Is technology making us stupid—or smarter than we’ve ever been? Author Nicholas Carr memorably made the case for the former in his 2010 book The Shallows: What The Internet Is Doing To Our Brains. This fall we’ll have a rejoinder of sorts from writer Clive Thompson, with his book Smarter Than You Think: How Technology Is Changing Our Minds For The Better.
My own take: technology can make us smarter or stupider, and we need to develop a set of principles to guide our everyday behavior, making sure that tech is improving and not impeding our mental processes. Today I want to propose one such principle, in response to the important question: What kind of information do we need to have stored in our heads, and what kind can we leave “in the cloud,” to be accessed as necessary?
Click to read the rest. This question of whether technology is helping or hurting is hot. I watch as friends and colleagues take positions on the matter and then argue vehemently for their point of view. I like Paul's approach: It's how you use technology that makes it a positive or negative influence so let's find the ways to use it with wisdom.
Note: Here's a related article by Paul from which a couple of the paragraphs in the above-linked-to post were originally published: "‘Digital Literacy’ Will Never Replace The Traditional Kind" (TIME).
If you want to support people, including yourself, in making changes or accomplishing goals, read The Progress Principle. The simple message: Research shows that if we can see our progress, no matter how small, we are motivated to keep on the path towards the change or goal. I can't tell you how many times I have recommended the book, or how many times people have read the book and then sent me a hearty "thank you."
For a quick overview of the book, click to watch this video (99u) of coauthor Dr. Teresa Amabile. In it she mentions that a person can track their progress in many ways including using an app; one example of this kind of app is iDoneThis, which you can download for free.
I finally decided to give Jerry Seinfeld's productivity secret a try. It's more commonly known as "Don't Break the Chain," and the concept is simple: spend some amount of time doing a desired activity every day and, when you do, cross off that day on a calendar. This creates a chain of Xs showing your progress. If you don't do your specified task on one day, you don't get an X and that chain is broken. It seems almost too simple to work, but it's allowed me to accomplish so much more than I ever thought possible.
And here's an app to support you in not breaking the chain: Wonderful Day.
If you have not already tried harnessing the progress principle, I urge you to give it a try.
Note: One of many reasons I am a believer in the value of the progress principle (other than that I have seen it work for myself and others) is because it is compatible with some of the solution-focused techniques, such as scaling. I have blogged about solution-focused approaches in the past, e.g., here, here, and here.
Mediation can be boring. In the last couple of years, I have talked with several experienced conflict professionals who have echoed my feeling of boredom. The boredom does not so much flow from being with parties in conflict but from the discussions among practitioners. I sense that too frequently we are playing small, our thinking and acting constrained, and governed excessively by the past.
And for those us of who have been involved in the field for decades, the feeling of deja vu descends upon us as we hear the same old discussions arising anew, from questions about process accreditation to prickly analyses of party autonomy and caucusing to debates about mediator self-awareness and mindfulness. We've been there and done that and know deep in our hearts that those may not be the right questions for the 21st century.
Always on the lookout for ways to ascertain the best questions to ask myself, parties, and the field, I was delighted to learn that Dr. Roberta Ness has a new book. I savored her first book. She teaches a class on innovation and is dean of University of Texas School of Public Health. (Click to watch her TEDxHouston talk on increasing innovation.) Today I listened to an interview of Dr. Ness (WGBH News) in which she talks about all of her books and how to become more creative.
In the interview she looks at this question: What if you could define—and distill—innovation and creativity? She says that innovation is teachable (although it takes practice like playing a musical instrument) and geniuses work from a toolbox. Her first book Innovation Generation describes those tools. She talks about her concern that the US is facing a lack of imagination and that schools are not teaching students to be creative. Even though kids' IQs are going up, their creativity is going down.
Ness says when a 3-year-old colors in a coloring book or draws a picture, he may decide to use the green crayon for hair; the typical school soon teaches him that is not an acceptable option. On the other hand, a philosophy and practice of education that does raise students' ability to innovate is Montessori, and Ness includes Maria Montessori as one of the people she profiles in her new book Genius Unmasked.
A threshold skill of innovation is frame-shifting. Ness explains that frames are expectations we have through which we filter new information. What's a frame-shift? From the WGBH site:Picture yourself in a restaurant, ordering a plate of linguine. The waiter delivers your food piping hot and asks if you need anything else. You politely ask for a little Parmesan cheese to go with your pasta — and in response the waiter says, “go to the kitchen and get it yourself.”
Ness calls this sort of puzzling interaction a “frame-shift.” When you go to a restaurant, you have a set of assumptions and expectations that Ness calls a “frame” — that you’ll order food, that your waiter will serve you, and that you’ll leave a tip, for example. The concept applies to professional fields as well. Just imagine the reaction to the first man who suggested the Earth was round.
She says that a frame-shift is often shocking and we therefore may reject it. Innovators must sometimes endure rejection. They also must use a tool of expansion: asking big, gigantic questions—and the right questions.
In her first book, Ness provides some tips for asking the right questions (perhaps in the new book, too, but I have not yet read it). She gives an acronym for remembering the tips: PIG In MuD. They are described here in this book review from Pacific Standard. From the book, they are:
Now let's use mediation as an example. First, would innovation in the field be helpful? If so, what questions can we ask that would improve the process, practice, or profession of conflict resolution? Although considering innovation in conflict resolution does not require green hair, a couple of trips to the kitchen to get your own Parmesan might be helpful. Let me know your thoughts.
The Goodwin Games, a new Fox TV comedy starring Beau Bridges, is a little wacky but it makes a vital personal finance point between laughs: Parents should ensure their children will inherit their estates as they wish, of course, but it’s equally important – maybe even more important – that they pass on their values.
How are you doing on that score?
An intriguing finding that caught my eye in the recent survey of people over 45, Americans’ Perspectives on New Retirement Realities and the Longevity Bonus, from Merrill Lynch and the Age Wave consulting firm, really underscores this view.
Click to read the rest of "Focus On Passing Down Your Values, Not Money" (Forbes).
The sound of cicadas on the east coast. Click to listen. (Above is a photo I took of one of the gang.)
Note: You can hear the sound of a landing plane in the middle of this short recording but mostly just the cicadas singing (or whatever they do).
Note (added June 3, 2013): Article on the cicadas "17-year cicadas create a buzz in some Va. neighborhoods" (Washington Post). Click to listen to them in another of my recordings from Manassas, Virginia.
Note (added June 9, 2013). Here are some haiku poems written by Matsu Basho about cicadas.
Nothing in the cry
of cicadas suggests they
are about to die
Calm and serene
The sound of a cicada
Penetrates the rock
Lonely silence,
A single cicada's cry
Sinking into stone
I am pleased to introduce to you Christine Valters Paintner and her new book Eyes of the Heart. I read the book because of my belief that photography can increase both our mindfulness and our ability to attend to ourselves, others, and our world. The book shows us why and how the way of seeing facilitated by photography can be valuable. I asked Christine a few questions that may be of interest to conflict professionals.
The law can be a very stressful profession. In Todd Kashdan's book Curious, he talks about the relationship between curiosity and anxiety: the more curious one is, the less anxiety he or she will be experiencing. In your book, you talk about the promotion of curiosity through photography. Will you say more about that, please.
Curiosity is a wonderful quality which promotes spacious inquiry. Rather than needing to figure everything out and extract the answers, through curiosity we can hold ourselves open to new possibilities. To be curious means to let go of my own expectations about how things should be and discover what is really there. It means softening my desire to be right and listen into new ways of thinking and being.
Since reading your book, I have repeated in conversations several of the points you made. People seem uniformly intrigued with the notion of receiving photos rather than taking them. Please explain that to readers.
This is one of my favorite aspects of talking about photography specifically as a contemplative practice. Our favorite and common language for photography is “taking” a photo. We use it all the time without much thought as to the deeper meaning of the words. But we live in a culture of taking, where we often grasp at things we want, look for life to meet our desires of the moment, feel impatient when things don’t go our way.
To “receive” a photo means to shift our intention in the process of creating an image. For me, receiving is about acknowledging that all of life is a gift. When I go for a walk with my camera, rather than look around me thinking about what images I can take, what kinds of beautiful things I can record as a trophy to my experience, I try to cultivate this sense of receiving gifts. I pay attention to moments that shimmer before me, even if I don’t understand exactly why. Something calls to me, stirs my energy, quickens me and I create a sense of spaciousness to receive that through the lens of the camera to see what might be revealed to me.
Mediators and other conflict professionals often use the process of reframing. How can your approach to photography help a person to become better at reframing in other arenas besides photography?
My hope is always that the practices in the book will spill over into daily life. We move through life telling ourselves a lot of stories. Some of these stories might be true, but more often they are based on our own limited vision of life, or from a wound we experienced long ago and we have frozen ourselves in that place.
Think about something simple, like you are running late for an appointment. Perhaps your mind starts to construct stories about what will happen if you arrive late. You will disappoint your boss, you will be reprimanded and humiliated, you will not get the promotion you wanted, and you will disappoint your spouse again. Your own version of this story will differ, but we all create this kind of narrative in response to anxiety in our lives. When we reframe, we acknowledge that the story we are telling ourselves may not be the full truth, and as such may not be especially helpful.
Another example from my own life: I spent many years dealing with a serious chronic illness. The story I had developed about myself took into account this reality and my limitations. For a long time, this was actually a helpful way for me to honor what I could and could not take on. However, as I gradually began to heal and have more energy and ability, the old story still stayed for a long time, until one day I was able to “reframe” my experience and begin to see what I am really capable of.
We can learn this from photography by paying attention to how we frame things within the lens and noticing the patterns and thoughts which arise in response. Slowly we might become more aware of the lens we use in daily life and which patterns are helpful, and which are restricting our freedom or creating even more anxiety.
Conflict is often seen as a problem and lack of perfection in a situation. Your description of wabi sabi reminded me of broken relationships. Do you think an understanding of wabi sabi could be helpful to parties in conflict?
I think that is a lovely connection Stephanie. I hadn’t thought of it in exactly that way before. The beauty of wabi sabi for me is the reminder that there is much grace in the things that are decaying or dying, in the scenes where things feel messy or in disorder.
Conflict is a healthy meeting of different needs when both parties are allowed to have their own experience, but also honor the other person’s right to have a different experience. If we see the beauty in the conflict, perhaps we could approach it with more reverence and respect, and see that we actually need to move through the discomfort of it to come to a place where everyone is heard and mutually honored. I am a big believer in the grace of being uncomfortable and how that can stretch us in new ways, to welcome in new perspectives.
Christine Valters Paintner, PhD, is the online Abbess at Abbey of the Arts, a virtual monastery and community for contemplative practice and creative expression. She is the author of 7 books on art and monasticism, including her latest, Eyes of the Heart: Photography as a Christian Contemplative Practice (Ave Maria Press). Christine currently lives out her commitment as a monk in the world with her husband in Galway, Ireland.
The "grace of being uncomfortable." What a nice description of true conflict resolution! I thank Christine for her thoughts above and for her excellent book. If you have not already done so, I recommend that you read Eyes of the Heart.
My talented friend and colleague Susanne Hoogwater (also a lawyer and mediator) is very creative. Since she is a Renaissance Soul, I am constantly astounded and delighted at the new arenas she opens up for others and the products she designs. Recently I have become aware of a method she is using to facilitate teaching about conflict, and watched it in action.
And now you may watch a sample SketchVideo created by Susanne, too. It's part of a series on emotional intelligence and critical decisionmaking that she is designing for Denver's Conflict Center. This sample looks at four kinds of power: over, surrender, with, and within.
Click to watch the SketchVideo and to learn more about the benefits of communicating with this medium, as well as Susanne's process of creating these videos. She does it all on her iPad!
Scan through your image library and select a handful of your favorites. Study each image and ask yourself these questions:
Since most people in my session would not have brought photos with them, I provided those below. Attendees were asked to write some reactions, observations, feelings, or descriptive words below each of the photos. I urged them to then revisit the photos a week later, preferably even further in the future, and again respond to them (not looking at the previous responses). Typically responses will shift and change.
Roberts writes in her book:Let's loosen up your literal association with imagery and train your eye to see more conceptually. One way to do this is by associating different words with an image to see how the connection between the two might change the way you feel about an image. Take a look at the following iPhone images and think about ... three words associated with each image. ... Set a date on your calendar one year from today [in my experience sooner can be as effective] to re-evaluate the images and your word selections to see if you feel differently.
Try a similar exercise with your own photos. Choose and assign a one-word title for images ... then revisit the photos at a later date to see if you feel compelled to rename them. The life perspectives you collect over time will likely reveal shifts in your perspective. [Emphasis added.]
If you try this measuring stick for shifts in perspective, either by using the photos below or your own, please let me know what you detect. For me, hearing about these shifts is fun, engaging, often intriguing.
Now for the photos (you will need to click for enlargement to see all the shots) . . .
Here are some photos. (I apologize that a couple of the captions are incomplete because Typepad does not resize them when a photo is resized.)
We have set the date for the Snap to Attention™ retreat to be held at the beautiful Spirit Mountain Retreat in Idyllwild, CA (nearest airport is Palm Springs). The two-day program will be held on the first weekend in November. Check here at this post for more details soon, email me to be notified when they are added, or join the Spirit Mountain mailing list.
This a short description of the program:
Snap to Attention™: Increasing Self-Awareness with Your Smartphone’s Camera
Brain science has proven what wise people have always known: Two critical components of resolving conflict, achieving career satisfaction, serving clients, and excelling at many other personal and professional endeavors are sharp and sensitive self-awareness and awake and aware attention. Many of us have in our pocket a tool to increase those skills of awareness and attention: our phone camera. We will look at how the camera’s filters, frames, and focus are metaphors for how we see the world, and ways to use our camera to increase our moment-to-moment mindfulness. Bring your smartphone and mind to increase in-sight and out-sight.
We will of course have time for contemplative activities, including photo snapping, on Spirit Mountain's beautiful grounds.
Click to read previous posts about photography.
Image credit: Spirit Mountain.
I recently learned of an app that allows me impose one photo on another. It's called Superimpose. Below is my debut attempt. As you can see, I have lots to learn but the app is definitely master-able. In my research, I learned that this may be the easiest app of those that combine photos.
As a demo of how the app works, I decided to play with a very old photo of my Springer Spaniel Scipio looking at a friend. (Both the dog and the friend are long dead.)
Below I have posted the original photo, then the version on which I used another app called Popsicolor, and finally a floating photo made with Superimpose. You will need to click the last photo to see the full version or you will miss part of the effect.
What apps do you recommend for photos?
The friend holding the food which is of such great interest to my dog is Mike Sparrow. Click to read his obituary.
Be sure to cllck to see the entire photo or, because of Typepad sizing, you will only see a view that is incomplete.
For a friend, I wrote this caption about the last photo: I think Scipio may be somewhere still, coveting someone's hamburger and fries.
We each have our own individual, unique filters and frames. This individuality results in our seeing the world—and people, situations, and circumstances in the world—in very different ways. I don't always attend to, construe, or notice what you do. Of course, as most of us probably know well, these differences can lead to conflict.
I recently posted about filters and frames at Brains on Purpose, and included a number of photos using various filters, frames, and apps to illustrate how one scene can have many versions or interpretations. That post at Brains on Purpose received a positive response from readers so I decided to post another series of shots, this time here at idealawg.
Take a look below at the various portrayals of garbage containers waiting on the street for the disposal truck. (Click on photos for larger versions.) Do the different renderings cause you to focus on varying places in the photo; imagine a different story; shift your responses, attitudes, or feelings?
Before taking a look, I hope you read the post at Brains on Purpose.
Note (added April 28, 2013): Here's information about a related workshop coming up later this year: "Upcoming seminar—Snap to Attention: Increasing Self-Awareness with Your Smartphone’s Camera" (idealawg).
The insanity crept up on us slowly; we just wanted what was best for our kids. We bought macrobiotic cupcakes and hypoallergenic socks, hired tutors to correct a 5-year-old's "pencil-holding deficiency," hooked up broadband connections in the treehouse but took down the swing set after the second skinned knee. We hovered over every school, playground and practice field — "helicopter parents," teachers christened us ... ."
Click to read previous idealawg posts about helicopter parents.
But the hovering behavior does not only go down the family tree, it also flies up into the parent branches. Adult children are overprotecting their aging parents. I suppose we can call a person doing this up-the-tree overprotecting a "helicopter child."
The motivations for hovering over and around one's parent are many. Just four are mentioned in "Overprotective children do more harm than good" (Gainesville Sun): old-age myths, the widowed parent, reparenting your parents, and emotional baggage. A bit of elaboration on these four reasons adult children overprotect . . .
Of course, there are many other reasons a child may hover. A few that come to mind right now: need to be needed, guilt, tendency to martyrdom, or lack of ability to listen to or read the parent.
The balance between autonomy and support is a delicate one in any relationship. In the case of aging parents, that balance can be particularly challenging. And there are ways to frame the challenge that can make it easier.
How do we maintain balance?
Although the balancing can be complex with many factors to consider, and unique to each family, a simple diagnostic tool can be helpful on a day-to-day basis. As in many situations, a double axis chart may be of some quick and simple guidance. Deciding which of the four quadrants below (click on chart for larger version) is most appropriate for the situation can keep one focused on that balance between support and autonomy. Ideally those decisions can be made in a collaborative manner between parent and child, keeping in mind that the appropriate quadrant may shift over time and be different for each situation (e.g., healthcare, eating, transportation, finances, living space maintenance, recreation).
Obviously, the interactions of a parent and child in the quadrant of high autonomy and low support is going to be different from interactions in high support and low autonomy. The latter is where you may find helicopter children, if the support is excessive for the situation.
To avoid helicopter childing, communication is key. Click here and here to read two poignant stories of missing communication, two stories of what most children probably want to avoid. For guidance, take a look at How to Say It to Seniors: Closing the Communication Gap with Our Elders.
Even if navigating new waters, caring and respect are excellent lighthouses. Or, to use a metaphor more aligned with helicopters: even if flying in unfamiliar air spaces, caring and respect are excellent air traffic controllers.
Note (added April 22, 2013): As I write in a post on an aligned topic, the opposite extreme can be much worse: "Tomorrow you may become yesterday's child: Is preventing elder abuse a matter of cultural integrity?" (idealawg).