Self-doubt is one of the most destructive forces. It makes you defensive instead of open, reactive instead of active. Self-doubt is consuming and cruel and my hope is today that we can all collectively agree to ban it.
Jennifer Lee
University of New Hampshire Commencement 2014, 2014
Video beginnt bei 9:32 — der Moment, in dem dieses Zitat gesprochen wurde
Die Geschichte hinter diesem Zitat
Jennifer Lee, the co-director and screenwriter of Disney's Frozen and Chief Creative Officer of Walt Disney Animation Studios, returned to her alma mater to deliver a commencement address entirely devoted to the theme of self-doubt. She accepted the speaking invitation precisely because her first reaction had been 'I'm not good enough to be the commencement speaker.' Lee traced her own battle with self-doubt from childhood bullying — 'I had the energy of the Tasmanian devil and the grace of a pile of pick-up sticks' — through high school, college, and into her film career. She described the lenses of self-doubt as 'nasty, thick and filthy, covered in swamp scum and mold, with a family of snails living on them.' The death of her college friend Jason MacConkey during their junior year at UNH temporarily knocked those lenses off: 'When you wake up so young with such loss, there is no doubt, only grief. And in that grief you see clearly.' The call to 'ban' self-doubt was simultaneously playful and serious — an acknowledgment that while self-doubt can't truly be eliminated, collectively naming it as the enemy is a powerful first step.