1
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
My name is Hannah,

2
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and that is a palindrome.

3
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
That is a word you can spell
the same forwards and backwards,

4
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
if you can spell.

5
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
But the thing is, my entire family
have palindromic names.

6
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
It's a bit of a tradition.

7
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
We've got Mum, Dad,

8
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
(Laughter)

9
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Nan, Pop.

10
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
And my brother Kayak.

11
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
(Laughter)

12
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
There you go.

13
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
That's just a big a joke, there.

14
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
(Laughter)

15
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I like to kick things off with a joke
because I'm a comedian.

16
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Now, there's two things
you know about me already.

17
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
My name's Hannah and I'm a comedian.

18
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I wasting no time.

19
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Here's a third thing
you can know about me.

20
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I don't think I'm qualified
to speak my own mind.

21
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Bold way to begin a talk, yes,

22
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
but it's true.

23
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I've always had a great deal of difficulty

24
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
turning my thinking into the talking.

25
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
So it seems a bit of a contradiction then

26
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
that someone like me
who is so bad at the chat

27
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
could be something like
a stand-up comedian,

28
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
but there you go. There you go.

29
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
It's what it is.

30
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I first tried my hand
at stand-up comedi--, comedie.

31
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
See? See? See?

32
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
(Laughter)

33
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I first tried my hand at stand-up comedy

34
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
in my late 20s,

35
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and despite being a pathologically shy
virtual mute with low self-esteem

36
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
who'd never held a microphone before,

37
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I knew as soon as I walked
and stood in front of the audience,

38
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I knew, before I'd even
landed my first joke,

39
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I knew that I really liked stand-up,

40
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and stand-up really liked me.

41
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
But for the life of me,
I couldn't work out why.

42
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Why is it I could be so good
at doing something I was so bad at?

43
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
(Laughter)

44
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I just couldn't work it out.

45
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I could not understand it,
that is until I could.

46
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Now before I explain to you why it is

47
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
that I can be good
at something I'm so bad at,

48
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
let me throw another spanner
of contradiction into the works

49
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
by telling you that not long after
I worked out why that was,

50
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I decided to quit comedy.

51
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
And before I explain
that little oppositional cat

52
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I just threw among the thinking pigeons,

53
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
let me also tell you this:

54
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
quitting launched my comedy career.

55
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
(Laughter)

56
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
It really launched it, to the point
where after quitting comedy,

57
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I became the most talked-about
comedian on the planet,

58
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
because apparently I'm even worse
than making retirement plans

59
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
than I am at speaking my own mind.

60
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Now, all I've done up until this point
apart from giving over a spattering

61
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
of biographical detail is to tell you
indirectly that I have three ideas

62
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
that I want to share with you today,

63
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and I've done that by way of sharing
three contradictions:

64
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
one, I am bad at talking,
I am good at talking;

65
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I quit, I did not quit.

66
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Three ideas, three contradictions.

67
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Now, if you're wondering
why there's only two things

68
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
on my so-called list of three

69
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
(Laughter)

70
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I remind you it is literally
a list of contradictions.

71
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Keep up.

72
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
(Laughter)

73
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Now, the folks at TED advised me
that with a talk of this length,

74
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
it's best to stick
with just sharing one idea.

75
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I said no.

76
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
(Laughter)

77
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Now, what would they know?

78
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
To explain why I have chosen to ignore
what is clearly very good advice,

79
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I want to take you back
to the beginning of this talk,

80
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
specifically my palindrome joke.

81
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Now that joke uses my favorite trick
of the comedian trade,

82
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
the rule of three,

83
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
whereby you make a statement

84
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and then back that statement up

85
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
with a list.

86
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
My entire family have palindromic names:

87
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Mum, Dad, Nan, Pop.

88
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
The first two ideas create a pattern,

89
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and that pattern creates expectation,

90
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and then the third thing, bam,

91
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Kayak, what? That's the rule of three.

92
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
One, two, surprise! Haha.

93
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Now (Laughter)

94
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Now the rule of three is not only
fundamental to the way I do my craft,

95
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
it is also fundamental
to the way I communicate,

96
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
so I won't be changing
anything for nobody,

97
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
not even TED,

98
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
which, I will point out,
stands for three ideas:

99
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
technology, entertainment,

100
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and dickheads.

101
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
(Laughter)

102
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Works every time, doesn't it.

103
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
But you need more than just jokes

104
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
to be able to cut it
as a professional comedian.

105
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
You need to be able to walk
that fine line between being charming

106
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and disarming.

107
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
And I discovered the most effective way
to generate the amount of charm I needed

108
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
to offset my disarming personality

109
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
was through not jokes but stories.

110
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
So my stand-up routines
are filled with stories:

111
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
stories about growing up,
my coming out story,

112
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
stories about the abuse I caught
for being not only a woman

113
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
but a big woman

114
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and a masculine-of-center woman.

115
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
If you watch my work online,
check the comments out below

116
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
for examples of abuse.

117
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Now it's that time in the talk
where I shift into second gear,

118
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and I'm going to tell you a story
about everything I've just said.

119
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
In the last few days of her life,

120
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
my grandma was surrounded by people,

121
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
a lot of people,

122
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
because my grandma
was the loving matriarch

123
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
of a large and loving family.

124
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Now, if you haven't made
the connection already,

125
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I am a member of that family.

126
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Now I was lucky enough
to be able to say goodbye

127
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
to my grandma on the day she died,

128
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
but as she was already
cocooned within herself by then,

129
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
it was something of a one-sided goodbye.

130
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
So I thought about a lot of things,

131
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
things I haven't thought about
in a long time,

132
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
like the letters I used
to write to my grandma

133
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
when I first started university,

134
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
letters I filled with funny stories
and anecdotes that I embellished

135
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
for her amusement,

136
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and I remembered how I couldn't
articulate the anxiety and fear

137
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
that filled me as I tried
to carve my tiny little life

138
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
into a world that felt far too big for me.

139
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
But I remembered finding
comfort in those letters,

140
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
because I wrote them
with my grandma in mind.

141
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
But as the world
got more and more overwhelming

142
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and my ability to negotiate it
got worse, not better,

143
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I stopped writing those letters.

144
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I just didn't think I had the life
that grandma would want to read about.

145
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Grandma did not know I was gay,

146
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and about six months before she died,

147
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
out of nowhere, she asked me
if I had a boyfriend.

148
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Now, I remember making
a conscious decision in that moment

149
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
not to come out to my grandmother,

150
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and I did that because I knew her life
was drawing to an end,

151
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and my time with her was finite,

152
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and I did not want to talk
about the ways we were different.

153
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I wanted to talk about
the ways were we connected.

154
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
So I changed the subject.

155
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
And at the time it felt
like the right decision.

156
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
But as I sat witness
to my grandmother's life

157
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
as it tapered to its inevitable end,

158
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I couldn't help but feel
I'd made a mistake

159
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
not to share such a significant
part of my life.

160
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
But I also knew that
I'd missed my opportunity,

161
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and as grandma always used to say,

162
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
"Ah, well, it's all part of the soup.

163
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Too late to take the onions out now."

164
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
(Laughter)

165
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
And I thought about that,

166
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and I thought about how I
had to deal with too many onions

167
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
as a kid,

168
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
growing up gay in a state
where homosexuality in illegal,

169
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and with that thought I could see

170
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
how tightly wrapped in the tendrils
of my own internalize shame I was,

171
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and with that, I thought
about all my traumas:

172
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
the violence, the abuse, my rape,

173
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and with all that cluster of thinking,

174
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
a thought, a question,
kept popping into my mind

175
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
to which I had no answer:

176
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
what is the purpose of my human?

177
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Out of anyone in my family,
I felt the most akin to my grandmother,

178
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and we shared the most traits in common.

179
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Not so much these days.

180
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Death really changes people.

181
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
But that (Laughter)
is my grandmother's sense of humor.

182
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
But the person I felt
most akin to in the world

183
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
was a mother, a grandmother,
a great-grandmother,

184
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
a great-great-grandmother.

185
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Me? I represented the very end
of my branch of the family tree,

186
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and I wasn't entirely sure
I was still connected to the trunk.

187
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
What was the purpose of my human?

188
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
The year after my grandmother's death

189
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
was the most intensely
creative of my life,

190
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and I suppose that's because at an end,

191
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
my thoughts gather more than they scatter.

192
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
My thought process is not linear.

193
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I'm a visual thinker. I see my thoughts.

194
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I don't have a photograph memory,

195
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and nor is my head a static gallery
of sensibly collected think pieces.

196
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
It's more that I've got this ever-evolving
language of hieroglyphics

197
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
that I've developed

198
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and I can understand fluidly

199
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and think deeply with
but I struggle to translate.

200
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I can't paint, draw, sculpt,
or even haberdash,

201
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and as for the written word,

202
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I'm OK at it but it's
a tortuous process of translation,

203
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and I don't feel it does the job.

204
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
And as far as speaking my own mind,
like I said, I'm not great at it.

205
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Speech has always felt
like an inadequate freeze frame

206
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
for the life inside of me.

207
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
All this to say, I've always understood

208
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
far more than I've ever
been able to communicate.

209
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Now about a year before grandma died,

210
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I was formally diagnosed with autism.

211
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Now for me, that was mostly good news.

212
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I always thought that I couldn't
sort my life out like a normal person

213
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
because I was depressed and anxious,

214
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
but it turns out

215
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I was depressed and anxious

216
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
because I couldn't sort my life out
like a normal person

217
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
because I was not a normal person,

218
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and I didn't know it.

219
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Now, this is not to say
I still don't struggle.

220
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Every day is a bit of a struggle,

221
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
to be honest.

222
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
But at least now I know
what my struggle is,

223
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and getting to the starting line
of normal is not it.

224
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
My struggle is not to escape the storm.

225
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
My struggle is to find the eye
of the storm as best I can.

226
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Now, apart from the usual way
us spectrum types find our calm --

227
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
repetitive behaviors, routine,
and obsessive thinking --

228
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I have another surprising doorway

229
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
into the eye of the storm:

230
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
stand-up comedy.

231
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
And if you need any more proof
I'm neurodivergent, yes,

232
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I am calm doing a thing
that scares the hell out of most people.

233
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I'm almost dead inside up here.

234
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
(Laughter)

235
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Diagnosis gave me a framework
on which to hang bits of me

236
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I could never understand.

237
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
My misfit suddenly had a fit,

238
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and for a while I got giddy
with a newfound confidence

239
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I had in my thinking.

240
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
But after Grandma died,
that confidence took a dive,

241
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
because thinking is how I grieve,

242
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and in that grief of thought,

243
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I could suddenly see with so much clarity

244
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
just how profoundly isolated I was

245
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and always had been.

246
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
What was the purpose of my human?

247
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I began to think a lot about how autism
and PTSD have so much in common,

248
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
and I started to worry,
because I had both.

249
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
Could I ever untangle them?

250
99:59:59,999 --> 99:59:59,999
I'd always been told
that the way out of trauma