The happiness advantage | Leda Karabela | TEDxThessaloniki

How can we be optimistic when everything around us is falling apart? For Leda Karabela, optimism is not about being a Pollyanna overlooking the real facts but, rather, a Tom Sawyer opting for a certain point of view in perceiving the world. To achieve this, she claims, we need to change: reconsider our expectations, set realistic goals, infuse our life with positive feelings, build social networks, be grateful for what we already have and, last but not least, aim not to being good but to becoming better.

Helping sharp, intelligently curious people overcome barriers that may be keeping them from achieving more is what keeps Leda occupied. Having held responsibilities for global projects, traveling and working with both physical and virtual teams in multiple countries for companies such as BP and Microsoft, Leda is using her strategic communication and executive/leadership coaching experience to help organizations maximize their performance. Realizing her passion for people, the ways they click and connect with each other, she is helping clients improve effectiveness and reach. She has also led the corporate relations program at the Stanford Business School and has lived in Boston, San Francisco, London, Athens and Dubai. Inter/intra-cultural communication, expatriation and cross-cultural adjustment issues are among the areas she consults. She is also part of the coaching team at SupporTED program offering her support to the TED Fellows programme designed to bring together young world-changers and trailblazers who have shown unusual accomplishment and exceptional courage.

In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience. At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where x = independently organized TED event. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are self-organized.* (*Subject to certain rules and regulations)