Inspirational Talk with Ghazaleh Ghobadi: From Medical Physicist to Storyteller

“Stories of us are meaningless without context”

In our most recent Inspirational Talk, Ghazaleh Ghobadi reflected on her inspiring personal and career journey from Iran to the Netherlands, from being a medical physicist to becoming a professional storyteller.

Mathematics Are For Girls

Ghazaleh was born and brought up in Iran to a mother who was a teacher and a father who was a pilot. Even though she was always interested in writing, she decided to pursue mathematics as was expected from girls at the time. She felt that being a girl in Iran flying wasn’t an option. But quantum physics felt like actually flying without wings.

“You can actually fly without wings.”

As a young woman she felt the need to leave Iran and continue her career in the Netherlands. She earned her PhD at the University of Groningen and did her Postdoc at the Leiden University and The Netherlands Cancer Institute where she also continued working as a medical physicist.

STEM for Women: A Perspective on Iran vs. The Netherlands

Reflecting on her experience, Ghazaleh noted that while it was more common for girls to enter STEM fields in Iran, she found that the Netherlands provided a fairer environment for scientific research. Her journey highlights the challenges and opportunities women face in STEM, both globally and personally.

Becoming a Storyteller

In the meantime, she also gave birth to her son who has helped her see the world in other ways. This inspired her to vocalize her fears and burnout and make a career change. After finishing a storytelling course, Ghazaleh found her new path. Now she runs her company Streamind. With Streamind, she works on various projects from the ones that promote artists inside Iran for creating art without censorship to workshops that encourage the use of storytelling, art, and mindfulness practices for well-being and personal development.

Today, Ghazaleh is also part of WIQD’s Organizing Committee. She found WIQD through one of her friends attending our Annual Symposium and felt that she had a unique ability to understand the experiences of women in the quantum field as well as to help them to share their stories.

Final Thoughts

Thank you to Ghazaleh for sharing her story with us! While this was a bit of a different inspirational talk from our other ones, featuring a role model who left the field, we hope you were inspired to follow your journey wherever it might take you, be it in quantum or somewhere else!

For more inspirational stories, join our next Inspirational Talk!