Natalie Portman delivers a powerful speech to Harvard grads about using inexperience as an asset.
"The very inexperience that in college made me feel insecure and made me want to play by others' rules, now was making me actually take risks I didn't even realize were risks."
Natalie Portman delivered this year's commencement address to the graduates at Harvard University, reflecting on her own time at the school.
She attended Harvard from 1999 to 2003, earning a degree in psychology in the process. She went into school worried that maybe she didn't really belong, that maybe others believed she was only there because of her fame. ("Star Wars Episode I" had just come out, and she had roles in a handful of other movies in the years leading up to that.)
All clips via Harvard University.
But then she started in on the true theme of her speech: Inexperience can be a powerful asset.
For many students, going off to college can be a scary thing. For most, it's the first time they're away from their parents for any length of time, and it most certainly is a time of inexperience.
Inexperience and failure can guide who we are and what we look for in life.
Portman's first film was called "The Professional." She took the audience back to one of her first reviews that would go on to affect her approach toward acting.
"Ms. Portman, a ravishing little gamine, poses far better than she acts," Janet Maslin wrote in her 1994 New York Times review of the film.
Over the long run, "The Professional" would come to be considered a moderately successful cult classic, but at the time, Portman saw it as a total failure. She acknowledges, though, that to this day, people will compliment her on this role from more than two decades ago.
This experience informed the career choices she made from there on out. She was determined to be "good" and not just "done."
And this passion, combined with a bit of inexperience, is what led her to the part of a lifetime.
It's because of her inexperience that she took on a high-risk, high-reward role in "Black Swan."
"People told me that 'Black Swan' was an artistic risk, a scary challenge to try to portray a professional ballet dancer," she says. "But it didn't feel like courage or daring that drew me to it. I was so oblivious to my own limits that I did things I was woefully unprepared to do. And so the very inexperience that in college made me feel insecure and made me want to play by others' rules, now was making me actually take risks I didn't even realize were risks."
Had she known what it took to be a ballerina, maybe she wouldn't have taken that chance. Maybe she would have passed on the role. But she took it.
So, before you become too realistic about your limits, use your inexperience for what its worth. Natalie Portman did and she took home an Oscar for it.
Photo by Mark Ralston/Getty Images.
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There's a reason why some people can perfectly copy accents, and others can't
Turns out, there's a neurodivergent link.
A woman in black long sleeve shirt stands in front of mirror.
Have you ever had that friend who goes on vacation for four days to London and comes back with a full-on Queen's English posh accent? "Oooh I left my brolly in the loo," they say, and you respond, "But you're from Colorado!" Well, there are reasons they (and many of us) do that, and usually it's on a pretty subconscious level.
It's called "accent mirroring," and it's actually quite common with people who are neurodivergent, particularly those with ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder). According Neurolaunch, the self-described "Free Mental Health Library," "Accent mirroring, also known as accent adaptation or phonetic convergence, is the tendency to unconsciously adopt the accent or speech patterns of those around us. This linguistic chameleon effect is not unique to individuals with ADHD, but it appears to be more pronounced and frequent in this population."
Essentially, when people have conversations, we're constantly "scanning" for information—not just the words we're absorbing, but the inflection and tone. "When we hear an accent, our brains automatically analyze and categorize the phonetic features, prosody, and intonation patterns," writes Neurolaunch. For most, this does result in copying the accent of the person with whom we're speaking. But those with ADHD might be more sensitive to auditory cues. This, "coupled with a reduced ability to filter out or inhibit the impulse to mimic…could potentially explain the increased tendency for accent mirroring."
While the article explains further research is needed, they distinctly state that, "Accent mirroring in individuals with ADHD often manifests as an unconscious mimicry of accents in social situations. This can range from subtle shifts in pronunciation to more noticeable changes in intonation and speech rhythm. For example, a person with ADHD might find themselves unconsciously adopting a Southern drawl when conversing with someone from Texas, even if they’ve never lived in the South themselves."
People are having their say online. On the subreddit r/ADHDWomen, a thread began: "Taking on accents is an ADHD thing?" The OP shares, "My whole life, I've picked up accents. I, myself, never noticed, but everyone around me would be like, 'Why are you talking like that??' It could be after I watched a show or movie with an accent or after I've traveled somewhere with a different accent than my 'normal.'
They continue, "Apparently, I pick it up fast, but it fades out slowly. Today... I'm scrolling Instagram, I watch a reel from a comedian couple (Darcy and Jeremy. IYKYK) about how Darcy (ADHD) picks up accents everywhere they go. It's called ADHD Mirroring??? And it's another way of masking."
(The OP is referring to Darcy Michaels and his husband Jeremy Baer, who are both touring comedians based in Canada.)
Hundreds of people on the Reddit thread alone seem to relate. One comments, "Omfg I've done this my whole life; I'll even pick up on the pauses/spaces when I'm talking to someone who is ESL—but English is my first language lol."
Sometimes, it can be a real issue for those around the chameleon. "I accidentally mimicked a waitress's weird laugh one time. As soon as she was out of earshot, my family started to reprimand me, but I was already like 'oh my god I don’t know why I did that, I feel so bad.'"
Many commenters on TikTok were shocked to find out this can be a sign of ADHD. One jokes, "Omg, yes, at a store the cashier was talking to me and she was French. She's like 'Oh are you French too? No, I'm not lol. I'm very east coast Canada."
And some people just embrace it and make it work for them. "I mirror their words or phrase! I’m 30. I realized I start calling everyone sweetie cause my manager does & I work at coffee shop."