You're listening to TED Talks Daily. I'm your host, Elise Hume. What do icons of popular culture like Beyonce, Toy Story, and Nike have in common? Well, today's speaker, Chloe Valdry, says the answer is the key to helping heal America during these divisive times. Valaldry is the founder of a group called Theory of Enchantment,

which is also the name for her framework for taking on painful topics with wisdom and compassion.

In her TED 2020 conversation with Ted's business curator, Corey Hageham,

she shares her theory and how we can use it in our daily lives to help

heal our social fabric.

So conflict is often rooted in long histories, deep belief systems and strong emotions, making

divisions between people difficult to mend. But building a better future means

we have to figure out how to have difficult conversations and still connect, heal, and move forward.

This is the very issue that Chloe Valdry has been thinking about. Thank you so much for being here,

Chloe. Thank you so much for being here, Chloe.

Thank you so much, Corey. I'm going to be talking to you today about a concept I created called the Theory of Enchantment. So the theory of enchantment is really a social, emotional

learning program that teaches individuals how to develop character, develop tools for resiliency, to meet the

hardship of life head on, but more importantly, to learn how to love oneself so that one can be

able to love others in the process. And the unique aspect of the theory of enchantment is that

it uses pop culture to teach a lot of these ideas.

So I use Disney, hip-hop, pop music, broadly speaking, and other really fun and cool aspects found

in pop culture to teach it. But more on that later. First, I'm going to tell you how I developed

this concept called the theory of enchantment. So about five years ago, I moved going to tell you how I developed this concept called the Theory of Enchantment.

So about five years ago, I moved to New York from New Orleans, and I got a job at the Wall Street Journal.

Now, my background is in international studies and diplomacy.

And I was really always interested in this concept of, you know, teaching people how to combat conflict.

This is what we study within international relations.

...