10 most inspiring TED talks from 2016 to watch on EZChannel (videos)

In an age where more than 300 hours of videos are uploaded online every minute, we are inundated with video contents to watch online. Therefore it becomes a matter of selecting the good videos from the poor ones and curating an experience filled with contents that you enjoy

Therefore it is important that we provide our users a way to curate videos to maximise our users’ enjoyment. We have built the EZChannel app to organise all the best online videos in one place.

To get you started on watching better videos, here are the most inspiring TED Talks in 2016.

1. Tim Urban: Inside the mind of a master procrastinator

As the main blogger from Wait But Why, Tim has captivated millions of monthly unique visitors with his unique long-form, humourous writing and stick-figure sketches on any topic of the day that catches his attention.

In Tim’s TED talk, he began by sharing how a scheduled work plan never goes according to plan, especially if it’s done by a procrastinator like himself.

He used metaphors like Instant Gratification Monkey to explain what is going on inside the mind of a procrastinator and how a Panic Monster is effective in combating the endless distractions to get the project back on track.

Tim’s insights into how his own mind works would ultimately provide a solution to long-term procrastination and help people change for the better.

Tim’s solution to long-term procrastination.

2. Celeste Headlee: 10 ways to have a better conversation

Celeste is known for her daily news talk show, On Second Thought, on Georgia Public Broadcasting. With more than 17 years of experience in public radio, and interviewing guests, she has developed a unique perspective on how to make better conversations.

Celeste’s tips sound familiar like common sense, but often forgotten. It is by putting the spotlight on the speaker, and showing genuine interest in the conversation can you learn and be amazed by whom you converse with.

Celeste’s recommendations on better communication.

3. James Veitch: This is what happens when you reply to spam email

Most of us hate spam emails, especially the ones from scammers, and we all seem to have gotten used to them as niggling side effects of using emails.

Not James Veitch, a British writer and comedian, began replying to every spam email he received, with hilarious effect. His exchanges with the email spammers and scammers led to his first book, Dot Con.

The video below shares an example of his witty exchanges with one email that got through his spam filter.

James’s solution to email spams and a boring inbox.

4. Shonda Rhimes: My year of saying yes to everything

How to find work-life balance is a question on most working professionals’ lives. Whether to find more energy to work longer hours, or cutback on work to spend more time with the loved ones, it is an ongoing struggle in most people’s lives.

In Shonda’s TED talk, she shared how she loved her work, and the nirvana, she calls the hum, that she experiences while working on multimillion dollar TV shows like How to Get Away With Murder, Scandal and Grey’s Anatomy, and how she lost it.

It has been a journey for Shonda to rediscover her passion in work and in life, all by starting to say “yes”, and choosing to spend more time with the family she loves. It is an inspiration to all of us still looking for our purpose in life and struggling to find work-life balance.

Shonda rediscovered her passion through the simple act of saying “yes”.

5. Reshma Saujani: Teach girls bravery, not perfection

Reshma is the founder of Girls Who Code, which is more than a program that teaches young girls to code, but also a platform to teach girls to be brave and take risks.

In her talk, she shared a personal story about braveness and failure. The experience of losing her race to the Congress in 2010 taught her to embrace failure, and treasure the experience of taking risks.

Girls in the modern society have been taught to aspire to perfection, while boys have been taught to be brave and take risks. As a result, most women have been held back for fear of failure, and therefore devoid of the opportunities to achieve greatness.

Through her experiences in Girls Who Code, Reshma believes by building a supportive network and the right mentality, more girls can learn the values of courage and perseverance.

Reshma wants to socialise girls to be brave, rather than to be perfect.

6. Adam Grant: The surprising habits of original thinkers

Adam Grant is one of the most respected professors from Wharton, and is also a bestselling author for his books, Give and Take and Originals. In his TED Talk he broke down the common traits of the Originals, people who think differently and change the world, and what makes Originals the way they are.

Originals have similar vices like the most of us, Procrastination, Doubt and Bad Ideas. But what makes Originals different is how they leverage the vices to be agents of change. Procrastination allows the Originals time to gather ideas and be creative under pressure as deadline looms. Doubting ideas allows the Originals to test, experiment and refine ideas. And having lots of bad ideas and the willingness to try means the Originals can distill the great ideas for execution.

Adam’s experience with missing out on Warby Parker should serve as a warning not to underestimate hidden Originals.

Adam’s advice on how to spot the Originals.

7. Judson Brewer: A simple way to break a bad habit

Judson is a psychiatrist who founded Claritas MindSciences to advocate mindfulness training to help people break addiction. He outlined the psychological mechanics behind bad habits and how he could help break the cycle.

Most habits are formed from positive and negative reinforcements, i.e. doing something that makes you feel good will make you repeat it, leading to a new habit. But bad habits are formed when you are under stress or feeling guilty, and you turn to something, or craving, that provided you with instant gratification in the past, which led to bad habits such as stress eating and cigarette addiction. Therefore, habits are simply the results of trigger, behavior, reward, repeated over and over again.

Judson’s solution to addiction is simply to be curious and focus on the experience while performing the act in question, rather than the emotional component. As one mindful smoker would suddenly be aware of how disgusting a cigarette tastes, rather than how it felt to smoke. Thus taking a crucial step in breaking the addiction.

Judson’s solution to breaking bad habits.

8. Julia Galef: Why you think you're right -- even if you're wrong

Throughout the years, Julia has worked on helping people improve reasoning and decision-making, most notably through the nonprofit organization, Center for Applied Rationality.

In her speech, Julia outlined the two common thought processes used in decision making, soldier mindset and scout mindset. Whereas the solider mindset aspires one person to defend one’s beliefs, even if it is wrong, and motivates oneself to find flaws in the counter argument; the scout mindset is based on curiosity and finding out the truth.

We can all benefit from better decision making processes if we can embrace the scout mindset, and put the truth before one’s own agendas.

Julia teaching us how to make better decisions.

9. Kang Lee: Can you really tell if a kid is lying?

Kang leads a team based at the University of Toronto to investigate when and why children lie, and how it correlates to social and neurological developments in children.

Lying is a learned skill that is required for adults to function well in social setting. A successful lie requires two ingredients: mindreading (knowing what I know and what you don’t know), self-control (ability to control expressions). By demonstrating the ability to lie, a child would have achieved the two ingredients and should be regarded as a milestone in intellectual development. In short, children that learned to lie earlier seem to be more intelligent.

Kang also shared with a new technology to observe lying through the Pinocchio effect.

Kang’s insights into lying in children.

10. Brian Little: Who are you, really? The puzzle of personality

In Brian’s view, each person’s personality is a combination of what we were born with, something acquired socially, and something completely unique (a part like all people, a part like some people, a part like no one else).

Even though traits like Extroversion and Introversion are strong predictor of how we act, as Extroverts like lots of social interactions and closeness, people frequently act “out of character” to execute personal projects. In such situation, an introverted professor would become an expert in public speaking to share knowledge in a field he is most passionate at.

Therefore, it may not be wise to pigeonhole people by the apparent their apparent traits, but by understanding the personal projects and missions each of us is on, as the basis for “out of character” acts that define our character.

Brian’s inputs on what makes you, you.

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