Sarah Kay TED Talk Moves and Inspires

Sarah Kay is a wonderful spoken word poet. In this TED talk, she recites two of her poems and talks about her journey to get where she's at now. Beautiful speech by a lovely spirit. I wish I could give a better summary of this video, but the video description on TED explains it best:

"If I should have a daughter, instead of Mom, she's gonna call me Point B ... " began spoken word poet Sarah Kay, in a talk that inspired two standing ovations at TED2011. She tells the story of her metamorphosis -- from a wide-eyed teenager soaking in verse at New York's Bowery Poetry Club to a teacher connecting kids with the power of self-expression through Project V.O.I.C.E. -- and gives two breathtaking performances of "B" and "Hiroshima."

Do yourself a favor and watch this.

Recommended Watch of the Day

Morgan Spurlock: The Greatest TED Talk Ever Sold

While this TED talk pretty much promotes Spurlock's new film 'The Greatest Film Ever Sold', it is still definitely worth the watch. The film and parts of the TED talk show what really goes on in the world of brand marketing. He's a pretty funny guy, so if you have 20 minutes to spare I recommend you spend it watching this video.

One important point that Spurlock brings up is the importance of knowing your brand. If you don't really know your brand, it's going to be difficult to market it. That's one thing that I struggle with a lot. I need to work on identifying what my "brand" is and using it better in real life and online. (Right now it's probably a mix between crazy cat lady, Netflix enthusiast, and over eater.)

Neil Pasricha TED Talk

This is a TED talk by Neil Pasricha called 'The 3 A's of Awesome'. He created the blog 1,000 Awesome Things, and this is a great lecture on the importance of optimism and being authentic. It's so important to try to stay positive and to enjoy life while you can, and I think that he really makes a lot of good points in this talk. I'm just starting my "real" life, and I'm sure that I'm going to have a lot of ups and downs. I just really hope that I think back to what he says and keep moving forward with my head held high.