Growing up, we all have dreams that even then seem a bit unattainable. Yet, every once in a while, are fun to fathom. Typical aspirations that my mom and dad heard were, “I want to be an astronaut, I want to be an Olympic gold medalist, I want to give a TEDTalk”. Well, on September 23rd, I actually accomplished the latter. Here’s my experience.

Image: Barbara Rodriguez
In April of this year, I applied and got chosen to give a Ted Talk at my school (thank you Dr. Smith for making this happen!). The process was strenuous, exciting, fulfilling, and made me cry once or twice. At times, I even went back to my 8-year old perspective: this is never going to happen. But it did. Let me tell you about the journey.
Choosing the topic: This took me a lot longer than I will admit. I wanted to do something with languages, as I speak 5 and wanted to share how that has shaped me as a person. But, did I want to give the audience a 10 minute crash course on Danish? Did I want to write an 8 minute poem dedicated to German’s tedious grammar? I decided that teaching people how I became a polyglot before the age of 11 was the answer.
After settling on the subject matter, one of my mom’s friends directed me towards the concept of brain plasticity. Researching the topic at a superficial level made me immediately connect the medical aspects of brain plasticity and its real world implementations. I saw that there was something missing in my research, and went for it. And thus, my topic was born: Implementing brain plasticity in schools.
I wrote, wrote, and wrote some more: I asked Chat GPT how to write the introduction of a Ted Talk. Didn’t like its response and asked again. Quickly returned to watching Ted Talks until I hoped to find an interesting hook to see if I could do something similar. That didn’t work. Explained my topic to a stranger: finally got my introduction.
Here comes the complicated part, writing the body. I give all my thanks to Isabel Garcia, my speech coach. When you’ve read six medical journals about neuroplasticity and how it was used in the 1980’s, your brain becomes quite fried. She guided me back to earth and helped me explain the otherwise confusing subject to my future audience of 16-50 year olds. I repeated each sentence out loud 50 times and made sure that it flowed. If it didn’t, I made it flow. Deleted paragraphs I deemed “necessary”. Left it for a month and came back. Wrote a conclusion that makes me smile when I said it. (When I actually gave my talk, it gave me a level of satisfaction that can’t otherwise be described).
Made the slides: Not all Ted Talks need slides. Alvaro de la Mora did an amazing job without them. It all depends on the speaker. I decided that slides would be necessary, as medical Ted talks have a habit of loosing people. You need certain things to bring them back.
It is as simple as giving your Ted talk to a new person and having them point out every time they want a visual - then you tweak it a bit. Keep your audience engaged. “Do that trick where you say a word and it appears behind you. That always produces a wow factor” - Jason De Rousse.

Memorize the talk: Maybe the hardest part? John Namias gave me a great tip. “Print out one page of your Ted Talk. Learn the first paragraph. Learn the second paragraph. Then learn paragraphs 1 and 2 together. Continue until you have your talk fully memorized. Good news is, a lot of it is already semi-memorized, as you wrote it. Bad news? It is both the most boring and important part of this entire process”. Johns technique helped me learn my talk to the point where I could give it flawlessly whilst a rock band was sound checking behind me! (True story).
Practice delivery: It is a 10 minute talk. You can’t stay in the same spot the entire time. You can’t have the same tone throughout your talk. You want to move your arms, but remember, you aren’t doing an interpretive dance.
Choose an outfit: To those who know me, know that this was my most difficult task by far. I actually chose it the night before (not by choice, but this made the adrenaline of not wanting to look like a mess kick in).
Gave my Ted Talk: Controversial opinion: This is the easiest part. Although I don’t remember anything, and actually had to go back to make sure that I had made every point, fight or flight kicks in. You have to trust yourself. The audience was my biggest ally. They helped me enjoy my time on the stage. Smile, pause, and sound confident. You got this.

Image: Barbara Rodriguez
Look back at pictures and turn an experience into a memory: The past 6 months have been an unforgettable experience. I can’t believe I did that. An 8, now 16 year old, has fulfilled a life long dream. I gave a Ted Talk! How cool am I?
Thank you to the entire Ted x team for for making this happen.
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