The Highlight Effect
hello everyone my name is tanaka ishana
sutava
and i’m a 22 year old creative
entrepreneur
and baylor university senior student and
i just want to say thank you so much for
taking the time out
to be able to listen to my idea and also
another special thank you to the tedx
csuf team for their hard work and their
dedication
for allowing all the speakers to be able
to share their idea
now first off i just want to say this is
one of the most craziest and honorable
things that i’ve done so far
and given a ted talk at my age i always
knew what i was gonna give one but i
never did i think it was gonna happen so
fast
i thought this was gonna happen when i
was 30. but
here we are now who am i and what am i
about i am a proud
first generation zimbabwean-american who
was raised by a village
of resilient support system my parents
come from zimbabwe
and at the young age of 23 and 24 years
old they came over to america
and i am the eldest son of two
intelligent immigrants
who sacrificed for me my siblings
to live the life that we have today so
standing in front of you today is a huge
blessing because at one point in time
there
was a time when i wasn’t able to speak
not because i didn’t have the fear of
public speaking
but because i had an ear infection when
i was young that caused me to go mute
and i did and it delayed my speech until
i was four years old
and there was a point of time when my
mom didn’t think i was going to speak at
all
and that being said i’m a young man on a
mission to inspire and leave something
of value
as a 22 year old creative entrepreneur
used in the form of multimedia to share
the stories
from different perspectives and bring
people together
the main goal is to influence
by empowering underrepresented groups to
build towards something more build
towards generational wealth
through authentically living their lives
and now the idea that i’m presenting to
you is called
the highlight effect now you might be
thinking what is the highlight
effect now truth be told
research in human psychology states that
everyone
wants to be noticed and i mean everyone
even from the most introverted of people
they want to be recognized for what they
do
and who they are and so
everyone has heard the snowball effect
and the butterfly effect
but my thesis my idea is the highlight
effect
and the highlight effect is this how
being your authentic self creates
opportunities
to create impact and share the vital
stories of others around the world at
any level regardless of your age and
identity
now most people think that they need to
be a huge social media influencer
a celebrity or a politician to have an
impact on somebody
but that could be further from the truth
according to harvard’s psychologist the
average person in their lifetime will
influence over 70
000 people think about that
70 000 and that number has
not only increased but has exponentially
been
blown to proportion because of how
connected we
are due to the internet
as a creative storyteller i wanted to
create a dialogue about equity and
diversity within my academic environment
among students
faculty and staff and be able to help my
student body
guide and provide insight of other
perspectives that weren’t usually heard
a couple years ago i was tasked as a
diversity inclusion
chair for student government at baylor
and the very first thing that came to
mind was lebron james
yes he is an nba champion an
executive producer and one of the
greatest basketball players to ever live
but the way that he utilizes his
platforms not for his own personal gain
but to be able to shine a light on other
people
is what inspired me to do the same
to create a podcast or a talk show and
that talk show was campus cuts
i wanted to dedicate this platform to
highlighting the members of the
community
and i mean all the members that i could
from my professor deanna totem beard the
head of the baylor theatre department
where she shared her perspective on the
current climate of education
theatric arts and entertainment
to one of my best friends megan peck a
baylor alumna
who is a social activist an author a
fellow podcaster
who advocates for lgbtq plus equality
and social justice for black lives
another member was john henry a first
generation american who built
his company at 19 and who sold it over
for a million dollars at 21
being featured on forbes 30 under 30
list and had a chance to be able to be
host of a tv show called hustle on vice
tv
and last but not least to my mentor big
bro
joe who i go to calvary church with who
shared his story
on prison reform and he used the gospel
to transform the lives of other people
in the prison system
and these are just a fraction of the
stories that have been highlighted
but not only have they touched me but to
the thousands that listened
when i think about the highlight effect
what comes to mind is the liberty mutual
pay it forward commercial which made its
rounds during the 2010s
and to sum it up it was just a
commercial of
other people seen doing good deeds
and another person seeing that and then
they wanted to do the same thing
i’m not sure about you but i know for
this
when you see someone in your life
whether you know them personally
or not that opens the door for another
person
you want to do the same thing
now my takeaway for you all
and how to apply the highlight effect in
your life is
the more the majority of time the
highest form of
impact is when we realize we just got to
be ourselves
whatever that means to you it is the
people who will be moved by what you’re
doing
inspired by you that will take the next
action step
in their life to whatever goal that
they’re pursuing
so whether you are a ceo a club
president
a professor a student a waitress
the skills that are embedded in you have
and will significantly change the
trajectory of someone
someone’s life and all i want you guys
to realize is this
you don’t have to be an icon to do this
you don’t have to be a certain age
all you have to do is be yourself
you being yourself is a superpower that
we all possess
and that superpower and our skills
that are inside of us allow other people
to be inspired to use their superpower
once you’re able to understand your
uniqueness
the talents and skill sets that are
possessed that are instrumental in
providing change wherever you go
it is the catalyst to provide people a
seat at the table
to contribute to a changing environment
and ultimately the key to living a life
filled with purpose
and all you have to do
is be you you for coming to my ted talk
i appreciate all of this and i
appreciate
all of you more than you will ever know