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announcement

Marisa A. Zapata: Rethinking homelessness

December 7, 2019 By Carlee Wright

Marisa A. Zap­a­ta is a researcher, edu­ca­tor and plan­ner. She is the Direc­tor of Home­less­ness Research & Action Col­lab­o­ra­tive and Asso­ciate Pro­fes­sor of Land-use Plan­ning at Port­land State Uni­ver­si­ty. She holds a doc­tor­ate in Region­al Plan­ning, a mas­ter’s in Urban Plan­ning and a bachelor’s in Anthro­pol­o­gy. When not work­ing, you may find her play­ing flute, read­ing a book, tak­ing a long walk or play­ing a board game. In Jan­u­ary, Dr. Zap­a­ta will take to the TEDxSalem stage to address how we can solve home­less­ness by rethink­ing who has a right to hous­ing.

What was your first TED expe­ri­ence? My first TED expe­ri­ence was prob­a­bly “ille­gal” because it was a TED “style” talk but not offi­cial­ly through TED. One of my friends from col­lege was doing a talk about health care issues that she was study­ing as a med­ical doc­tor. It was won­der­ful to see her, a per­son I had known for awhile, being on a stage and shar­ing her knowl­edge. I learned a lot from the talk!

Do you have a favorite TED Talk? How has it impact­ed your life or per­spec­tive? My cur­rent fave is by Gab­by Rivera who talked about cre­at­ing the first queer Lati­na super­hero. I didn’t grow up read­ing graph­ic nov­els, though my dad talked about his favorite super­hero — Spi­der­man. Like many things I have only real­ized as an adult, my lack of inter­est in a par­tic­u­lar thing was part­ly dri­ven by not see­ing peo­ple like me. I know a lot of peo­ple say rep­re­sen­ta­tion mat­ters, but it real­ly goes fur­ther than an image or a lan­guage. It’s also about ideas and con­ver­sa­tion styles and char­ac­ters who are like your fam­i­ly mem­bers. For me, super­heroes are about imag­ing dif­fer­ent types of futures. A super­verse with white men and hyper­sex­u­al­ized white women could nev­er be a future for me. But a Lati­na? That’s a super I can believe in. I also loved Gabby’s deliv­ery. Like Gab­by, I grew up learn­ing to tell sto­ries and for me, humor was a big part of that. See­ing her laugh on stage is a great reminder that humor can be such an impor­tant part of talks on seri­ous top­ics.

What does this year’s theme “Vision” mean to you? I love this year’s theme. Vision can mean so many dif­fer­ent things, but I think all of those things involved how we share our thoughts, ideas, fears, and hopes. Whether through lit­er­al shared sight or through lan­guage, we cul­ti­vate how we live in com­mu­ni­ty with one anoth­er. For my work, I think about how to envi­sion just futures, and cre­ate path­ways to move us in those direc­tions while prepar­ing for uncer­tain­ty. A lot of this work is about fore­sight — try­ing to think about how our futures might play out based on our presents. I think this is espe­cial­ly impor­tant when think­ing about home­less­ness. We have what can feel like an over­whelm­ing set of tasks in front of us, and list of pos­si­ble options. Envi­sion­ing futures allows us to struc­ture the work and the options.

Tell us some­thing about your­self we could nev­er tell from look­ing at you. My health pre­vents me from work­ing out as hard or often as I want. I’d love to be doing one hour of spin­ning or jog­ging or bik­ing to work, but my phys­i­cal health doesn’t match that. I’ve come to appre­ci­ate a long walk, but also, I just want to go jump on a tram­po­line for an hour!

What is the scari­est thing you have ever done for fun? I rap­pelled down a 28-sto­ry build­ing for a Big Brother/Big Sis­ter fundrais­er with my Lit­tle Sis from the pro­gram. It was for “fun.” It wasn’t real­ly all that fun.

Favorite books? And why. 

Bless Me, Ulti­ma by Rudol­fo Anaya. The sto­ry of a young boy caught between two cul­tures as a young Lati­no liv­ing in the South­west res­onat­ed with me as a cul­tur­al­ly mixed Mex­i­can Amer­i­can from Texas. This book was the first time I read some­thing where mag­i­cal real­ism was inte­grat­ed into the sto­ry, and one of the first times I had seen my cul­ture described in a fic­tion­al sto­ry.

Invis­i­ble Cities by Ita­lo Calvi­no. It’s hard to explain too much about the book with­out giv­ing it away! Maybe I can leave it with — it’s my world view. We all may come from sim­i­lar places and see and expe­ri­ence our com­mu­ni­ties in rad­i­cal­ly dif­fer­ent ways.

Go-to karaoke song? Fan­cy by Reba McEn­tire

Chunky or smooth peanut but­ter? Chunky. All the way.

A ran­dom fact: A fire ant bite could kill me! 


TEDxSalem VII

TEDxSalem VII is an all-day event fea­tur­ing talks, per­for­mances, refresh­ments, lunch and swag. It takes place from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Sat­ur­day, Jan. 4, 2020, at the Salem Con­ven­tion Cen­ter. Click here for tick­ets.  Fol­low us on Face­book for the most up-to-date news from our com­mu­ni­ty, and check our web­site reg­u­lar­ly for new infor­ma­tion. You can also reach us at info@tedxsalem.com

Filed Under: 2020 TEDxSalem, announcement, Speakers, TEDxSalem VII Tagged With: 2020 TEDxSalem, announcement, homelessness, ideas worth spreading, Portland State University, Salem Convention Center, Speaker Announcement, TEDx, TEDxSalem, TEDxSalem VII, tickets, vision

Student scientist Mihir Joshi has a solution to save the ocean

December 2, 2019 By Carlee Wright

The youngest speak­er to take to the TEDxSalem stage this com­ing year is Mihir Joshi, a 13-year-old stu­dent at South Salem High School. Mihir, who enjoys play­ing video games, prob­lem-solv­ing and run­ning cross-coun­try, at one time, was able to solve a Rubiks Cube in under 45 sec­onds. Always look­ing for solu­tions, this curi­ous teen will take to the TEDxSalem stage to share how he learned to pre­dict the change of Marine Pro­tect­ed Areas and what you can do to help save the ocean.

What was your first TED expe­ri­ence? I par­tic­i­pat­ed and spoke at the first-ever TEDxYouth@Salem event in Novem­ber 2017. (Check out Mihir’s talk here)

Do you have a favorite TED Talk? How has it impact­ed your life or per­spec­tive? “This is What Hap­pens When you Reply to Spam Emails” by James Veitch. I love this TEDxTalk because of its amaz­ing use of humor.

What does this year’s theme “Vision” mean to you? To me, Vision means to visu­al­ize some­thing that doesn’t exist today and strive to make it a real­i­ty because of your pas­sion and hard work.

What do you feel most grate­ful for in your life? Being able to grow up in a pos­i­tive and sup­port­ive house­hold with amaz­ing par­ents and a great sis­ter.

Tell us some­thing about your­self we could nev­er tell from look­ing at you. I won home­com­ing court this year in my high school.     

What song best describes your life? “Haven’t Met You Yet” By Michael Bublé. I chose this song because I’m always look­ing for the next thing out there and I believe the best is yet to come.

Top 3 movies of the moment?

  1.     3 Idiots (Bol­ly­wood movie)
  2.     Guardians of the Galaxy 1
  3.     Ter­mi­na­tor 1

Top 3 songs or artists?

  1.     AJR
  2.     Jon Bel­lion
  3.     Khalid

Where would you go in a time machine? I would go back in time to watch Neil Arm­strong take his first step on the moon.          

Chunky or smooth peanut but­ter? How could any­one ever like chunky peanut but­ter! Smooth is the only option.  

Favorite col­or? Red


TEDxSalem VII

TEDxSalem VII is an all-day event fea­tur­ing talks, per­for­mances, refresh­ments, lunch and swag. It takes place from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Sat­ur­day, Jan. 4, 2020, at the Salem Con­ven­tion Cen­ter. Click here for tick­ets.  Fol­low us on Face­book for the most up-to-date news from our com­mu­ni­ty, and check our web­site reg­u­lar­ly for new infor­ma­tion. You can also reach us at info@tedxsalem.com

Filed Under: 2020 TEDxSalem, announcement, Speakers, TEDxSalem VII Tagged With: 2020, 2020 TEDxSalem, announcement, Salem Convention Center, Speaker Announcement, student, TEDxSalem VII, tickets, vision, Youth

Michelle LaFontaine brings Bollywood dance to TEDxSalem VII

November 30, 2019 By Sarah Kelber

When Michelle LaFontaine and her troupe Sun­dari Bol­ly­wood take to the TEDxSalem stage in Jan­u­ary, expect an inter­ac­tive expe­ri­ence.

“Plan to move to the music,” said LaFontaine of the East Indi­an-inspired dance per­for­mance. “The music is so upbeat and fun, one can’t help them­selves!”

LaFontaine made the move from bel­ly-danc­ing to Bol­ly­wood dance after hear­ing about an open audi­tion when she lived in Seat­tle in 2011. She had a sched­ul­ing con­flict, but the direc­tor invit­ed her to try out a class the next week.

“I showed up, jumped in head first as I tend to do,” LaFontaine said. “She was impressed with my abil­i­ty to pick up chore­og­ra­phy quick­ly and asked that I be a part of her team. So I start­ed learn­ing.”

Learn­ing soon turned to per­form­ing, which in 2014 turned to teach­ing.

“Dance is an incred­i­ble way to express one­self through move­ment and gain both body aware­ness and con­fi­dence,” she said. “It’s also an incred­i­ble form of exer­cise and helps main­tain youth in the body and brain.”

She now teach­es week­ly class­es in Salem and hosts month­ly shows for those who decide they’d like to per­form.

“I want to encour­age every­one to explore some form of dance, in par­tic­u­lar, women,” she said. “I believe the boost­ing of our­selves is of utmost impor­tance!”

LaFontaine is excit­ed to bring the joy and expres­sion of Bol­ly­wood to even more of Salem through TEDx. The city has been home “for about 12 years, minus the four years I was in Seat­tle.”

“I enjoy the com­mu­ni­ty, espe­cial­ly the diver­si­ty of our com­mu­ni­ty,” she said. “I love work­ing in Salem as a small busi­ness own­er and strive to sup­port my local busi­ness­es.”

She’s also involved in the Indi­an com­mu­ni­ty via the board for INDUS, a non­prof­it whose vision is “to pro­mote and strength­en friend­ship and under­stand­ing of cul­tures between the peo­ples of Indi­an Sub-con­ti­nent and Unit­ed States.”

“I get the plea­sure of help­ing pre­pare the events we hold and per­form for the com­mu­ni­ty of peo­ple I tru­ly adore,” she said.

So when you see Sun­dari, be ready to move.

“My favorite part about per­form­ing is see­ing the smiles on my audience’s faces and con­nect­ing with them,” LaFontaine said. “They often can’t help but tap their foot to the music and clap their hands, and their involve­ment makes per­form­ing even more fun for me and my group!”


TEDxSalem VII

TEDxSalem VII is an all-day event fea­tur­ing talks, per­for­mances, refresh­ments, lunch and swag. It takes place from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Sat­ur­day, Jan. 4, 2020, at the Salem Con­ven­tion Cen­ter. Click here for tick­ets.  Fol­low us on Face­book for the most up-to-date news from our com­mu­ni­ty, and check our web­site reg­u­lar­ly for new infor­ma­tion. You can also reach us at info@tedxsalem.com

Filed Under: 2020 TEDxSalem, announcement, Entertainment, TEDxSalem VII Tagged With: announcement, entertainment, performance, Salem, Salem Convention Center, TEDxSalem, TEDxSalem VII, TEDxSalemWomen, vision

Theresa McCormick: Tomorrow’s fuel may be under your kitchen sink

November 27, 2019 By Carlee Wright

Sci­en­tist There­sa McCormick has a few ideas about alter­na­tive fuels, includ­ing one that you may find in your house already. 

There­sa is an Assis­tant Pro­fes­sor of Chem­istry at Port­land State Uni­ver­si­ty who holds a BSc Chem­istry from Queen’s Uni­ver­si­ty (2004), a PhD Chem­istry from Queen’s Uni­ver­si­ty (2008), with Post­doc from Uni­ver­si­ty of Rochester (2009–2010) and Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to (2011–2013). Orig­i­nal­ly from Cana­da, her favorite hob­by is curl­ing (more on that below), and now lives in Port­land with her hus­band, Omar El Akkad, and their daugh­ter. She once per­formed in an immer­sive rein­ter­pre­ta­tion of Julius Cesar that took over the entire chem­istry build­ing at her uni­ver­si­ty. Curi­ous? Us too…read on and learn more about Dr. McCormick then join us in Jan­u­ary for her idea worth spread­ing.

What was your first TED expe­ri­ence? My broth­er intro­duced me to TED, I don’t remem­ber what video he sent to me first, but he was devour­ing TED talks and send­ing me sev­er­al a day that he loved. 

Do you have a favorite TED Talk? How has it impact­ed your life or per­spec­tive? Isabel Allende, her talk is so empow­er­ing, every once and a while I need to hear amaz­ing women talk about their lives. After watch­ing her talk, I start­ed read­ing her books, which are great, and where I learned why the Gold­en Gate Bridge is called the Gold­en Gate Bridge. 

What does this year’s theme “Vision” mean to you? To me, vision means see­ing things for both what they are and what they could be. When I think about see­ing things for what they are I think about see­ing the whole pic­ture, what the prob­lem is, and how to solve the prob­lem, and what new prob­lems that solu­tion will make. And when I think about what things could be I imag­ine how the world could be with the ide­al solu­tion to prob­lems. 

How has your life been dif­fer­ent than what you’d imag­ined? My life is dif­fer­ent from what I imag­ined in almost every way. I was raised on a farm out­side a very small town in rur­al Ontario. Most women I knew grew-up to become farmer’s wives. I knew I didn’t want to do that. I loved math and sci­ence, so I thought I would become a med­ical doc­tor, and work in my home town, and my farmer hus­band would look after the farm. When I went away to uni­ver­si­ty I found out that if you liked math and sci­ence you could become a sci­en­tist (I pre­vi­ous­ly thought all sci­en­tists were dead white men). That start­ed me down the path to become a chemist, and as is com­mon in aca­d­e­mics when I final­ly found a job as a pro­fes­sor I was very far from the farm I grew up-on. I nev­er thought I would leave Cana­da and move to Ore­gon (I didn’t real­ly know where it was until I inter­viewed at PSU). I nev­er thought I would be a chemist, teach­ing and research­ing, mak­ing dis­cov­er­ies and try­ing to solve the big world prob­lems.

Tell us some­thing about your­self we could nev­er tell from look­ing at you. Most peo­ple are pret­ty sur­prised to find out I was the cap­tain of the wrestling team in high school. I joined the team the year after they first allowed women to wres­tle. I had an amaz­ing coach who sup­port­ed the women as much as the men on the team. It was a great expe­ri­ence for me. Trav­el­ing for tour­na­ments was the first time I was on a plane. I learned a lot about how to lead a team that has been invalu­able in lead­ing a research group. I learned how to throw some­one, not quite as use­ful most of the time, but good to remem­ber. 

What is some­thing unex­pect­ed that has changed about you in the last few years? My daugh­ter came into my life two and a half years ago, which changed every­thing. Before her, my work was one of the most impor­tant things in my life, but now my fam­i­ly takes top-notch. Dahlia brings a new per­spec­tive, focus and joy to life to life.  

Do you have any com­mu­ni­ty activ­i­ties? I love curl­ing. I am a mem­ber of the Ever­green Curl­ing Club in Beaver­ton and have curled on the same team since I came to Ore­gon six years ago. I play lead, which means I throw the first two stones for my team. It’s a great com­mu­ni­ty and a fun sport.

If you could live in the set­ting of any book or movie, with­out nec­es­sar­i­ly being involved in the sto­ry, which would you choose? Anna Karen­i­na – I fell in love with 19th cen­tu­ry Rus­sia. I loved the farm­ing scenes, I want to go to the operas and par­ties. I read it because I felt like I need­ed to read it to be a well-round­ed adult, but I loved it. If you haven’t read it go read it. 

What is the scari­est thing you have ever done for fun? I went sky div­ing once. It was a late night in the lab and the whole group decid­ed it would be fun to go sky­div­ing. We all agreed to go togeth­er, but then every­one else backed out so I con­vinced my soon-to-be hus­band to go with me. I loved it and would do it again.

Would you rather have a rewind but­ton or a pause but­ton on your life? Pause, as long as it lets every­one else stop and I can still do things and don’t age while things are paused. 

Favorite book(s)? And why.
Amer­i­can War: it’s very good and every­one should have at least a dozen copies.

Time Trav­el­ers Wife: I love any­thing with time trav­el, so it was already off to a good start, but the char­ac­ters are great. Most great books I can’t put down, but this one I refused to pick up when I only had one chap­ter left because I didn’t want it to end.

Oryx and Crake, Mad­dAd­dam, and Year of the Flood: it is an immense­ly immer­sive imag­i­na­tion of a world where peo­ple didn’t take care of the earth.  

Make one change in the world? I would get rid of all car­bon emis­sions and have only sus­tain­able ener­gy. And while I’m at it, just cool the world down a bit. 

Chunky or smooth peanut but­ter? Smooth

Great­est fear? Bears and bees 


TEDxSalem VII

TEDxSalem VII is an all-day event fea­tur­ing talks, per­for­mances, refresh­ments, lunch and swag. It takes place from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Sat­ur­day, Jan. 4, 2020, at the Salem Con­ven­tion Cen­ter. Click here for tick­ets.  Fol­low us on Face­book for the most up-to-date news from our com­mu­ni­ty, and check our web­site reg­u­lar­ly for new infor­ma­tion. You can also reach us at info@tedxsalem.com

Filed Under: 2020 TEDxSalem, announcement, Speakers, TEDxSalem VII Tagged With: 2020 TEDxSalem, announcement, chemistry, january, Portland State University, Salem Convention Center, Science, Speaker Announcement, TEDxSalem, TEDxSalem VII, vision

TEDxSalem VII speaker Bassam Tarazi — Living Intentionally

November 17, 2019 By Carlee Wright

Bas­sam Tarazi is a Change Man­age­ment Consultant…but he wasn’t always. He has a back­ground in mechan­i­cal engi­neer­ing and start­ed his career as a nuclear engi­neer work­ing on nuclear sub­marines in Pearl Har­bor, Hawaii. Born and raised in Con­necti­cut, the 39-year-old now lives in Port­land with his wife, Saman­tha, and dog, Oliv­er. His hob­bies include writ­ing, read­ing, hiking/trekking, swim­ming, bik­ing, and watch­ing his beloved Arse­nal foot­ball club dis­ap­point him. He once con­vinced Fidel Cas­tro to sign his US pass­port with a Sharpie, but that’s not the only risky thing he’s done. Bas­sam has a dynam­ic list of chal­lenges he’s faced, which he will share more about at TEDxSalem VII.

What was your first TED expe­ri­ence? Simon Sinek’s talk was my first stum­ble into a TED Talk (at least from what I can remem­ber)

Do you have a favorite TED Talk? How has it impact­ed your life or per­spec­tive? I’d say it’s that same talk. “Peo­ple don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it.” Simon was one of the first peo­ple to real­ly dri­ve home that idea. Ever since, I’ve always tried to tack­le my “why” in life and to be sure I bring it across in all that I do.

What does this year’s theme “Vision” mean to you? It’s not about what we want to do in the world, but who we want to be. I think we spend too much time think­ing about what we are going to do in life and we for­get to lay the foun­da­tion of who we are going to become. What do peo­ple say about us when we leave the room? When I think of vision, I think about what would go in my eulo­gy, not on my resume.

What do you feel most grate­ful for in your life? That I grew up in the rel­a­tive time of plen­ty. In the his­to­ry of humankind, it is only for the slight­est sliv­er of it that we have the free­doms and time to explore our imag­i­na­tions and this world in the way that we can today. What an incred­i­ble gift that is.

What are some of the most impor­tant lessons you’ve learned in life? How did you learn them? 

You nev­er know when a smile might save some­one’s life. — My mom used to say that to us when we were kids.

“Make every deci­sion the right deci­sion.” When you are left with an either-or choice, just pick one and nev­er look back. If the choice you made does­n’t work out, you can’t look back and say, “I knew it. I should have cho­sen the oth­er thing.” You don’t know that. You could have been dead if you chose the oth­er thing. Learn what you learned in what you chose, dust your­self off and move for­ward. My father taught me that.

Writ­ing isn’t a man­i­fes­ta­tion of what I’ve dis­cov­ered, it’s a dis­cov­ery of what I’ll man­i­fest. Learned this one on my own, try­ing to write. I used to hold ideas in my head think­ing that once I fig­ure them out then I’ll write them down. But it does­n’t work that way. The best part of writ­ing is sit­ting down to write and then writ­ing some­thing you did­n’t even know was in your end. 

In five years you’ll be wrong. I think we some­times get too caught up in our visions for the future that we for­get to see what’s in front of us every day. When peo­ple ask me where do I want to be in five years, I always answer, “Liv­ing inten­tion­al­ly,” because when I go back five years and look for­ward, I’m nev­er where I thought I’d be. We design our ship and load our pro­vi­sions for what we think we will encounter over the hori­zon, but what we inevitably do encounter is nev­er what we expect­ed. So we cer­tain­ly have to choose and pad­dle in a car­di­nal direc­tion in life, but we should always be ready to adapt to what comes from beyond the hori­zon. This has taught me to not put too much weight on any deci­sion. Life will always throw a curve­ball, so it’s bet­ter to act while you can and adapt lat­er.

Tell us some­thing about your­self we could nev­er tell from look­ing at you. I have a stut­ter that I work around every day. One of the hard­est things for me to do is just say my first name when going around the room intro­duc­ing our­selves.

If you could live in the set­ting of any book or movie, with­out nec­es­sar­i­ly being involved in the sto­ry, which would you choose? Incep­tion; Imag­ine there was a world where you could enter peo­ple’s dreams?! That would be crazy.

If you could instant­ly become an expert in some­thing, what would it be? Rock­et sci­ence

Go-to karaoke song? The Killers “Mr. Bright­side” 

Where would you go in a time machine? Inside the com­mand mod­ule of Apol­lo 11 on top of the Sat­urn 5, ten sec­onds before liftoff. It was the great­est adven­ture of all time. Would have loved to be a part of it.


TEDxSalem VII

TEDxSalem VII is an all-day event fea­tur­ing talks, per­for­mances, refresh­ments, lunch and swag. It takes place from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Sat­ur­day, Jan. 4, 2020, at the Salem Con­ven­tion Cen­ter. Click here for tick­ets.  Fol­low us on Face­book for the most up-to-date news from our com­mu­ni­ty, and check our web­site reg­u­lar­ly for new infor­ma­tion. You can also reach us at info@tedxsalem.com

Filed Under: 2020 TEDxSalem, announcement, TEDxSalem VII Tagged With: 2020, announcement, Speaker Announcement, TEDxSalem 2020, TEDxSalem VII, tickets, vision

TEDxSalem poet explores identity, female empowerment through words

November 12, 2019 By Sarah Evans

Poet. Col­lege stu­dent. Black woman. Hait­ian immi­grant. Adoptee.

These are just a few of Jolie Brownell’s many iden­ti­ties.

When the 20-year-old takes the stage at TEDxSalem, the audi­ence will hear her grap­ple with these iden­ti­ties through her poet­ry.

“I want to express through poet­ry my walks of life, the inter­sec­tions of my dif­fer­ent iden­ti­ties, and what that means to me and to soci­ety,” Brownell says.

Brownell, who grad­u­at­ed from Sun­set High School in Beaver­ton, is a sopho­more at Loy­ola Mary­mount Uni­ver­si­ty in Los Ange­les. She’s major­ing in women and gen­der stud­ies.

Her choice of major wouldn’t sur­prise any­one who knew her in high school.

By age 19, Brownell had already won awards for her blog, “Me Too Girl,” and she had self-pub­lished a book with the same title. The book is a col­lec­tion of mes­sages and poems on girl empow­er­ment.

She has giv­en speech­es on this top­ic to hun­dreds of women and girls in the Port­land area, and led work­shops in part­ner­ship with Girls Inc., I Am That Girl, Pro­duced By Her, and Chick­Tech.

Brownell is orig­i­nal­ly from Haiti, but a Port­land fam­i­ly adopt­ed her when she was 3.

She first became ded­i­cat­ed to female empow­er­ment issues when she was just 13.

“Like many young girls around that age, I was con­sumed with self-hatred, self-doubt, lack of con­fi­dence,” she says. “Dur­ing the sum­mer between mid­dle school and high school, I decid­ed to shift gears because I real­ized that I’m going to have this body, I’m going to be this per­son for the rest of my life. Do I want to spend the rest of my life hat­ing this per­son, or do I want to spend it try­ing to teach myself how to love myself?”

Her essays and jour­nal entries about self-dis­cov­ery even­tu­al­ly led to her blog and her book.

“I’ve always loved the pow­er behind words, and I want­ed to use my words to uplift and inspire oth­ers,” Brownell says.

Brownell hopes that TEDxSalem audi­ence mem­bers will expe­ri­ence that inspi­ra­tion dur­ing her per­for­mance. But, ulti­mate­ly, the work to improve self-con­fi­dence is an indi­vid­ual pur­suit, she says.

“I’m try­ing to encour­age and uplift women. But I can only do so much and then you must car­ry it; you must do the work, the final step of lov­ing your­self,” she says. “I encour­age the audi­ence to find the deep­er mean­ings in my work and what that means for them.”

For more infor­ma­tion about Jolie Brownell, check out her web­site at www.joliebrownell.com


TEDxSalem VII

TEDxSalem VII is an all-day event fea­tur­ing talks, per­for­mances, refresh­ments, lunch and swag. It takes place from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Sat­ur­day, Jan. 4, 2020, at the Salem Con­ven­tion Cen­ter. Click here for tick­ets.  Fol­low us on Face­book for the most up-to-date news from our com­mu­ni­ty, and check our web­site reg­u­lar­ly for new infor­ma­tion. You can also reach us at info@tedxsalem.com

Filed Under: 2020 TEDxSalem, Entertainment, TEDxSalem VII Tagged With: 2020, announcement, entertainment, performance, poetry, Salem, Salem Convention Center, TEDxSalem

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