The Invisible Pink Elephant

The fascination of any moment, be it a speech, a performance or a TEDx talk, lies in the layers beneath the surface. It's not just about the minutes spent onstage but the countless hours of preparation, the brainstorming sessions fueled by caffeine and the endless revisions that culminate in that single moment of truth.

Our recent moment was 12 minutes on a TEDx stage.

And we are proud of what we put on stage in those 12 minutes.

One thing that wasn’t in those 12 minutes on stage was an elephant.

You read that right, just bear (or elephant) with me, I’ll get there, I promise.

We were selected at the end of September for a March 8th TEDx talk in Youngstown, Ohio. To say we were excited would be an understatement.

We had vocalized a desire to do a 2-person TEDx talk back in February of 2020. We weren’t told “no” but we definitely weren’t told “yes” either… until 3 years and 7 months later.

Our talk was all about disrupting monotony. Well, it wasn’t always about disrupting monotony, but that’s a story for another time.

When we figured out that this talk was about monotony, we worked on script content that would disrupt monotony. We brainstormed endlessly about how to make our presentation stand out. Somewhere along the line, probably fueled by too much caffeine or perhaps a touch of madness, we thought it would be funny to have one of us walk across the stage with an elephant, a nod to the infamous "elephant in the room" idiom. Like a bunch of sleep-deprived geniuses, we thought it was brilliant.

So let the record show, as evidenced by our script collection, that January 11th was the first time the elephant stage direction was recorded. And once it was recorded, it became part of our talk and part of our talk’s identity.

About a week later, our friend suggested that we make the elephant pink so as not to imply some sort of political statement. That wasn’t even on our radar! So it was either introduce a donkey or make the elephant pink. And if I had to choose between a pink elephant and a jackass, I’ll always ditch the jackass.

So the January 18th script is the first time the elephant stage direction clarifies that it is a PINK elephant.

And so rehearsals and rewrites continued and the pink elephant remained untouched and remained funny.

As the date of our TEDx talk neared, it was time to create the 3rd character on stage. There were endless google searches for just the right elephant outline. There were constant look outs for just the right cardboard. There were engineering discussions about how to create the elephant. There were logistics conversations about how to transport the elephant from Maryland to Ohio. There were blocking and staging meetings about where the elephant would be before and after the brief reveal. Then the most important decision was the elephant’s name.

Turns out the name was the easiest of all those elements: Ella F. Ante. The elephant was a she because we didn’t have enough cardboard to make it male (you do realize how much cardboard we would need, don’t you?).

While we tweaked our script, Ella loomed lazily in the back of our minds. She was the least of our worries. About 25 iterations later, we were ready to deliver our TEDx talk in front of an audience of family and friends, the people we knew would laugh at our style of humor that includes puns, word play, clever stories and, of course, an elephant.

Humor is a crucial element to our brand and a vital piece of how we crafted and chose to deliver our message of disrupting monotony.

With a makeshift stage set, friends and family gathered for TEDquila and TALKo’s (see how the word play seamlessly weaves?).

The first few lines of our talk helped us get through our nerves, I mean, yes, it’s friends and family, but also, it’s friends and family.

Soon, it was time for Ella, the pink pachyderm, to parade from stage right to left.

Either the deafening laughter impaired our hearing or our unimpaired hearing allowed us to hear the silence of no laughter.

Poor Ella.

The whimsical addition meant to bring a touch of humor to our talk, barely got a chuckle. 

In that moment, something powerful was revealed.

We needed better friends.

Just kidding.

The revelation was that our friends had undeveloped and unrefined senses of humor.

Kidding again. 

It was a moment of revelation that we had let our joke take center stage, overshadowing the true essence of our message. 

Yes, we were talking about distraction and disruption. However, the pink elephant had become a distraction, pulling attention away from the importance of our words, disrupting our message. Ella taught us that sometimes, the biggest distractions are the ones we create ourselves.

And with less than a week before TEDx, we faced a tough decision – to let go of our beloved Ella. 

It wasn't easy.

We had grown attached to her quirky charm, but knew deep down that it wasn't serving our message.

We bid a bittersweet farewell to our cardboard companion, dismantling her with a tinge of regret. 

And while we took the TEDx stage without our pink elephant, we did bring part of her with us to Ohio. 

Our elephant wasn’t on stage, but she was in the room.

The “elephant in the room” phrase is about an important, maybe controversial, issue that no one mentions or wants to discuss. Not discussing an important topic (even if it’s controversial) can be a distraction as well. The preoccupation with an unaddressed issue might shine brighter than a neon pink cardboard elephant.

Too often, we hold onto things that no longer serve us, clinging to them like a stubborn elephant in our script. We need to recognize when something no longer serves us or our message and let it go.

Whether it's a joke, a habit, a negative thought or even a relationship, it's okay to let go and move forward.

Our TEDx talk was a success, filled with laughter, inspiration and most importantly, a clear message that resonated with the audience.

Stepping onto the stage without the burden of our elephant-sized prop lifted a trunk-load of weight lift off our shoulders.

Ella taught us that letting go of our elephant is the key to unlocking our full potential. We must be willing to shed the unnecessary baggage that holds us back, even if it means saying goodbye to something we once held dear. 

True brilliance lies not in flashy gimmicks, but in the power of our words and ideas that allow us to soar to new heights and share our message with the world.

So here's to Ella F. Ante, the invisible pink elephant who taught us that sometimes, the best ideas are the ones we leave behind.