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Jan
19
Accidental Lessons
Filed Under lifelong learning, personal development, teaching moments | View Comments
I don’t like Ariel.
No, that’s not true. It’s not that I don’t like Ariel. I actually hate her. I have since I was sixteen. Teenaged me just couldn’t get behind a girl who gives up a critical (non-harmful) component of her personal identity to pursue a guy she doesn’t know anything about, but thinks is cute. Adult me doesn’t care for characters who do this, either.
The Disney Princesses in general have come under quite a bit of attack in recent months because of the lessons these characters, beloved by little girls for decades, have the potential to share. No one is looking at the fairy tale from which the Princess came or the period during which the movie was made. They’re too busy worrying that a mindset from days gone by will translate as “classic” and “expected” for girls of today.
And they’re not wrong for worrying.
Not too long ago, a picture was making the rounds on the feminist sites where someone had taken each Disney Princess and boiled her down to her essence. While I hotly disagree with the analysis of bookworm Belle, it illustrates the lesson a little girl could pick up from her favorite princess. The problem is, it’s not just little girls being imprinted with these lessons. Web series The Guild illustrates just how widespread the problem is when a male character insults another male character by telling him he has the street smarts of a cartoon princess.
When everyone learns a lesson incorrectly, it becomes that much harder to set the record straight.
I do appreciate how Huffy’s marketing department seems to be approaching the situation. The new commercial for their Disney Princess bikes shows two little girls off on a quest to rescue a prince (a teddy bear). Once he’s free, they take off on another adventure. The commercial has been already been recognized for promoting feminist values for little girls, but is it really enough?
It might prove to be a good start if the effort can be sustained by other girl-focused media.
Jan
8
Games Develop Transactional Awareness
Filed Under gaming, lifelong learning, personal development | View Comments
During grad school, I spent my weekends helping out at a friend’s game shop. The shop hosted the Pokemon League and held a weekly tournament, which meant there were a lot of tweens and teens in the shop. My friend was often handling sales and doing orders and to say the other owner wasn’t good with kids would be a gross understatement, so I ran League and the tournament and my friend did all the official paperwork for it.
Watching the kids between games and tournament rounds was interesting. They would swap strategy tips and help out confused newcomers. The more experienced kids would take on a trainer or mentoring role, adopting the new kid and showing them how to best use their cards or how to combine their cards. They would help them navigate the League procedures. The newcomer was quickly settled in, and the kids were helping each other become better players.
Sometimes, the kids would trade cards. They’d work together to find a comparable trade that would make both parties happy. Sometimes, they’d come borrow a trade magazine to check and make sure they had a fair trade going. When a dispute came up, they worked it out themselves or asked a third kid to help them resolve it. They only brought it to the owners if they absolutely couldn’t work it out on their own.
A couple of years after I left, these same kids were working together to set up in-store leagues and tournaments for other TCGs, continuing to mentor new kids in as they showed up. We were pretty proud of them.
People frown on the obsessiveness that can come from gaming, especially TCGs and miniature gaming, but they’re missing the benefits these kids get from engaging in them. They learn to share their knowledge. They learn how to help out someone else, selflessly in most cases. They learn how to resolve their own disagreements. They learn how to negotiate with an eye toward win-win results. They learn how to interact with each other, and they learn what is appropriate and what is inappropriate in interacting with someone else.
Gaming develops a wide range of skills, which helps younger gamers develop into adults who can better handle the world around them.
Nov
19
In preparation for watching the finale tonight, I’ve been watching the Project Runway extras. Extended judging. Designer interviews. One thing really stood out to me as I listened to each one discuss where he or she came from: Where you start doesn’t have to be where you’ll end up, but what you do on the way can guide, shape, and have a profound effect on your ultimate destination.
Some of this season’s contestants have been designing from the get-go. They knew early on what they wanted to do, and they’ve followed their heart. Others had to “arrive”. One of them actually started out as a med student. He found the human body fascinating, but not enough to repair it. Going through med school, though, gave him a better understanding of the human body, which has, in turn, made him a good designer.
I think that’s one benefit creatives have — they can take what they’ve seen and done, and apply it to make their work stronger and more personal. Every life experience becomes one more layer in their work. When you aren’t doing creative work, it’s easy to take a narrow-minded approach to your work. Instead of embracing what you’ve done and been, you get yourself locked into the role you’re currently in.
This is my current struggle. I went from creating workshops, educational programs, and mini-games to doing nothing but teaching someone else’s curriculum and doing admin work. When I started realizing I wasn’t happy with where I was, I started looking to jobs I probably never would have considered and naturally couldn’t figure out how to make myself fit into them. I even lost my love of volunteering because I kept trying to serve companies and causes I just wasn’t interested in.
A few months ago, I started actually looking at my own path, at where I’ve been, and I noticed something. My path has been filled with the kind of organizing, creative, and educational work that I enjoy. I’ve had it with me all along. Years of assisting with curating and managing collections, both at work and privately. Years of writing, crafting, designing. Years of not only teaching, but coaching, mentoring, and directing. It’s all right there, waiting to be added up to something I’m really going to shine at and enjoy.
And then I started running into this message everywhere.
I actually share it with my students now when they worry that what they decide to do in their electives at school or in their college work will tie them down forever. I tell them to study what interests them right now and let it become part of who they are, because they honestly never know how an interest from their youth will help shape and direct their future.
Sep
14
The necessary, but unloved, skill
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The school year has begun, and I’m starting to meet new students at the tutoring center. One of my new study skills students and I were talking about his course load for the year, and I discovered he was taking both an Auto-CAD and a drawing class. When I asked why both, he said he liked drafting, but he needed to learn drawing skills to really get where he wants to be after high school.
I could appreciate that. The road I’m building under my feet will definitely benefit from my having some sort of drawing skill, but I struggle to create stick figures. Last summer, I took the time to work through the beginning level of Drawspace in the hopes of developing some sort of skill. What I found was that I could duplicate the lessons, but when I tried to apply techniques on my own, it was like I had never learned the skill. To make matters worse, I hated doing the real-life human lessons. In fact, I often put them off because I didn’t want to do them. I completely ignored the last lesson because I felt like I’d had enough. I gave up and promised myself that I’d go back to it when I was less frustrated.
Despite my problems recreating people, I enjoyed the cartoon lessons. I knew that if I wanted those to come out well, then I needed to understand human proportions and the basics of drawing a well-constructed, believable person. I found a book that taught drawing people from stick figure bases. I could wrap my mind around that, but in the end I became frustrated again and put down my pencils.
Even though drawing and I don’t really get along me right now, I know that I have to gain a little mastery over it to really be successful in my chosen future. I’ll keep at it in these little bursts until it frustrates me less, and then I’ll work on it in longer bursts until I’m where I want to be. By then, I might even enjoy the thought of drawing.
Jul
20
The gender of children’s play
Filed Under personal development | View Comments
I was an unusual kid. I played dress-up, often using safety pins and a collection of old jewelry and scarves to help change to form of the clothes to match whatever game I was playing. That led to a brief period of designing my own fashions and trying to learn to sew. I had a few Barbies that I liked to style. I had a pretty nice play kitchen and I held tea parties.
But I also had boxes I’d turned into sailing ships, race cars, and computers. I had action figures from Star Wars, G.I. Joe, and M.A.S.K. I would run around with my cousins, water gun in hand, and play Transformers. After school, I’d spread my books out on my parents’ bed and worked on my homework while I watched Silverhawks and Thundercats.
I graduated from my play kitchen to a weather station, a planetarium projector, and a telescope.
I was lucky. My parents didn’t worry about whether or not certain toys were appropriate for their daughter. They let me explore and play with those things I enjoyed. If that meant I wanted Victorian Barbie to lead an army of Joes, so be it! I was a child having fun.
It’s bizarre, but twenty years after I stopped playing with my Barbies and action figures, I routinely have to defend my cartoon choices to some of my girl students because they’re just mortified that I watch cartoons their brothers enjoy. (They aren’t bothered by the fact that I’m a thirtysomething who still loves to watch cartoons.) The boys I teach feel they have to apologize for liking anything on the Disney Channel.
This shouldn’t be. Somehow, it feels like we’re still caught in this time warp where little girls play house with their dollies and boys raze everything in sight with their toy trucks. As I said earlier, it’s not as bad as it was when I first started teaching, but it’s still there and it does still shape how my teenagers and the young adults in my life think.
Girls should be able to choose what kinds of games they want to play without having stereotypes forced on them.
Boys should be able to choose what kinds of games they want to play without having stereotypes forced on them.
Jun
26
One way to reduce stress is to do things you enjoy. The idea is if you enjoy what you’re doing, then it will be less likely to add to your stress.
Unless you’re like me. I keep a master to-do list of various projects I need and want to get through, many of which involve activities I enjoy. Then, I select a few to work on for the time being. On the surface, this looks like a great idea. When I need to unwind, I have a selection of ways to chill out and do something I enjoy.
Instead, what happens sometimes is that I’ve become so overwhelmed that those few choices feel overwhelming and I can’t do anything until I’ve resolved some of that stress. Then, I can narrow down my choices and start getting things done.
Sometimes, I”ll set a deadline for parts of projects I’m working on and that works well for me. I can work to a deadline and not get stressed out about it. Except there are times I can’t meet my own deadline for whatever reason. When I’m just juggling projects, I’ll often shift around deadlines so I can finish what I’m working on. But when that sense of being overwhelmed kicks in, I become annoyed that I missed the deadline, which adds to my stress, and I have to take a step back, relax, and then shuffle the current deadlines.
Lesson learned: Working on projects or activities you enjoy can be a great way to relax. Just make sure the project or activity isn’t adding to your stress level.
Jun
24
Taming Stress
Filed Under personal development | View Comments
You’re back! I guess some of the symptoms from Monday’s post resonated with you and now you’re wondering how stand tall without feeling a lot of pain in your back or looking like a hunchback.
A good place to start is with some of the lifestyle choices I illustrated on Monday.
- Exercise. Walking is a great way to reduce stress because it’s active, it allows you to change your scenery, and you can walk at a speed that suits your mood. When I’m thinking a lot, I walk quickly. When I’m working out something, I walk a little more slowly. Yoga is also good because it forces you to slow down and just enjoy the moment.
- Color Therapy. Surrounding yourself with colors that sooth can actually encourage you to calm down and relax. Usually softer shades of blue and green are recommended, but tailoring it to your tastes can be beneficial. For example, my sanctuary is lilac, sage, and taupe, and I find it very soothing after a rough day.
- Aromatherapy. It sounds a little new age, but if you think about it, emotions are triggered by smells all the time. Think about the way you feel when you first smell that turkey at Thanksgiving or when you smell cookies fresh out of the oven. They both affect you. A scented candle or incense can affect you the same way if you pick smells you like. Scents commonly suggested to relax include vanilla, lavender, sandalwood, and ocean or rain. I commonly have a vanilla-sandalwood blend going in my room. One warning, though: If you are allergic to perfumes, try to find a candle with essential oils. Your head will thank you.
Really, reducing your stress is more about removing those things that cause you stress, but anything that relaxes you will work. For example, I’ll read, sing, or play video games if I just need to relax. I know people who craft or write code to relax. If you enjoy it and don’t perceive it as something stressful, it is beneficial.
Of course, we learned on Monday that reading, singing, and playing video games (along with all the relaxing choices I’ve made for my living space) aren’t reducing my stress level much, if at all. Recently, I was encouraged to take up kickboxing, tae-bo, or the martial arts because I need to be more aggressive. The idea is that once I’m releasing whatever it is I’m bottling up, I’ll be more able to relax.
I’m really more of a relaxing sports kind of girl, but I’m trying to figure out how to work one of these aggressive sports into my routine. If none of the above works for you, you might also consider taking up a very physical sport.
Jun
22
Recognizing Stress
Filed Under personal development | View Comments
My job is pretty stressful. I like to pretend it’s not, but sixteen months of frustrating my LMP (licensed massage practitioner) has convinced me that maybe it really is. There’s even evidence to suggest my personal life has a bit of stress to it, but I try not to think about that.
I walk to wake myself up in the mornings. I do yoga because it reminds me of ballet class. I decorated my living space in soothing colors because they’re the colors I gravitate toward naturally. I drink herbal and green teas because I love the taste. I even burn aromatherapy candles and incense because I love the smells. Right now, I have a mug of green tea sweetened with locally produced honey on my desk and a Tuscan orange tart in the wax burner because they’re part of my routine.
By all rights, I should be completely relaxed.
However, I’ve been fighting various illnesses over the last year or so. I’ve been sleeping. (For an insomniac, suddenly getting eight or nine hours of sleep is just devastating.) My LMP spent the better part of the first year I saw her trying to get my back to feel like something other than a brick wall. A few months ago, she noticed I was no longer standing straight and discovered I’d compacted part of my rib cage. (Working on stretching that has been painful, for the record.) Someone at work noticed recently that I’ve all but stopped talking about my personal projects, and I had to realize it was because I’m just not spending as much time on them as I used to.
A little bit of stress, a brief slump, is fine once in a while because the tension helps push you a little bit and the slump forces you to stop and reflect on what’s really important to you.
A lot of stress, a long slump, for an extended period of time, can be deadly. It can affect your health. It can affect your productivity.
If you’ve read this and you find yourself identifying with it, maybe you’ve got just a little bit more stress than you need right now. On Wednesday, I’ll share some of the more traditional tips for reducing stress, and then I’ll tell you how my LMP now wants me to deal with mine.
Jun
19
These days, people are concerned about their job security and with good reason. No industry is safe from it. At my current job, we’re all facing reduced hours just trying to get through this. It’s tough to do your best when you know that tomorrow you might lose your job. You can guard against downsizing by making do with what you have and by acting the role you want to move to. You can also protect yourself by becoming the person the staff can’t imagine functioning without.
Now understand, being the “go-to” person is rough in many ways. You have to keep your ears and eyes open so you know what’s going on, even if no one has told you. You have to provide timely and beneficial advice, ideas, and work results. This doesn’t mean you have to be the best at everything, but it is helpful if you can produce consistent, high-quality work. It even helps to get along well with your co-workers. You don’t have to make them your best friends, but you should at least be cordial, know their names, etc.
Of course, once you’ve become that person no one wants to make do without, be careful. If you don’t set clear boundaries, people may start taking advantage of those skills and attitudes that made you indispensable to begin with, and that only leads to burning out. Do it with the same thoughtfulness and respect, and it should be smooth sailing for you and for those you work with.
Jun
17
Fake it till you make it
Filed Under character development, lifelong learning, personal development | View Comments
Being thrust into an unfamiliar situation can be rough. You have no idea what you need to know or are expected to know, and sometimes you’re pretty sure your current skills aren’t enough.
Relax! The first step in making yourself believe you belong there is acting like you have every right to be there. A little projected confidence goes a long way toward making everyone (including you) that you belong there. You can be a complete mess on the inside, but no one will ever guess that as long as you act with confidence.
The second step is to keep up the act. It sounds crazy, but maintaining the act requires you to learn and practice the skills you’re pretending to have. Before you know it, you’re no longer acting. You’re doing.
You can even move yourself into that dream job by pretending you already have it and doing what others in that role already do. You pick up the skills and attitudes you’ll need.
With a little confidence and a lot of learning, you can turn things around and make a more successful situation for yourself.
