Kelly Corrigan

I thought this seems so hard.

I don't think I would like it at all.

I think I prefer the way that modern life goes.

But even just over the hour and a half that we spent listening to their stories, I started to rethink my initial reaction.

I started to see that in this community, no one ever gets lost.

And it got me thinking, what is progress?

Is it this monochromatic step forward where every bit of it is to the good?

Or is it more of a mixed bag?

Because at this moment, when AI seems to be surrounding us and ready to come in any door or window we happen to leave open, we should know what world we're leaving behind and what world we're choosing to enter.

And we should do that carefully.

So my experience of absorbing the truth of this very old Maasai culture, for better or worse, and what modern life has improved upon and maybe what parts of modern life are a terrible degradation of what was, of how this woman grew up, made me want Nini to come to TED and just tell the story of her childhood versus the way she's raising her own children now in the city.

She had the power to decide, live as I was raised or live in a new modern way.

And she had to work hard to figure out what would be lost if she stepped forward into non-traditional individualistic living.

And then she activated her own great agency to see what parts of her childhood she could somehow replicate in the very modern world where she finds herself living now.

And that is a challenge to all of us.

So ladies and gentlemen, please welcome Danini Kimsera Sikar.

That was Danini Kimsera-Sikar on the TED 2025 stage.

But don't go anywhere.

We'll be right back for more reflections and behind-the-scenes conversations with Danini right after a short break.

Danini's talk was all show, no tell.