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Ted Talk: The Voices in My Head
By: Eleanor Longden |
The voices inside my head reflection
Into
Eleanor's second semester of college she begins to hear a single voice in her
head narrating everything she is doing. As she begins to grow frightened the
voices multiply and become hostile. This Ted Talk is an extraordinary
story about how Eleanor turns a mental illness into a
survival and knowledgeable experience. In the beginning of her traumatic experience,
which was in the midst of her feelings of anxiety and low self-worth, Eleanor’s
psychiatrist told her, “Eleanor, you would be better off with cancer, because
cancer is easier to cure than schizophrenia.” Through the struggles and turmoil’s Eleanor
somehow interpreted the hostile voices as meaningful response to traumatic life
events. She also learned to interpret the voices into a metaphorical meaning
instead of a literal one. This sense of realization saved Eleanor out of the
depths of self-harm and fear. In the Ted Talk Eleanor says, “A broken and
haunted person began that journey, but the person who emerged was a survivor.” Eleanor
emerged into a completely different person, who was more outspoken and could
overcome her insecurities and illness. Through the whole journey she always had
people there to help through it. She never went into anything blindly and never
agreed to something just because it was the usual prescription given, she
always had the support and guidance of her parents and physiatrist. As a comparison
in the play “Twelve Angry Men”, by Reginald Rose, a set of jurors are to
determine if the boy in guilty or innocent of the murder of his father. In the
play each juror has his own set of personality traits and characteristics. One
particular character, Juror #2, portrays a very nervous, silent man who only
goes along with the majority of the votes. I believe Juror #2 resembles Eleanor
because by themselves they believe they have little self-worth and don’t feel
comfortable speaking out or sharing their opinion, but like Eleanor has her
parents and her physiatrist, Juror #2 has Juror #8. Juror #8, unlike Juror #2,
is man who doesn’t have a problem with expressing his opinion and throughout
the play and the more Juror #8 disagrees with the rest of the men, the more
Juror #2 starts to agree with him and have a voice in the play. Both Eleanor
and Juror #2 go through a process, both completely different, but enhance
themselves as a person in the end.
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