my attention and they have since I was a little girl I used to love books and I would climb to the tippy top of tall trees so that I could savor every word in silence and I had this amazing vocabulary I wasn't very popular as you might imagine but later in news I learned how to unclutter my words and speak more conversational II communicate concisely with clarity so it's fitting that today I'm focusing on one word and I love this word because it's a little bit too big for its britches isn't it it conjures these grandiose images when all it really means is extraordinary one step beyond the ordinary I think it's time that we redefine what this word is or remember what it really means because I think we don't all have to be heroes we can all lead extraordinary lives that can impact others there are so many supporting roles that we can play that add plot twists and texture and perspective to this narrative that we call life and I know this is true because I've interviewed some of these people they're not headline makers but the stories that they have shared with me have impacted my life they've changed the way I act or think and so they taught me that yes we can lead extraordinary lives if we believe we can so what stops us when I was working in news there were a lot of kids in newsrooms and they would come to me for advice they'd want to know how to write a better story or they'd want to know maybe my story how I had achieved the things that I had in life my personal and professional goals they were bright they were enthusiastic but they were untested they were seeking confidence and a few trade secrets so what I shared with them I'm going to share with you today the three secrets to leading an extraordinary life and not getting stuck along the way and the first one is tune in to your spidey-sense I would tell newbie reporters that your spidey sense will tingle when there is a question in the back of your mind that you haven't asked you might even think it's too inconsequential to even pay attention to ask that question I would tell them because that is the question that the viewer sitting on the couch at home is hoping that you're going to ask and I know because when I followed my spidey-sense and I'd ask these questions viewers would email and say thank you and when I didn't oh I'd hear from them too it's just your intuition telling you where you're supposed to go in life so why don't we always follow our intuition we know how that feels maybe for you it's played out like this you have been reading a newspaper and you see a job advertisement and it jumps right off the page at you and you have that moment of excitement and then the sensible voice Tunes in or chimes in and says what are you thinking don't tip the boat or don't rock the boat don't rock the boat because you might tip it and things really aren't that bad and so you step away and then later you regret it and if you've done that don't beat yourself up now about it because it is just proof that your spidey sense is in good working order tune into your spidey sense secret number one - leading an extraordinary life secret number two spots the signs one of my favorite movies of all time is Steve Martin's la story and in it there are California road signs that send his character clear messages about the next steps he's supposed to take in life wouldn't that just be the coolest thing if we had these huge honking road signs with hundreds of light bulbs illuminating our path forward the truth is that in real life there are signs but they're often tiny and easy to miss when I was in high school I spotted a sign I was sitting in class staring out the window when something fluttered and caught my eye so when I left the classroom I stopped to see what it was it was a tiny piece of paper stuck to the window with a single piece of tape and on it was an invitation to apply to Oxford or Cambridge and I had that moment and a tiny voice inside whispered why not try and then this loud booming voice chimed in and said you really think you could get in but I trusted that I had spotted that sign for a reason so I stood my ground and I reasoned back what are they really going to do chase me down the street with my application in hand shouting so that everybody can hear how dare you think you can go to Oxford University so I applied and I got it and when I got there I was surrounded by brilliant minds scientists inventors probably Olympians who climbed mountains in their spare time godlike heroes that they were I was just happy to attend it opened my mind and so many doors later in life and it was an experience that I never would have had if I hadn't spotted the signs secret number 2 - an extraordinary life secret number 3 silence your fear now I could have been stopped right there at that door in high school if I had given in to the f-word fear have you ever heard it described as false evidence appearing real it's a really good acronym when you have that loud obnoxious voice of fear in your head trying to stop you from doing what you think you might be able to do and by the way it gets louder and more obnoxious the more you try to ignore it the point is you don't ignore fear you do listen to it because as people who have climbed mountains will tell you sometimes fear is sending you some really critical information so you live with fear you sit with it you scan it for any information that might be of real value and then you turn the volume way down and it takes practice to do that it also takes courage there is a public speaker and author who encouraged me to take the podium and share my stories her name is Cindy Solomon and she identifies four different kinds of courage the courage that Cindy says you need to silence your fear is core courage in other words you choose to be courageous knowing all of the consequences now I'm someone that if you give me a challenge I'll identify every possible pitfall and worst case scenario I get it from my mother who gets it from her mother who she says considered war a religion but the truth is we're all courageous women we have all left into the unknown eyes wide open knowing that if the worst-case scenario happened at least we'd have an adventure to show for it silence your fear secret number three to an extraordinary life and what an extraordinary adventure moving to New Zealand has been I did leave behind a career of 20 years and a comfortable life in sunny California to move sight unseen to windy and wet Wellington and some people thought I was just a little crazy but the truth is if I'm being honest with myself and with those kids in the newsroom I had gotten stuck it looked like I was living my life full speed ahead but on a daily basis I was overriding my own spidey sense that was telling me I had outgrown my job and my life on the outside did not reflect who I was on the inside and there were signs I did not know then that I would be moving to Ottawa the land of the long white cloud but I spotted in the clouds and I've enhanced it so that you can see clearly what I saw the first three letters of my name and I took that to mean it's up to me to write the rest of my story not just let life happen a far clearer sign came to my husband in the form of a single tweet letting him know about this position down in the southern hemisphere and his spidey sense tingle he applied and three weeks later he was offered the position and we sat down together to silence our fear carefully considering the consequences because this time we had a couple of our own somewhat indignant children we were uprooting and then we took the leap eyes wide open and what did we find out you can rock the boat and it doesn't tip over and you can't get unstuck and an extraordinary life once again I mean look at me I was just considering public speaking told no one would care and I'm standing on the little round rug of a TEDTalk stage dreams can come true people who aren't heroes can lead extraordinary lives and I know that what I'm sharing up here is not necessarily anything scientific even though there is new science or new studies that show there is something to innovation to innovation to intuition wishful thinking there so it may not be anything new that I'm sharing and it may not be anything scientific and right there I know I have broken two rules of a good TED talk but the wisdom I am sharing is passed down from generation to generation from my parents to me theirs to them and yet somehow it is still not always getting through or at least it's not sticking so that's why I'm here today to tell you that if your answer when I asked you those questions in the beginning was know that you don't believe you can lead an extraordinary life or that you don't think you are now to redefine what extraordinary means to you remembering it is just one step beyond the ordinary one step beyond your comfort zone and I challenge you because history shows that people learn things through stories individual stories impacting individual people if any one of you feels impacted by anything you've heard here today go out and act on it take that step take that leap with your eyes wide open and if you do I promise you that you will have an adventure to live and a story to tell and who knows next year this may be you standing up here on a TED talk stage sharing an idea worth spreading thank you you

Channel: TEDx Talks

Views: 193,375

Rating: 4.8421793 out of 5

Keywords: TEDx, tedx, ted talk, tedx talks, ted, ted x, tedx talk, ted talks

Id: -QlXre4B3R0

Length: 15min 25sec (925 seconds)

Published: Sat Jan 04 2014