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TEDx Talks
Published: 2012-12-24
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K48LhGk7gtk
hello everyone thank you for having me here today I made a lot of choices in my life that have led me to where I am now many of them considered crazy either by me or by other other people but they've led me to where I am now and who I am now and in these Artie told you a little bit of that but some of that
is model dancer mechanical engineering student and team leader of the water leave formula motor sports team one of my goals is to change the stereotype of what a female engineer looks like in fact I met someone just the other day who works on deciding or not deciding I guess but looking into why girls do and don't study or pursue studies and fields of science technology engineering
and math and when I said I was a third year mechanical engineering student she looked at me and said how really that's unusual so even people that are trying to change the stereotype are helping enforce the stereotypes so I'm just a little tidbit to show you that people do look at me like I'm crazy on a regular basis and so I guess that's kinda enforcing the
F. title in the theme of my talk so let's take a moment and picture crazy what comes to mind well what comes to my mind is the MotoGP rider going full out on the corner full speed ahead leading the bike screaming their knee on the ground and going full out to get what they want which is the race went note making a crazy choice is similar
in the sense that you have to take that risk to gain what you want what you desire now what does taking that risk mean for you might be a job opportunity it might be a trip it might be doing something that you wouldn't normally do what does taking that risk mean for you to tell you about my crazy choices and how they led me to where
I am now we take you back to high school when I was deciding what I was going to pursue what I was going to study I was seen as the complete girly girl I did ten years of competitive dance I was a cousin a Titian up I was already working on my shoe collection and %HESITATION still growing obviously and I told all my teachers and friends
that I was gonna pursue mechanical engineering and they all looked at me like I was crazy and they they still kind of do and I guess what some of them knew and some of them didn't was not only did I love science and math I'm I also love to workshop class where I got to use machinery use tools I got to design things and go and
make them myself and I thought that was the coolest thing and that is why I choose mechanical engineering so to me it wasn't so crazy it all kind of fit together and made sense the summer before university something happened it was great I went to a race I had the opportunity to go to Mosport and watch an American the moderates now something happen with to me
I fell in love with racing I just love the sound the smell the atmosphere just being so close to these cars going by the look beautiful they sound cool is just awesome and I fell in love with racing and if we refer back to Amy speech earlier about listening to your DNA and you're calling and that that was a moment for me that I decided to
follow my passion racing and I've been heading in that direction ever since when I came to university I found this perfect team a team that designs and builds racecars from the ground up and then competes against other universities from around the world and I thought that was the coolest thing ever but there was a problem it was a really big team and they were all men
they're all male and I was extremely extremely intimidated they talk like they knew everything about cars I mean I knew I was interested but I didn't know I could talk technically about the cars whatsoever and so I was intimidated I stood on the sidelines and I didn't join the team thinking you know that's crazy I can't join that's crazy it's almost cliche to say but it
took a near death experience for me to learn an important lesson I contracted a rare virus which caused meningitis and presented itself in the form of what seemed like strokes so the excruciating headaches the partial body paralysis the speech impediment and so I mean it it was physical torture and pain for me it was mental torture for my friends and family and that's really scary for
everyone to go through because the doctors didn't know what I had for over a week and they told my parents to prepare for the worst Ford for eventual possible death and luckily I had a co worker at the time come visit me in the hospital and he inspired me to create a bucket list so I did and luckily I left that hospital with my life by
I fought it off the doctors are still confused as to how I made it but I did and I left the hospital with my life and that bucket list but that bucket list represented the opportunities that I was going to take from that point forward so I decided I was going to approach life like the motorcycle I was gonna scrape many on the ground I was
gonna go all out and just do whatever life throws at me and just is go for it so things like the cliche skydiving right but also things like I got to co drive for a crazy Leo one of Canada's I'm Canadian rally championship drivers letter which is really cool to co drive for him I am I got to be a flag girl from one of my
favorite racing teams the flying lizards I got to travel London Paris Germany I even got too weak to meet the our first female engineer to win the twenty four hours of Le Monde so it's pretty incredible athlete a gate and as Dini's meant mentioned right she said fan of NASCAR that's exactly how it said I work for NASCAR %HESITATION as an official this past summer which
is an exciting opportunity that it definitely jumped on and bringing it back to my story I returned to school and I join the formula team so that that was a wonderful like that crazy choice of course didn't seem so crazy anymore because of like I'm doing and I don't care so and and I mean people people I guess we're grateful that I did her words support
of that I did and definitely didn't treat me any different I was one of the guys and it was great I got set help build the car I got to go to competition I got to really be part of the team even a few months into into my time with the team there was a fourth year designer that couldn't complete his duties as Jesse designer and
we had no one to pick up the slack superior was my second year only girl on the team still new to all this really you know for a few months before I did know what a chance even was and I said you know what he will do it under it all take on so that was definitely crazy and but I did it anyways I learned all
the programs that I needed to learn and I figured it out I made it work I work long nights and you know whether people saw me working or not and I'd that definitely hope to validate that I was in the right field I was making it work for me I was making engineering work together with my passion my newfound passion for racing and I knew I
was headed in the right direction so that that's something I agree the choice I'm proud to say I made so just as everything is going great a you know school wise I figured it all out it's all coming together alert that you can't control everything that happens in your life for me that can be described as this photo I at the time was very happy you
know engineering and racing it's all going great but there's a part of me that's missing I wasn't I wasn't completely as feminine as I use to be so I started dancing again and I found modeling and you know that everything to me that fit I am those two people in one it just all works for me so I played a photo shoot for outdoors and of
course the Canadian winter did not agree so I brought the photo shoot indoors and to a building that was familiar which of course is an engineering building and the car was there in the photo was taken it wasn't planned it wasn't to be released it wasn't part of the original %HESITATION photo shoot plants but I do get taken and well that was how it was taken
essentially but when I look at this photo I see my femininity and my passion for race cars the two key things that identify who I am but unfortunately to the outside perspective it's just another model with a race car and that's the image that the university clearly does not want to promote and I can't blame them I said before that you can't control everything that happens
in your life but you can control the lessons that you learned and how you decide to move forward afterwards the important lesson I learned was the power perspectives the ability to put myself in someone else's shoes and look at a situation for how they see it not just how I see it that's an important lesson I'm gonna take with me for the rest of my life
I also learned a lot of important lessons about myself yes I forgot to tell you the formula team was suspended unable to compete a competition that season I withdrew from my studies and I hit rock bottom those kind of an important thing to tell you and anyhoo I did return to my studies I decided to face my fears and that was the most terrifying feeling that
I don't wish it upon anyone but I had to return to my studies I had to return and face the team but had been that have gone through this this turmoil suspension I had to work with the people responsible for the team and my punishment everyday I have to face people pointing and staring and saying look that's her I I may be exaggerating a little bit
on the last part but it really honestly felt like it and it's that was the worst thing to go through and if his it was just it was dreadful but luckily there were friends family and key faculty members that really helped me keep my head up high face my fears and take it all one day at a time I ended up designing another chassis for the
formula team now becoming team lead and definitely continuing to to take my motto of taking those risks so I choose crazy I have been and I still will I accept that the good and the bad and the ugly is gonna come along with it but I still choose crazy now my question to you is will you cursor life missing opportunity missing those chances just taken are
