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Why comfort will ruin your life | Bill Eckstrom | TEDxUniversityofNevada

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    So, I was on a roll.
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    I was an executive with a nice salary,
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    annual bonuses, and stock options,
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    all the perks.
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    Everything was on track.
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    And on Monday, January 7th, 2008
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    at three o'clock in the afternoon,
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    in a small conference room
    on the top floor of our building,
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    the president of the company
    wanted to have a quick meeting with me,
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    which wasn't unusual since he was my boss.
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    But the meeting turned out
    to be even more brief than expected.
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    He fired me.
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    And I'll never forget how his words
    just sucked the breath right out of me,
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    and I left the conference room
    in a dazed state,
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    and I went home and curled up in my bed
    in the fetal position for three hours.
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    And while I could go on
    in vivid detail about how I felt,
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    what it did to my self-esteem,
    my finances, and so on,
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    what I now realize is,
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    while that event created the greatest
    amount of discomfort I had ever felt,
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    it was that discomfort,
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    the departure from my ordered life,
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    that forever changed it for the better.
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    You see, friends,
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    what makes you comfortable can ruin you,
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    and what makes you uncomfortable
    is the only way to grow.
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    Let me say that again:
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    What makes you comfortable can ruin you,
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    and only in a state of discomfort,
    can you continually grow.
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    Now, I suppose if on January 8th,
    had somebody come up and said,
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    "Gee buddy, getting fired is a good thing
    because now you're really going to grow!"
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    I probably would have smacked them.
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    But, pretty quickly I became motivated
    to start a new journey,
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    and after a couple years
    of work with my new team
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    and a PhD friend
    at the University of Nebraska,
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    we had this epiphany
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    on how to illustrate and apply
    the science of discomfort and growth.
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    We called the concept: the "Growth Rings."
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    The Growth Rings represent
    living environments
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    that promote or hinder growth.
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    And that includes everything
    from your place of work,
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    to even a fishbowl.
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    You see, what dictates
    the size of a goldfish
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    is its environment.
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    And while this goldfish
    lives in a very safe environment,
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    it's also very limiting in most every way.
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    And when placed
    in a more robust environment,
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    like, say, a small pond,
    this can be the result.
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    Now, it also means he could be eaten.
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    But friends, this is you -
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    the environments
    in which you work, live, and play,
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    they're all a proverbial fishbowl
    that dictates your growth.
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    So, the first Growth Ring represents
    a low-performing, low-growth environment,
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    called stagnation.
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    Stagnation is understood
    by having to follow too many steps,
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    and permissions, and minutiae.
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    That stifles creativity,
    independent thought, and action.
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    To imagine an environment such as this,
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    think no further than our state
    and federal governments.
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    Now, the antithesis
    of stagnation is chaos,
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    also low-growth and low-performing.
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    Chaos can be caused by internal
    or external events or conditions.
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    We see chaos occur at times
    in business mergers,
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    natural disasters,
    and horrific events like 9/11.
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    Chaos is having
    zero predictability or control
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    over inputs and outcomes.
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    Coming back down the Growth Rings,
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    next to stagnation is
    the most desirable environment: order.
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    Order is knowing that what you do,
    or what is happening in your environment,
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    leads to a predictable outcome.
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    And in predictability, comfort is found.
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    But comfort is also
    what makes order so dangerous.
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    Because science shows that anytime
    you continually do something,
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    or even think about something
    the same way,
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    you'll eventually stop growing.
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    And this applies to every living thing -
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    even our dog.
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    You see, if Aspen had a chance,
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    she'd choose comfort six days a week
    and twice on Sundays.
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    (Laughter)
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    But too much growth-limiting order
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    would have prevented her
    from becoming a therapy dog,
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    and had this been allowed,
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    think of the lives this gentle soul
    would not be touching today.
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    So, before your order continues
    to limit the way you think and act,
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    remember what I said earlier:
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    Growth only occurs
    in a state of discomfort.
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    Now, think about the power of that phrase:
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    Growth only occurs
    in a state of discomfort.
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    I can unequivocally state,
    I wouldn't be standing on this stage today
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    without my uncomfortable,
    order-disrupting day, nine years ago -
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    by the way I'm not recommending you go
    get fired to see if it leads to a TEDTalk.
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    (Laughter)
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    When you feel discomfort hit,
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    that means you've entered
    the complexity ring.
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    Complexity is nothing more
    than changed order,
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    but when your order is changed,
    outcomes are no longer predictable,
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    and it's unpredictability
    that makes you uncomfortable.
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    And while most times
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    your visceral response to discomfort
    is not just "No" but "Hell, no,"
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    you can actually learn
    how empowering it is
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    to consciously acknowledge discomfort,
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    and then, when appropriate,
    choose complexity over order.
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    And I know seeking discomfort sounds odd,
    and not many people do it,
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    but you have to learn to embrace it
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    because it's the only environment
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    where sustained
    or exponential growth can occur.
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    Okay.
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    To weave high-growth complexity
    into the fabric of your lives,
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    there are three primary ways
    it can be triggered.
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    Complexity trigger number one
    is it can be forced upon you.
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    When I got fired, I didn't have
    a chance to stay in order,
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    complexity was selected for me,
    and when this happens,
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    how much you grow
    depends on how you respond to it.
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    Now, I could have remained angry,
    I could have used it as an excuse,
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    but what I actually learned
    is that I suck as an employee,
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    and I'm much better off accepting
    the risks of running my own company.
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    Complexity trigger number two:
    Someone can help you get there.
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    This is the role of parents,
    teachers, coaches, and bosses.
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    Because left on their own,
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    people will consciously or subconsciously
    select the comfort of order.
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    And they then need to be
    pushed into complexity
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    in order to continue growing.
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    My youngest daughter
    spent most of her high school life
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    training to play tennis,
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    and her coach was
    pretty familiar with our work
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    on complexity and the Growth Rings.
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    So, I called him up one day
    to check on Maddie's progress,
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    and I was able to phrase
    my question like this, I said:
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    "Hey, Lee, how long has it been
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    since Maddie's been pushed
    deep into complexity?"
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    Lee's response:
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    "Hmm, funny you'd ask Bill.
    We got there yesterday.
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    She broke down into tears
    on the tennis court."
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    "Huh."
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    Well, knowing how tough my daughter is,
    and the fact that she never cries,
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    told me she was deep into complexity.
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    But, friends, this is where critical
    developmental decisions are made
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    because the old Bill,
    the pre-Growth Ring Bill,
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    would have intervened and wanted to know
    what was making her so uncomfortable.
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    Then I would have done everything I could
    to try and get her happy again.
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    What I really would have been doing
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    is removing the complexity,
    and putting her in order.
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    I actually would have been stifling
    her development.
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    But the new, post-Growth Ring Bill
    relished in his daughter's discomfort.
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    (Laughter)
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    And it was the coach's next words
    that told me everything I needed to hear.
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    He said, "Bill, I've got to tell you,
    it took a heck of a lot more
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    to get her to the limits
    of complexity this month,
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    than it did last month."
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    Discomfort was causing her growth.
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    Okay, but what if you're not lucky enough
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    to live or work in a robust
    high-growth environment?
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    What if you're stuck in order,
    even worse, stagnation?
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    Well, the great news is,
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    everyone can trigger
    complexity at any time.
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    So, complexity trigger number three:
    Trigger it yourself.
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    Take a journey with me
    back to Montgomery, Alabama
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    in the 1950s.
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    Imagine, if you will
    a young girl, who's black,
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    and she attends an all-black high school.
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    And she takes the city bus
    to get there and home,
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    which wasn't unusual in that era.
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    And on March 2, 1955,
    she boards a bus to come home from school,
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    and she sits near the back,
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    in the first row of seats
    where blacks were allowed to sit.
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    And as the bus continues
    to fill with white people,
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    there's eventually
    no more room in the front.
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    And according to local law
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    she needed to move further back
    to create room for white people to sit.
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    You see, Montgomery had an order in place
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    that when followed,
    led to a very predictable outcome:
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    repression of people with little conflict.
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    But 15-year-old Claudette Colvin
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    had just spent the last month
    in high school studying black history,
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    and she was understandably fed up
    with the historic and existing atrocities.
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    And so on this day, she decided
    she didn't like Montgomery's order,
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    and by refusing to give up her seat,
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    she sent a community, our laws,
    and our entire country into complexity.
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    Yes, nine months before Rosa Parks
    made her famous decision to stay put,
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    it was a 15-year-old girl
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    that was handcuffed, dragged
    from the bus, and taken to prison.
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    It was Miss Colvin, not Rosa Parks,
    who first fought the law,
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    and by the way,
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    was also the star plaintiff to testify
    in the famous lawsuit
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    that went all the way
    to the US Supreme Court.
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    So,
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    I use Claudette's actions
    not to heighten awareness of race issues,
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    although that's not necessarily bad,
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    but I used it as an example
    of every issue,
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    of every situation
    in an ordered environment.
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    It's a real and perfect example
    of complexity forcing people,
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    our communities,
    and our courts into discomfort,
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    and the downstream impact that can occur
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    anytime someone elects to move from order.
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    Dr. Serene Jones, in a recent book,
    summarizes this concept very eloquently.
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    She said: "The constant facade of order
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    hides the wilderness that is craving
    to seep out and teach us
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    that life wasn't created
    to be what we think it is.
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    Beyond words, we must
    experience the wilderness
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    to be taught what cannot
    be otherwise known."
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    So, friends,
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    it's not the discomfort of losing a job,
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    it's not having a child break down
    on the tennis court,
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    but it's order you should fear the most
    because it is a threat.
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    And order-disrupting people
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    like Jesus, Galileo,
    Claudette Colvin, Aspen's trainer,
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    and maybe even a few of you
    have already proven -
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    now, think about this -
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    it's not the complexity-triggering
    individuals or events
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    you should fear the most,
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    but it's your own willingness
    to accept or seek discomfort
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    that will dictate the growth
    of not just you,
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    but our entire world.
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    Thank you very much
    for allowing me to be a part of this.
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    (Applause)
Title:
Why comfort will ruin your life | Bill Eckstrom | TEDxUniversityofNevada
Description:

After documenting and researching over 50,000 coaching interactions in the workplace, Bill Eckstrom shares life-altering, personal and professional development ideas through the introduction of the "Growth Rings." The rings illustrate how dangerous it can be to remain in a state of comfort and how being in discomfort is the only way to sustain growth. You’ll be amazed at the world-changing outcomes discomfort can have on your life and the lives of others.

Bill Eckstrom is an entrepreneur, author, speaker, outdoorsman and father of three. With a passion deeply rooted in growth and development, Bill has always been fascinated by the role a coach has on the performance of individuals and teams. As a result, he founded the EcSell Institute whose sole focus is to educate, track and measure coaching effectiveness for leaders within organizations around the world. This has led to hundreds of keynotes, published articles and e-books created from the research and documentation of coaching interactions and outcomes. You can learn more about the EcSell Institute here: https://www.ecsellinstitute.com/

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx

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Video Language:
English
Team:
closed TED
Project:
TEDxTalks
Duration:
12:35
  • Edited 10/02/2017 - a few typos fixed

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