Transcriber: Brian Vuksanovich Reviewer: Tijana Mihajlović
My name's Gabrielle, and I'm eighteen.
And truth is, I haven't made it in any way,
and I'm not an expert in any sport, or any phenomenon, or any field.
(Laughter)
So, lots of you may be wondering why I'm here today.
(Laughter)
I'm not an expert in anything,
but I am an expert in my ideas, in my truths, in my experiences,
and that is why I stand before you today.
So before I start, let me tell you how this all came to be.
I was born in the Philippines and I've spent most of my life there.
I was born in the city called Davao,
and every year I go back,
and I get to see my family, and I get to spend time with my friends.
I also get to visit my old High School.
The first time I was there, it was the winter of my freshman year.
I got to see my old English teacher,
and he gave me the chance to speak to a senior class.
And I didn't know what to say.
I had just started college three months before that,
and it was a very odd place to be,
because just earlier that year
I was kind of friends with the students in his class,
and I was wearing the same uniform,
and, essentially, I was one of them.
So I told them words of encouragement and words of reassurance,
the things that they wanted to hear,
because I didn't want to scare them.
But today, I think of what I would actually tell them.
First, I would encourage them
to immerse themselves in a new environment.
Growing up in the more privileged part of town,
the odds weren't necessarily stacked against me.
And everyone kind of knew, or knew of each other,
but let me ask you today:
does the name Gabrielle Presbitero rings any bells to you?
Yeah, I didn't think so.
(Laughter)
So being in a new environment has afforded me the opportunity
to carve an identity for myself, apart from whatever is expected of me,
largely in part because there aren't any expectations.
Next, I would encourage them to keep the culture of excellence alive.
I was raised to be an achiever,
and that thirst, that will, that drive to succeed
is such a big part of who I am.
Back in my High School,
it was my goal to be at the quarterly recognition program.
It was a program where medals and certificates were given out
to students who excelled academically.
And back in my time it was held on a Tuesday morning,
where the honor students had to sit in front,
and the rest of the student body
watched the program from a separate section.
It was this culture of competitiveness
that drove me to achieve what I thought I couldn't.
It brought out the best in me.
But here's what I wouldn't tell them.
First I would say that sometimes the hardest person to convince
that you belong and that you are deserving is yourself.
Truth is, I didn't know what to do
when I first started writing this TEDx talk.
I'm eighteen,
and in the company of experienced professionals
with revolutionizing ideas.
And not being able to feed off the belief that other people had in me,
challenged my own self-belief.
Next, I would say that the recognition you seek
in your medals, in your trophies, in your certificates, yeah,
these don't equate to a purpose that you serve.
When I started college,
I realized that these medals were the life-line to my motivation.
And when I began a life without medals, I was lost.
And I knew I needed to work hard,
but since these medals were gone, I had a very vague sense why.
So, let me tell you this:
as humans, it is in our nature to turn to something we can see,
or turn to something that we can feel,
to represent something we can't.
And we zero in so much in who we want to be
and what we want to achieve,
that we forget that the self-growth comes with the process.
All my life when I've faltered I've always said, "I did my best."
And I've always treated that as a consolation.
The afterthought to that was always, "But it wasn't enough."
In fact, I should've been saying this,
"I did my best,
and it is through this failure that my best gets a little better."
And that is not a consolation, but, in fact, it is the prize.
Thank you.
(Applause)