What Made You Who You Are?

Teasing for my forthcoming TEDx talk.

Bernie Swain heads a speakers bureau that represents some of the most prominent American personalities from politics, business, sports and media.

He conducted an informal survey among them in order to understand what is the determining factor that defines who they are today.

The results were as follows:

• 45% of the participants attribute their journey to a person, a mentor who guided them decisively.
• 40% cite an event (a failure, an injury, a death…) as the turning point of their lives.
• 15% consider environments — such as a place, a time, or an enveloping experience — as their major influence.

This Thursday (September 29^th), I will be giving a talk during the TEDx Celsa session “Switch To Optimism” that will be held at Google’s Parisian headquarters.

I will talk about the factor that defined who I am today and made me switch to optimism. It belongs to one of the categories mentioned above. But, obviously, I have to spare the suspense.

Meanwhile, you can also ask yourself what made you who you are today.

“Know thyself.“