If the first two talks of TED 2009 that I have seen are anything to go by, this years conference was absolutely amazing. It certainly seems to be improving in the quality of filming and the AV support.
That aside, Elizabeth Gilbert's (author of 'Eat, Pray, Love') talk on a different way to think about genius is fantastic.
I don't believe in God. But I do believe in the very real emotion that she speaks of when we witness or experience 'divinity' as she calls it. Jonathan Haidt calls it 'elation'. This is often when viewing creative things, maybe the sound of Paul Potts singing in his first audition, maybe at the birth of a child, maybe when you are lying next to a girl looking in to her eyes and longing to kiss her for the first time... and then you do (perhaps that is a different emotion).
Maybe for you it is staring out on vast untouched beauty at the top of a mountain, or walking to work as the streetlights glisten on untouched snow.
Maybe it is sitting by a window as the sunlight filters through and lands on your face, while you sit with your eyes closed thinking of someone special.
Perhaps I am mixing all sorts of things that touch more on happiness and less on the moments of creative genius of which Gilbert speaks. I think there is an overlap though. I think if we focus on things we are passionate about. If you find our element. If we search for flow in the things we do every day...
We will 'sing ole'' more often.
To do that... you have to keep showing up. Keep showing up until you find that flow.
Exciting Times.
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