[Music]
you guys it's about to get serious hang
on
yeah real serious
oh no no no back one there we go just
for a heads up that shot of me proudly
wearing a towel and a tambourine with
clothespins on my head on the right was
taken in October so here we go I've got
good news and bad news and I'm going to
tell you the bad news first
the bad news is you're going to spend
the rest of your lives trying to get
back to the place where you were when
you were a child and everything felt
fearless and effortless and curious but
the good news is you get the chance to
spend the rest of your life trying to
get back to the place where you were
when you were a child and everything
felt effortless innocent okay so the
theme for this year's TEDx is revision
not that anybody has heard that word yet
today there are a lot of different ways
to look at it and on the one hand we
have no choice in the matter
right life is a constant series of
molting constant series of experiences
and if we are awake enough to absorb
those experiences life is a constant
path of evolution so really this theme
is about the universality of what it
means to be alive which is a very
challenging question to answer in the
context of a 15-minute talk more or less
so let's bring it into a personal life
perspective mine I'll give you some
background I spent the better part of
seven years of my childhood
sailing around the world with my family
my older sister my mom and my
when you drop that on people you usually
hear things like oh my god what a unique
experience you are so fortunate this is
true wow you must have had such
incredible adventures you're so blessed
this perspective that you must have had
you have the best childhood this is true
what is also true is that I grew up with
an enormous amount of free-floating
anxiety that I spent a very long time in
therapy trying to figure out and a real
yearning for roots and stability and
freedom and that might sound like a
paradox but when you spend several years
on a really small vessel with just your
family your life is deeply confined you
add to that the fact that you never have
a chance to put down roots you start to
feel settled you start to feel familiar
time to go to the next place as a child
you have no control over this
furthermore because there was always
this undercurrent of tension this
potential for danger potential for real
survival situations I felt as a young
child that it was my job to be as good
and as quiet and as well-behaved as
possible to stay out of the way of the
grown-ups keeping us safe which of
course leads you to a tendency to be
selective with your feelings
you tamp them down you have a tendency
to pretend that everything is nice and
good and happy all the time
well that's not realistic life isn't
happy and nice all the time
nothing is you see where I'm going
as a young sensitive creative kid
yearning to express that which we've
been taught to tamp down yearning to
feel music
became my outlet became my source of
expression and music you're allowed to
be dramatic and music you're allowed to
stomp your feet and music you're allowed
to dance you're allowed to sing about
sorrow you're allowed to scream if the
song calls for it right
so this childhood was a gift it laid the
foundation for my path as a creative so
I grew up I went to school I became a
singer-songwriter I spent the better
part of 20 years earning my living
recording performing touring and a bunch
of other life happened too but a couple
of things happen as I got close to 40 I
went through a really tough breakup I
was burned out I was exhausted and I
joined my family's boat business and as
a new kind of structure took the place
of my old life and as the concerns of
making rent and booking the next gig
fell away I was given the mental time
and freedom to sit back and really think
about my life why had I done what I had
done why do we define success the way we
define it why did I feel like such a
failure what do you do when you wake up
and you realize you didn't make it well
in my case I got fairly depressed I come
from a pretty accomplished family and
like a lot of American families that
accomplishment is measured in terms of
financial gain and public recognition
okay so I paid rent for 17 years so what
I didn't sell out arenas
why do I even care what was I trying to
prove it came down to this overriding
question what does it mean to be a
creative when that has been your life's
identity and no longer pays all your
bills heads up this is a work in
progress so I do not have it all figured
out if you're looking for one definitive
answer if I had it completely figured
out I doubt very much I would be here I
would be ascended laughing at everybody
from the next dimension so but you
remember my opening statement about the
young child I'm about to get back to
that okay so a couple of years ago a
dear friend of mine called me up and she
said Sarah it's the weirdest thing I
have this feeling you're supposed to
write a book and my response was like
what I'm a songwriter I like short
structure structure
I like those boundaries within which I
can go crazy right stability and freedom
I mean I've you know blogged I've
written some articles but a book then
she said and I think it's supposed to be
a children's book and you're supposed to
illustrate it to which my response was
laughter because I am the world's worst
visual artist I cannot draw there's no
talent there I like to doodle doodling
is very different never will I show my
doodles and also children's book she
said well maybe it's a metaphor for the
field of childhood I don't know keep in
your back pocket so I did mostly
forgotten and then last year I quit my
job after seven years it didn't fit me
anymore okay here we go again change
what now and now I'm 47 years old
and I'm thinking I'm going to dive back
into music and do what with it I'm not
sure so I let it ride and I started
writing songs again and there was one
song in particular that just came
pouring out which is what happens when
my favorite songs come it's like a
channeling it's like if I can just get
out of the way long enough the thing is
gonna make itself shown to me
well what showed itself to me in this
and you'll forgive me for messing around
with the guitar because this is a loner
and we had to borrow somebody's shoelace
and I don't know whose shoelace it was
so whoever you are thank you and I hope
you get your shoelace back to make the
to make this work
add to that the fact that I've just
forgotten my capo so we're going to
transpose this song but anyway what
showed itself to me was so interesting
it was a dialogue and that hasn't
happened to me much before it was called
do you hear the call and I've always
felt this calling it's his undefined
thing this yearning that I've expressed
through music but in this case it was my
self now talking to my very young
childhood self and I was telling already
come in plop yourself down and tell me
your stories
[Music]
and it went something like this but in a
different key come on in sit with me
whispers story to you
[Music]
where is she
but treasure she has
raise your hand fear
[Music]
get up and dance you snap that
persistent
do you hear call
[Music]
I remember being little digging in the
dirt
I remember going
[Music]
I remember knowing she led the world
wash me and there
[Music]
how cold coming up do you hear the car
[Music]
anyway it goes on but I'm running out of
time so
but I did finish it it is real it's an
entire song but what I realized was that
child she was fearless that child you
know learning to tamp down your feelings
and anxiety whatever notwithstanding
that child would look at approaching a
new Anchorage even if she had been
seasick and throwing up for days with
nothing but excitement her first
thoughts were I wonder what new friends
I'm going to make I wonder what I'll see
the first time I go snorkeling fearless
I have a vivid memory of being I think
it was the Solomon Islands when I was
five or six years old and a boy came out
in his canoe and he had some wood and a
knife and he started whittling and I was
into it we didn't speak each other's
language it was about the play and he
he'd brought some extra wood for me he
wanted me to try it and I did it was a
he was building a carving a miniature
dugout canoe mine didn't work it wasn't
a canoe of course it wasn't it was a it
was a stick with a with a chunk notched
out of it but I didn't care it was about
the experience right fearless and then I
realized oh my god I've been spending
the rest of my life trying to get back
to that kid that's what the yearning has
been about that's what the calling has
been about I never cared about making it
really I never cared about proving
myself better than you I just wanted to
sing I just wanted to play I just wanted
to feel holy moly
when we are very young
we don't judge until we're told you we
don't feel shame until we're told you we
don't worry about feeling until we're
told to okay I get it we live in a
fairly primitive world and it can be
quite brutal and some of this is for our
own good right we have to have some
rules we have to figure out how to get
along but how far off balance we get
okay so I'm a 47 year old used to be
independent singer-songwriter chick who
doesn't want to go back to the old ways
and now what well I wrote the book I
wrote the book with my terrible visual
artistic abilities I didn't want to but
that song that song felt to me like a
picture book so I wrote the lyrics in my
equally terrible handwriting and I
Illustrated it I straightened it as an
act of defiance is traded it as a
statement of alliance with that young
child is rated it as a tribute to
unselfconscious creation i ate it as a
call to everyone to put down the
measuring stick by which all other
accomplishments are defined and drop the
insecurity and just draw or just sing or
just write or just fill in the blank
when you do that something will happen
something will happen and it might be
the last thing you expect but
something's gonna happen and what you do
with that thing is gonna take you to the
next thing and the next thing and the
next and you might look up one day and
find that you are happily married that
you have a beautiful home
in Phoenix Arizona the valet says that
you are helping you're talented designer
wife with her projects and you're
meeting and engaging with all these
artists you never knew existed and
people are responding to your weird
pseudoknot children's book that's
actually for grown-ups and asking them
to be more like kids again and you're
writing more songs you might so at the
end of it look here's the thing about
revision revision happens whether we
like it or not but when we take an
active part in our revising when we shed
the mantle of insecurity around which
everybody else's opinions matter and
around which everything else has been
defined about how our revision should
look the most beautiful surprises the
weight thanks
you