A Matter of Point of View

i am

not exactly where i was distinct to be

co-litanan playing destiny if you wish

that’s the taste of my life

however today i feel more than ever

i’m in the right place

as a child i had no self-confidence for

two reasons

first i thought i was ugly as the only

black girl of my school

i regularly received racist comments

about my physical appearance

those commands followed me all my

schooling from your skin looks like poo

in my childhood to your party

for a black girl in my teenage years

not the best comments to be strong

self-confidence

these remarks quickly had consequences

on me i remember that

as a child i wanted to straighten my

hair and bleach my skin

second reason i thought i was trump

because my lowest team

killed my intellectual abilities my

family

put a lot of pressure on me to excel at

everything i did

from sports to school but being an

average student

i was stupid enough to think i have no

talents

i wasn’t this distorted self-perception

i have been conditioned to failure

year after year as my selfish team

dropped my grades too

this situation went on until my last

year of high school

at that time something triggered me and

my low self-esteem turned into

self-confidence

and i discovered parts of my personality

i didn’t even know

at that point after believing i was not

pretty my entire childhood

i was selected to take part in the 2020

miss france competition

and after believing i had no talents

today

i write engaged articles i became an

actress

i organized protests gathering thousands

of people

and i’m invited today to give a ted talk

i told you seconds ago about something

triggering me

after graduating high school with

average grade scheme

summer break i was off to college and i

had good resolution in mind for the new

year to come

so i tried to improve myself but i

didn’t know how to proceed

that’s when i found a youtube video of a

man named steve

who taught a story about the power of

mental conditioning

steve explained the day a mother brought

her son to his first reading training

and taught him he’s a bit stupid so

don’t mind if he doesn’t understand

anything

steve then decided to condition himself

as if this child

was gifted throughout the week he talked

to him as if he was a genius

he made him feel important at the end of

the week

steve gave his students a test he

realized that the child

obtained the best result ever out of the

thousand students here

at your son had the best results ever

he said to his mother and do you know

what she answered

i don’t believe it then steve replies

that’s exactly the answer i expected

from you

you don’t believe it and since you don’t

believe in your son

then he can’t believe in himself

this video had a powerful impact on me

it restored my self-confidence i then

decided to apply steve’s methods

directly on myself every day before

going back to college

i convinced myself that i was

intelligent and that i had many talents

i conditioned myself to succeed and you

know what

it was a fantastic success as the weeks

went by

my grades improved and thanks to my

positive mental conditioning

i reached the 15th grade point of read

with the compliments of the class

counsel

i then realized that i had abilities i

never suspected

and that i had to believe in them to

give myself the means to succeed to

reveal them

besides my studies i was very committed

on my social networks

i regularly organized debates on

political and social issues such as

the death penalty racism misogyny

and many other topics so

i was thinking about what i wanted to do

with my life

then a major event upset me a few weeks

after the end of my classes

on may 25th 2020 media were repeating

the same information

over and over george floyd

a black man father of five children was

killed in meniere police

by three police officers during a check

police officers knelt on floyd’s neck

for

nine minutes while the man repeated over

and over i can’t breathe

his death scene touched many hearts

across the globe

and riots were taking place worldwide

claiming that

black lives matter and that justice must

be known

for the flight family i was

very touched by this tragic case

i imagined my father who could have been

in this place as he suffered unjustified

violence

during the police check in the past

i followed the news from my town closely

and saw

that many people were talking about

george flair’s death on social media but

no one was ready to act on it so

i wanted to show actions speak louder

than words

by which i called for a protest on my

instagram

i still remember a friend telling me the

next day

you’re never going to make it there will

be 10 people at your demonstration

i doubt it for a moment but i remembered

that i was conditioned to believe in

myself so

just to prove to myself that i could do

it i decided not to have a second

thought

and proceeded further i got into the

organization of a protest

well i knew absolutely nothing about it

very quickly the movement has grown in

ways that completely exceeded my

expectations

after only three days on my social

networks 600 people were expected

and i received supporting messages from

other countries

i could not believe it

then came the d-day the protest was

going to begin on the nisswa avenue

la promenade des anglais i arrived at

the departure

expecting to see 200 people

well turned out the promenade was so

full of people

i couldn’t see the mars hands it was

impossible to estimate on human terms

how many we were

but what was certain was that we were

definitely

more than 200 and then one thing led to

another very quickly

the procession started the march i gave

my speech in a bullhorn

the crowd childed slogans and demanded

justice and journalists were chasing me

the more the demonstration progressed

the more the crowd grew

the next day i learned in the media that

we were thousands of people

i can’t even realize what that means

today

after that day my life took a new turn

by conditioning myself to succeed i had

no needs

i had gathered thousands of people for a

course that was close to my heart

i have seen creating a collective i am

regularly invited to participate in

public debates

and i write newspaper articles and then

another thing happened because of all

this media coverage

i was approached by a member of the miss

france committee

he encouraged me to give it a try and

enter the contest

since i was a little girl i admired

these women from my television

and i finally found myself in their

shoes

driven by my values i engage in the

adventure with the primary goal of

touching the public

through my story and commitments

i was selected and arrived at miss code

desire while keeping my committed sight

despite the preconceived

non-compatibility of

miss francie universe and the militant

worlds

later my typical miss activist profile

attracted the media

and i was invited on a tv show and

interviewed by many channels

today i’m an actress in a committed

short film

and only god knows what’s right of me

whatever it is now i’m confident

now that you are aware of the tremendous

impact your state of mind can have on

your actions

let’s move on to the practical advices

that i have applied myself

to have a strong mindset let’s go back

in time

before the demonstration and before miss

france

just after watching steve’s video i

remember that afternoon

i was thinking hard on how could i

positively change my life

i will share two of the crucial things i

realized during this

introspection with you all the first

thing i realized was that

over the course of my life apart from my

immediate family

my surroundings would constantly change

people

will constantly come and go in my life

in fact the only person in the world

with whom

i’m certain to live with until i die is

myself

so i might as well deepen the

relationship

i decided to condition my minds to

really think about myself

before thinking about others i remember

that

when i faced a difficult situation i

said to myself

i’m in control of my mind so where there

is a will

there is a way with this principle

i have not failed on a single debate or

interview

and all my personal projects end up in

success

thanks to this strong mentality i took

part in very impressive debates with

experienced journalists

and match audience sometimes i’m happy

with what i’ve done

sometimes i’m not during one particular

debate

i did not live up to my own expectations

but he did not discouraged me

instead it gave me the motivation to

work twice as hard to do better next

time

so i adapted my work to my expectations

and i put in place routines to make sure

i would live up to it for example

it has been a year since i have taken on

the habit of learning two words

expressions biographies or other things

per day

because if i want to prove my legitimacy

to some

60 year old politicians or journalists

who doesn’t really care for my young age

i have to increase my general culture

tirelessly

to give you an idea of the knowledge i

gained with this method

i could say to the 100 capitals i know

or even the government’s entire

organizational charts

but well you get my points

i have been able to keep up with these

habits because of the confidence i got

from lenin from my mistakes

i trusted and i worked hard to give

myself the means to live up to my

expectations

in my mind i wanted to so i could

since then with the conviction that

where there is a will

there is a way i have not failed on a

single debate or interview

and all my personal projects end up in

success

i must tell you that i am aware that we

all are not equal when it comes to

where there is a will there is a way i

am aware that

everyone is not equal for that for

example

a white man from a rich family will have

more chances of succeeding

than a veiled black and proliteral women

regardless of their respective wills if

everyone

at his own level must fight against this

injustice

it is certainly not a valid reason for

us to feel sorry for ourselves

because to have a will is already a real

door open to possibilities

in my case in addition to my tenacious

will i had to work hard

to despite my young age and the fact

that i’m a black woman

impose my credibility and get where i am

today

but without the will i would not have

arrived anywhere

because at the slightest obstacle

without this determination

i would have given up before i leave you

the last thing i want to say is that

i went from being a victim of racism to

being

a fighter against racism

i went from the belief that i had no

talent to the belief that i could help

you find yours

however my skin color and my

intellectual faculties remain the same

only my way of apprehending things has

changed

i will close with a quote from alain

leblai

that inspired me a lot

in life nothing is necessarily good

or bad everything is a matter of point

of view