My journey of growing up

Course Code and Name: MSJ11346 Speech Writing and Public Speaking

"To love is to suffer", an infamous saying by some famous or infamous person in some semi-famous movie, probably. And being a hopeless romantic, that's all I always believed in. I was always in love with the idea of love itself. Now, before I dig into my sad life, hello everyone, I am Sabiha Syed Archi and I welcome you to my first Ted talk.

I have always kind of dreamt of this day. Talking about my incredibly basic sad life in front of a huge audience who will probably forget, or will want to, the moment they are out of the auditorium. Jokes apart, I hope you all will take something from this.

You know the problem with emotional people like me is that we tend to think way more than that it is necessary. Unfortunately, we even tend to feel things in an unnecessary amount as well. And then if there were some add-ons in my beautiful life, it was my family, who were born very practical. I always used to crave affection. I wanted my parents to be like all the parents I used to notice when I would sit in the field to wait for my driver to pick me up from school. And with time, I grew up to believe that I must give love to every special person in my life because I craved for it. But what I missed, is that to love someone you must be loved as well. So most of the time, when I used to date someone or call someone my friend, I would tend to ignore all the red flags. I would stay in a toxic relationship or friendship, because hey, at the end of the day love changes everything right? But no, things don't happen that way. Be it love, friendship, or basic respect, it shall and should always be mutual. You cannot really, in fact, you should not suffer just because you need love to be alive. And I do not say this just for the romantic relationships that exist, this is for every other relationship that we were asked to value, or we want to value. And when it comes to value, it should never be one-sided. Now I don't know if it has anything to do with the fact that our society introduced us to the word "adjust" or the movies that have constantly romanticized "one-sided love", we tend to somehow have always justified toxic behavior. But know that, what toxic is toxic. If your better half does not give you respect, then he/she is toxic. And no matter how hard it is for us to digest the fact, your parents too can be toxic. And no matter what the people say, what the society says, or whoever says whatever, always believe in your instinct. Always believe that what makes you uncomfortable, is not right. And the more you push, the more you are comforting yourself with a wrong sense of belief, you are only hurting yourself. Now I know the fact we have this inbuilt belief in us in things like it is our duty to save a marriage or you know, parents always want the best for us. And sometimes no matter how much we understand that whatever is happening is not right, it becomes hard to come out of it. We tend to doubt ourselves that maybe we are doing something wrong, maybe it's us who created all the problems. Maybe we are demanding way too much. In such cases, always remember to prioritize yourself first. Because even if you are asking for too much, well, you are asking for too much. There's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing in asking for attention or affection. There's nothing wrong in being super clingy. There's nothing wrong with asking for space. Every person has their demands. We want something from our life. We all want to be happy at the end of the day. Yes, some people do become a huge part of our lives but sometimes they just don't understand you and do not make your life worth living, you do not really need them. And you do not need to adjust. We adjust for the people who love us. Not for the people who think they own us because we love them. Love is never to suffer. It should feel like breathing in the fresh air. Affection should heal you, not kill you. So yes, next time you think of adjusting with the person, just remember one thing. Is that person really worth your time and sacrifice? Is this how you want to live for the rest of your life? And whatever your instinct will say, is what you should do!

And with that, I thank you all for listening to me. I bid adieu to everyone, love right, and stay well. Thank you!

Video Link: https://youtu.be/Tr3o-oEmN1U

Learnings and outcomes (Self-reflection): I always had an anxiety speaking in front of public or camera. Due to pandemic, we haven’t had the pleasure to speak in front of public but this course surely lessens my anxiety of speaking in front of camera.