I’m coming to the end of my second day on my Business Entrepreneurship course and today we have been looking at what we find inspiring and where we look for inspiration. Our speaker for the morning session suggested we explore some TED talks, which, I admit, I have watched quite a few of. For anyone who hasn’t heard of them you can find out more about the TED mission here.
We started by looking at How do schools kill creativity? – by Ken Robinson. An interesting and potentially divisive talk (depending on your stance on the British education system), that suggests that the arts, which are traditionally seen as ‘bottom of the pile’ in academic circles are in fact important in providing a creative outlet for children. Regardless of whether you agree with his talk, the actual delivery of the talk was – in my opinion – excellent. Sir Ken spoke slowly and clearly – a simple, yet very effective way to make sure that every member of the audience is listening, and most importantly following what you’re saying. He also used humour to endear himself to listening audience, although it was often self-deprecating, it was good-natured. I did find that occasionally it broke up a serious point, which meant that the focus was moved to the humorous. Perhaps he needed a bit less humour, or simply to be more discriminating with where the humour was placed in his talk. What do you think?
This evening I have watched a short talk (4 mins) on The Danger Of Silence and another about bullying – To This Day by Shane Koyczan. As slam poets, the purpose of these poems is to draw attention to a particular idea quickly and in such a way that resonates with the audience. I was able to relate to the both talks, with The Danger of Silence making me think more about the people who don’t speak on our course and see if I could bring them into the conversation. It seems to me that often the people who don’t speak are the one’s that need to be heard, because what they have to say may be profound. It might just solve your problem, change your perspective or start a movement.
To This Day resonates with me because it could be anyone and everyone. Every child who has ever been bullied or ostracised at school and everyone who has ever felt attacked for being different – a strange thought in a world where everyone is different. As Shane says in the poem ‘if you can’t see anything beautiful about yourself, get a better mirror’. The perfect sentiment – everyone is beautiful!
Inspiration is often personal – my family inspire me in many different ways. My brother, for example, inspires me because he never says yes, no matter how crazy my ideas are. He’s a ‘Go for it!’ type of person. My parents inspire me because they’re always around if I need a chat, or just an experienced head. My other half inspires me by asking questions that make me think about the world from a different perspective. Of course external influences can also provide inspiration – Elon Musk being my current inspirational entrepreneur. He has also spoken at a TED event about Tesla and SpaceX, his electric car and space rocket ventures. His viewpoint is interesting, aggressive, yet progressive, with a very strong self-belief. He also has this habit of tearing up the rulebook – open-source patents and open-source ideas are the two things that come to mind. To quote Steve Jobs, ‘the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.’ Elon fits this description, wouldn’t it be great to have more people like that.