Yancey Strickler

My first thought was I've never felt like I belonged anywhere.

Yeah, yeah.

Like I grew up in the country on a farm.

I loved books.

I didn't, you know, just it wasn't how, what am I doing here?

And that always created kind of a hyper awareness.

Another word is anxiety.

Another word, you know, but just a feeling of not totally fitting in.

And I've never really been a part of any,

institution I've never been really blessed by.

I mean, this TED, this stage is certainly an amazing exception, very excited about.

But I've just never had the option to be part of those things.

You know, I went to a high school in the middle of nowhere, very rural area.

I didn't, yeah, I don't have no connections.

Like, so just those things are not for me.

And so anything I've done, it's always been, I have to figure out what's my weird way.

And I'm again, that not belonging causes me to be off often very self-aware of what I'm doing.

And so I'm like doing something while having some understanding and maybe why I'm doing it.

And through that, like a deepening, I don't know, this is like retrospectively I'm saying this is what's happening.

Um, and so.