Transcriber: Mychelly de Oliveira Reviewer: Denise RQ
Please welcome Ann Panjakidze.
(Applause)
Have you ever felt like you're sad or depressed but don't know why?
Like this feeling came out of nowhere?
Well, I'm sure you have, and I have too.
So the reason for this mysterious disharmony may be different.
It may be a minor detail that you don't even think about.
For example:
it's your usual day, you're walking on the street,
and suddenly, you see constructions everywhere.
You of course don't pay attention to them, and they annoy you subconsciously.
Or you just walk by a beggar, and you don't even notice him.
Or you see rubbish on the streets.
At that moment, your thoughts may be somewhere else,
but there is a chaos that surrounds you.
And after an hour or something, you just have an awful mood.
You're unbalanced.
There are many other things that can negatively affect your spirit;
lack of time, traffic jams, gossip,
all the good relationships that created harmony,
and humans somehow distorted it.
One proof is that everything, especially atmosphere,
and the whole environment is now very dirty.
And this is dangerous for not only our health
but for our behavior too.
Yes, environment and everything that surrounds us
has a huge influence on how we feel; that's pretty clear.
But how are we capable of fighting this negative impact?
How can we defeat disharmony?
Images: some people hate [inaudible], that is like on every step.
And they're often moody.
Will they always be like that,
just because it seems impossible to beautify the world?
My answer is no.
Maybe taking part in many organizations to clean environment may help.
These people understand that their activities will not fulfill their needs;
not to see dirty places, not to see rubbish on the streets.
However, that will truly affect their mood in a positive way.
There are many other ways to solve this problem, for example:
expressing feelings is often helpful, or I'd recommend daily changes.
Like start recycling waste products everyday.
Start having good interactions with plants,
reduce usage of chemicals, and so on.
Changes.
The changes I'm talking about play a big role in creating harmony.
Those changes then become our own principle,
and we start to obey our own rules.
Which gives you more strength, even more confidence.
And we start to have harmonious lifestyle, acceptable for us.
The only thing that mustn't happen in this situation is getting lazy,
or doing something wrong that we are going to regret.
Just because of temptation, just because we don't think adequately.
For me, obtaining harmony is also crucial
to create for us some limits and boundaries.
What limits am I talking about and how can that help?
Well, I became vegetarian not long ago.
Today is 56th day, I guess, that I haven't eaten meat.
So, the reason I made this decision was exactly because of what I needed.
And I needed peace, I needed harmony.
The thoughts about animals suffering, not living beautiful lives,
made me cry not once.
But I still kept eating them because they were already dead
and I couldn't change that fact, because they were delicious.
But, once I said to myself,
"You see animals as friends, how can you eat them?"
And then I stopped eating meat.
And now here I am, and limiting myself wasn't "free from pain" I assure you.
Yes, limiting myself from eating meat.
Even though this decision wasn't easy for me,
I still felt like it was meant to be like that.
I wasn't sure if I could endure my mission because I used to love meat.
I used to eat it everyday because it was very delicious for me,
but I really wanted to stop eating it.
So, even though I didn't have enough confidence
I still decided to at least try.
Surprisingly, my decision appeared so strongly in my subconscious
that I've made it:
I'm a vegetarian.
This decision actually wasn't easy for me.
But first days were strongest.
I saw meat and didn't even have the will to eat it.
I feel the same way now too,
but I'm a human and I've also had my moments of temptation.
Like once, I was very tired, very hungry.
In the car there was only a hamburger, and I wanted to eat the hamburger.
My parents wanted me to eat that hamburger so badly.
They pushed me so hard
because they thought not eating meat was very unhealthy.
And I was thinking: should I eat the hamburger or should I not?
And I made the decision, I didn't eat it.
And I think that that was a great choice.
Because that was a big step forward to making myself a better person.
Another hard part is that I hate rice.
I dislike vegetables and soups.
Not a fan of fruits, and not a fan of any kinds of fruits and salads.
So, what's left?
Not much variety, right?
But, now I'm so sure of what I want that this isn't even a problem for me.
And whenever you have that kind of strong desire,
all so-called "problems" just vanish.
Now about my inspiration.
Our history has so many famous vegetarians,
but I want to say two words about Mahatma Gandhi, who truly inspired me.
"Spiritual progress does demand, at some stage,
that we should cease to kill our fellow creatures
just for what our body wants," he said.
And I agree with that.
He was against killing and eating animals because that was violence
and no violence leads to inner peace and harmony.
And progress, that's what everybody wants.
Kind of generally,
what is the most common thing when you're sad and when you're depressed,
what do you do?
Like listen to music, watch movies,
go out with your friends, talk to them, eat?
I don't know.
These activities actually bring light to me which is very important.
Because if you're sad and depressed all the time
your friends also catch your mood.
The only question left now is that you do all the kind things, right?
You help beggars, you do not eat meat,
you clean the environment, and so on.
But you do all these kind of things just for yourself, right?
Isn't that kind of egoistic?
But I will say that gaining harmony for yourself has only good sides.
Because whenever you have the harmony,
you're being cheerful with your friends,
you bring fun and light while being with them, and so on.
So I think that what we need to do is realize the problem of our disharmony.
Try to find ways to solve it.
Solve it.
Then gain that harmony and multiply it.
And that is the thing we can do to make the world a better place.
Thank you.
(Applause)