Last December, I delivered a talk for TED. In fact it was the first ever TEDWomen and was a great event. I met  many amazing, dedicated men and women whose work is to help women around the globe. The editors at TED just released the video of my talk.

Writing the talk took over a month. It began as long  speech, and I spent weeks pairing it down to the six minutes I was allotted.  I also worked with a very talented coach, Trisha Bauman, who helped be understand many new (to me) key elements for successful public speaking and performance.  While I have given numerous talks over the years, this was the first one that I felt I should memorize. In fact,  memorization really frees you up, and allows you to connect with the audience and with what you are saying much more naturally.

The audience at the conference was wonderful. In fact you can hear me laughing with them because I was so taken aback by their loud spontaneous laughter. It was great. Many of the other  talks were (rightfully) serious, and I sense that the audience was looking for relief, which I provided. While many of the other speakers were serious with touches of humor, I was humorous with an underlying note of serious.  My favorite way to be.