How to Conquer Stress and Do Hard Things | Sangeetha Rai | TEDxKULeuvenBrussels

TEDx Talks

26 Aug 202414:44

Summary

TLDRThe speaker reminisces about her grandparents' farm in India, a place of love and positivity that shaped her resilience. Facing career challenges and societal expectations as an Asian woman in a male-dominated field, she initially struggles with self-doubt and stress. Drawing from her grandparents' example of handling adversity, she develops 'customized resiliency kits' to tackle specific stressors like public speaking and leadership. These kits, consisting of a few focused techniques, help her and others conquer fears and lead more fulfilling lives, emphasizing the可控性 of stress management.

Takeaways

🌍 The happiest place for the speaker is not a famous amusement park, but her grandparents' coconut farm in South India.
👵 The speaker's grandparents demonstrated resilience and positivity despite limited resources and hardships.
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 The speaker's childhood was filled with love, belonging, and stories from Indian epics, fostering a sense of identity.
🎓 After moving to the US, the speaker faced challenges such as cultural adaptation, language barriers, and gender biases in her career.
🚀 Despite initial setbacks and a lack of support, the speaker was determined and eventually achieved her first promotion.
💔 The speaker experienced a crisis of confidence and felt trapped by the expectations and actions of others in her workplace.
🌧️ A moment of despair led the speaker to recall her grandparents' resilience during monsoons, inspiring her to find her own path to overcoming stress.
🛠️ The speaker developed the concept of 'customized resiliency kits' to help her and others tackle specific stressors.
🗣️ Public speaking was a significant stressor for the speaker, which she overcame using her resiliency kit, leading to successful engagements.
🌟 Successful people, like Serena Williams and Beyoncé, have their own versions of resiliency kits, highlighting their importance.
👩‍🎓 The speaker's daughter, Sonia, used a customized resiliency kit to manage schoolwork and opportunities, demonstrating the effectiveness of this approach.

Q & A

What is the speaker’s happiest place on earth?
-The speaker's happiest place is their grandparents' coconut farm in a beach village in Tulunadu, South India.
How does the speaker describe their grandparents' farm?
-The farm was surrounded by more than 200 coconut trees, filled with love and positive energy. The speaker fondly remembers the smell of the sea breeze mixed with their grandmother’s fish curry.
What was life like for the speaker’s grandparents?
-The speaker’s grandparents lived simply with limited resources—6 hours of electricity per day, an outdoor toilet, and three meals of boiled rice and fish. Despite this, they navigated life with ease and positivity.
What cultural expectations did the speaker face as a teenager in India?
-As a teenager, the speaker was expected to excel in school while also preparing for an arranged marriage to a suitable boy who would provide for and take care of her.
What challenges did the speaker face when they moved to the U.S.?
-The speaker knew no one, including their husband, had no education in the U.S., no support network, and struggled in a male-dominated field of technology. Additionally, they had a strong accent, making it difficult for people to understand them.
What ceilings did the speaker face in their career?
-The speaker faced both a glass ceiling and a bamboo ceiling as an Asian woman, where they were expected to be contributors but not seen as suitable for leadership roles.
How did the speaker react to their first promotion and the team's response?
-The speaker was horrified by their team's reaction. Some refused to work for them, others undermined them, and some patronized them, which made the speaker feel demoralized and doubt their abilities.
What realization helped the speaker build resilience?
-The speaker realized that their grandparents built customized resiliency kits for each stressor they faced, focusing on what they could control. This led the speaker to shift their mindset and build personalized resiliency kits.
How did the speaker overcome their fear of public speaking?
-The speaker built a customized resiliency kit consisting of solid preparation, a specific meditation for charisma, and a finger press method to manage nervousness. This helped them become a confident public speaker.
What is the formula the speaker shared for creating a customized resiliency kit?
-The formula has three steps: 1) Identify your major stressor, 2) Build and customize a kit for that specific stressor, 3) Practice using the kit consistently and repeatedly to train the brain.

Outlines

00:00

🌴 Nostalgic Childhood Memories

The speaker reminisces about their happiest place on earth, which is not a famous amusement park but their grandparents' coconut farm in a small beach village in South India. The farm was surrounded by coconut trees and filled with love and positive energy. The speaker fondly recalls the smell of the sea breeze mixed with the aroma of their grandmother's fish curry cooking over a fire pit. They remember their grandfather's animated stories about the Indian epic Ramayana. Despite having limited resources, their grandparents navigated life with ease and unconditional love. The speaker feels a sense of belonging and love when they think of their time spent there.

05:02

🌧️ Overcoming Professional Challenges

The speaker shares her journey of moving to the US after college, where she faced challenges as an Asian woman in a male-dominated field with no prior experience interacting with men and a strong accent that made her difficult to understand. Despite these obstacles, she found success in her first job at a New York startup. However, she encountered career barriers and received unhelpful feedback. After a promotion, she faced resistance from her team, including refusal to work with her, constant undermining, and patronizing behavior. These experiences led her to doubt herself and feel trapped and alone. She tried various methods to build resilience but found them ineffective until she had a breakthrough moment.

10:04

💡 Building Custom Resilience Kits

During a moment of despair, the speaker remembered her grandparents' resilience in the face of adversity. She realized that they focused on what they could control and built customized solutions for each problem. Inspired by this, she decided to create her own 'resilience kits' to tackle specific stressors. She successfully applied this approach to public speaking, building a kit that included preparation, a specific meditation, and a finger press method to manage nervousness. She then extended this strategy to other areas of her life, such as being bold, negotiating, and balancing work and home life. After experiencing personal success, she began to mentor others and help them build their own kits, leading to more fulfilling lives and improved mental health.

👩‍🎓 Empowering the Next Generation

The speaker, along with her daughter Sonia, demonstrates how to build a customized resilience kit. Sonia's stressor was balancing schoolwork with extracurricular opportunities and dealing with impostor syndrome. Her kit included a 20-minute run, a decision tree for opportunities, and an exercise to debunk her fears. The speaker emphasizes the importance of having a kit that consists of no more than five items focusing on what one can control, such as preparation, techniques, lucky charms, affirmations, and exercises. The speaker shares that these kits can enhance neuroplasticity and train the brain to handle stress better. She concludes by highlighting the impact of stress on health and the importance of having the right mindset and resilience kit to conquer stressors.

Mindmap

Keywords

💡Resilience

Resilience refers to the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties; toughness. In the video, resilience is a central theme as the speaker describes how her grandparents demonstrated this quality by maintaining positivity despite facing hardships such as leaks in their home during monsoons. The speaker also discusses building 'resiliency kits' to help manage stressors, illustrating the concept through personal experiences and strategies like public speaking and leadership.

💡Stressors

Stressors are events or situations that cause stress. The video discusses various stressors such as the challenges of public speaking, cultural adjustments, and work-related pressures. The speaker's journey and the concept of 'resiliency kits' are centered around identifying and overcoming these stressors to build resilience.

💡Public Speaking

Public speaking is the act of performing a speech to an audience. The video emphasizes the fear and anxiety associated with public speaking, especially for the speaker who had to overcome a language barrier. It is used as an example of a stressor that the speaker tackled by creating a customized resiliency kit, which included preparation and specific meditation techniques.

💡Leadership

Leadership is the act of leading a group of people or an organization. The video discusses the speaker's challenges in leadership roles, particularly as an Asian woman in a male-dominated field. The concept of building resilience is tied to leadership as the speaker had to navigate cultural and professional barriers to be an effective leader.

💡Imposter Syndrome

Imposter syndrome is a psychological pattern where individuals doubt their accomplishments and fear being exposed as a 'fraud'. In the video, the speaker's daughter, Sonia, experiences imposter syndrome when presented with opportunities. The video uses this term to illustrate a common stressor that can be managed through a customized resiliency kit.

💡Neuroplacticity

Neuroplasticity, also known as brain plasticity or neural plasticity, is the ability of the brain to change and adapt as a result of experience. The video mentions that using a customized resiliency kit can enhance neuroplasticity, allowing individuals to train their brains to better handle stressors.

💡Customized Resiliency Kits

Customized resiliency kits are personalized strategies or tools designed to help individuals overcome specific stressors. The video describes how the speaker developed such kits for various challenges, including public speaking and leadership. These kits are tailored to the individual's needs and are used as a practical approach to building resilience.

💡Cultural Barriers

Cultural barriers refer to the difficulties faced when interacting between different cultures. The speaker discusses her experience as an immigrant in the US and the cultural barriers she faced, such as a strong accent leading to misunderstandings. These barriers are presented as stressors that the speaker had to overcome to succeed in her career.

💡Glass Ceiling

The glass ceiling is a metaphor for an invisible barrier that prevents certain groups of people from rising to positions of power within an organization. The video references the glass ceiling as a stressor that the speaker encountered in her career, particularly as a woman in a male-dominated field.

💡Bamboo Ceiling

The bamboo ceiling is a concept similar to the glass ceiling but specifically refers to the barriers faced by Asians and Asian Americans in advancing their professional careers. The video mentions the bamboo ceiling as another type of invisible barrier that the speaker, as an Asian woman, had to confront in her career progression.

💡Mental Health

Mental health is a person's condition regarding their psychological and emotional well-being. The video touches on mental health issues such as anxiety and stress, which are caused by various stressors. The speaker's journey to build resilience is also a narrative about improving her mental health through self-help strategies like customized resiliency kits.

Highlights

The happiest place on earth is described as a coconut farm in South India, not a famous theme park.

The narrator's grandparents had a profound impact on their life, teaching them about love, positivity, and resilience.

Despite limited resources, the grandparents led a life filled with ease and unconditional love.

The narrator's teenage years in India were filled with societal expectations and pressures.

Moving to the US, the narrator faced cultural and professional challenges, including a male-dominated field and language barriers.

The narrator experienced career stagnation and faced a variety of biases and resistance in the workplace.

A moment of rock bottom led to a realization about the importance of building resilience.

The concept of 'customized resiliency kits' is introduced as a method to conquer stressors.

The narrator shares personal strategies for public speaking to overcome anxiety.

Successful people utilize customized resiliency kits, often without realizing it.

A friend's fear of flying is addressed with a customized kit, leading to improved sleep and reduced anxiety.

The narrator's daughter, Sonia, uses a customized kit to balance schoolwork and opportunities.

The formula for creating a customized resilience kit is presented.

Customized resiliency kits can help individuals step outside their comfort zones and lead more fulfilling lives.

The importance of having specific resiliency kits for specific stressors is emphasized.

The narrator shares a profound lesson from their childhood about the power of the mind and its susceptibility to suggestion.