I love TED Talks and I’m even undertaking training to deliver my own TED Talk this weekend. If you haven’t a clue what I’m talking about or you’re getting confused with a movie of a similar name – let me tell you more.

A TED Talk is a strong and powerful talk, usually of 18 minutes long, which is designed to spread ideas and inspire you. TED began as a conference in 1984 and now covers a range of topics in more than 100 different languages. The idea behind TED Talks are to share ideas throughout the world.

What distinguishes a TED Talk from a run of the mill speech is that there’s no ‘Hi I’m Karen and this is what I’m talking to you about today…’, it’s about hitting you with a compelling message. What you’ll notice about TED talks is that they are succinct, that the speakers are on purpose and to be frank, they stand out from other speakers on their topic.

Here are 3 of my favourite TED Talks and I’d love you to share yours in the comments below.  I’ll be back with some suggestions on how you can deliver your own powerful message next week.

Sell Your Crap, Pay Off Your Debt, Do What You Love… with Adam Baker

This is one of the first TED Talks I ever watched.  If you’ve ever wanted to sell your stuff and travel the world, I urge you to put 19 minutes aside to watch this now.

The power of vulnerability with Brene Brown

One of the things that make a TED Talk powerful is the frankness and honesty showed by the speaker, and this is one of the distinguishing factors in this talk.  Plus I love the humour interspersed with serious moments, and a powerful message at the end.

Stroke of insight with Jill Bolte Taylor

Lastly, another characteristic of a good TED Talk is emotional story telling and in this thought provoking talk, Jill shares her own personal story, which will make you sit up and take notice.