Latest / Walk the Pod: 10 minute walking / S65E4 Confidence vs doubt

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S65E4 Confidence vs doubt · Walk the Pod: 10 minute walking

• 0:10
  Speaker 1: Hello and welcome to Walk the Pod, your daily walking
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: show where I take my podcast for a walk because
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: I don't have a dock. You're very welcome along, this
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  Speaker 1: is episode 4, series 65 of the daily walking podcast
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  Speaker 1: that for just 10 minutes. Today, confidence and doubt. Welcome
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: to Walk the Pod. Walking in a small park, very
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  Speaker 1: near to Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens this lunchtime, I'm
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  Speaker 1: thinking about the opposite of confidence, I guess, which is
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  Speaker 1: possibly doubt. depending on how you look at it. But
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  Speaker 1: one opposite of confidence is certainly doubt. Because I think
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  Speaker 1: that is what gets in the way of our confidence.
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  Speaker 1: It is difficult to be confident because what do we know?
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  Speaker 1: We're only humans in the world. It's difficult to feel
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  Speaker 1: like we definitely have the answer. And Kiwi Rob was
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  Speaker 1: reflecting on this yesterday and how his approach is usually
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  Speaker 1: to think, well, I'm probably wrong. And I doubt that's
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  Speaker 1: the case. But still, that's kind of what I'd like
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  Speaker 1: to think about today is how do we present confidently
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  Speaker 1: when doubt must be in our minds? And if we've
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  Speaker 1: got any critical thinking capacity whatsoever, it should be in
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  Speaker 1: our minds, really. We should always be questioning what we
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  Speaker 1: think is true in order to improve. on our thoughts
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: on what is true. So I think it's kind of
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  Speaker 1: essential that we doubt. But given that, how do we
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  Speaker 1: then present confidently to other people? That's my topic to
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  Speaker 1: ponder for the day. And maybe another prompt, if you
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  Speaker 1: have any thoughts on that, please go to walkthepod.com, leave
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  Speaker 1: me a voice note. A few thoughts on the subject
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  Speaker 1: of doubt today. I want to think for a second
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  Speaker 1: about Louise de Bourgeois' enormous metal sculptures of spiders. I
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  Speaker 1: don't know whether you have ever seen these in real life.
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  Speaker 1: There was one in the Turbine Hall of the Tate
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  Speaker 1: Modern for a while in the centre of London. They're
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  Speaker 1: all over the world in various places. I don't know
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  Speaker 1: how many of them there are, probably only a handful
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  Speaker 1: because they're enormous, but You may have seen them. I mean,
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  Speaker 1: imagine an enormous metal sculpture of a spider. The one
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  Speaker 1: I'm thinking of is called a maman. I don't know
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  Speaker 1: what that means. But what I do know about the
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  Speaker 1: process in which that spider was created is that Louise
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  Speaker 1: de Bourgeois, the artist, went to see a Picasso exhibition
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  Speaker 1: as a young artist and wrote in her diary that
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  Speaker 1: that she didn't pick up a paintbrush for over a
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  Speaker 1: month afterwards. And the reason for that was simply intimidation
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  Speaker 1: and simply thinking, how can I possibly create anything when
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  Speaker 1: art like this exists? And was overwhelmed with doubt for
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  Speaker 1: that period. Or maybe it was much more relaxed than that.
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  Speaker 1: Maybe she wasn't overwhelmed with doubt. Maybe she was just reflecting.
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  Speaker 1: It's very difficult to tell without interviewing her. But I
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  Speaker 1: was struck by that. But then... De Bourgeois went on
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  Speaker 1: to create these incredible, enormous metal sculptures. And what she
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: said about confidence is what I want to bring you.
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  Speaker 1: She said the first person you have to convince is yourself.
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  Speaker 1: And so what she's really saying is if you as
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  Speaker 1: a person in the world are going to do anything
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  Speaker 1: at all, you're going to have to convince other people.
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  Speaker 1: And if you're going to convince other people, you need
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  Speaker 1: to be convinced that the thing is the right thing
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  Speaker 1: to do yourself. I mean, imagine someone coming to you
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  Speaker 1: and saying, I think I want to make a gigantic
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  Speaker 1: metal sculpture of a spider, but I'm not sure. Are
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  Speaker 1: you going to give them the resources with which to
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  Speaker 1: make a giant metal spider? You're probably, even if you've
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  Speaker 1: got about your person, 17 tons of metal, you're probably
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  Speaker 1: not going to hand it over immediately because the person
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  Speaker 1: doesn't sound sure that that's what they want to do.
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  Speaker 1: And that, I think, is why some artists or successful
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  Speaker 1: artists perhaps have an extraordinary level of conviction. And not
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: just artists, of course. Confidence comes into lots and lots
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  Speaker 1: of things, not just creative endeavors. But this is why
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  Speaker 1: when people do have huge conviction, this is actually seen
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  Speaker 1: as a good thing because Whilst, as we touched on
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  Speaker 1: briefly yesterday, they might be absolutely wrong, and an enormous
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  Speaker 1: metal sculpture is not what anybody needs right now, thank
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  Speaker 1: you very much, it's certainly not going to get made
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  Speaker 1: if you've got any doubt about it, because there's not
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  Speaker 1: much evidence out there to say that we need enormous, great,
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  Speaker 1: giant metal spiders. It's not like a lot of other things,
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  Speaker 1: which have sort of evidence-based needs to them. Art is different,
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  Speaker 1: so The artist has got to have an enormous amount
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  Speaker 1: of conviction and confidence in order to get their stuff made.
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  Speaker 1: Just a thought, and I would be terrifically interested in
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  Speaker 1: your thoughts on this. More on confidence tomorrow. I've just
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  Speaker 1: had a fascinating conversation with a professor I'm going to
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  Speaker 1: be talking to as part of a panel next week,
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: What My Robot Taught Me About Being Human. Professor Threshentha...
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: nani yakara who is a buddhist martial artist and a
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  Speaker 1: soft robotics professor has an enormous amount to say about
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: what building robots can tell us about being human i
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  Speaker 1: can't wait to speak to him and i've got a
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  Speaker 1: lot of thoughts about confidence actually from the process of
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: having my pre-briefing chats with him so i've got lots
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  Speaker 1: more on confidence to bring you from tomorrow but as
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  Speaker 1: usual very interested in your thoughts too What can I
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  Speaker 1: see directly in front of me? Well, as often happens
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: when I'm in small parks in central London, I'm surrounded
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  Speaker 1: by enormous and ancient plane trees. These are trees with
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  Speaker 1: huge hand-like leaves. They're enormous structures which dominate the park.
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  Speaker 1: And underneath them, hundreds of students on wooden benches. some
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  Speaker 1: of which are suspended for no particular reason on blocks
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  Speaker 1: of concrete that stick out of the ground, which I
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: suspect means that once upon a time the ground was
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: a little bit more built up than it is now. Sure,
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  Speaker 1: they're not deliberately suspended on elevated concrete blocks. We're still
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: looking for orange in the environment, and actually it's a
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  Speaker 1: very good time of year to be doing that because
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  Speaker 1: most of the environment is orange in terms of Leaf litter.
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: And if I was in the woods at home, it
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  Speaker 1: would all be orange right now. Primarily. So if you're
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: on a walk and thinking, I'd like to surround myself
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: with more people who walk every day, you might enjoy
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: getting involved with the Walk the Pod Discord server. If
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: you're not familiar with Discord, think of it more like
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: a community message board on the internet. And on that
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: community message board, you can post your orange photographs. and
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: get involved with all other kinds of conversations that are happening. So,
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: definitely worth checking that out. If you Google Walk the Pod,
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: and follow the links to walkthepod.com, you will find a
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: button which says, join the Discord server, and it is
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: completely free. Thank you for walking with me, dear friends.
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  Speaker 1: It's been a delight to stretch my legs with you
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  Speaker 1: and bring you episode four of... series 65 of walk
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  Speaker 1: the pod i think we're making some interesting inroads into
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  Speaker 1: confidence and i can't wait to see where we go
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  Speaker 1: next with it take care of your beautiful mind and
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  Speaker 1: as usual i'll be back tomorrow