A former poker machine addict, an acupuncturist and a rally driver walked into a bar.
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Well, okay, they didn't walk into a bar but they did walk onto the Canberra Theatre stage on Saturday to share their deeply personal stories and the spark of an idea they hope will spread.
The annual TEDx Canberra event - this year centred on the theme 'momentum' - was a day packed with inspiration, with 17 Canberrans stepping on to the famous red dot to inspire, challenge and educate.
TEDx Canberra is the local version of the global TED (Technology Entertainment Design) talk phenomenon.
Sutton resident Melanie Greenhalgh wants people to know it's okay to be so completely consumed by grief that you can't see a way out.
Indigenous entrepreneur Julie Okely would love to see Australian primary school children learn to speak an Indigenous language at school.
And acupuncturist and Chinese medicine doctor Kal Ientile wants people who work in an office to start scraping a Chinese soup spoon along their trapezius muscle every hour.
Mr Ientile's TEDx talk focused on the phenomenon of "chronic mobile neck" - where the small muscles in the neck struggle to bear the weight of the head sitting forward and facing downwards while looking at a mobile phone, tablet or laptop.
"So the big muscles start to take over and get so tight it causes trigger point, where the muscles contract and can't let go," he said.
"My idea is for people to buy a Chineese soup spoon - and you can get them anywhere for about $1 - and just stop for 20 seconds every hour and run the spoon along the muscle.
"The scraping causes the body to send extra blood to the muscle and hence keeps it warm and looser."
It's a small idea that could make a huge difference to people's lives - and that's the point of TEDx.
But the day wasn't just about talking. Professional graphic recorder Gavin Blake was on hand to draw each talk as a huge infographic, in real-time.
"My drawings help amplify and share the ideas being talked about on stage," Mr Blake said.
"And if you missed TEDx, it's a brilliant way to visually catch up on the awesome content you missed."
The ideas discussed at TEDx Canberra will be made into video clips, available on the TEDx Canberra YouTube channel next month.
