hi
good morning hello
thank you for having me so let's get
started with my ted talks
my very first time so
i am the last born in my family that
follows and honors traditional values
my oldest sister is a lecturer
and my second sister is working for the
public sector
and their paths are exactly the same as
my parents expected
finishing college getting married
at the age of 24 having a job
and then having kids and my parents
expected me
to have the same path in my sophomore
year of high school
when both of my sisters both got married
my family got a big debt
i still remember my parents
they had to get up every day work very
hard
to make sure that i still got a decent
life and a good education regardless
i still remember my mom she had to
borrow money
so that she could have enough 23 million
vietnam dome for me
to pay my tuition fee when it was the
candidate
in the national excellent student
contest
the subject of english which was pretty
expensive back then
and then i passed the contest which
meant that i got direct offers
from several universities within the
country
and when we got the news my mom was the
happiest
and she was like hooray now you are able
to get into
security academy
[Music]
so for your information to get into that
university
you had to get a score of around 29 out
of 30
in the entrance university exam which
was
obviously impossible for me because i
was super bad at maths
and plus you were very likely to get a
job
offer after graduation and that is the
reason why my parents wanted me to study
to that university because
they want to feel reassured that i
got a stable job i got a foreseeable
future the so-called foreseeable future
as much as i didn't want to disappoint
my parents
i knew that this path was not for me
i knew that i was not cut out for this
job
as a police officer because all i wanted
to do
was television and communication and
that was my very first
step outside the norm which i think
doesn't necessarily mean that you are
the first person to do something
in the world it just simply means that
what you are doing is not
normal is not familiar in your closed
network of your friends
of your family and you have no idea how
things would turn out
so i got into college and on a very
beautiful day
i posted a video of me covering a very
cute song
named foo so
you know after one night that video went
viral
all over the internet and wow
after a few weeks later i got an
invitation to film the music video
and write some parts to the song with
the songwriter
and wow the song became a hit
and the envy got millions of views
and wow a ceo of an entertainment agency
contacted me
everything happened so quickly that i
didn't have time to
process it and the ceo persuaded me
into becoming a singer under his company
and i was like
yeah i was pretty interested but i still
have a college to finish
and then he told me his story of
dropping out of college
in his senior year to become a director
and now he made it
and i was like wow that would be a lot
of fun
i think this would be a very big
opportunity for me
my time to shine on the other side of
the spectrum
the music video got good response in
general but regarding my voice in my
singing
people didn't like it that much and of
course i was very sad
pretty sad sad sad and discouraged
um i asked my parents for advice
and my mom asked me so despite
all the opinions on of people on your
voice
do you still want to pursue a career as
a singer
and i was hesitating i told mom um mom
i'm not so sure
another story still during that time
i hosted three english shows on vtv7
which is the national education channel
and everything was going pretty well
until
i read comments on the internet and most
of the audience did not like my voice
and they complained about my hosting
skills my english
and you know that shows these shows were
for learning english
so the host is supposed to have good
english
you know if i was trying to sell you a
pen
and you didn't buy it okay i could blame
the pen is not good
but when the product is me when is me
appearing
on the national tv and serving millions
of audience
all across the nation it is getting
harder and harder to sleep at night
and seeing me getting disappointed being
sad
in myself from time to time then my mom
asked me
have you ever considered quitting this
job
i mean you're still a student you don't
have to work
you can fail you can try i just wanted
you to be healthy and happy every day
and an inner voice in me right at that
moment
told my mom that homemade no
mom i still want to keep working because
i know that i can fix it
and then my mom told me then
congratulations i think that you have
already found your passion
and i was like passion i have found my
passion
and yes i found my passion on that day
i soon realized that passion is
something
that pushes you through difficult times
because you don't care whatever
it takes to become better i like to sing
but i didn't have enough determination
to push myself
through people's opinions on my voice
and i quit
that means i don't have enough passion
for it i like to do the job of a tv host
and i know that i have strong
willingness to face
and overcome adversity for what i love
and as a result i rejected the offer of
the ceo
and a lot of people i know when a lot of
the experts in the industry
told me that i think that was a bad
decision i think if i were you i
wouldn't do that
but the thing here is that the best
advice
is the advice that people give you for
you
not the advice what would they do if
they were you because everyone is
different
and i the lesson i learned hard way from
this big event in my life is that
people cannot take the right decisions
in your life
only you can by listening more to your
inner voice
and by staying true to your vision and i
know that my vision has always been that
education education has always been my
backbone my family's backbone
and finishing college and using what i
learned to bring value to people
as a host as a social influencer as an
author has been always my ultimate goal
it can be very difficult to navigate in
at first
but it is sometimes better to take
a conscious decision that might appear
very crazy
very not right for others than just
following the norms
blindly and then
getting back to my story i still
continue with my work
as a tv host at vtv7 i still
be a full-time student at my diplomatic
academy of vietnam
and regarding my voice as a lot of
audience complained about my two
high-pitched voice which was very
irritating to listen to
and they didn't like my voice i decided
and i was so determined
to change my voice by lowering the tone
of my voice when speaking english
from hello this is a very nice day yes
this was exactly my voice in the past
to hello this is a very nice day
everything was going pretty well once
again and one day
the produce the producer and the
director of the show that i hosted
uploaded
a podcast that had me hosting with that
high pitched voice i guess probably back
in the season one the first season of
the show
and then i asked him if it was okay
to delete the podcast because i thought
the voice was
terrible and the audience might not like
it and i was too afraid to be judged
again
by the audience and then he texted me
back
and i could feel the disappointment and
the anger a little bit in his text
messages and he told me
that voice was a part of you why did you
deny it
okay so no more podcast that had you
will be uploaded ever again
and i was like what did did i do
something wrong what was happening
am i making you angry i didn't know what
was happening back then i was so stupid
it was not until when i talked to people
i talked more to my audience and
i read more comments and people started
to say
what happened to your voice v you spoke
too
quietly and softly that it's really hard
to listen to you
and we couldn't really find the positive
energy
the fun vibes like before and that
moment
left me speechless because i was too
confident
that the positive energy was something
that i could always bring to people
that was my unique selling point but
when the audience couldn't find that in
me
it felt like a loss of a part in my body
i really lost sight of who i was
i listened to people's opinions and
i changed who i am because i think
others
might accept me for it but i was strong
what i had been doing so far is not
trying to become
better but trying to become someone else
by rejecting myself by seeking
validation from
every single one and what the producer
and
the director told me just went on a loop
in my brain for weeks
that voice was the part of you why did
you deny it
why did i deny it i didn't know
i think because we as humans
often make a lot of mistakes and we
often
very often punish ourselves for those
past
mistakes because those mistakes often
come back
with an overwhelming feeling of guilt
of shame if i am not i'm not good enough
and i have never ever been good enough
and i realized that the hardest person
to forgive on this earth
is not someone who betrayed you
another friend who wasn't there for you
when you need the most
is not your ex-boyfriend who broke your
heart to pieces
the hardest person to forgive on this
earth is myself
and then my best friend told me to stop
doing what i have been doing so far
which is pleasing every single one
and he said just be yourself that three
words
i know we listen to this phrase all the
time just be yourself
i mean when i'm having a shower just be
yourself when i'm eating just be
yourself
when on the stage just be yourself when
i'm talking to you just be yourself
just be yourself just three words but
we're here all the time and we're
getting tired of it
but it's the use of the word just
that really surprises me because when we
use the word just
it means that it is something very easy
to do
then why just being myself
is still the hardest thing for me to do
why i didn't know
and after talking to my therapist after
learning more about meditation about my
inner peace
listening more to my inner voice
i realized that my true self is
actually being covered up with thinking
and with a perception which is based on
fear
my true self is who i really am when i
let go
of all those stories of all the
judgments
that i myself place on me
do you still remember a challenge on
facebook where people would post
10 year challenge where people would
post their pictures when they were
kids and people and your friends would
comment oh you look so cute you look so
happy you look so nice and then uh
the the the the person would say oh yeah
yeah i look cute i was a cute kid back
then
but you know my challenge i think for
you
today is that take a picture of your
face
today and remember that in 10 years time
you will be amazed at how gorgeous and
beautiful you
are because right now you are already
gorgeous and beautiful because
you just don't see it yet my stories of
stepping outside the norm
is challenging myself but it is not
about changing myself
because you you see as you can see i
failed when i try
to change myself
at the end of the day we as humans we
are allowed to make mistakes we are
allowed to laugh at ourselves we are
allowed
you know to do something wrong just make
mistakes
it's not the end of the world who on
earth has not made a mistake
tell me a name who no one so
it's okay to feel bad it's okay to feel
down and heavy sometimes
because the cloud rains when it's heavy
too
so it's really okay it's totally normal
you don't have to try to become anyone
else you don't have to try to become
this guy
that guy this lady that lady know
you don't have to try to become anyone
else you just be you
and being you being authentic being an
individual
is enough because individuality
makes diversity and individuality
and diversities are two most precious
things on this earth
i know that some of you here every
single one of you here
might be having some problems and
pressure to deal with every single day
maybe with your friends with your family
with your work with your study
with your love life and i just want to
tell you that
no matter who you are no matter where
you come from
you are the one and only and that's what
makes you beautiful and special in your
own ways
and no matter what you are facing right
now
and i don't know no matter what the
future holds for you
please never change
yourself love yourself
accept yourself and then transform
yourself
i really hope you have a great day today
thank you