Challenging Our Lazy Brain: Ronald Paredes at TEDxYouth@NIS (Transcript)

TRANSCRIPT:

I want to start by doing a little experiment. It’s just an exercise. Everybody should have in their hands a card and a pencil, okay?

So what we’re going to do — I would like you to try to draw this portrait. But we’re going to do it a little bit different, okay?

If you are right-handed, I want you to use your left hand. If you are left-handed, I want you to use your right hand. If you are ambidextrous, I want you to use your mouth.

We’re going to do this for about a minute, and then we’re going to talk about it. We can start now. It’s going to be ugly, I know. It’s not an art exercise; it’s not a drawing exercise, but I want you to try your best. Try to capture the details, the texture.

I know you will be surprised with the result.

Yeah, it’s supposed to be difficult. If you didn’t recognize this guy, this is Leonardo da Vinci. He’s one of the most creative and ingenious persons that ever lived. I also happen to be an artist. Of course, not like Leonardo da Vinci.

But I have to create ideas everyday; I have to come up with new ideas everyday. But sometimes it’s just, you know, my brain, it stops working. Just for some reason, it stops working.

Some of my friends would say it’s because I’m old. But I cannot afford to have all these brain blockages, you know, I have to deliver work. So this is a terrible thing for me because I have to keep working, okay?