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Freedom fighting ourselves | Andrei Olaru | TEDxSciencesPoCampusDijon


first I just want to thank you all for

being here listening to this talk

one thing the organizer is for for the

amazing opportunity that you’ve offered

me it’s early not often I am asked to

attract such large amount of people in

the same room and for them to hear my

ramblings for 20 minutes so look the

first thing I want to begin with is a

small confession writing this talk was

one of the most difficult things I’ve

ever done and that’s not because I

generally have an issue with writing

speeches I’ve done multi tears of

competitive debating this provided me

with ample opportunities to make a fool

of myself in front of large crowds God

does hear out of the way oh I think it’s

more other had to do with the like

oppressing feeling of inadequacy that I

had that I had never I was imagining

myself on a path because I perceive TED

talks as being interesting moments held

by people that doesn’t extent already

have achieved success in their lives one

way or another um people that either

have exceptional experiences or have

interesting findings or math-amazing

careers um but generally people that

when you’re inviting you have a high

chance that they may be able to offer

relevant advice to others or run to to

tell relevant stories and then

interesting anecdotes to offer relevant

pieces of wisdom

in extent they are relevant individuals

and the scary thing is just how natural

that sentence sounded because the way in

which we are associate relevancy to

success is hardwired into our brains the

point to which the concept that the

correlation may not be automatic seems

almost impossible for us that maybe we

I just didn’t want to post a photo of

myself at had let me find one not in

digital format digital cameras were not

anything back there I wanted I knew

already what my life path was I wanted

to be one of the greats I wanted to be

successful and it so happened that at

that time I was interested in

theoretical physics devouring books by

my at that moment role models Stephen

Hawking and Albert Einstein like candy

so I knew what that has to do in life ah

and this lasted for about two years in

which I just didn’t get along with my

physics teachers teacher that well but

no despair because in that mean time I

just discovered it obviously my destiny

was to be great in a different field as

I became enthusiastic about IIT and so

role models like Steve Jobs or Bill

Gates I obviously knew I had to become a

great cold

the way in which we do programming and

this lasted for about a year as well

until I started debating in high school

and realized that maybe maybe my place

was not an IT maybe I was to be right

there next to John Jacques who saw it

and revolutionized political philosophy

yes of course how could I not have seen

this that the place in which my bus was

to be displayed after my death was

obviously the economics section a

smaller switch this time but obviously

as a tenth relates to the 90 myself so

much better it was by now known that I

was to be one of the greatest lawyers

that ever existed or maybe maybe not law

maybe I was to go and become a diplomat

and to study international relations or

maybe you know I was really stinky I

could be a great spy and working

intelligence or maybe my meticulous yes

I was to revolutionize watchmaking or

yes a 17 year old wanted to be a

watchman I know I was writing these up

but after after I got to college I

discovered my artistic side and

obviously that was my calling

how could I not have seen it I was to be

a graphical designer and also to

revolutionize photography and maybe in

the meantime I was as discovering it was

not that amazing at these maybe I was to

be a writer or you know a combination of

all of this yes that was it I was do a

great key design or maybe maybe maybe

not that maybe maybe styling company

become an entrepreneur or maybe I know I

was revolutionized modern teaching but

not before I just changed the whole way

in which the political system work and

also started my own newspaper and do

investigative journalism because I could

go on like this for

because fact of the matter is all of the

things that I have tried up until now

are domains in which I haven’t truly

been successful or not in the

traditional sense and you may say that I

am still young and only 22 but honestly

how comes some find Ercoli in calling in

the first or second try and for me it

takes 100 what will be so different

about the 101 and honestly I’m not the

only one in that situations if you take

a look at stats about Millennials people

that are within my generation that are

right now under 34 and above 18 or or 16

something like that you can see a lot of

science of this restlessness in trying

to find a field in which they are to

become great things like the fact that

the unemployment rate is of 16.3% the

fact that just 16 10 Millennials have

jobs of our part-time part of the whole

idea of following your passion things

like the fact that 75 Persie percent of

them see themselves as authentic that

40% either want to start a business

already have started one or that more

than that more than a quarter are

already self-employed all these are

signs that my entire generation suffers

from something and this guy simone

session egg has a very interesting talk

called Millennials in the workplace

exactly about that of how Millennials

have been told up like from the moment

they’re born that they are destined for

greatness that they can achieve whatever

they set their minds to that they are to

be a shining star and the only question

is what will be the place

night-sky that they will have to fall

into that they have the freedom to do

whatever they want in life in a sense

freedom is the ideology of this

millennium will we’re free to do and to

feel and to be whomever we want as long

as we are to be successful no chains and

or shackles stop us from being

successful as long as we are to be

successful we can be whatever we want as

long as we are to be relevant as long as

we are to be successful we will be

relevant and as natural and that may

sound it’s also to a certain extent

quite SAP and the Society mochi will be

displayed right in front of you um it’s

sad because like for starters success is

in many ways to find the relative terms

and there’s not any but not everybody

can achieve success but even more than

that but everybody has necessarily to be

to achieve success now anybody has to to

achieve anything in a sense not

achieving success is a choice in

themselves in itself and as trivial as

it may sound many of us are already

making that choice many about is

thinking emoji I want you to think about

this like whenever we decide to not

sacrifice things like emotional comfort

and thus to go out with our friends

whenever we decide

is physical comfort or having a

multifaceted life just in order for us

to be able to dedicate them of our time

and energy in one particular direction

as to become successful

every time we don’t do that we make an

active choice to know them successful

and honestly that’s a great thing but at

the same time we just cannot escape and

our mind cannot escape the shackles that

the culture of success glorification has

created for us

I don’t a small show of hands how many

of you have ever felt bad for watching a

TV series okay okay keep your hands up

how many of you have are feeling regret

thinking that they haven’t learned a new

language when they were younger

okay well now last question how many of

you are having a feeling of of dread

when ever you’re envisioning your own

mediocrity and you know you don’t

necessarily

[Music]

or not to me make it to yourselves but

fact of the matter is that the deal that

were feeling whenever we’re realizing

that we are taking the detour from our

path where success is in a way of

feeling as honest and real as any other

expression of our identity and that is

because our identity is in a way just a

construction upon the basis of our

perception the reality that we perceive

and the reality that we perceive is one

in which success is not a choice is an

imperative is something that you just

have to achieve failure is not something

acceptable and I know it’s a bit petty

of me if I’m in your front of all of you

and then just justifying my failures in

a slightly entertaining manner Oh like

what it’s kind of hard to find a pieces

of wisdom when your creative space is

restricted by the fact that the only

major difference between you and a

homeless beggar is the fact that the

homeless beggar is at least providing

sustenance to itself cause you’re living

on your parents money to be honest

actually if you take a look at the title

of my talk freedom fighting ourselves

you can see that it can be read in three

different ways

and on this is one of the reasons why I

chose it because honestly I didn’t

really know what I wanted to talk about

for quite awhile so I wanted to give

myself some

ability in that sense but what I didn’t

know is that they want to have hippo for

action um I knew that if I managed to

make it that we see modicum of logical

sense you will leave this room was being

slightly less adamant about your

convictions and that’s not to say that

your convictions may be bad in any way I

just want to shine some light upon the

fact that they are just as strong as you

make them um in as a great man once at

an HBO cult

power resides where men believe it

resides no more and no this and honestly

our convictions have power upon us only

as much as we want to offer them power

on I recently read a book that left its

mark upon me it’s called The Iceman

biblecry heart it’s a fun interesting

insightful book has a lot more wisdom is

in it than this set off so I obviously

recommend it but this often also a very

good source of inspiration for me and in

the book Luke Reinhardt is a

psychologist that decides his life is

boring and he feels like no choice that

he makes is any better so he wants to

succumb his ability to make choices to

the dice do not stop making choices and

let the dice make choices for him he

wants for this with a construct his

personality something

don’t necessarily advice but whilst

doing so he obviously has to find

options to give the dice and he starts

asking himself questions questions like

when does he sleep at night

what is he attracted to only a

particular type of women why does he

just not just leave his wife and start

becoming a carpenter in a nearby town

like so many questions is there anything

that we think about ourselves for

granted why do we wear clothes why do we

go and listen to TED talks that have

little content whatsoever why do we

believe that success is a prerequisite

for a good life like there must be some

reasons behind it then there may be

amazing reasons but unless we think

about them and discover them and then

put them up against reason supporting

that opposite course of action we may

not know that whether what we’re doing

is a good choice or not maybe we just

refer off like showing off our sexy

bodies more than we like being

comfortable in our codes maybe with more

rather eat sweets than be slim numb

ourselves with drugs that we loose it

let our inner traitor roam free he

rather than have a good talk like so

maybe so many choices that we can make

but we need to fight for our freedom to

make them see what they did there oh

yeah I call this talk because I believe

I need to think again I believe that a

world in which people are not critical

regarding their own frequency

and convictions the bedroom world is a

world in which people first of all know

themselves more and can find out better

what makes them happy it’s also a world

in which whenever they make choices that

have even happened if us guilty it’s a

world in which they are slightly more

tolerant because they understand that

others choices are just as much an

expression of the environment in which

they live in as it was for them and

there’s more rather than being hateful

towards them would help these people

actually try to fight their

preconceptions and honestly a TED talk

is slightly too short for me to offer

you a truly relevant list of advice both

in the psychological field on how to

challenge your own preconceptions in

sociology into how to trigger change

positive changes in people or even in

other other fields though honestly if

you search for me after this talk I can

offer you like five minutes of my time a

present present you my plan on

overthrowing the world order it’s pretty

cool

go ahead I can vouch for it okay ah but

what they think you should come out of

this talk with is the following we do

live in the part of the world’s history

that in which we’re most free there

hasn’t have never been so few shackles

around our minds and bodies however the

fight is not yet won traditions customs

manipulators or even laws are still

restricting our ability to choose our

path in life and do whatever we want and

I may not have achieved

success and may never have in a

traditional sense but what I want is

more rather the freedom to not have to

achieve success together with the

freedom to just generally do whatever I

feel like it is necessary for me to do

and I want this freedom both for me and

for everybody else and especially in in

today’s political scene defending

freedom and then fighting for it is as

much of an imperative as it ever was

and in that sense if there is one

conviction that I have thought long and

hard and licensed every nuke and Pratt

and true still decided that’s a

conviction I still have is the fact that

the fight for freedom is worth it and

that is because freedom is not a

specific statements more rather a

process it has to be nurtured for it to

grow for us to start understanding more

and more the just how broad our range of

possibilities is and this is a fight and

I want to fight and further stop I just

hope that you might join me thank you [Applause]

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