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Saying the Hard Things: The Power of Speaking Up

From TEDx Talks

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Some things are hard to say in our lives. We all face conversations we are scared to have, whether it's confronting someone about a problem, asking for a raise, or even saying the first "I love you" to someone. And that can be really frustrating because oftentimes the words we just can't seem to get out are the ones we need to say in order to get what we want. So we are given a choice: speak and risk rejection, or stay silent and never move forward. Oftentimes, the choice of whether or not to speak up about something can be a double-edged sword.

Now, I am not timid by any means. I'm a theater major, and I'm more comfortable talking to a crowd like you than I am being in one. But in the last few years, I have faced many situations where I was rendered speechless due to intimidation, anxiety, or just plain fear. People might find that surprising about me because for the last year, I have traveled the state of Wisconsin as a motivational speaker to high school students. People probably wouldn't assume that for years I was terrified of talking because my very career itself revolves around it.

But public speaking is a lot different than private conversation. In a speech, you can be as articulate and precise as you want. It's all laid out there for you, and you just have to deliver it. But you can't rehearse private conversation. There's no guarantee that you'll say the most clever thing at the perfect moment, or that the other person won't look at you like you're crazy. You are on your own, and for some people, that can be really hard.

In fact, some people are crippled by the fear of being judged during conversation, and as one of those people, I can tell you that the more unpredictable and uncontrollable our lives become, the quieter we become. My life didn't become that unpredictable until just before I turned 16. Up until that point, it had been pretty stable. But that summer, the most inconceivable, life-altering, mind-blowing events of my teenage life occurred. I met a boy, a real live actual boy, and God, or a boy he was. He had a face that should have been on billboards and a voice like Sinatra. If you don't understand what I'm saying, the boy was hot. I'm going to call him Joe. And to me, Joe was about as perfect as perfect could get.

I felt unworthy standing next to him. I had been self-conscious about my looks for a long time, and I rarely considered that anyone, let alone this wonder boy with brown eyes, would think that my scrawny frame and deer-in-the-headlights face would be attractive. But then a wave of unpredictability hit, and Joe told me he was into me. And I had a normal teenage girl reaction. I flipped out. I had never had a boyfriend before, and things like this never happened to me. It was perfect. But like many summer flings turn out to be, Joe's and my courtship was rather tumultuous. He had been my first kiss, which I had built up in my head to be this end-all-be-all experience. But in the moment, I was a nervous wreck. And after the moment, I couldn't even look at Joe. We didn't talk for weeks, and I figured we were done.

But later that summer, Joe made it very clear to me at a pool party that he was not finished. He tried more than once to cross boundaries with me that I was not ready to cross. And I was so confused. I really liked Joe, but I wanted him to stop. But I didn't want him to think that I was lame, so I just froze and said it was fine. But it was not fine. It was humiliating, and I left that party feeling confused, bewildered, and judged for the fact that I was still nuts about this guy. So sophomore year started, and I was devastated over Joe. We didn't talk for almost an entire year, and I'm not the type to let a guy get to me. But Joe was the itch that I couldn't scratch.

It was teenager-y and stupid, and talking to my friends about it made me feel teenager-y and stupid. So I just stopped talking about it. I just sucked it up. But the memories of the first kiss, the pool party, and whatever else weighed heavy, and I kept moving. But then in my junior year, life took another unexpected turn when Joe and I reconnected. And this time, I fell hard. Suddenly, he was so much more than just a perfect face. He was funny, charming, and talented, and I genuinely thought that what had happened the summer before was just a phase. This Joe was different. So when he asked me out, I was still hesitant. But I had been waiting for this guy for almost two years.

I thought that this time, we would get it right. And for a while, everything was as perfect as I dreamed it would be. My life revolved around Joe, seeing Joe, daydreaming about Joe, snapchatting Joe, kissing Joe. And as much as I hate saying this and sounding melodramatic, I really did fall in love with him. He was the first guy I could see a future with, and I really wanted that future. But then again, life started to unravel. Our conversations became emptier. I would get so frustrated with his flippant replies to things that I really cared about. But I didn't want to make him uncomfortable, so I just brushed it off.

But I felt like I was giving a lot more than I was getting. Joe would flirt with other girls right in front of me. He was rude to me in front of his friends. And it seemed like every time I tried to voice my opinion about even simple things, he would come back with, "Well, that's dumb." And since I thought he was so perfect, I considered everything I loved to be wrong. I knew I was losing him, and I started having anxiety attacks. I became so caught up in trying to impress Joe that I started forgetting about myself. And then, just a few days before Valentine's Day of 2014, just two months after we started dating, I found out that Joe asked another girl to our junior prom. And I was in shock. I was in love with this guy I had waited two years for, and he couldn't even give me two months of his time.

In my whole life, I had never felt more degraded, betrayed, and stupid. So I ended it that night, and just like that, the future that I had imagined for myself, one with Joe and babies in a big white house, was gone. And for the next few months, I went numb. It felt like my life wasn't real. I had gone from obsessing about Joe's every move to not speaking to him at all. It was like he died. And when school ended, I had nothing to busy myself with, so I would cower away in my room and cry. I thought if I told people how I felt, no one would take me seriously. So I just sucked it up and dealt with it on my own. When my senior year started, I was at my wit's end.

I knew I had to get out of the hole that I had been in all summer. And there was a leadership group at my school that I was really curious about. So I went to a few meetings, and eventually, I became president of that group. And my first order of business was to create an anti-bullying event for October. Bullying is an interesting subject for me because I've been on both sides of it. I've been bullied before, but I've also dished it out to people in turn. And I really cared about this group, and I wanted to make a big event. So I decided that I was going to give my first motivational speech ever to my entire high school. No pressure.

In that speech, I talked about my insecurities, my own experiences with bullying, and how I found the strength to stop bullying. And people loved it. I was on TV, interviewed in the paper, and best of all, kids really took that speech to heart. It was invigorating to put myself in such a vulnerable position and then being met with such a positive response. I was amazed at how much my words could do and by how much social status it gave me in such a short amount of time. People started calling me Miss Perfect, and I didn't love that, but I took it as a compliment. I was on top of the world.

But with my new reputation came big responsibilities. Anytime someone needed a leader for a project, I was the go-to girl, and I didn't want to say no. I was Miss Perfect, so I could handle anything, right? Pretty soon, I was writing for the school newspaper, running a variety show, taking dance lessons, taking AP classes, working, filling out scholarships. And by December, it felt like I was running the school, and I had no margin for error. Getting something wrong would mean risking my perfect exterior, and I could not lose that.

I was exhausted, and in the rare moments of peace, I was still thinking about Joe. Outside, I was lighter than air. Inside, I was breaking. And my method of dealing with everything worked like this: tell no one. If people found out that Miss Perfect was crying in her room every night, the gig would have been up. So I kept silent. But just a few days before Christmas break, I cracked. I broke down crying, and I couldn't stop. And ironically, that happened in the middle of my AP psychology class. So I ran out of the room. My parents were called, and finally, after almost three years of holding everything in, I let it all out.

And it was relieving to have finally admitted the truth, but it didn't come without consequences. Christmas break began with me telling my family that I was not okay, and it ended with me attending my first sessions of cognitive-behavioral therapy, where I was diagnosed with depression and social anxiety. The beginning of my recovery was excruciatingly confronting emotions that I had been swallowing for so long with my therapist felt like being naked in a room with someone I had just met, and then I'd have to go back and relay it all to my family or go back to school and pretend like I hadn't just been crying.

Or even go back to AP psych and learn about the very things I was going through. It was incredibly hard, and I didn't want anyone to know. Therapy was helping me tremendously, but there was still a huge disconnect between the perfect, smiley girl I was at school and the anxious, depressive one who came out in therapy. And I thought if I told people who I really was, they wouldn't believe me. So as time went on, I started having more success with motivational speaking. And for many of those ventures, I talked about depression and my recovery process.

And instead of being met with rejection or ridicule like I was afraid of, I received nothing but the warmest empathy from my audiences. Kids were telling me their own stories of adversity simply because I had shared mine. And all of that got me thinking: if I could tell hundreds of strangers about the part of my life that I was most ashamed of, what was so hard about telling the rest of my friends and those who already cared about me the real truth? So pretty soon, I started talking, and I started small with just a few friends, and then a few more.

And it brought me closer to them than we had ever been before. Knowing that I had an army of true, devoted friends to help me on my worst days made such a difference, and it literally killed my anxiety. I stopped thinking about Joe, stopped trying to be perfect, and instead started living life for the only person I ever should have lived it for: myself. Life is unpredictable. If anyone would have told me that I would go through eight months of therapy and become a motivational speaker all the same calendar year, I would have laughed in their face. But here I am.

And I still deal with depression and anxiety all the time. No issue is ever fully solved. But in the last year, I've come to realize that even though I'm young and sometimes teenager-y and stupid, I have a voice. And that I can use it to share what I've learned from this crazy, ugly, beautiful cycle that is life. And the first thing I learned is that perfection is overrated. For years, I tried so hard to date the perfect boy, have a perfect reputation, be a perfect girl, and ultimately, all of those ventures went down in flames.

Being real, on the other hand, has brought me nothing but success. Breaking down in psych that day got me into the help that I needed. Telling my friends about who I am has made us closer than we've ever been. And telling my audiences about my imperfect past has gotten people talking about subjects that I'm really passionate about. Perfection is not only unattainable, but it's unrelatable. No one is perfect. Thus, no one can relate to a perfect person. But everyone has flaws. And in my experience, people don't care if you're a little rough around the edges.

Maybe I'm naive, but I truly believe that if you're kind, caring, and honest with people, you can make friends with anyone. And anyone who still expects you to be perfect on top of all of that isn't worth your time anyway. The next thing I learned is that vulnerability is crucial to finding yourself. Andrew Solomon, an award-winning writer and lecturer, writes in one of his testimonies that by choosing to avoid situations that make us vulnerable, we forgo meaning in our lives. But life doesn't have time for that.

Life is going to be unpredictable and force you into situations where you're uncomfortable. But instead of running from those situations, we should do what University of Houston researcher Brené Brown says to do and lean into the discomfort of life. It took me years to tell someone that I was not okay. But if I hadn't, I would probably still be crying in my room. We need more bravery. So embrace the situations that make you squirm. Give them hell. You don't gain muscle by staying out of the weight room.

And you won't gain personal strength if you only choose to look at the pretty parts of life. So psychoanalyze yourself, confront the emotions and the people you need to confront, and you will find the you you're supposed to be. The last thing I learned is probably the most obvious thing, but I'm going to be vulnerable and imperfect and maybe even look a little stupid and tell you anyway. And the thing is that you have to talk to get what you need. We were all given these things called mouths and hands and these gifts called speech and signing.

And as somebody who went silent for years, I'm telling you, use them. Let people in. No matter how stupid you think you sound, someone will take you seriously. Someone wants to help you. So talk about the things that matter to you, whether it's in front of hundreds of people or even just with one person. Leave nothing unsaid because it's always the things that you don't say that haunt you the most. But if you're honest with people, the ones who truly love you will listen.

Life isn't always as easy as small talk. It took me 18 years and eight months of therapy to realize that I have a voice. But now that I've found it, that voice has led me to do things I never knew I could do, like giving a TED talk about talking. My voice has helped me see that there is so much power in speaking up and that there's a lot more to life than seeking to be the best at everything. We have a voice. Let's use it because some things are hard to say, and life is unpredictable, weird, uncomfortable, totally aggravating, and yet incomprehensibly beautiful in so many ways.

And we should talk about it. Thank you.

At a Glance

Life is not perfect. This is something everyone knows. But for some, accepting the asymmetry of life can be a struggle in itself. In this talk, UWM freshman Amanda Springob shares her coming of age story, detailing the highs and lows of her teenage life in her relationships with men, depression, and small-town fame. Along the way, she examines the importance of speaking up, not just in the public eye, but in our private lives as well.

TEDx Talks

TEDx Talks is a global platform that enables independent organizers to host TED-style events in their communities, featuring local speakers and ideas worth spreading. Launched in 2009, TEDxTalks has grown into a diverse network of events spanning various topics and locations worldwide. These talks aim to spark conversation, inspire action, and foster connections within local communities while adhering to the principles of TED's mission.