two months ago I thought I would be
delivering a talk on my unprecedented
experiences in my almost 18 years of
living a talk on my unconventional views
on the phenomenons and realities of
human experience
two months ago I thought I would stand
on this stage and begin by narrating one
of them what I thought to be one of the
most harrowing nights of my life
a night an experience that has taken me
nearly four years to simply begin to
learn to live with a story of how a 14
turning 15 year old Anushka who was
living void of any GCSE or IB stress
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gorgeous who had just joined wso a new
school with her best friend of seven
years a story of how she embarked on her
first international school trip a jovial
teenager and returned a shattered one a
story of Florida's terrible humidity you
know the one that makes you resemble a
disheveled Chewbacca and that's a
compliment a story of how I received a
call in that same Florida heat at 4:52
a.m. and my mother said the words mr. de
has died the say mr. know that I knew
for seven years the same buster not that
I grew up with joined wso with the same
mr. no that I shared a teenage his
romantic pain and an undying love for
Justin Bieber I was going to begin with
a story of relevance a story of
self-development realization acceptance
a story of a paradigmatic mind ship that
taught me to learn from a loss but just
two months ago someone pressed that
reset button and it all happened again
nobody thinks they're going to die it's
true you might refute it with the brutal
candor of biology but almost everybody
lives each day believing in a tomorrow
whether it's avoiding a piece of
homework and leaving it for the next day
ignoring your parents after a fight with
all hopes to reconcile the next morning
or applying to university to pursue your
dream career our minds in this world
runs on a momentous cycle where one
thing builds on another as we grow with
adrià experience where time stops for
nobody where our actions have
consequences and what happened two
minute ago will affect what happens in
the next few nobody avoids giving out
consequences because if we all live each
day as our last we wouldn't believe in
consequences but we do we give out late
detentions set deadlines have arguments
or teach our children valuable lessons
because nobody thinks they're going to
die and nobody comes close to thinking a
loved one is going to die until it
happens death a word that makes me
uncomfortable makes many uncomfortable
but a tragedy that most view with
respect with the pleasure of a spectator
seat and a smoke screen of shared
condolences until it happens to them
because it happened again two months ago
it happened for the third time
two months ago I lost a best friend my
best friend
another best friend I lost Vishal to a
car accident someone who plays the piano
while I sing someone who kicks my knees
in just laugh at me losing my balance
and someone who listens to my hardship
and reminds me that he thought I was
strong a strength and I'm not sure I
possess any longer because not after
losing three best friends at the ages of
seven 14 and 17 because no amount of
beautifully written words poems or TED
Talks can do them justice can do Chelsea
mr. na
Vishal can do my pain justice tonight's
theme is control-alt-delete so I'm going
to break down the sustenance of
life-changing incidents of trauma of
grief how this one experience can either
break or shape you and how this impact
can possibly be up to you
it feels peculiar repeating my own words
but I truly do believe this we live in a
world where explanation is key we as
human beings strive to learn we break
things down make them comprehensible
whether it's the stages of mitosis or
the stages of grief
we like to synthesize simple
explanations for complicated things we
like to believe that somewhere out there
someone has the answers to everything
someone has it all figured out it's why
we seek advice it's why we vent to our
friends simply go to school or attend
TED Talks because we like to make
informed decisions we want to make sure
that whatever is happening and whatever
we choose to do about it is right and
that's why when I found out my best
friend was in a coma I scavenged for
that explanation that why that undo
button because none of it makes sense it
still doesn't make sense but we all have
these buttons these functions that help
us build her through our everyday lives
the good and the bad the happy and the
sad they help us figure out what
deserves our energy and what doesn't
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before we also have a limited number of
scenarios we can actually use them in
so when I found out Michelle was
fighting for his life when I think about
my best friend not sitting in the
audience today I press control I'll
refresh our first button of the evening
the button you press when you're spaced
with a situation that makes you go huh a
situation with regardless of times
regardless of how many times you shake
your head in disbelief the page just
doesn't load up
you can't process it some call it a
nightmare some call it surreal so you've
refresh and refresh and refresh but your
brain just keeps going
error 404 emotional reaction not found
you have nothing to say and nothing to
do this button is just being pressed
over and over and over but this button
can be pressed it's not just in times of
tragedy but in times of unexpected
reward - you just received an A you on a
test that you thought you were going to
fail ctrl alt refresh huh but it's
moments like when you don't know if
you're gonna see your best friend again
ctrl I'll refresh huh
that's the funny thing about life a
momentous cycle where actions have
consequences and some things some things
just happen life goes on and you're
still now many my question how I went
from a Windows function to unparalleled
chapters of my life but you see the
thing is one incident can fundamentally
transform the very foundation of a
person's character their markup their
intricate wiring that makes up their
personality that's built on upon an
accumulation of past experiences all
uprooted because of one reality one
incident and all has changed forever
and these unprecedented instance aren't
limited to grief it's anything that
moves you that jolts your entire school
of thought that questions your systems
of reality that makes you stop for a
second or two while the world just goes
by and forces you to see things
differently with the different lens of
perception but sometimes we aren't ready
to process this change the world goes on
and you want to - but the tab just
doesn't load up in the Google Chrome of
your mind
so you just ctrl alt minimize our second
button of this evening the button of
ignorance a temporarily tool of
indifference but there's a reason that I
call it minimize because nothing you
ignore ever truly goes away like I
minimize tab on your screen whether it's
an assignment you procrastinate it up
until the very last minute I know you've
been there or a great experience that
you just can't deal with right now or
ever it all comes back to bite you
sooner or later because it's tool of
indifference this button it's on a timer
similar your similar to your snooze
button on your alarm you can press it
and get those extra few minutes of sleep
but your alarm will starter loose -
sooner or later and you can press it
again but eventually you will have to
wake up use this button cautiously I say
because depending on the nature of the
event this button can prove to be
unhealthy though it works trust me I
know it does
the simple hope that we could all smack
Michelle when he wakes up by pressing
ctrl alt minimize is what got me through
three days of uncertainty and it's not
that when you use this button you're in
denial or you don't care it's just that
sometimes you can't your mind settles in
a place where it's not able to put
together this jigsaw puzzle of pieces
that seem to be all all different shapes
sizes and colors and it just doesn't
make any sense
but sometimes the multiple tabs are we
open and didn't load up load up all at
once on the sixth day of a shawls fight
I woke up to find my mother at my
bedside with that solemn look plastered
over her face I knew what was up but I
control alt minimized and asked her what
he didn't make it she said but all I
heard was a repetitive series of nose
leaving my mouth and my ctrl alt refresh
button and going crazy but in that
moment the page did load up and I
realized that I had lost him that my
minimized tab was now exploded in front
of my eyes and my snooze button no
longer working and the alarm blaring in
my ears in that moment I got it and when
we finally get it we press control alt
zoom this button perfectly ties in with
that momentous cycle of life and actions
having consequences because things
happen we cry we scream we laugh
action-reaction we zoom in we amplify we
work ourselves up and convince ourselves
that truly is the end of the world and
anyone who tells you otherwise just to
forget it I know I know how it feels and
I know
you do too now the funny thing about
these buttons is the fact that they
usually don't work in isolation you know
that assignment you press ctrl Alt
minimize on by leaving it for the next
day yeah it's a four thousand word
extended essay and it's now due tomorrow
ctrl alt zoom now you're freaking out
but this button is usually the go-to
button but it's the button that often
makes us lose sense or sight of this
bigger picture everyone keeps talking
about the long run this button can
occasionally make us forget that at the
end of the day it will be okay but this
button isn't subhuman it's emotion
it isn't overreacting far from it
because we act and react how we feel how
we've processed it how we think the
consequence is that something holds for
us will impact us and if that's not
human I don't know what is monumental
incidents have the potential to make an
individual meet the world with a
different eye with an altered lens of
perception some may call it
post-traumatic stress or some may even
call it the best day of their lives some
may prefer not to give it a label you
see things in a different light you
digest it differently
therefore you behave differently it only
makes sense
we call this digestion emotion how we
take something how it impacts us and
what chord it strikes within our psyche
and depending on the chord it strikes we
use a different button refresh zoom
minimize for later or one of the other
hundreds of buttons I haven't mentioned
tonight and these buttons don't work in
a systematic order regardless of the
situation at hand we're all human we
change our minds we close up we put up
walls we open up and we go do things out
of our comfort zone
we simply be human
and we humans are thrown a curveball
sometimes we face unanticipated
circumstances for me one of these
circumstances
we're losing my best friend friends for
you it might be the divorce of your
parents or not getting into the national
football team or being made redundant or
it can be something entirely positive
like that dream job halfway across the
world and when we're faced with these
unanticipated circumstances we hung on
to this emotional airplane that we don't
know how to fly so we press all these
buttons back and forth back and forth
refresh zoom but in my zoom in all hopes
that will somehow gain control of this
airplane of this unstable emotional
airplane learn how to steer it in the
right direction with no collateral
damage and land it at the healthy
emotional airport and sometimes we gain
sight of the switch the switch control
alt except now I call it a switch and
not a button because of the
unpredictable nature of switches they
trip at any given time without any
warnings because that's the volatile
nature of acceptance of human emotion
you believe it one day and then you
don't when someone's the experience is
something completely uncalled-for they
board that emotional airplane and
finally flip the control alt accept
which when someone reaches that ability
to finally even comprehend the idea of
acceptance the world smacks you hard on
the concrete floors of reality and you
just missed your best Vin's but that is
what many call life we choose what
defines us and what doesn't we choose
the experiences and the people that we
carry forward with us and we choose
the experiences and the people that we
learn from and not leave behind because
I always say advice and people and
experiences are like a piece of paper
you can cut around it and choose what
parts to keep and what parts to learn
from and over time we learn how to gain
control of these control buttons we
learn how to control the emotional
aeroplane and make these right decisions
but sometimes we can unlearn and we can
lose control and we're left in a place
where the world is going on and we just
want to press pause how we carry on we
go on one day at a time one moment at a
time because that's the beauty of it all
that is a human experience thank you
very much my name is Anoushka Gore thank
you for coming to my TED talk