WEBVTT

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I remember the conversation well.

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I was 42, and I was sitting
at the dining room table

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with my new husband,

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and I had finally decided
not to have children.

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"Well, of course," you might say.


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The biological clock had
finally wound down,


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stopped ticking, so to speak,
so of course, naturally.

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But that would be an oversimplification
of a much more complicated process.

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And it's a process I think
some of you might be familiar with.

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We live in a time
when science and technology

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allow us to expand far beyond
our biological limitations.

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We have options like in vitro,
fertility drugs, egg and embryo donation,

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egg freezing, not to mention
surrogacy or adoption.

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It's a world of choices.

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And in that world, this world,
I chose to remain childless.

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But before I tell you more
about my own story,

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let me give you a little context.

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I'm in very good company.

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Never before have more women remained
childless to the end of their fertility,

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or waited longer before
having their first child.

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Nearly half of us,

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nearly 50% of North American women
are making this choice.

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Yet we are still perceived
as the exception rather than the norm.

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We're choosing to remain childless.

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So let me start here
with this term, "childless."

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I have to admit I have a problem with it
even though I'm using it in this talk.

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It implies that there's something missing.

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It implies that there's somehow a deficit

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in those of us that choose
not to have children.

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And this is interesting
because we're all born childless.

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And it's not like being born without
a limb or with a missing vital organ.

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But the term implies
that there's something missing.

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A "lessness" that must somehow
be addressed or fulfilled.

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And even more interesting,

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this is a term that is applied
almost exclusively to women.

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We don't hear a lot
about men being childless.

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In fact, my husband tells me he is
rarely if ever asked if he has children.

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I am asked all the time,
and usually it goes something like this:

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"Do you have children?" "No." "Oh."

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(Laughter)

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As though there's something missing.

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As though I'm to be
pitied for this choice.

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As though we assume that it is
the biological destiny of women,

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all women, to bear children.

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And I'm going to propose
that our destinies are our own business.

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A powerful choice we make
to be fulfilled on our own terms.

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And those terms might
include children and they might not.

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So don't get me wrong here.

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I love children, in fact
I am a world-class cool auntie.

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(Laughter)

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But loving children
doesn't mean bearing them.

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In 1976, when I had
my first serious boyfriend,

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and you all know what I mean by serious,

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(Laughter)

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everyone was afraid I would get pregnant.

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And that concern went on
through my late teens and my 20s

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until my 30s when suddenly everyone
was afraid I wouldn't get pregnant.

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(Laughter)

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Right?

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My womb was so interesting to people.

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(Laughter)

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So, I didn't get pregnant.

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And over those years
I went back and forth,

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exploring options, undecided.

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Until that day at the dining
room table when I knew

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that what I wanted, more than children,
was a fulfilled life, a life of meaning.

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In coaching, we say that having
a fulfilled life is a radical act.

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And choosing to have a fulfilled life
in an unconventional way,

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well, that's just even more radical.

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But it's a deeply personal choice.

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So I'm going to take you back in time,
further back than the 1970s,

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and introduce you to a famous woman
who might be familiar to you,

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who made a personal choice
in a radical act for her time:

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Queen Elizabeth the First, a virgin queen,

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which we know, based
on historical fact, is not true.

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(Laughter)

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She was a queen.

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(Laughter)

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Which brings us to sex.

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Particularly if you were a married woman,
choosing not to have children,

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it implies that you might
just be having sex for pleasure.

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Another radical notion.

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(Laughter)

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But, meanwhile, back in the 1500s,
Queen Elizabeth is the reigning monarch,

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the Virgin Queen, excellent PR
for a childless woman of her time,

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and despite the fact
that she's the monarch

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and she herself is
an unmarried, childless woman,

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women's choices are severely limited.

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Women cannot go to school.

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They can be educated at home
but they can't go to school.

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Nor can they enter professions
such as politics, law, or medicine.

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Women can go into marriage, motherhood,
domestic service, or the sex trade.

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Or, if you wanted a life of the mind,
free of domesticity,

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you could become a nun.

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Basically, those were your choices.

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So Elizabeth wasn't stupid,
she understood the culture she was in,

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and she chose powerfully her own destiny.

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Her reign is known as the Golden Age.

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It brought us new frontiers
in art, music, and literature,

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and a renaissance in thinking
that influences us to this day.

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But no heirs.

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Still, a legacy.

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[#untrending]

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Elizabeth chose to untrend.

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She chose personal and professional
satisfaction over childbearing,

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and it was a radical act.

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And I'm here to say it still is.

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We're still stigmatized
for making this choice

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even though we live
in a very different time.

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Oops. Sorry.

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There we are.

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We are doctors, we are teachers,
we are lawyers.

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We are archbishops, we are judges.

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We have the kind of choice

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that an Elizabethan woman
couldn't even have dreamed of.

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We are the rulers of our own destinies.

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We have the right, the political,
economic, and social rights and freedoms

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that our feminist grandmothers, aunties,
godmothers, and mothers fought for.

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So given that, may we also
not consider another choice?

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May we choose not to have children

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and consider instead
the notion of "otherhood."

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Now, wish I could lay claim
to this term, I can't.

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It comes from Melanie Notkin's 2014
book of the same title, but I love it.

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So, what is otherhood?

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Well, I'm entering the third act
of my particular story.

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I'm nearly 60 years old,
and the plot is getting tricky.

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I'm asking myself questions like
"Has all this mattered?"

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And in my recent book, Untrending,

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I ask about things
like legacy and leave-behind.

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These are big questions.

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And there's a way that having children
begins to answer these questions for us.

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Having children is
a fulfilling and creative act.

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Motherhood gives our lives
purpose, for sure.

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But what about otherhood?

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Otherhood is another place

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where we find purpose, wholeness,
meaning, and satisfaction,

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simply by living our personal truth.

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It's where we trust

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that a life of creative purpose
is not exclusive to procreation

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and that our legacies
are not just biological.

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It includes loving,
mentoring and nurturing

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the other humans that cross our path.

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Fighting for the rights
of the world's children,

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making poetry, art, or music, or forging
a path in entrepreneurship or science,

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or simply getting up every day

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and living a life that is true
to your own deep choosing.

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Does this mean a life
that is free of longing?

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No.

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Does this mean that I don't wonder

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what my life would've been like
if I'd had children?

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Of course I do.

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And I wonder about that
the same way I wonder

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what would my life would have been like
if I'd become an archaeologist,

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or moved to Paris in my 20s
when the notion struck me,

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or not married my first husband.

NOTE Paragraph

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But our longings make us who we are.

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Our longings make our lives richer.

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Our longings lead us
to new dreams and desires.

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And living with longing,
making peace with longing,

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that is spiritual warriorship.

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That is fulfillment.

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That is powerful choice-making.

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And there's also this:

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trust.

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Trust that what life serves you
is a magnificent unfolding,

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and that the spiritual warrior in you
chose this path and put you on it

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because it leads to your fulfillment

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and the world's.

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And finally, let me ask you, together,

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can we give ourselves permission
to live radical lives of fulfillment

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and embrace a woman's right
to choose her own destiny?

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Thank you.

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(Applause) (Cheers)