Josh Nichols set out to “hack his way to happiness.”
The Savannah computer programmer soon found a flaw in that approach.
“You can’t hack your way to happiness, but you can hack away your unhappiness,” said Nichols, a bachelor who abandoned his slovenly ways and even quit his job.
Nichols was among 14 presenters at the annual TEDx Creative Coast event staged Friday at the Jepson Center for the Arts. The diverse mix of musicians, artists, teachers, clergy and tech-savvy professionals shared ideas on the theme of “Decoding Happiness” with the 200-plus person audience.
Friday’s “TED Talks” — the speaker presentations, which are limited to 18 minutes — included a number of personal revelations. Music teacher Amy Drew recounted how her 183-day hike of the Appalachian Trail failed to provide enlightenment. Her reentry into society wasn’t easy – “the world is smelly,” she said — and she was miserable until her parents confronted her and told her to “figure it out.”
She reflected back on one of her last days on the trail when she came across some strangers in the middle of the Maine wilderness. They plied her with cold beer and steak. The memory made her smile and led to an eureka moment.
“Look at what makes you smile and then ask ‘Why?’” she said. “Take those pieces out and apply them to everything. When I did that, I saw the big picture.”
Another speaker, Murray Wilson, bemoaned a threat to his happiness — the development of the driverless car. Wilson is an Englishman and learned to drive when he was 12 years old. While driving is among the “most expensive and dangerous” activity of our daily lives, it is a source of joy.
“I console myself with the knowledge that they are having a devilishly difficult time” developing the driverless car.
Music was a cornerstone of TEDx Creative Coast 2013. The event featured singing as well as a player of a steel-drum like instrument known as Saraz Handpans.
“Music has a special way of capturing any emotion and engaging audiences in many ways,” said Mark Garnier, the handpan player.
The TEDx Creative Coast conference is modeled off the TED — an acronym for Technology Entertainment Design — gatherings held annually in Long Beach, Calif., and Edinburgh, Scotland. Those events routinely attract the world’s thought leaders as speakers, from Bill Gates to Malcolm Gladwell.
Friday’s “TED talks” were streamed over the Internet and can be watched at tedxcreativecoast.com and ted.com.
TEDx Creative Coast moderator and host Radford Harrell summed up the potential impacts of Friday’s presentations and the theme of “decoding happiness” for Savannah.
“In decoding happiness, it is amazingly complex and surprisingly simple, all at the same time,” Harrell said. “But everything you year really only has value if you apply it.”