Say your truths and seek them in others
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0:01 - 0:03Like many of us,
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0:03 - 0:05I've had several careers in my life,
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0:05 - 0:07and although they've been varied,
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0:07 - 0:11my first job set the foundation
for all of them. -
0:11 - 0:15I was a home-birth midwife
throughout my 20s. -
0:16 - 0:21Delivering babies taught me
valuable and sometimes surprising things, -
0:21 - 0:24like how to start a car at 2am.
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0:24 - 0:25when it's 10 degrees below zero.
-
0:25 - 0:26(Laughter)
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0:26 - 0:31Or how to revive a father
who's fainted at the sight of blood. -
0:31 - 0:32(Laughter)
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0:32 - 0:34Or how to cut the umbilical cord just so,
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0:34 - 0:37to make a beautiful belly button.
-
0:37 - 0:40But those aren't the things
that stuck with me or guided me -
0:40 - 0:44when I stopped being a midwife
and started other jobs. -
0:44 - 0:48What stuck with me was this bedrock belief
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0:48 - 0:54that each one of us comes into this world
with a unique worth. -
0:54 - 0:58When I looked into the face of a newborn,
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0:58 - 1:02I caught a glimpse of that worthiness,
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1:02 - 1:05that sense of unapologetic selfhood,
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1:05 - 1:07that unique spark.
-
1:09 - 1:12I use the word "soul"
to describe that spark, -
1:12 - 1:17because it's the only word in English
that comes close to naming -
1:17 - 1:20what each baby brought into the room.
-
1:21 - 1:25Every newborn was as singular
as a snowflake, -
1:25 - 1:29a matchless mash-up of biology
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1:29 - 1:31and ancestry and mystery.
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1:32 - 1:34And then that baby grows up,
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1:34 - 1:36and in order to fit into the family,
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1:36 - 1:38to conform to the culture,
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1:38 - 1:41to the community, to the gender,
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1:41 - 1:44that little one begins to cover its soul,
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1:44 - 1:46layer by layer.
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1:46 - 1:48We're born this way,
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1:48 - 1:50but --
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1:50 - 1:51(Laughter)
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1:51 - 1:54But as we grow, a lot
of things happen to us -
1:55 - 1:56that make us ...
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1:58 - 2:03want to hide our soulful
eccentricities and authenticity. -
2:03 - 2:04We've all done this.
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2:04 - 2:07Everyone in this room is a former baby --
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2:07 - 2:08(Laughter)
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2:08 - 2:11with a distinctive birthright.
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2:12 - 2:17But as adults, we spend so much
of our time uncomfortable in our own skin, -
2:17 - 2:21like we have ADD:
authenticity deficit disorder. -
2:21 - 2:23But not those babies --
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2:23 - 2:24not yet.
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2:24 - 2:26Their message to me was:
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2:26 - 2:29uncover your soul
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2:29 - 2:32and look for that soul-spark
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2:32 - 2:33in everyone else.
-
2:33 - 2:34It's still there.
-
2:35 - 2:38And here's what I learned
from laboring women. -
2:38 - 2:41Their message was about staying open,
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2:41 - 2:44even when things are painful.
-
2:45 - 2:47A woman's cervix normally looks like this.
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2:47 - 2:49It's a tight little muscle
-
2:49 - 2:51at the base of the uterus.
-
2:51 - 2:55And during labor,
it has to stretch from this -
2:56 - 2:57to this.
-
2:57 - 2:58Ouch!
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2:58 - 3:01If you fight against that pain,
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3:01 - 3:03you just create more pain,
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3:03 - 3:06and you block what wants to be born.
-
3:06 - 3:10I'll never forget the magic
that would happen -
3:10 - 3:13when a woman stopped resisting the pain
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3:14 - 3:15and opened.
-
3:15 - 3:19It was as if the forces
of the universe took notice -
3:19 - 3:21and sent in a wave of help.
-
3:22 - 3:24I never forgot that message,
-
3:24 - 3:28and now, when difficult
or painful things happen to me -
3:28 - 3:30in my life or my work,
-
3:30 - 3:33of course at first I resist them,
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3:33 - 3:36but then I remember
what I learned from the mothers: -
3:36 - 3:37stay open.
-
3:38 - 3:39Stay curious.
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3:39 - 3:42Ask the pain what it's come to deliver.
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3:42 - 3:44Something new wants to be born.
-
3:45 - 3:48And there was one more big soulful lesson,
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3:48 - 3:50and that one I learned
from Albert Einstein. -
3:51 - 3:53He wasn't at any of the births, but --
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3:53 - 3:54(Laughter)
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3:54 - 3:56It was a lesson about time.
-
3:58 - 4:02At the end of his life,
Albert Einstein concluded -
4:02 - 4:06that our normal, hamster-wheel
experience of life -
4:06 - 4:07is an illusion.
-
4:08 - 4:10We run round and round, faster and faster,
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4:10 - 4:12trying to get somewhere.
-
4:12 - 4:14And all the while,
-
4:15 - 4:19underneath surface time
is this whole other dimension -
4:19 - 4:24where the past and the present
and the future merge -
4:24 - 4:27and become deep time.
-
4:27 - 4:30And there's nowhere to get to.
-
4:31 - 4:35Albert Einstein called
this state, this dimension, -
4:35 - 4:37"only being."
-
4:37 - 4:39And he said when he experienced it,
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4:39 - 4:41he knew sacred awe.
-
4:42 - 4:43When I was delivering babies,
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4:43 - 4:45I was forced off the hamster wheel.
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4:45 - 4:49Sometimes I had to sit for days,
hours and hours, -
4:49 - 4:52just breathing with the parents;
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4:52 - 4:53just being.
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4:54 - 4:57And I got a big dose of sacred awe.
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4:57 - 5:02So those are the three lessons
I took with me from midwifery. -
5:02 - 5:05One: uncover your soul.
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5:05 - 5:12Two: when things get difficult
or painful, try to stay open. -
5:12 - 5:16And three: every now and then,
step off your hamster wheel -
5:16 - 5:18into deep time.
-
5:19 - 5:22Those lessons have served me
throughout my life, -
5:23 - 5:25but they really served me recently,
-
5:25 - 5:30when I took on the most
important job of my life thus far. -
5:31 - 5:35Two years ago, my younger sister
came out of remission -
5:35 - 5:37from a rare blood cancer,
-
5:38 - 5:42and the only treatment left for her
was a bone marrow transplant. -
5:43 - 5:46And against the odds,
we found a match for her, -
5:46 - 5:48who turned out to be me.
-
5:49 - 5:52I come from a family of four girls,
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5:52 - 5:58and when my sisters found out that
I was my sister's perfect genetic match, -
5:59 - 6:01their reaction was, "Really? You?"
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6:01 - 6:02(Laughter)
-
6:02 - 6:04"A perfect match for her?"
-
6:04 - 6:07Which is pretty typical for siblings.
-
6:07 - 6:10In a sibling society,
there's lots of things. -
6:10 - 6:14There's love and there's friendship
and there's protection. -
6:14 - 6:16But there's also jealousy
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6:17 - 6:18and competition
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6:19 - 6:21and rejection and attack.
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6:22 - 6:28In siblinghood, that's where we start
assembling many of those first layers -
6:28 - 6:29that cover our soul.
-
6:30 - 6:33When I discovered I was my sister's match,
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6:33 - 6:35I went into research mode.
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6:35 - 6:37And I discovered that
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6:38 - 6:41the premise of transplants
is pretty straightforward. -
6:41 - 6:44You destroy all the bone marrow
in the cancer patient -
6:44 - 6:47with massive doses of chemotherapy,
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6:47 - 6:50and then you replace that marrow
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6:50 - 6:54with several million healthy
marrow cells from a donor. -
6:54 - 6:56And then you do everything you can
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6:56 - 7:00to make sure that those new cells
engraft in the patient. -
7:00 - 7:05I also learned that bone marrow
transplants are fraught with danger. -
7:05 - 7:10If my sister made it
through the near-lethal chemotherapy, -
7:11 - 7:14she still would face other challenges.
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7:14 - 7:16My cells
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7:17 - 7:19might attack her body.
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7:20 - 7:23And her body might reject my cells.
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7:23 - 7:25They call this rejection or attack,
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7:25 - 7:27and both could kill her.
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7:28 - 7:30Rejection. Attack.
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7:30 - 7:32Those words had a familiar ring
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7:32 - 7:35in the context of being siblings.
-
7:36 - 7:39My sister and I had
a long history of love, -
7:39 - 7:42but we also had a long history
of rejection and attack, -
7:42 - 7:46from minor misunderstandings
to bigger betrayals. -
7:47 - 7:49We didn't have
the kind of the relationship -
7:49 - 7:51where we talked about the deeper stuff;
-
7:52 - 7:57but, like many siblings and like people
in all kinds of relationships, -
7:57 - 8:00we were hesitant to tell our truths,
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8:00 - 8:03to reveal our wounds,
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8:03 - 8:05to admit our wrongdoings.
-
8:05 - 8:10But when I learned about
the dangers of rejection or attack, -
8:10 - 8:12I thought, it's time to change this.
-
8:13 - 8:18What if we left the bone marrow
transplant up to the doctors, -
8:18 - 8:24but did something that we later came
to call our "soul marrow transplant?" -
8:24 - 8:28What if we faced any pain
we had caused each other, -
8:28 - 8:31and instead of rejection or attack,
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8:31 - 8:33could we listen?
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8:33 - 8:35Could we forgive?
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8:35 - 8:37Could we merge?
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8:37 - 8:40Would that teach our cells to do the same?
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8:41 - 8:46To woo my skeptical sister,
I turned to my parents' holy text: -
8:46 - 8:48the New Yorker Magazine.
-
8:48 - 8:50(Laughter)
-
8:50 - 8:53I sent her a cartoon from its pages
-
8:53 - 8:57as a way of explaining
why we should visit a therapist -
8:57 - 9:02before having my bone marrow harvested
and transplanted into her body. -
9:02 - 9:04Here it is.
-
9:04 - 9:08"I have never forgiven him for that thing
I made up in my head." -
9:08 - 9:10(Laughter)
-
9:10 - 9:12I told my sister
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9:13 - 9:16we had probably been doing the same thing,
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9:16 - 9:22carting around made-up stories
in our heads that kept us separate. -
9:22 - 9:25And I told her that after the transplant,
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9:25 - 9:28all of the blood flowing in her veins
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9:28 - 9:29would be my blood,
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9:29 - 9:32made from my marrow cells,
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9:32 - 9:37and that inside the nucleus
of each of those cells -
9:37 - 9:39is a complete set of my DNA.
-
9:39 - 9:43"I will be swimming around in you
for the rest of your life," -
9:43 - 9:46I told my slightly horrified sister.
-
9:46 - 9:48(Laughter)
-
9:48 - 9:51"I think we better clean up
our relationship." -
9:52 - 9:55A health crisis makes people
do all sorts of risky things, -
9:56 - 9:59like quitting a job
or jumping out of an airplane -
10:00 - 10:02and, in the case of my sister,
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10:02 - 10:05saying "yes" to several therapy sessions,
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10:06 - 10:09during which we got down to the marrow.
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10:12 - 10:16We looked at and released years of stories
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10:16 - 10:18and assumptions about each other
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10:18 - 10:20and blame and shame
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10:20 - 10:24until all that was left was love.
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10:26 - 10:30People have said I was brave
to undergo the bone marrow harvest, -
10:30 - 10:32but I don't think so.
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10:32 - 10:34What felt brave to me
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10:34 - 10:37was that other kind
of harvest and transplant, -
10:37 - 10:39the soul marrow transplant,
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10:40 - 10:44getting emotionally naked
with another human being, -
10:44 - 10:47putting aside pride and defensiveness,
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10:47 - 10:49lifting the layers
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10:50 - 10:54and sharing with each other
our vulnerable souls. -
10:54 - 10:57I called on those midwife lessons:
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10:57 - 10:59uncover your soul.
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11:00 - 11:03Open to what's scary and painful.
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11:03 - 11:04Look for the sacred awe.
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11:06 - 11:09Here I am with my marrow cells
after the harvest. -
11:09 - 11:11That's they call it -- "harvest,"
-
11:11 - 11:14like it's some kind of bucolic
farm-to-table event -- -
11:14 - 11:15(Laughter)
-
11:15 - 11:18Which I can assure you it is not.
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11:20 - 11:23And here is my brave, brave sister
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11:23 - 11:25receiving my cells.
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11:26 - 11:30After the transplant, we began to spend
more and more time together. -
11:30 - 11:33It was as if we were little girls again.
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11:34 - 11:37The past and the present merged.
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11:37 - 11:39We entered deep time.
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11:39 - 11:44I left the hamster wheel of work and life
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11:44 - 11:45to join my sister
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11:46 - 11:48on that lonely island
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11:48 - 11:50of illness and healing.
-
11:51 - 11:53We spent months together --
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11:53 - 11:55in the isolation unit,
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11:55 - 11:57in the hospital and in her home.
-
11:58 - 12:00Our fast-paced society
-
12:00 - 12:05does not support or even value
this kind of work. -
12:05 - 12:09We see it as a disruption
of real life and important work. -
12:09 - 12:14We worry about the emotional drain
and the financial cost -- -
12:14 - 12:17and, yes, there is a financial cost.
-
12:17 - 12:19But I was paid
-
12:20 - 12:24in the kind of currency our culture
seems to have forgotten all about. -
12:25 - 12:27I was paid in love.
-
12:28 - 12:29I was paid in soul.
-
12:29 - 12:32I was paid in my sister.
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12:33 - 12:38My sister said the year after transplant
was the best year of her life, -
12:38 - 12:39which was surprising.
-
12:39 - 12:42She suffered so much.
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12:42 - 12:46But she said life never tasted as sweet,
-
12:46 - 12:49and that because of the soul-baring
-
12:49 - 12:51and the truth-telling
we had done with each other, -
12:52 - 12:56she became more unapologetically herself
-
12:56 - 12:57with everyone.
-
12:57 - 13:00She said things
she'd always needed to say. -
13:00 - 13:03She did things she always wanted to do.
-
13:03 - 13:05The same happened for me.
-
13:05 - 13:11I became braver about being authentic
with the people in my life. -
13:12 - 13:14I said my truths,
-
13:14 - 13:18but more important than that,
I sought the truth of others. -
13:20 - 13:23It wasn't until
the final chapter of this story -
13:23 - 13:27that I realized just how well
midwifery had trained me. -
13:27 - 13:30After that best year of my sister's life,
-
13:30 - 13:32the cancer came roaring back,
-
13:33 - 13:36and this time there was nothing more
the doctors could do. -
13:36 - 13:39They gave her just
a couple of months to live. -
13:40 - 13:43The night before my sister died,
-
13:43 - 13:46I sat by her bedside.
-
13:46 - 13:48She was so small and thin.
-
13:49 - 13:51I could see the blood pulsing in her neck.
-
13:52 - 13:55It was my blood, her blood, our blood.
-
13:56 - 13:59When she died, part of me would die, too.
-
14:01 - 14:05I tried to make sense of it all,
-
14:05 - 14:08how becoming one with each other
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14:08 - 14:10had made us more ourselves,
-
14:10 - 14:12our soul selves,
-
14:12 - 14:17and how by facing and opening
to the pain of our past, -
14:17 - 14:20we'd finally been delivered to each other,
-
14:21 - 14:23and how by stepping out of time,
-
14:23 - 14:25we would now be connected forever.
-
14:27 - 14:30My sister left me with so many things,
-
14:30 - 14:33and I'm going to leave you now
with just one of them. -
14:34 - 14:38You don't have to wait
for a life-or-death situation -
14:38 - 14:42to clean up the relationships
that matter to you, -
14:42 - 14:44to offer the marrow of your soul
-
14:45 - 14:47and to seek it in another.
-
14:48 - 14:50We can all do this.
-
14:50 - 14:55We can be like a new kind
of first responder, -
14:55 - 14:59like the one to take
the first courageous step -
15:00 - 15:02toward the other,
-
15:02 - 15:05and to do something or try to do something
-
15:05 - 15:08other than rejection or attack.
-
15:09 - 15:11We can do this with our siblings
-
15:11 - 15:12and our mates
-
15:12 - 15:14and our friends and our colleagues.
-
15:14 - 15:17We can do this with the disconnection
-
15:17 - 15:20and the discord all around us.
-
15:20 - 15:24We can do this for the soul of the world.
-
15:25 - 15:26Thank you.
-
15:26 - 15:32(Applause)
- Title:
- Say your truths and seek them in others
- Speaker:
- Elizabeth Lesser
- Description:
-
In a lyrical, unexpectedly funny talk about heavy topics like the frayed relationships and the death of a loved one, Elizabeth Lesser describes the healing process of putting aside pride and defensiveness to make way for soul-baring and truth-telling. "You don't have to wait for a life-or-death situation to clean up the relationships that matter to you," she says. "Be like a new kind of first responder ... the one to take the first courageous step toward the other."
- Video Language:
- English
- Team:
- closed TED
- Project:
- TEDTalks
- Duration:
- 15:44
Brian Greene edited English subtitles for Say your truths and seek them in others | ||
Brian Greene edited English subtitles for Say your truths and seek them in others | ||
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Camille Martínez edited English subtitles for Say your truths and seek them in others | ||
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