How I made obstacles the fuel of my life
i grew up in a beautiful fantastic
island with white sand and crystal water
and that island is sardinia after the
pandemic
as soon as you can go you should
definitely book a trip for yourself
for 18 years i never left the island
yet i was dreaming about crossing the
sea visiting the world
and discovering all the beauty of all
the cities
fast forward is 2021 i
live in another beautiful island at this
time a little bit more far away from
sardinia
and is the island of manhattan in new
york city
i’m in my 12th year at google i’m very
happy and satisfied with my job
which has been quite a treat and i’m
enjoying my life
in this beautiful space how on earth
did i get here so let’s start from the
very beginning
i spent my past 38 years of life
chasing my dreams overcoming my
obstacles while flirting with time i’m
here today
because i’d love to share with you my
learnings as i went through all of them
in my life
and not because i believe my obstacles
are unique to me
even though i think i’ve had a very good
share of them
to be here with you today but because i
believe
that my way of approaching them could be
an inspiration to all of you
and i hope that you will walk away
energized by my five ways
to utmost happiness so
let’s begin this journey i would like
you to come with me
back in time to 1988
when i was a little girl six years old
with short boyish hair
by the way my mom used to keep them that
way so that she could treat lies
more easily so i’m in school
and my favorite teacher cecilia is
asking
that question to all the kids what do
you want to be when you grow up
me without hesitation i raise my hand
and i say
i want to be a leader in a large
corporation
now what did i know about large
corporation at six years old in a little
town in sardinia
it’s still a mystery to me but little
did i know
that i was already learning a very big
life lesson which was to dream big
to have a vision even if that vision
seems impossible to you
and let’s go back to my life for a
minute
my teenage years were quite interesting
i was bullied at school almost every day
for not looking as pretty as the other
girls and for my
religious upbringing as i grew up in a
very strict geova witness community
i could not celebrate birthdays i could
not celebrate christmas
parties and sleepovers all of that was
out of sight
and even if i was attempting to do any
of these things
i would be reported to my mom and i
would then get finished
eventually head home i had my good fear
of challenges as well
my parents were fighting every day
because of the religious differences
they were treating each other with
divorce every day
and i remember having nightmares of
waking up
in the morning and seeing my father
walking away leaving us alone
now i knew back then that my environment
was not normal water falling from the
ceiling every winter cute little rats
visiting us every summer you know
i still enjoy seeing the rats in the
street of manhattan
but right now from my apartment i have
to say
and while i was thinking how could i
escape that environment
my only survival were my books
i remember just spending my afternoon
studying and reading
literature history dante was my favorite
friend
so while i was plotting my liberation
the only way that i could think about
planning things
was about doing any possible job in
summer to raise
some money to cross that sea selling ice
cream
under the burning sum in fantastic
sardinia locations or cleaning
apartments all over
just to make a little money to pay for
my trip
to italy the best news of my life
back then arrived when i was 18 years
old
the day that the college of applied sent
me a letter
that i was accepted and that they were
offering me a scholarship
just to study there in that moment
i could see the light at the end of the
tunnel
and i still remember vividly the night
that with my mom
we boarded that ferry from albia to
genoa
to cross that sea by the way we wish we
could have done it with a flight but
flight were way too expensive
back then after those
super long 15 hours of navigation and
you know train and buses and everything
we arrived in milan
and i still remember that day as being
a horrible horrible day for the rest of
the humanity
especially for america for new york and
for all those families and people
that day that i called my second
birthday
was the 9 11.
and life truly came full circle because
now
is only few block from my place
but let’s go back to that night when i
arrived in milan
and i knew that was one more thing that
i needed to close
before i could be totally happy which
was cutting my dead ends
so i had to tell to my mom that i’ve
been lying all those years
and that my only plan since the very
beginning was to escape and go to milan
to study for college
so i took the courage in my hand and
i faced her and i told her that i was
quitting
that i had enough that i wanted to just
live my life and being like any other
person
enjoying all the things that you could
discover
for her this was the most
you know dreadful news that she could
hear
she didn’t speak to me for a year when i
quit
but it was the only way for me to
finally get relief
and really be happy and enjoy my life
eventually i graduated going through
another fair share of challenges which
include
being threatened of murder from your
best friend
having to escape your apartment in the
middle of the night
um be technically homeless for two weeks
um
doing any sort of job you know to have
some money to enjoy
a pretty close and anything but the
moment and that day
that i finally at that paper you know
that i
completed my five years of college i
still remember a big sense of
accomplishment for achieving that dream
and you know when i found my first job i
thought that that was
it you know i was like i’m done i’m
happy i can settle
i found a good-looking boyfriend which
is now my husband and i said
no more obstacles for me no more
challenges
but little did i know again that life
had other plans
for me at one point i even
thought that those challenges were sent
on purpose
so that i could strengthen myself be
stronger
and somehow i was using those obstacles
as a fuel
to keep going and it was kind of a game
the more i could get through
the stronger would i get and i thought
maybe those are gifts in disguise
you know so you might be wondering
what other gifts life brought me
one day i received an amazing call from
an irish recruiter
i remember being terrified by the
interview because i said my english is
crap they’re going to never hire me
and then there i was one month later
boarding a flight
to dublin the day i landed in the city i
still remember
was pouring rain i was alone i couldn’t
understand
a word from the taxi driver and
[Music]
even if all of that was going on i could
feel that life was bringing something so
joyful to me
i was literally like a kid in a candy
shop
i was experiencing all these new friends
i was enjoying my work
up and down you know the country and i
thought that i was done again
i said this is happiness nothing else is
going to happen
until one day was 2011
and my mom is calling me uh luckily
she was talking to me again after all
these years and
she had forgot about me uh doing that to
her
and casually on the phone she’s like you
know i’m here at the hospital i’m doing
some checkups et cetera and by the way i
have cancer
and then i’m like whoa i never thought
about my
mom honestly being ill because to me
she was invincible she could do whatever
she wanted
you know she was always up and down
again and doing amazing jobs
but then here she was telling me that
awful news and i was okay what am i
gonna do now
so we started the journey you know um
over illness endless visits
uh treatments trying to find a way to
see
if it was possible to you know survive
and then one day we were in my living
room and she’s like nadia i want you to
know something
and i was like mom telling me and she
said well
i want you to know i’m gonna start
turning yellow
and i said what do you mean by turning
yellow she’s like well you know
the type of concert i have i will be
yellow very
soon uh and she was like that she was
brutally honest
very direct either you loved her either
you hated her
and she did turn yellow in the end
and few months later after that you know
conversation um she passed away she was
51
and once again i was faced with an
honorable reality
uh of preparing your body for a funeral
uh finding a way to dispose of her
hashes you know
following your dreams and dealing with
any sort of family disgrace
two weeks after that event
i accepted to relocate to paris life was
teaching me again
another very big lesson um when it’s
time to
heal and grieve do take that time
but when it’s time to pursue your dreams
you just need to get
going and push through to make them
happen
now is there more to my life oh you bet
were there more obstacles more
challenges
there were so many more things that i’m
deciding to write a book about
it honestly including one that is
above all of us these days a global
pandemic
last year when i got the american role i
was about to give up
the embassies were closing i couldn’t
get a visa
it felt that i couldn’t make it uh
the travel ban and all of it and i was
like this is it i’m done
and then my six years old self came back
to me and she said well
nadia you don’t give up you take your
greet you take your perseverance and
you’ll make it
and here i am telling you you know this
story from my apartment in battery park
in new york now you might have had a
life
that is totally different than mine you
might have had
many more more dreadful obstacles
you might have had less obstacles and
everything was
you know done and done but what can be
the same in every situation is the grit
and the energy and the tactics that you
line up to pursue your dreams
so i want to uh conclude my talk today
in sharing my five ways my five
learnings
to really change your dreams
so number one dream big
and when you think that big is enough
dream bigger
have a vision uh make those you know
things uh even the most impossible real
in your head
because it’s in that moment that you’ll
see the possibilities
and number two uh accept the obstacles
that you’re given for what they are
you know sometimes they can be gifts in
disguise
and only after you’re gonna find out
number three cut the dead ends so
do yourself this very big favor even if
his friends
relatives whomever free yourself
from the toxicity so that you can go
after your dreams uh being your best
self and once you’re done number four
surround yourself only with people that
lift you up
people that believe in you people that
give you energy
and strength to go through your life so
that you can
be happy and number five be mindful of
time
you know sometimes we think that time is
too slow sometimes we think the time is
too fast
but the real time is now so be present
in your days
and be mindful that when you need to
catch your dreams
you do need to go fast now
how can you earn your time what are some
of the things that you could be doing
today
for example you could catch a piece of
paper and write down something that you
really want to do
write it down now that is going to be
your catalyst
it’s going to be your way to turbocharge
your future
and it’s going to be your way to finally
own your time
today tomorrow and trust me
forever so thank you