Ted Audio Collective.

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You're listening to Ted Talks Daily,

you're listening to Ted Talks Daily,

where we bring you new ideas to spark your curiosity every day.

I'm your host, Elise Hugh.

Writer Laurel Bratman's story is in some ways highly specific to her,

and in other ways, instantly relatable to those of us who have a

complicated relationship with striving and achievement. In her heartfelt

2023 talk from Ted Women the writer takes us through a midlife realization of hers,

with lessons that can apply to many of us after the break.

And now our Ted Talk of the day.

You could say I had an unconventional childhood for a couple reasons.

I was born to Jewish avocado and citrus growers in rural Southern California.

My dad was a surgeon at our local hospital and my mom ran the ranch where she sold, we sold our fruit commercially and they rescued donkeys.

My early childhood was so beautiful, strange and very privileged.

And you could say that I really had nothing

to worry about until I did.

When I was three and my dad was 42 he was diagnosed with metastatic bone

cancer and he was told he had six months to live. He had his right leg

amputated and he went in for chemo and radiation,

which in the early 1980s for bone cancer was especially brutal.

...