We Live in the Shadow of Our Perspective

TEDx Speaker’s Competition Talk by Rohan Chandratre

Welcome to this exciting evening Ladies and Gentleman. I am very pleased to have the stage today. I would like to start with three of my equations to life. Where I suggest, ‘Life’ is the unification of the product of ‘Happiness’ and ‘Purpose’ per ‘Time’ from ‘Birth’ to ‘Death’.

‘Happiness’ is ‘Materialistic Gains’ to the power of ‘Perspective’ divided by ‘Expectations’.

And ‘Perspective’ is the product of ‘Understanding’ and ‘Exposure’ divided by ‘Responsibility’.

Love isn’t in the equations to attain simplicity and requires a separate talk in itself.

3.8 Billion years ago on this very planet Earth, we started our journey of life. Research has shown that life could survive this long only because of it’s one damn ability, to adapt. It adapted to temperatures, winds, waters, air, from itself and to every change it faced. No matter what environment it lived in, it survived through all of it.

The reason I want to stress on this is that we, humans, forget that we can adapt to change. And it is this belief system which decides for us. Hence, I want to introduce ‘The Three Step Principle’ to act upon this beliefs system than to fall for it. We must:

1. Decide for our own change.

2. Create the change.

3. Adapt to it.

All we need to do is believe in ourselves and our abilities to adapt.

I would like to talk about Placebo. For those new to this term here’s a short introduction. There have been many studies in the history of medicine, where two groups were formed of patients suffering the similar disorder. One of which were given real medicine and others were given a fake medicine without their knowledge or also known as ‘placebo’. Both groups usually end up with an equal amount of improvements. This is called as Placebo effect.

But there was this one study which really caught my attention. Professor Kaptchuk from Harvard conducted a study, published in Science Translational Medicine in 2014, which dealt with migraine pain medication. One group took a migraine drug labelled with the drug’s name, another took a placebo labelled “placebo,” and a third group took nothing. The study was conducted a couple of times with a variety of people. The researchers discovered that the placebo was 50% as effective as the real drug to reduce pain after a migraine attack. The researchers speculated that the driving force beyond this reaction was the simple act of taking a pill. “People associate the ritual of taking medicine as a positive healing effect. Even if they know it’s not medicine, the action itself can stimulate the brain into thinking the body is being healed.

A similar meta-analysis experiment was done by Daniel Moerman, an anthropologist, where he gave 2 placebo tablets labelled placebo to subjects and similarly, 4 placebo tablets labelled ‘placebo’ to other subjects. He discovered that four pills are better than two pills. Also, it was found that expensive placebos work better than cheap ones, a capsule works better than a tablet, an injection works better than a capsule and finally a fake operation works even better. And a paper also shows that people are more likely to take advice when they are paid for it.

“The placebo effect is more than positive thinking — believing a treatment or procedure will work. It’s about creating a stronger connection between the brain and body and how they work together.” – Ted Kaptchuk.

Whatever we believe in culturally, we inherit it in a similar way. Therefore it really matters what we believe in as it directly affects the potential outcome of life. To sum up, we call it ‘The Perspective towards Life’. One very common example of this that I can recall is in 1961, President John F. Kennedy visited NASA and asked a Janitor about his work, where he replied saying “I am helping to put a man on the moon.”

That is a very beautiful way of looking at the situation and a perspective which is going to lead the janitor’s life with a positive attitude.

“Challenge for Entrepreneur is to say what’s the difference between, really believing in your ideas and sticking to them versus pursuing some unrealistic dream that doesn’t actually have merit.” – Elon Musk

The answer lies within the perspective of the Entrepreneur himself/herself. In 1903 we have our first controlled air flight by the Wright Brothers, in the next 66 years, we land on the moon. Imagine asking a person in 1901 to land on or just go near the moon, he would go crazy. And this world is built by crazy people. The innovation, ideas, art, science everything develops because of these crazy people who worked for it, who believed it’s possible.

Hence changing the perspective can change our complete path of life. This answers the “Why?”. The next obvious question would be “How?”. A study conducted by Robert Waldinger, which is going on since 80 years and 268 subjects (kids), suggests that relationship is the most important aspect of a happy life and prosperous future. People with strong relationships tend to have heart diseases half the times than those who are lonely. Curing loneliness is a very crucial aspect of getting a healthy mind.

Doing healthy activities keeps mind refreshed and inherits positive vibes from the environment. You can meditate, express yourself creatively. You can get a massage, do yoga or a tai chi, you can go out with your friends, do the work that you love, you can have sex, you can exercise, you can play with animals, you can laugh, you can figure out for your own self on which part you are lacking and where you can improve.

One last thing, I want everyone to imagine a Rose plant, full of thorns. Spring comes and rose blossoms. The flower grows in the strand. There are more thorns than flowers. But we don’t call it a thorn plant we call it a rose plant. So to gain beauty, the plant didn’t remove its thorns, it blossomed a flower. Now, this plant is you, thorns are your hundred problems and that one flower is your thoughts. If it blossoms right, everything else doesn’t matter.