Author: Mark

The Empathy Test

After reading Daniel Pink’s Empathy section in his book, “A Whole New Mind” he assigned us another task. One of the options was to take a test. It just so happens that I took an empathy test in psychology earlier this semester.

The test was a series of questions, where we answered with a number on a scale from 1 to 7, based on how strongly I personally feel on the question. As I answered the questions, I noticed I wasn’t answering with any 6′s or 7′s, but rather with a lot of 1′s and 2′s.

Come to find out, according to that test, I’m not very empathetic. Questions such as, “Do other people’s moods affect you?” or “Do you find it unpleasant to have a lot of things going on around you?” With some of these questions, I can see it being advantageous to answer strongly (a 6 or 7). But many of these, I feel it is better to have a lower response.

I feel it is good when things don’t affect your routine. I feel it is good that I don’t startle easy. And I feel it is often good that other people’s moods don’t affect me.

In some cases, I can see where an empathetic mindset would be a good thing, but where a more unempathetic mindset would be as advantageous and, in some cases, better.


The 20-10 Test

I read the Meaning section of Daniel Pinks “A Whole New Mind.” To end the section, he offers a variety of challenges to send his point home. I tried what Pink calls The 20-10 Test. The test asks that you imagine that you now have either 20 million dollars to call your own or you learn you now have 10 years left to live.

How would you live differently?

Would you quit your job? Get a new one? Go back to school?

In one of my earlier blogs, I explained that the Aerospace Engineering field I am pursuing is of interest to me, but the selling point was the salary. If given $20 million, I don’t truly know if I would finish out my degree. Part of me says I would, to be able to keep my self busy and have a meaningful job/hobby. But the other part of me says that a boat and a few fishing poles fills a lot of free time too. Like anyone else, I feel like I would be compelled to travel, fulfill some of the more outlandish goals and dreams, and buy a few necessary items…

The purpose behind the test is Meaning. Would you be happy with something given to you like that? Or would you still thrive for some meaning to your life; something you accomplish or complete yourself.

Only you can answer that.

image from telegraph.co.uk


“I Wanna Be That Cool”

After reading the most recent Daniel Pink assignment, he had a few recommended tasks to help elaborate on the subject.

Storytelling

My friends and I have played our own little game since high school. Some saw it as kind of cruel, but we meant no harm. We would often do it to our friends. The game was called “I Wanna Be That Cool.” The game can be played anywhere and everywhere.

Here’s how you play:

If you and a friend are someplace with other people, strangers or other friends, etc. then you have the oppurtunity to play. You simply look around and find somebody that catches your attention… usually seeming less than cool. When one of the people playing the game, any other players direct their attention to person singled out. Usually, the reason is obvious, but the initial “I wanna be that cool” is usually followed with a short story. The player tells a short story that he/she must make up on the spot.

One of the most notable ones was when I was at the beach with someone else, who I’ll leave nameless, whispered, “I wanna be that cool.” I leaned up off of my beach chair to see a rather large woman a few feet from us helping her kids dig a hole in the sand. She was much too large to be bending over as far as she was (with her back turned to me). And she was much too large to be wearing, if you can call it that, the bikini she had on. Now, cases liike this rarely need a follow up story, but one insued. The lady was attempting to dig a hole that she could sit in because she had watched The View earlier that day, where they talked off the healing power of sand. This woman thought, combined with the heat, she had found the next weight loss craze of the future.

I invite you to go and spread the game!

It can be quite fun.

 

image from gabrielweinberg.com


Halloween Homework

So for the weekend, I thought about what I would assign myself for homework. In the spirit of October and Halloween, I decided to figure out exactly what Halloween was all about.

I watched a few movies. I researched a few topics. And I came up with a few cool facts from it all.

I knew about all of the Dia de los Muertes that is celebrated in many Hispanic cultures, where they honor the dead and celebrate their passing, but our Halloween sounds nothing like that.

Kids dressing up and getting candy from strangers. Teenagers destroying pumpkins and front yards. Adults dressing up and having another excuse to throw a party.

Some say that Halloween came about from the Celts putting on ceremonies (fires, etc.) to ward off wondering ghosts, but this just wasn’t creative enough for me. So I watched some movies. One movie was “Trick ‘r’ Treat.”

This movie is really like four shorter films rolled into one, but characters are somewhat interlinked in each one. Somewhere in the middle of these movies in a movie, they tell a little bit of history and superstition. Jack-o-Lanterns are done and displayed to protect our souls and our house, being displayed on the proch, near the front door. But they must remain lit through out the 31st. The candy is an offering to the ghouls and ghosts, giving them a satisfying treat rather than them taking your spirit. The costumes are done so that the real ghouls, ghosts, and goblins can blend in with the rest of us.

Pretty weird to think about. The candy retreival and late-night pranks just fall into play.

Happy Halloween Everyone!

images from aintitcool.com and kensavage.com


Other’s Advice

I’ve talked to a few others in the past about my major and career future. Now that I’m a Junior, I got my future somewhat planned out… As much as someone can I guess. I have a couple of friends and family members that are well into the Aerospace industry, or something close. Two of my family memebrs work for Delta. One of them is a mechanic, working three weeks out of the month. Sounds pretty good. But I’ve gone over my options, and I have already learned what exactly I’m interested in. I know that rocketry and propulsion is what I’d like to focus on. All I have to do is take control of my future.

image from nar.org


For Informational Purposes Only

So, Dr. Hunter asked an interesting question in class the other day; what do you want to be when you grow up? What are your “professional aspirations” (to be more specific)?

Now, this question has passed by our desks plenty of times in the past. But now we are big kids. We are in college, so I guess its about time we start to get realistic and try and answer this question; What do you want to do with your life?

I had something like this in mind:

Maybe not that, exactly, but something close should suffice.

Specifically, with my field of Aerospace Engineering, I am interested in a career centered around rockets and propulsion. I feel like, in the space industry, propulsion is the area with the most room for improvement. I’m not saying I want to invent the next super-accelerant, but I would like to work close by. Ideally close enough to provide a comfortable living for my wife, dogs, and future kids.

I do not really mind what field I end up working in. I would like to stay in the Aerospace industry because I know that is what interests me (and I know the starting and average salaries of the profession).

After you get through the tough curriculum, you start to see the benefits of working in the engineering field. Normal hour work week, usually good benefits, and a decent paycheck. My main objective in life is to live it. To me, that is working a little and hanging out with the people you love at the places you love. And  for me that is family and friends… somewhere on the beach.

 

image from allsuperdesign.com


Sell Your Kids!

Sorry, I got that wrong. You should teach your kids to sell stuff.

Sorry for the confusion, but now that I have your attention, I’d like to introduce to a man named Cameron Herold. Herold has been sharing his belief and practice on raising his kids to be entrepreneurs, as his father did him. See the video here(http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/cameron_herold_let_s_raise_kids_to_be_entrepreneurs.html).

This video really made since to me. Herold had problems with French and was gifted at public speaking. Don’t get the kid a French tutor, get him a public speaking coach. Improve his already above average skills into something special. It is like if you have a 5th grade mathematician that is not that good at ancient World History. Do you let them sharpen their math skills or do you leave that alone and force them to study history?

In my eyes, you are going to let them choose their major in college and live their life, why concentrate on the negative, in any situation or aspect of life.

Cameron Herold also talks about his children knowing and understanding earning and saving money. He teaches them the art of negotiating and compromising. He teaches them how to analyze clientele, how to make a business where no one sees the oppurtunity. How to notice and foresee innovation.

I will definately remember this when raising my kids… when that time comes.

Until then, and until next time, farewell.

 

image from ballyhooligan.wordpress.com


Story of Stories Finale

     The first half of the semester is gone, and the class is moving on to other tasks. Now that the invention mobs project has come to a close, for our English class at least, we get to look back and reflect on our job well done. We worked as a team, had a creative process, covered the four standards of excellence, and gave the project a worthy farewell.

     As a group, I feel like we meshed really well. Each of the group members submitted good ideas, and we all showed up at meetings outside of class when asked. There were no arguments. And one thing that surprised me was that everyone participated in making a little childish YouTube video for the sake of the project; shyness or embarrassment never arose. When we finally met to figure out how exactly to showcase our work, everyone communicated well. We talked through the layout and decided who would cover each of the closing tasks for the final presentation.

     When we started out, our progress was slow. Our creative process had a few dead ends, but our destination was unknown, which I feel is the best kind. Our original idea was limited, and we felt like it did not reach or include enough people. We went from having eight stories (planning to turn them into one), each with a different author, to having one story with a different author at every sentence’s end. We took this one story, followed it with illustrations, colored the illustrations, and showcased the final project, encouraging others to be an author in our ongoing project. If not for our various contributions, the end product would not have been as impressive. It took all of us to come up with our main direction and goals.

     During class, we collaborated and debated on four major criteria for our project to be modeled after; the four standards of excellence. Visual rhetoric was a simple task, which Eric and Tim mastered with the poster and Kyle and I perfected with the overall table layout. Attention to Audience is where I feel like our group really went above and beyond. Our table was interactive; showcasing a wishing well and a chance for the audience to participate in our ongoing story of stories (They can revisit the link and see where THERE story has gone, both literally and physically). Since our group meshed so well, Organization just sort of happened. No one member was out of the loop in anything. We all were fully aware of all areas of the project, so anyone could pick up where the other left off. And Objective was evident with our interactive process; connecting people through a story, requiring minimal effort, but still be a part of something.

     The final showcase of the project showed how much effort each of us put into the project; not a lot. We did not write the story, everyone else did, and this is what was so fun about the project. Our final product that we showcased wasn’t even ours. It was everyone else’s. In the end, I did a few illustrations for the PowerPoint part, but Tim colored the pictures in with Photoshop. And each of us in the group had one thing for the final showcase. In the end, we did work hard on the project, but we only steered the progress a little bit, our anonymous authors did, and are still doing, the real work.

See more at: http://bakingacookie.wordpress.com/


The Story of Stories 2

It’s finished!!

Our story of stories project, linked here(https://docs.google.com/document/d/1rfu-bEQpaK_Nxb1IIX1kU28aooM_lW0yBABnGlQYWVI/edit?hl=en_US&pli=1) has come to a close.

We advertised well, placing it on a couple of facebook pages and profiles, sending out a  mass email, and accessing it through our blogs. It brought a lot of traffic to the google doc. Our group actually watched as the document changed and grew before our eyes, 15 to 20 users adding and arguing at once. The story seemed to go astray from what we had expected, but it has now incorporated all of the objects.

Thanks for all of the help guys! Check back in for our final presentation of “The Story of Stories”


It All Depends On YOU

So our Invention Mobs projects are refining down to a final culmination. Most groups have decided on their final medium, as well as how their concept will be presented. My group and I have sort of done that.

While participating in this project I have realized how easy it is for people to contribute on something. I have seen how helping out could hinder someone or make a difference in someone’s life. But I have also come to notice how resistant some people are to helping. How hard it is to get people to participate in a project, no matter how easy the task at hand may be, like say… writing, or even speaking, a single sentence.

Our group, let’s call it the Dream Team, decided to do a story of stories. We put up a forum asking people to add a sentence, making a coherent story in the end. The forum site had over 40 views, 1 added sentence, and it was from me. So Tim, of the Dream Team, posted it on another site, where we also received just 1 sentence.

We changed it to a google doc that could be clicked on (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1rfu-bEQpaK_Nxb1IIX1kU28aooM_lW0yBABnGlQYWVI/edit?hl=en_US) and added to anonymously. If you are reading this, please take a few more seconds and participate. If my begging does not suffice, check out our video: 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wWZPKJob9Nk&feature=player_embedded