On the road again: TED@PalmSprings, day 6

Travel dominated today: get up, shower, check out, take a taxi to the airport, check in, board, fly to DFW, wait and work, fly to RDU, and finally get a ride home. The only times I ever wish I was rich enough to own a private plane are when I’m moving from one coast to another. Still, at least I’m home.

I owe a special thanks to the nice American Airlines check-in folks in Palm Springs, who noticed my bag weighed 51.8 pounds, then took it anyway. I’ll try not to make that mistake again; the only reason I was over the limit this time was that TED gave us a lot of printed material I forgot to ship home with my TED bag.

I’m still processing TED, and I probably will be for some time to come. This one did not blow me away the way the first one did, but at the same time it moved me, impressed me, made me think, and left me wanting to improve both myself and the world. Those are all good things and more than enough justification to attend next year, as I hope to do.

As long as I stay in my own little world, I don’t feel like a complete failure more than, say, half the time (or so). When I go to TED, however, everyone around me seems more accomplished, cooler, and just generally better than I am. After a period of depression, my reaction always takes a predictable turn: I get angry—not at them, mind you, but at myself. If I want to do better, do more, get thinner, get in shape, whatever, then I need to shut up and get busy and just do it.

And so I shall. I’m going to work hard to better myself on multiple fronts this coming year. I’m not dumb enough to believe I’ll achieve enough to quiet my inner demons, but at least I can do a little better, do a bit more, get at least somewhat thinner, get in better shape, and generally make some progress.

Of course, the odds are high that next year at TED, I’ll feel just as much the outsider and the failure as I did this time, but hey, I will have tried.