i am 19 years old and i’m currently
studying psychology at webster
university vienna i also have her to be
an alumnus of Kiev International School
where our event is being held and I
graduated turn about almost exactly
actually two years ago in 2013 I would
like to thank all of you for coming out
here today this is honestly and
absolutely amazing and very very
humbling experience for me and I’m very
proud that everybody comes out here to
actually listen to what I personally
even have to say I’m here today because
I want to talk to you about change it’s
quite simple we’re very lucky today to
have collected and absolutely amazing
this plethora of people that can speak
to you about this topic on a very wide
variety of subjects and unlike them i
haven’t really built paradigm-shifting
droves or started new media platforms or
created successful companies I’m pretty
sure actually while they were achieving
I was stuck on youtube watching videos
of cats chasing laser pointers but you
know don’t discredit me yet I think it
takes a lot of effort and dedication to
sit through two hours of cats falling
off furniture but all jokes aside I
think that what i have done is i
struggled I’ve struggled with change and
I struggled with acceptance of change
and what i have done is I’ve learned
I’ve learned from changing times from
hard times and I think I’ve come out a
learner and I have a little bit of
experience with this my story starts out
actually a little bit cliched because
when I was graduating high school I had
no idea what I wanted to do with my life
I was confused I didn’t know where I
wanted to go I did not know who I wanted
to be and to be quite honest I didn’t
even know if I wanted to do anything
with my life and that was the problem I
was perfectly content with my life here
in Kiev I had absolutely fantastic
friends I had an amazing school I had a
house where I was completely always
taken care of and comforted and nurture
so I didn’t really have a need to leave
to leave I was protected secure nurtured
so when the time came to decide my
future plans I hit a roadblock I didn’t
know where I wanted to go so I remember
dramatically storming into my house one
day and declaring to my parents that I
was going to take a gap year because I
needed this time off and I have deserved
it so I left high school with a brave
face I was putting on a brave face for
my parents who were accosted looking at
me concerned but never actually asking
because they were dedicated to the craft
of letting me make my own decisions and
letting me go through life independently
I was putting on a brave face for my
friends that would ask me very very
worried of what I was going to do with
my life and I actually remember I would
constantly give them a rehearsed answer
that I was rejuvenating and I needed to
travel and see the world but worst of
all I was putting on a brave face for
myself because I was avoiding this very
important decision but worst of all I
was avoiding and procrastinating the
real reason for why i did not want to
leave and I was coming up with constant
excuses to nullify my behavior which was
not the right thing to do and so the
months rolled on and I remember that
toot started turning into 33 in 244 and
26 and before I knew at nine months had
gone by and I did incredible things I
cannot deny it and I’m actually very
great glad that I took that time off but
I’m not glad for why I took that time
off my reasoning for it was flawed
anyway um as the spring of 2014 came to
an end I remember having the same
realization over and over again and that
I had to make my decision once more I
had to decide where I was going to go
and the time had come once more but this
time time itself was not on my side
because i could not procrastinate this
decision any longer i was an absolute
wreck to be completely honest with you
because i really had no idea where i
wanted to go I had no idea what I wanted
to do and it was really scary it wasn’t
actually until one night that
issue was going to be resolved I
remember in the middle of the night
making why my way downstairs and seeing
my mom sewing away at her table as she
does to relieve her own stresses in life
and I remember the way that she looked
at me and how she ushered me over and
told me to sit down and for the first
time ever and no one had ever done
before she just very candidly asked me a
question and all she did was ask me why
I was so afraid what was I so scared of
that I did not want to move on that’s
question to be completely honest caught
me off guard I had no idea what to reply
to her I had no idea what to say and
that conversation ended with no
resolution however I remember making my
way upstairs and lying in bed and
understanding that I could no longer run
away from answering that question for
myself as I lay in bed that night I
realized that the answer to this
terrifying grandiose problem was
actually extremely simple of course i
would like to blame my parents because
they gave me an amazing life i went to
an amazing school like give
international school and i felt very
safe very accepted here i had great
friends teachers liked me i liked my
teachers everything was going great i
had fantastic friends from all over the
world where I could always speak to them
about all different kinds of topics and
most of all I lived with my family with
my family that loved me and accepted me
and supported me and because of that I
did not want to move on it was very
simple I had an amazing life so I was
afraid that if I were going to make a
new change I would no longer have it and
as I lay in bed all of these thoughts
unraveled and I realized that this fear
of change was actually making me scared
of very trivial things about college I
was afraid that if I would start doing
laundry I would put it to wash detergent
that the washing machine would blow up
or that I would hit snooze too many
times and nobody would wake me up and
nobody would have my back or that my
roommate was going to end up psychotic
or worst of all that she would think I
was psychotic that would be even worse
but all in all I was just scared and I
was letting my fear stop me from making
a very important decision in my life and
it was terrible and to be completely
honest I am very embarrassed of myself
for having gone through that from being
scared of such simple things I was
trying to avoid a change for as long as
humanly possible that realization
however was exactly a year ago and today
I’m probably the happiest I have ever
been in my life i live in study in one
of the most beautiful cities in the
world i have new and fantastic friends
and my roommate did not turn out to be
psychotic well not fully anyway but
that’s kind of a on the point as i look
back at that time i find it really silly
i find these fears to be completely
nonsensical yet back then they were so
tangible and so terrifying today these
frustrations don’t really mean anything
anymore I decided to go to college after
I realized I was being a complete
hypocrite i was always telling my
friends the change was something
completely natural that you have to jump
into the abyss of the unknown because
you could come out the champion i
remember telling my girlfriend’s to get
out of toxic relationships even though
they were completely terrified that this
was their only shot at true love and
that if they were gonna work going to
break up with him now there would never
be loved again and i remember my friends
coming up to me with new ideas new
projects new dreams new hobbies and i
would always tell them and yes you
should take this step forward you should
be able to take this change as it is and
be happy with it we are a society
completely obsessed with change as a
negative entity we assign change this
role of a foe and sometimes we even
think that change is something down out
of mere desperation it’s a cookie cutter
idea that’s pushed on to us by Hollywood
and self-help books that always tells us
that know if you’re you’re fed up with
your life and your desk job sucks and
you’re just this miserable little coil
in the machine of life you should uphill
everything uproot everything buy a
sailboat and sail away into the horizon
and
is actually perhaps the only way change
is positively represented in our society
and I think that’s a problem I actually
remember sitting in one of my psychology
classes and being introduced to a scale
the scale is called the social
readjustment scale and the premise do
this is actually very simple just hold
on yelling with me you’re given a list
of life situations and each of this life
situations has a number you go through
this list you tick off every single
thing that applies to you and then you
tally up your results this yields a
number this number is supposed to
represent how stressed you are in your
life and how much of the stress is going
to put your health into jeopardy as i
was taking this test i realized that
every single item on it pertained to
some sort of life change pregnancy had
50 points getting married had 25 moving
locations have 20 change in diet had 15
a change in schools had 25 in admittedly
not all change on this list was good but
not all of it was bad either the
measurement of the scale runs from 150
points to 350 if you score 150 200
you’re mildly stressed probably not
going to die anytime soon you know
you’re doing okay if you score above a
three hundred you are putting your life
in jeopardy everything is going to be
bad you will have all the diseases all
the diabetes everything my score on this
test was 290 so it will probably have a
brain aneurysm like now and i genuinely
in Sicily apologize in advance and thank
you for listening to me but in all
honesty and all jokes aside we are so
afraid of change that we build scales to
measure its effect on our health we are
so afraid of change that we’d rather let
it affect our health let it give us a
heart attack then let it in and deal
with it accordingly and this honestly is
why I’m here today I want all of you to
befriend change I want all of you to
understand the change is going to come
not
come any in any case it is going to
happen either way whether you want it or
not whether you’re ready for it or not
it is going to come knocking at your
door and you better be ready to open up
and welcome it into your house into an
open embrace before it grows impatient
and puts a brick through your living
room window change is going to happen
either way it’s going to happen
regardless of your attitude toward it
and your attitude actually is perhaps
the only part the only variable that you
have control over but the good news is
that your attitude toward change is
perhaps the only thing that can
alleviate the negative side effects that
it may bring it is the only thing that
can make change better all of this is
very inspirational and lalala but how do
you change this attitude how what is the
step that you can make in order to
actually make this change in your life
you make that change by realizing that
the more you are afraid of change the
more you avoid it the more you’ll press
it the more you hide from it the more
you prevent it from being positive being
afraid is important and I cannot deny
that it helps us keep ourselves safe and
preserve ourselves but being afraid of
ifs and maybes is completely
counterproductive what if they won’t
like me what if I can’t do it maybe this
is a bad idea maybe I should just stay
home but life does not work on ifs and
maybes life works on yeses and noes life
works with structure life works
angularly life flows and changes life is
a constant change and the way we do that
is by embracing change and we do that by
understanding that we have potential and
our job here is that we must fulfill
that potential if we try if we work if
we persevere and choose not to be afraid
of the unknown then we can indeed come
out to be champions I will not lie to
you and tell you that every single
change in your life is going to be super
positive
it sometimes it’s going to be terrible
sometimes it’s going to be hard
sometimes it’s going to hurt sometimes
you’re going to make wrong decisions and
sometimes you’re going to choose the
wrong path sometimes you’re going to
wish that you did not move at all but if
you don’t move it all if you choose to
stay put and sit every single good that
could come out of your future is going
to be left unrealized if you choose to
be afraid if you choose to stay if you
choose to say it you’re never going to
be able to experience any positive
change if I chose to stay in bed that
day I would have absolutely nothing to
talk to you about today because I would
have absolutely nothing to say you you
can choose to stay home and stay cooped
up in your house till the rest of your
life no problem but I sure as well hope
that one that one constants change the
one that all of us are destined for
comes knocking at your door to collect
you at the end of your life I hope that
the life that flashes before your eyes
is going to be that of a man that has
lived change is the living being it is
an entity that we cannot avoid it is an
entity that we can only be friend and
learn how to coexist with it will bite
sometimes but sometimes it will offer us
a great gain great protection and great
opportunity as my friend once told me as
we were sitting and pontificating on the
meaning of life change isn’t good or bad ani change simply is thank you