The power of intention | Tsipor Maizlick | TEDxJerusalem

Translator: Débora Escudeiro
Reviewer: Denise RQI grew up in Jerusalem, not far from here,in a small family of four. I’m a daddy’s girl, I love my father. He’s one of the kindest people
I’ve ever met. My father worked hard his entire life,and he taught me the same thing
that most of us are being taught:that good, responsible people
work hard and work a lot. I was living under the assumption
that if I want to be successfulI should do something
in every given moment. There was always something
to clean, a problem to solve,an email to answer
or a phone call to make. I had a never-ending list of tasksand gave myself no permission to rest
until it was completed. I believed, like many others,that success is necessarily involved
with a lot of work. But is working hard and a lot
really the effective wayto create exceptional results?According to the 80-20 Pareto Principle,
the answer is “no”. If you look at the distribution
of peas within pods,ownership of capital,
and incomes in businesses,you will always see
that about 80% of the effectcomes out of 20% of the causesand that 20% of the effect
comes out of 80% of the causes. What does it mean? How does it concern us?In every given moment, everyone
of us is on one side of that ratio. Either you’re doing a lot
and getting very littleor you’re doing little and getting a lot. Ever since I’ve heard
about the Pareto PrincipleI’ve been looking for ways
to do less and achieve more. And then, about a year ago,
I got the opportunity to practiceunder my very special circumstances,
which took most of my time and energy. I became paralyzed;
I had no physical abilities to invest,only my mind, my will, my intention. I became ill with an autoimmune disease
called Guillain-Barré syndrome. Although it sounds like
the name of a French lover,Guillain-Barré is
a severe neurological diseasewhich causes sensory and motor paralysis. If it is not diagnosed or treated
on time, it might cause death. The body attacks the myelin,the soft sheath which covers
all of the nerves in our bodyand is responsible
for the neurological ,including physical sensation, movement,
and function of the inner organs. At the time I got sick,I was preparing for half a marathon
for the second time in a rowand was excited
in the preparation for the big day. But as John Lennon said,”Life is what happens to you
while you’re busy making other plans. “It took a while for me and my doctors
to understand this was no flu. For two weeks I experienceda cold sensation
in the tips of my fingers,I lost sensation in my arms and my legs,I became stiffer
and experienced extreme exhaustion. A ten-minute walk
took me an hour and a half. Climbing up the stairs
to my house, 20 minutes. My pace kept decelerating. And instead of running to the finish line,
I found myself crawling to the hospital. A week and a half before Purim holiday
I was at the hospital,before receiving treatment and was losing
more and more of my basic capabilities. Purim is a Jewish version of Halloween. It’s a commandment to be happy
on Purim holiday. So everyone will celebrate
and wear costumes. When my daughter and my dear ex
visited me at the hospitalI realized I wouldn’t be able to help her
get dressed on Purim morning. I was told to not make any plans
for the next month to come. I remember lying there,
at the hospital bed, thinking to myself:”I have no choice but to store
all of my belongings,say goodbye to my former lifeand go live at my mother’s house
for the next few months. “I was being realistic
and completely desperate. It was my darkest time. I’m not sure what was there
beyond my desperation,but all of a sudden I thought,”It’s just a statistic. A distribution. It’s a probability,
like all probabilities,that has the average
which is the majority of people,but also has the extreme,
the dots outside the graph. “And I realized that even if the chances
were slight, they still existed. I knew that most of the result
depended on me. “Who am I concerning the odds?””What am I going to do to heal myself?”I had a purpose right there:
to be healthy as soon as possibleand go back being
my daughter’s mother again. I decided to put all of my intention
in what I had rather in what I was losing. Back then, the difference betweendoing something with my intention
or doing it without my intentionwas the difference between
trying and succeeding. I knew that every day without movementwould add significant time
to my rehabilitation,so I didn’t wait a second
before I took responsibility in my health. And long before
the physical therapy began,I combined between keep
resting and moving. I got myself healthy food, vitamins,and a variety of physical treatment
from friends who wanted to help out. On the second day of my medical treatment,
I was half paralyzed, in a wheelchair. When I crossed a stairway
with 16 steps and a rail,I remember quietly looking at them
for a few momentsand wondering if I could climb them. And there I was, sitting
at the bottom of the stairway,taking a deep breath,
imagining myself climbing up the stairs. It seemed impossible. Suddenly, I heard music
in the back of my mind. (“Gonna Fly Now” –
Theme song from Rocky Balboa) And I started climbing up the stairs
with the agility of a sloth. From the outside,
I looked like a paralyzed womanhardly pulling herself on a stairway. In my mind, however, I was Rocky Balboa
during his victory match. With every step, I became happier,
and as I reached the top of the stairway,a few minutes later, I felt victorious. A minute later
I was back in a wheelchair,exhausted. I needed my mom to push me
back to the department. My life looked a lot like that
in the past year:from being victorious
to disabled and back again. When I returned home,
bills were piling up,my income stopped, I had a child to raise,
and customers waiting for my return. And yet my body was full with pain
as a result of the neurological revival. I had to do less and achieve so much more. Life didn’t wait for me for a second. In many mornings I was standing
in a crossroad of choicesbetween lying on the couch all day long
and proceeding with my life. In order to leave the couch,I had to enroll my
consciousness toward my dayand choose, despite the circumstances,
to be a contributing, useful person. Every morning I asked myself,
what is my purpose?What are my intentions?
Who do I want to be today?The statistic shows that the average time
for a Guillain-Barré patientis 38 days in department,and anywhere between three weeks
and three months in rehabilitation. I spent only ten days in department
and five days in rehabilitation. And guess what else happened?On Purim morning I was home
on vacation from the hospitaland helped my girl with her costume. I have learned
that what happens on my insidehas a huge effect on my outside. From the inside, I was a winner,
athlete, dreamer, consciousness coach. And I remembered
that my intention would determinewhether I would be with most
of the other Guillain-Barré patients,at the average, or would I be
a dot away from the graph. From the outside, even though I was active
only seven months of it,2014 was one of the best years of my life,
personally and professionally. We are all living in such a fast pace,
we are all connectedin almost every moment
to our emails, and our cell phones,and we are expected to react
immediately and be available. We all have our circumstances to handle. And so many times,
we’re taking actions in a hurry. Sometimes, out of our stress,
our fear, our pain, or our anger. Then we can find ourselves
doing a lot and getting very little. Or, at the worst case,we can find ourselves making damage
which we have to take care of later. I’m still recovering from my disease
and feel its impact in my daily life. It has forced me to stop
and pay attention before I take actions. I have learnedthat it’s not the amount of actions
that will determine my result. It’s the quality of action that matters. When I’m setting my intention,
then I’m present in the moment. In my body,I become clear with my purpose,
and I can recognizewhether my action is valuable for me
and for the people around me or not. And, if it’s not, then taking
no action is sometimes better. More than anything,my disease gave me a year of practice
and a constant reminderthat in every given moment, I can stopand through my will,
my choice, and my intentionbe on that side of the Pareto distribution
in which I do less and get so much more. Which side would you like to be?Which side would you choose to be?