I grew up in a working-class immigrant
family that fled here from Iran in 1988
my uncle was executed by the Iranian
government my youngest brother was
tragically dropped at Birth during
delivery so I always laugh a little bit
it's uncomfortable and post 1979 Iranian
Revolution there we go
my family instantly became second-class
citizens persecuted due to our religion
who were bhai is in a Muslim country my
parents as you can imagine were riddled
with PTSD and had zero coping mechanisms
built so they raised myself and my three
siblings my sister's here in a constant
state of survival fear and anxiety were
the dominant emotional signatures of my
upbringing untreated mental health
issues and ramp it in our home an
affection was a luxury and if that
wasn't bad enough just a couple months
before my 35th birthday
I learned a statistic that blew my mind
by the age of 35 95% of who we are is a
set of memorized behaviors emotional
reactions attitudes beliefs and
perceptions that are subconscious
automatic programs just in case you
missed it
this is why so many of us drop New
Year's resolutions before February ever
comes around a study done by the
University of Scranton home of the
office showed that only 8% of Americans
actually reach their near receive goals
that's pathetic
this is why we repeat the same
self-sabotaging behaviors that leave us
feeling defeated and frustrated whenever
we try to make any lasting change we're
faced with an internal dilemma a
david-and-goliath
of a conflict within because the 5% of
our mind that is conscious and plug it
into this 3d reality is up against 95
percent of our mind that is subconscious
memorized and programmed through decades
of repetition you don't have to be a
child of Iranian refugees that he's
terrified of turning into your parents
am i right
when I learned these numbers they hit me
like a ton of bricks up to that point in
my life I had spent 34 years on this
planet trying to break the very DNA that
ran through my body that was passed down
to me by my parents I had tried strategy
after strategy after strategy to break
old toxic patterns but it always felt
like I was chipping away at this giant
invisible Boulder that was far too large
to even conceptualize and now I
understood why change is hard because
emotional mental and behavioral habits
are hardwired but here's the beauty of
it all the magnificence of the human
body we used to believe that by the time
we were teased
our brain stopped growing stop
developing new neurons but thankfully
that has been disproven new activities
train our brain to create new neural
pathways based on choice versus by
default I knew I no longer wanted to
live from this autopilot state of
existence because based on my rocky
childhood my subconscious mind was
saturated in fear and scarcity upon
learning this information I immediately
started to make some big changes for
starters I started to brush my teeth
with my non-dominant left hand there we
go my gums hated it but the rest of me
was really intrigued I took different
routes to work stopped the coffee shops
that previously had gone completely
unnoticed by me and even got out of bed
differently throughout the week it's
enough that okay within days I started
to feel a freshness a sense of aliveness
and I knew I wanted to go deeper so as
my 35th birthday approached I decided to
commit I launched a YouTube web series
called thrive at 35 and volunteered the
general public to serve as my
accountability partner each episode
showcased my new experiences in an
effort to entertain build community and
inspire some of you to just lean in a
little bit into the unknown I wrote and
recited a original vagina monologue
based on my adventures with mini-me I
finally conquered hurdles you see in the
seventh grade my gym teacher called me a
wimp because I used to run around them
and that's stuck with me for some time
twenty-one years to be exact I bungee
jumped on New Year's Eve day
of all 50 jumpers present that morning
my friend Kate and I were the only two
that hesitated before taking the plunge
she attributes it to our higher
functioning brains but not everything I
did was super daring and exotic it
doesn't have to be for you to reap the
benefits and the unknown I big Hollow
and my friends and their daughters on
Shabbat learning about mitzvot I got a
crash course in investing and I even
planted flowers in south-central it was
working I began to really blossom it's
as if something had changed on a
metaphysical level and I had put that
safety brake I had on my life that
permanent safety brake down put the gear
in neutral and entered into the highway
of change a state of flow building
momentum with every new adventure and
today I'm here to share with you my
three lessons from a year of embracing
the unknown less than one gross growth
is just beyond resistance the hardest
part is getting started so often we talk
ourselves out of doing something new
daring and exciting because we're scared
we're scared of the unknown and I was no
exception to this rule immediately after
making this bold declaration thoughts
began to come in no one's gonna watch
your episodes who do you think you are
you are being selfish you do not deserve
the spotlight people are having families
becoming doctors starting businesses and
you want to make a webseries about
yourself really when are you gonna grow
up what are you doing you're not ready
for this just go back to being
comfortable it's safe there do you have
one of those
if you do know that you're normal
this is very common for anyone who's
gonna start something new that's going
to benefit themselves or the world
observe and release observe and release
these thoughts put fear in the back seat
where it belongs
and ask yourself if not me then who if
not now then when to to joy leads to
expansion every new experience is
special and has a lasting memory do
remember your first kiss the first time
you drove a car the first time you went
skiing when we are engaged in a new
experience we are fully alert and take
it in with all of our senses doing
something new
literally catapults us into the present
moment or our joy resides because
unbeknownst to us we are finally free of
regret from the past an anxiety of the
unforeseen future when you're surfing
for the first time and a giant wave is
coming at you you're not worried about
what you said to stare yesterday at
lunch by doing something new every week
for an entire year I created this
forward moving positive loop in my life
follow along with me with each new
experience I was forced to be present
which led to me to be more joyful and
because I was doing this regularly
I was just happier more often
essentially life began to cherry-pick
experiences from the infinite
possibilities that are available in the
unknown that matched my state of
happiness leading to more joy and more
expansion for more
three I'll get their vulnerability
fosters deeper human connections it
takes a lot of vulnerability to do
something new like a TED talk it takes
even more vulnerability to have a camera
rolling while you're doing it
the emotional rollercoaster you're on
joy excitement hesitation disgust is
visually audibly and vibrationally
projected onto that screen and
experienced by those watching that
allows for people to connect with you at
the heart level my viewers reached out
to me sharing with me their bigots
doubts and fears telling me about things
they had been putting off for years and
we're finally feeling inspired to do
sharing with me experiences that they
were so passionate about and wanted me
to also have as a way of deepening our
connection asking me to do things they
would never personally do in a million
years but would watch me do one friend
suggested I go spend the night at Skid
Row in Los Angeles to experience what
it's like to be homeless and I decided
to pass respectfully but instead I
volunteered at a local community center
to address the food desert in LA by
stepping out of your comfort zone you
somehow give people the permission to do
the same watching me on the screen gave
people the opportunity to tap into their
own creative desire to experience and
expand to be a child again and just feel
more alive and by engaging in new
experiences and being vulnerable
regularly you even deepen your
connection to yourself and to life you
start to really have confidence in their
own abilities your confidence like gets
major boost and you can actually readily
face your fears during this year-long
experiment I started to take really big
risks professionally I said yes to
opportunities that I previously would
have turned down because I was scared of
failure but not anymore
I took bigger and bigger risks until I
finally grew the courage to leave my 15
year corporate career and do what I
really love what I'm really good at the
unknown is full of opportunities but so
many of us would rather have more of the
same because we're scared we're scared
of the unknown we might even be unhappy
with what we have but we're safe I have
one final lesson to share with you I
wish I can stop this talk right here and
say yeah if you're feeling stuck just
try new things and you're gonna be cured
all of you that's not true that is
incomplete and frankly it would be
irresponsible of me to leave you with
that without sharing with you my final
lesson my biggest lesson be willing to
press pause we go through life without
ever pausing through major life
transitions career change getting
married getting divorced
getting married again having children
losing a loved one we go from one lover
to the next without ever pausing my
immigrant parents didn't have the
opportunity to pause they were
constantly hustling moving working
worrying about tomorrow
all the while missing out on what life
was trying to tell them what life and
their emotions were trying to show them
even my own grandiose approach to rewire
my brain was based in doing something
new every week for a year because that's
all I knew that's what I was conditioned
for you are not in a
rut because of your job your spouse your
life's responsibilities you feel stuck
because you keep bringing the same
energy into everything you do you bring
you or ever you go you're not stuck
because of your external life but
because of your internal state of being
we can be in a life situation and think
it's gonna be different this time the
people are different
the circumstances are different it looks
different but without the awareness and
presence to pause you're gonna bring all
that old stuff forward and create more
of the same the very ruts you're trying
to desperately climb out of the unknown
is magical and powerful because it holds
within it an opportunity to reset the
next time you find yourself in a new
life situation instead of doing what you
always done have the courage to pause
leverage your newfound confidence your
ability to stay present your openness to
vulnerability your new trust and your
unknown and with a state of absolute
groundedness ask yourself how am I going
to show up this time
[Music]
[Applause]