Michelle Doh TEDx | Michelle Doh | TEDxYouth@DaeguIntlSchool
URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aOuBQfSEF3s Video ID: aOuBQfSEF3s ============================================================ I have a weird habit an eccentric one to be spe specific what I do is I first go through my hair find the curly one and pull it out um and play with it until it's R out so I think it all started in fourth grade it looks like I have straight hair right guys um it was fourth grade when I found out that it wasn't curly I it wasn't straight underneath the strands on the outside so no one knew that I had curly hair right but I hated it so I started to pull out all of the curly ones I could possibly find um I don't have hair loss yet yet but I feel like it's going to happen soon enough so I hated the fact that my internal and external realities looked different like the layers of hair I had um my identity felt hidden and mess depending on the people and the surroundings I was in I'm korean-american I have Christian friends and school friends I show different parts of me depending on who I am with and where I am at I just turned 14 and I'm 165 cm probably I have my iconic long hair until recently and I and my friends tease me for having small eyes I always wear the starfish necklace omma gave me that ABA bought her when they were dating I know sweet and I have chubby fingers especially my pinky which looks like a soft little caterpillar my mom told me to marry a guy who love everything about me even my pinkies hi I'm Michelle sjo now these ideas are how others see me people say I'm smart kind and a leader I obviously don't disagree but these are how others see me right so does anything else matter if I don't know who I am as you all know um every single country has different cultures and values we prefer right and especially if you're a korean-american you will face difficulties eventually while you figure out um who are you depending on if you're more of a Korean than an American or the opposite and as you can tell I'm 100% pure Korean but I'm born in the US so I also have a US citizenship so both of my parents have a mindset and a Viewpoint of more of a Korean right um but since I learn an experience in an international school now I have both cultures combined American and Korean for example in Korea hunger there are different ways of calling people with elderly or our parents likeo M and so on while we call our friends and younger with momya and other words instead in English we say yo what's up Mr hle my parents said that they felt like um I was treating like like my friends and they didn't obviously like it I didn't even be mean to be rude or make them feel upset but that's how they felt and you know like the friend group I hang out with the most is from our school and the only time I do get to speak Korean is when I'm with my family or when I'm at church so that's why I feel like I have the two sides of me sing from Korea and Michelle from America so I moved to deu when I was 10 3 years ago and I feel like I have become a pretty much different person from that time I stay in deu most of the time but um every Sunday for church and to visit my grandparents whenever I visited gomi I felt like I was the girl three years ago um but that's pretty reasonable because I spent most of my childhood there and I have all of my memories left behind but I felt so different when I'm in gy with the people I used to know and know when I'm here and they go trying to meet new people and trying to learn more cultures and fit into this new environment when I come back to deu I return to the Michelle I was before singju I'm more comfortable speaking English than Korean I when I realized that I haven't read or opened my Bible except once at church on Sunday has made me feel worse about myself I think my personality also changed a lot while I act kind of chill and quiet in Korea I mean Goomy um I'm one of those people who have 24 4 S in class during in deu I don't think I moved on from the past and kept it in Gom until now I often get confused between the singu part of me and the Michelle part of me and I think all of you will feel the same way as I do because students attending international schools often have multiple sides of them or try to find their real identity now I did like this quick survey to our students and teachers in dis and these are the results so as you can see 82.5 or 6% of them have said that they sometime in their life thought that people viewed them differently um how they thought uh people view them differently than how they thought of themselves and and almost half of them said that they were confused about their identity at least once so we can see how big of a problem this is to our society now here's the thing I care about how others view me I care about it too much and I often think to myself that it is really weird how the perspective of others am myself- contradict when people view uh people at church view me as s who's kind and faithful amen I always felt something was wrong because I wasn't whoever they thought of me as of course I do have a kind and faithful side of me but every time people complimented me I always doubted myself if all of this was for God for myself or even for them maybe it was my feelings and intentions or maybe I spent my whole life trying to fit in the image of what others thought of me instead of developing myself and shaping myself into a better version of me and now you might be wondering okay Michelle we get your problem but how did you overcome it so I was watching TV like a normal person would do like that um on a Sunday afternoon and I and there was an interview going on about Dwayne Johnson that caught my eye this is what he said when it comes to hard work and things I'm passionate about I sto saying I have to and start to say I get to that really hit me hard so I don't want to go into the cliche ways to how to overcome this identity crisis but it may sound similar think positive how you view things whether positively or negatively really affects you and your status there's even a study for it Barbara fredon a professor at the um the professor of psychology at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill has been investigating the positive effects um of humans for more than 30 years and her research shows that people with a more positive attitude or emotions um are more resilient and they are able to overcome difficulties more quickly so that's why I um that's why we should change our attitude and take this as an advantage to us the blend of the two cultures uh and all of the experiences I personally go through as singju and Michelle makes me unique also the trend of globalization um in the trend of globalization I think it's super cool to have diverse backgrounds and identities it's like hm let's say how I like myself eating Donuts but I also like myself eating dooki so I think it's good to just be you with all of your different facets without thinking about it one thing that I'm sure of now is that I'll never get to know perfectly who I am but I learn to accept myself yeah I'm Michelle but I'm also singju I am hardworking pretty respectful to others and sometimes insightful sometimes really goofy I love children and without music I cannot just survive I like socializing a lot and I secretly enjoy passing around people just a secret between you and me um and I love to cry about movies books touching stories whatever I even cried every single time watching Big Hero I even though I watched like a gazillion times I make stupid mistakes like doing nothing for five five hours and just sitting on my desk or I sleep even though if I'm not done with my homework I regret saying hurtful things to my parents so I do have the good size of me but I also have bad ones too but I know I love whoever I am and whatever I can and whatever I am I can be whoever I want to be I don't need to Pace between who I am between Michelle and singju I am Michelle sju though now I have accepted myself and decided to keep on moving forward um to reflect and develop upon myself for my future for myself and for everyone around me I now made friends who are Christians but also who can speak English so that's really cool and awesome of how I don't have to struggle to change my opinion into Korean and just rather just say it with my personal beliefs and they will just understand I didn't have to separate sju and Michelle and you should too you should try to accept both of your identities and try to combine them naturally I know from my experience no matter how much others try to make you feel better or say all these flattery stuff about you you are the only one who can actually make you feel good about yourself and be confident in yourself we are made to fit in differently in different groups and communities that's the human instinct of it and so we have to love ourselves love yourself accept who you are view the world in a way you've never done before I finally cut my hair short which I maintained it to grow it long until now and this was the new start of my journey thank you