Talking on TEDx platform!
I always was inspired watching TED videos; hardly I knew I would be speaking on TEDx one day. Wow, the experience of knowing about it, preparing for it, and finally seeing the video has been amazing.
Probably if you are passionate about something, the universe would somehow give that to you automatically!
Initial Days...
One fine day I was approached by TEDxBNMIT as they had heard about me growing Organic vegetables in my Terrace and composting Kitchen Leftovers at home. I was overwhelmed to share my story on it.They were home for 1st round of "interview" and they would shortlist the nominated speakers. We had a video recording session where I was showed them my terrace kitchen garden and my compost factory. :)
As they announced me to have been short listed, I was excited and nervous. Not nervous due to stage fear, but nervous, as I would be representing all the 24,000+ members from my Organic Terrace Gardening group! In the span of 18mins, (they have a strict deadline of time) I had to convey something so important and my personal goal was to inspire atleast one in the audience, which would make me happy.
The speech HAD to be strong enough to inspire, for me to convince someone else, who would be very new to the topic, to give a thought about it. Phew, that was a huge responsibility!
I knew what to speak, I have been speaking about it non-stop from past 1 year now in all my OTG visits from various people, various groups - so the content was ready in my mind. I could speak about it the whole day. BUT all that in 18mins - NO WAY! So, I knew there had to be preparations and practice sessions.
And the Preparations Began...
I started off researching on- Tips for TEDx talks
- Some of the Inspirations Speeches : I saw many, but my personal favorites were below. They spoke their mind and were so natural and passionate about what they spoke!
Just search the net on "how to prepare for TED talks" and you would get thousands of search results you could go through.
Once I had pictured out mentally on the flow of my talk, I sat down to draft my slide contents. More than Organic Gardening, I wanted to concentrate more on Waste management - because that is the immediate need for the city and country. Organic Kitchen Gardening would definitely be the topic of the town, once we sort out the garbage mess we are in!
Picture speaks a thousand words
At first I did not think of the time limit and I put down EVERYTHING I wanted to tell - with pictures. One of the tips to make audience interested in your slides is to use less words and more pictures, as picture speaks thousand words.
- I got in touch with few of my OTG Guru's and friends for the pictures they had taken on related areas. I wanted to use "real" pictures that my OTG folks took, than me pulling out sample pictures from the internet. You will know what I mean when u look at my slides.
- I got in touch with Deccan Herald for getting the permission to use some clipping of their youtube video on Mandur Landfill
- I got in touch with The Ugly Indians to use their pictures as sample on the good work few of us are already doing.
- And other small misc stuffs had to be looked at, before I used them in my slides, after all it would be on youtube for the public to watch!
All this, to create that additional "effect" for the audience, so that they know what we are seeing out there.. which even we used to ignore earlier.
Practice
Finally I had the slides ready and it was about 75 slides!! My hubby was shocked to see the number, which looked impossible for me to complete in 18mins.
I switched on the stopwatch in my mobile and spoke what my slides were, the first one took nearly 40mins, and I gasped for breath, because, I almost ran like a train with that talk! I realized, even though I had TOO MUCH to convey to my audience, it would not work. They would not get even a single thing, which would be useless.
I sat down to cut short the slides, which came down to almost 50 slides - nope, still ~30mins.
Again to club few pictures and again the stopwatch ran for ~45 slides - 27mins.
After a LOT of permutation and combination and a lot of conscious practice of not repeating the words or sentences, I finalized on 40 slides, and ~19mins - much better!
That gave me some confidence to manage.
That gave me some confidence to manage.
The D-Day
It was March 14th 2015, and we reached the venue.
(Pic Courtesy : Preethi Bharadwaj)
I was accompanied by my family too! They are my pillar and strength and whatever I am today, they HAD to be there :)
The auditorium was jam packed with the audience. I was so happy to see my co-speakers to be so inspirational. I felt lucky to be there among them!
I started off with my story on how it all began....
I stated few real instances which made the audience laugh and giggle, which gave me a confidence that atleast they were not sleeping listening to me! :-P
I spoke about what and how ANYONE can start good practices to go eco friendly :
- Refusing Plastic Covers, Carrying cloth bags.
- Using cutlery for get-together's and weddings, instead of using disposable ones.
- Shifting from disposable diapers and sanitary pads to reusable ones.
- Buying locally from farmers, to encourage organic food.
- Start community composting - at offices, apartments, localities using simple ways.
- Teach their kids on gardening - to start early, to know where the Tomatoes come from (not from the market or the fridge)!
- To resist the temptation to litter the streets and keep our city clean.
- To grow organic vegetables at home!
And bam! the unforgettable 18mins of my life was over with a blink of an eye! At this moment, my only thought was that I hope to have conveyed what I wanted to.
Right after my talk was the tea break and I was so happy to see many coming over to me to compliment the subject and that they too wanted to start off with Organic Kitchen Gardening and Composting and did not know how to begin. I was floating on air, when people showed interest and showed the sense of responsibility. One of them came to me and said, he would stop using plastic covers - I felt, Yayyy! One of a kind to think like us :-D
Then we continued to watch other talks, had a great lunch and returned back home with a smile. A day, well spent with lot of new information and inspiring people!
Hope we continue to spread the awareness. This has to spread wild from mouth to mouth and one fine day, we will all see the "Dream, Clean Earth" we have been dreaming of!
TEDx Talk Video
Slides
Pictures of the event
Pictures of the complete event can be found here.
