Stirring the Pot by Jenny McCarthy Page B

for twenty minutes,” what would you tell your audience? Because that’s really what TED talks do, right? The TED folks invite people from all walks of life to come and tell the paying audience why they or their thoughts or their research or their humor is
special
. Plus, I hear they coach you and give you guidelines on making your presentation of your specialness even more special. Twenty fabulously long minutes to blow your wad
and
the assistance of someone whose job it is to help you not make a fool of yourself or bore your audience? I’ve got to get me some of that! Of course, no one can really coach you out of being a pompous jackass or a self-satisfied prick.
    Everyone has a favorite TED talk (or a new favorite every week), and I’ll admit that I’ve become a fan of anumber of them, too. The one from several years ago by that neuroscientist who narrates the experience of having a stroke was pretty amazing. This was a major stroke (she couldn’t walk or talk for many years afterward), but she knew enough about how the brain works to be aware of what was happening to her, even as she was slowly losing function. Her TED talk replays her thought process. I’m guessing she persuaded every last person in the room (not to mention countless online viewers since) that she was reliving the stroke for the first time on that stage. She was not only passionate but believable. She was herself, and not overly studied or practiced. Her story was structured (she was in command even when she was acting out how it felt to be out of control), but it seemed like she was kind of, well, improvising. My hero. We should all be that relaxed and confident and interesting after the worst thing in the world has happened to us. Practice makes perfect!

Dream It to Achieve It, Baby!
    Call it visualization or call it fantasy—all I know is that being able to dream about what you want in life is a great way to begin to make it happen. Remember the complicated brain blah-blah I mentioned I’d read about in
Psychology Today
at my gyno? Well, that applies here, too—apparently if you can visualize, fantasize, or dream it in detail, you pave some kind of neurological access to the experience again.
    Athletes know this, too—they visualize running the race, hitting the ball, sinking the basket, or making the putt, and then when they go to do the thing in real life, sometimes the memory of doing it successfully kicks in and twitches their muscles or tweaks their aim and they pass an opponent, hit the home run, dunk the ball, or win the tournament.
    Sounds to me like it can’t hurt to daydream! Which is such good news, because I just love it when something I already do anyway is proven not only to
not
bea waste of time but even to be beneficial. Here’s hoping science will soon prove the usefulness of my nail biting.
    I think that every woman needs to have a handful of excellent daydreams in her mental file cabinet. Three to five should do it, and on a range of topics, so that you can pull them out and escape to a happy place during long car or plane rides, boring theater productions, tedious dates, bad sex, or lectures from your boss.
    One daydream/fantasy should feature you in your dream job (see the me-subbing-for-Oprah fantasy in the last chapter). Picture the scenario in superdetail. Ask yourself:
    Where would you work?
    Me: On Oprah’s old show; I’d be her stand-in and sometime co-host. I wouldn’t have to be at the studio
every
day, but she’d trust me with the trickiest topics and interviews.
    How would you get there?
    Me: Limo, natch!
    What would your office look like?
    Me: Attached private bath (see my sex fantasy on this page , and my feelings about stylish modern plumbing, this page ).
    What would you wear to work?
    Me: Whatever I want. I’d have a wardrobe budget.
    How would you treat your employees?
    Me: We’d all totally love each other, have the utmost respect for each other, and know the unique and perfect gift for each